The Sense of Reckoning (27 page)

“Yes, it’s behind there.”

Ellen shifted the bundles and looked back at him questioningly.

He shone the flashlight along the baseboard. “He says there’s a hole, it will look like a mouse hole ...”

“There!” said Ellen, falling to her knees and pointing to a small opening.

“Hook your finger in there and pull up.”

Loring let out a groan. Ellen did as she was told and the panel rose. Startled, she fell over backward, but the panel’s counterweight held it in place. “I’ve looked in this room a million times before! I thought it might be here because ... you know ...”—her eyes turned toward the rafter exposed in the hole in the ceiling where the light had hung. “But I never found
that
!” She looked back at Garrick. “Now what?”

“He says there is another hole on the left,” said Garrick, playing the flashlight along the left edge. “He says use that to swing it open.”

Ellen ran her finger along the edge until she found the irregularity, then pulled the panel open.

“That’s it!” she cried. “Garrick, you found it!”

Garrick trained his flashlight on the painting. “Good heavens,” he said, his eyebrows climbing.

Chapter 40

Ann regained consciousness to a pounding in her head so violent she could barely open her eyes despite the darkness. She put her hand to her head and her fingers came away wet. She wiped them on her parka. She groped around the ceiling of the car for a light, but none of the protuberances she stabbed at resulted in illumination. She tried opening the driver’s-side door but it thumped into an obstruction, leaving a gap of only an inch or two.

She felt for her knapsack on the passenger seat but the seat was empty, although the air on her ungloved hand was cold—even colder than the already-cold air of the Maine night. Her groping eventually located the knapsack on the floor of the passenger side. She hauled it into her lap, which sent a protest of pain stabbing at her temple. She sat back while a wave of nausea passed. She fumbled her cellphone out of an outer pocket of the knapsack, painstakingly located the flashlight app, and flicked it on.

To her left, the driver’s-side window was a bizarre mosaic. On the inside was a smear of blood, startlingly red in the light. On the outside, broken twigs and orange leaves were plastered to the glass. She swept the light to the right.

There, sitting in the passenger seat, was Biden Firth.

She let out a scream, pressing herself back against the driver’s-side door. Her phone fell to the floor, the flashlight app casting an eerie LED glow into the car’s interior.
 

Biden’s visible presence was completely different from any other spirit she had sensed. When she perceived spirits as more than just lights or scents—when she sensed them in a more lifelike physical form—they usually presented an amorphous body, a somewhat clearer head, and clearly defined eyes. Biden’s body, on the other hand, was suggested only by a somewhat opaque area. His features were undifferentiated and distorted, like a robber wearing a stocking mask. His eyes were two darker spots within that mask. But what was completely clear were his hands: two almost disembodied appendages, apparently resting on his knees. The left hand rose, moving toward her, and she screamed again.

She grabbed the driver’s-door handle and banged her shoulder against it, but the car was tight up against an embankment. She turned back toward Biden, anchoring herself with her hands on the steering wheel, and Biden grabbed her right hand. Her third scream was as much from pain as from fear as the familiar jolt ran up her arm. She snatched her hand back. A blackness opened in the space where Biden’s mouth must be and that taunting laugh that had plagued her at her cabin filled the car.

Turning away from him again, she fumbled at the side of the seat, searching for the seat-back release. She hit the lever almost by accident and flopped back.
 

She tried to kick herself into the backseat, but something was holding her down. She began to thrash until she realized that her seatbelt was still fastened. Her right hand was still painfully cramped from Biden’s touch so she stabbed at the seatbelt release with her left, one of Biden’s hands floating through the air toward it, the laughter now enveloping her like a noxious miasma. Just as Biden’s hand reached hers, one of her stabs released the seatbelt and she scrambled into the backseat. Turning to lunge toward the back passenger door, she saw Biden once again in the seat next to her.

“Stop it!” she gasped.

Again the laugh enveloped her.

Was she trapped in the car with an insane spirit? Was she destined to scramble from front to back to front until ... what? Would he disappear when the sun rose? She should know these things. She looked around frantically—the banging in her head made it hard to think.

The sunroof. It would at least be harder for him to block her.

She hauled herself into the front seat again. Biden again materialized in the passenger seat. The engine was still running and she pressed and held the button to open the sunroof. She saw the spectral hand again reach for her own, but this time the pain was less and she was able to keep her hand on the button, her fingers curling into claws as the cramp intensified through the seemingly interminable seconds until the sunroof opened. Then she grabbed her knapsack and threw it out of the car and hauled herself up behind it.

She slid down the front window and scrambled off the hood, sprawling on the ground and jarring another protest from her head. She turned to face her tormentor.

In the moonlight, the car looked almost disturbingly normal—the engine purred, the headlights illuminated a swirl of fog. In the darkness, the only sign of something wrong was the slight angle at which it sat, the driver’s side tipped slightly down into the ditch next to the road. She snatched up the knapsack. As she did, she thought she caught a glimpse of two disembodied hands outside the car and moving toward her, like some sort of grasping creatures from the deep.

It was so hard to think with her head pounding and those hands reaching for her. A thought floated out of the confusion—Garrick. He would know what to do. She had been on her way to find him, so she needed to follow the road. But no—there was a shorter way. Along the tidal flats. Maybe it would be harder for Biden to follow her there.

Chapter 41

Garrick squatted next to Ellen and examined the painting. The Lady looked serenely but sadly out at them.

“It’s Daddy’s Lady! Has she been here the whole time?”

“I don’t know how long it’s been here. Where did your father get this?” asked Garrick sharply.

“He found it. I almost feel like I know her ...”

“Where did he ‘find’ it?”

Ellen scrambled to her feet but Garrick stayed down, his eyes sweeping appraisingly over the painting. By one of the Old Masters, certainly—perhaps Bronzino or even Raphael.

“It doesn’t matter where he found it. She’s going to save the hotel.”

“How?”

“I’m going to sell her.”

Garrick turned, his knees protesting, to see Ellen standing over him, a squat and oddly flimsy-looking gun pointed at him. He tried to rise, but his knees rebelled and he fell over backward, thumping into the wall inches from the painting itself. He dropped the flashlight, which rolled on the linoleum, casting crazy shadows on the walls until it came to rest near Ellen’s feet.

“Be careful, Garrick!” Ellen gasped, stepping toward the painting as if to check for damage and then leaping back to stay out of Garrick’s long reach. The object still trained on Garrick, she bent and retrieved the flashlight and shone it in Garrick’s face.
 

“What is that thing?” he said, glowering at her.

“It’s a Taser.”

His already pale face went a shade paler. His heart began a painful hammering in his chest and his hand went automatically to his neck, massaging next to his Adam’s apple. “And what do you intend to do with it?”

She lowered herself onto a box of Pine-Sol. “I’m sorry, Garrick. I need to be able to sell the painting and I need to make sure no one knows. What are you doing?”

“Carotid massage. It quiets my heart.”

“Yes, your heart problems. Even as a young man you had a weak heart.”

“It’s not weak, it’s balky,” he snapped. “You can’t sell that painting—it’s obviously stolen. It’s Italian Renaissance.”

“I have a buyer. He doesn’t mind where it came from.”

“You’ll go to jail.”

“Only if I get caught, and I’m not going to get caught. It’s all thought out.” Ellen nodded her head toward the Taser. “It will be less painful than a gun. And less ... messy.” She paused. If she was waiting for Garrick to reply, she was disappointed. “It doesn’t mean you’ll be gone, Garrick—I’m sure that your spirit will continue. And if anyone can enjoy the benefits of both worlds, it’s you. I hope that we will be able to communicate ... afterwards. Maybe you can give me a message from Daddy.”

“You are planning on Tasing me to death,” said Garrick, enunciating each word with fuming precision, “and then you’re hoping that you and I will continue to have friendly chats?”

“Well ... yes. I hope so.” Her voice sounded uncertain, but the hand holding the Taser never wavered, the red dot of its laser centered on Garrick’s chest. “We’ve always had a special relationship, haven’t we, Garrick?” Again she got no reply. “Plus, I think that in many ways you are already more of the spirit world than the material world.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, I’m a living being and if you kill me neither one of us knows what will happen to my spirit.”

“You can stay here with me. You can be part of the hotel becoming what it used to be.” Her voice was becoming dreamy.

“Ellen, I hardly think—” said Garrick, beginning to lever himself up from the floor.

Ellen pulled the trigger.

There was a popping noise accompanied by a little spray of confetti and then Garrick was on the floor, his back arched, two small darts embedded in his torso—one in his chest and one in his stomach. Ellen pulled the trigger several times and current continued to flow.
 

“Jesus, Ellen, stop it!” cried Loring.

Garrick writhed, a jagged groan escaping his lips. After half a minute of this largely silent but horrible tableau, the clicking from the cartridge ended and Garrick puddled to the floor. Ellen ejected the cartridge and drew another one from her cardigan pocket. The only sound was the labored whistle of Garrick’s breath.

Ellen pushed a strand of hair back from her face. “Garrick?” she said tentatively.

“Ellen,” Garrick croaked, “I’m not the only one who knows the painting’s here.”

“Don’t be silly, you told me you wouldn’t involve anyone else. You’re making that up.”

“I involved a fellow senser to get the information from Loring,” he wheezed out, each word an effort. He turned to Loring, who was standing in the doorway, his fists balled at his sides. “Loring, warn the person you spoke to about what Ellen’s planning to do.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Loring, his voice tight with anger.

“Who is Loring supposed to warn? Is he here with us?” asked Ellen. She looked wildly around the room. “Loring, did Daddy hide it here? And then you killed yourself in the same room? I still can’t believe you did that to me—making me find you!” She turned back to Garrick. “I don’t believe you. I don’t believe you would have involved someone else after promising me you wouldn’t.”

“You seemed so,” Garrick glared at the Taser, “desperate.” He turned to Loring again. “The person you spoke to will come back at some point—maybe with the police if I disappear.”

“Garrick, I really don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Loring. “I didn’t tell anyone where the painting was.”

“Well, someone did, and the person who has the information will come looking for me. And that person will be in danger unless warned of what’s happening.”

“Stop talking to him!” cried Ellen, and she pulled the trigger again.

Again Garrick’s body arched, and this time he couldn’t hold back a cry.
 

“God, Garrick, I’m sorry,” she quavered. “With your heart how it is, I thought it would be faster.”

“Ellen, please, Ellen, stop it,” groaned Loring. “Can’t you hear me at all?”

For another half minute the current flowed, and then Garrick’s body collapsed back on the floor.

Ellen ejected the second cartridge and loaded a third. The room was silent except for the tiny ticking of Garrick’s pocket watch. After a minute, she whispered, “Garrick, are you still there?”

There was no answer. Another minute passed. Finally, Ellen set the flashlight on the ground pointed at Garrick’s face and glanced around the room, the Taser still trained on his torso. She picked up a broom and, gingerly grasping the end, slid it across the floor into Garrick’s arm. The arm moved slightly, no more animate than a boat rocked by a wave. She withdrew the broom and watched him again for a minute. She then slid the broom across the floor again, toward his face. She thought his eyes were closed, but she couldn’t be sure—they were hidden by a strand of hair. She hoped they were closed. She pushed the broom into his face and then, not eliciting any response, withdrew it again.