The Unloved (12 page)

He shifted his gaze slightly, and he saw it again.

He closed his eyes for a moment, waiting for them to get used to the darkness, then opened them again.

And gasped, and his heart began to pound.

A hundred yards behind the house, in the cemetery, a pale white form seemed to be moving amid the tombstones.

A ghost.

His grandmother’s ghost.

But that was dumb, he told himself. There were no such things as ghosts, except in movies.

Except that it was there, as clearly visible as his grandmother had been in his dream. He couldn’t see it perfectly, for the branches of the oak tree kept swaying in the breeze, but every few seconds he could catch a glimpse of it, moving through the graveyard, circling slowly around the crypt.

His heart beat even faster, and he felt the cold knot of fear left over from the dream begin to harden in his belly.

What should he do?

Should he crawl back in bed and pull the covers up over his head? But what if the ghost had seen him, and came for him?

Julie.

Julie would know what to do.

His legs trembling, he went to the door and listened again. What if it were out there now, waiting for him?

He listened as hard as he could, but heard nothing. Carefully, doing his best to make no noise, he twisted the doorknob and pulled the door open a crack.

The hall was pitch dark, and his grandmother seemed to reach out of the blackness, trying to wrap her icy fingers around his throat.

He shrank back, panic closing in on him.

But he couldn’t stay where he was. Not anymore.

Then he knew what to do.

If he turned on all the lights in his room and opened his door wide, he’d be able to see what was in the hall.

He turned the switch on the wall, and the chandelier over the center of the room came on. He opened the door again. Though the crack was only an inch wide, it was already better. Slowly, carefully, he widened the crack, and the shaft of light widened.

He looked both ways, peering into the dark shadows beyond the light. Then, taking a deep breath, he sprinted down the hall and burst through the door to Julie’s room, hurling himself into her bed and pulling the covers up tight. Instantly, Julie sat up.

“Jeff?” she asked. Pulling the covers away from him, she glared down at him. “Jeff! What are you doing?”

Jeff swallowed the lump in his throat, and tried not to let his voice quaver. “Gh-Ghost,” he managed. “There’s a ghost in the graveyard, Julie!”

Julie stared at him. “What are you talking about?”

“I
saw
it,” Jeff insisted. “I woke up, and I knew something was wrong, and when I looked out the window, I saw it!”

“What
did you see?” Julie demanded.

“A
ghost!
It was all white, and it was just sort of floating around!”

Julie rolled her eyes. “That’s dumb. There’s no such thing as ghosts, and you know it.”

“I saw it!” Jeff insisted. “If you don’t believe me, just look!”

Suddenly Julie thought she understood. “You think you can make me get out of bed and go look out the window just so you can laugh at me? Well, you can’t, so just go back to your bed, or I’m going to call Mom and Dad.”

Jeff stayed where he was, his face set stubbornly. “I don’t care,” he said. “I know what I saw.”

Julie hesitated. Always before, the threat to call their parents had put an end to Jeff’s games. But this time he really looked scared. At last, sighing heavily but still curious, she got out of bed and went to the window.

The cemetery lay serenely in the moonlight, empty of anything but the crypt and a few headstones.

“There’s nothing there,” Julie said.

“There is too,” Jeff said, staying where he was.

“There
isn’t,”
Julie insisted. “If you don’t believe me, come look!”

There was a long silence, and finally Jeff left the bed and approached the window cautiously. Before he looked out, he slipped his hand into his older sister’s. Then, at last, he screwed up his courage and looked once more into the moonlit stillness of the night.

The graveyard was empty.

He caught his breath, his eyes flooding with tears. “But it was there,” he said. “I saw it. I know I did.”

Finally, convinced that whatever he’d seen had truly frightened him, Julie led her brother back to bed. “Well, whatever it was, it’s gone now. But if you want to, you can sleep with me tonight, all right?”

Jeff nodded solemnly, and let Julie tuck him in. A minute later she got into the other side of the bed and switched off the light.

For several minutes the room was silent. Then the hair on
the back of Jeff’s neck stood on end and he felt a shiver run down his spine.

“Boo!” Julie cried, grabbing him from behind.

Jeff shrieked, then, despite himself, began to giggle. But long after his giggling had subsided and Julie had fallen asleep, the image of what he’d seen in the graveyard stayed in his mind.

It
had
been a ghost, and it
had
been real.

And if he’d stayed in his room, it would have come for him.

“I did too see something!” Jeff flared. His jaw set stubbornly and his eyes narrowed to angry slits as he glared at his sister across the kitchen table.

But Julie only shrugged, and poured some molasses onto the stack of pancakes Ruby had just set in front of her.

“I didn’t
say
you didn’t see something,” she replied, deliberately using the exaggeratedly patient tone she knew would make Jeff even madder. “All I said was that you didn’t see a ghost. There’s no such thing as ghosts.”

“How do you know?” Jeff demanded. “Just because you say so doesn’t make it so!”

“And just because you say so, doesn’t either.”

Ruby came over with an enormous plate of food and sat down to join the children. “What you two arguin’ about so early in the morning?” she asked.

Before Jeff could say a word, Julie cut him off. “Jeff thought he saw a ghost last night. Did you ever hear anything so dumb?” But instead of nodding, as Julie had expected, Ruby turned to look at Jeff, her eyes glistening brightly.

“Down in the graveyard?” she asked. “By the crypt?”

Jeff’s eyes widened with surprise, and he nodded. “It was all white,” he breathed. “Almost like it was floating, or something.”

Once again Ruby nodded. “That would have been Miz Helena,” she said quietly. “I thought she’d turn up.” “Grandmother?” Jeff asked.

But before Ruby could reply, Julie broke out in laughter. “Oh, come on, Ruby, you’ve got to be kidding!” Ruby swung around, and when her eyes fixed on Julie,
there was a darkness in them that made the laughter die on the girl’s lips. “ ’Round here, we don’t kid ’bout things like that.”

“B-But there’s no such things as ghosts,” Julie repeated, but her voice had lost most of its conviction.

“Aren’t there?” the old woman asked. “Well, maybe where you come from there aren’t. But things ain’t the same down here. And if Jeff says he saw a ghost last night, I’d be inclined to believe him if I was you.”

Jeff, emboldened, gazed up at Ruby with awe. “Did you ever see a ghost?”

Ruby’s lips pursed for a moment, then, once more, she nodded, “I reckon I have,” she said. “Fact is, I don’t think there’s many people on this island who haven’t. Not if they’ve been here after someone dies, leastways. Happens every time. Happened when your grandfather died—I saw the specter myself.”

Julie, her breakfast forgotten, looked out the window. Though the morning sky was bright and the heat was already beginning to make the air shimmer, she realized that she was shivering as she looked down the slope toward the family graveyard. For just a moment she almost imagined she could see—
No! She shook the strange sensation off and turned back to Ruby. “I still say there isn’t any such thing as ghosts,” she insisted, but suddenly wondered whom she was trying to convince—Ruby or herself.

Ruby peered at her through placid eyes. “You can believe what you want,” she said. “It don’t make no difference. I know what I’ve seen. And if Miz Helena came back last night, it wouldn’t surprise me at all. There’s people around here say all the Devereauxes come back. Some folks say they never leave this island at all, and that some nights—when the moon’s just right—you can see all of ’em, wandering around the island.”

Jeff’s eyes were as large as saucers now. “But what do they want? What are they doing?”

Ruby shrugged elaborately. “Who knows? Maybe they just lookin’ around, seein’ to it that everything’s all right.” Her
eyes narrowed then, taking on a faraway look, and the pitch of her voice dropped. “Or maybe they want something,” she went on. “With the dead, you never know. But I know they’re here, and I know when a Devereaux dies, he always come back, at least once.”

“Wow,” Jeff breathed. “Wait’ll I tell Toby about this!”

“Tell him about what?” Kevin asked, coming in from the dining room and taking the last chair at the table.

“The ghost!” Jeff exclaimed. He was already on his feet, picking up the plate in front of him and carrying it over to the sink. “I saw Grandmother last night! Isn’t that neat?” Then, before his father could say anything, Jeff was gone, banging out the back door and skipping down the steps two at a time.

Kevin watched him go, then turned to Ruby. “Mind telling me what that was all about?”

“You heard him,” Ruby replied, pushing herself up from her chair and setting about fixing a stack of pancakes for Kevin. “Miz Helena. She come back last night, and Jeff saw her.”

Kevin’s expression tightened angrily. “For Christ’s sake, Ruby! You aren’t still scaring kids with those old stories, are you?”

Julie looked sharply at her father. “You mean you’ve heard it before?”

Kevin’s head bobbed a single time. “Not since I was Jeff’s age. She scared me half to death after my father died, telling me he’d come back and if I wasn’t good, he’d punish me.” His eyes shifted back to Ruby, and he noted her spine stiffen as she expertly flipped the pancakes. “And I won’t have you scaring Jeff like that, Ruby.”

Ruby spoke without turning around. “Didn’t look to me like he was what you could call petrified,” she muttered.

“He probably wasn’t, now,” Kevin replied. “But what about tonight? Or tomorrow night? I lost a lot of sleep over those stories when I was his age, and I’d just as soon he didn’t have to.”

“All’s I did was tell him what I know,” Ruby said stiffly as she set the plate in front of Kevin. “I don’t see as how the truth can hurt anyone.”

“But it’s not the truth,” Kevin shot back. “It’s nothing but an old wives’ tale.”

Ruby turned to stare at Kevin, her eyes boring into his. “For someone who ain’t been around here for an awful long time, you sure seem to think you know what’s goin’ on,” she said. “But let me tell you somethin’, young man,” she added in a tone Kevin hadn’t heard since he was a boy. “You don’t know nothin’! You hear me? You don’t know nothin’!” And then, back erect and head held high, she disappeared through the swinging door to the butler’s pantry. A moment later Julie and Kevin could hear her angrily banging drawers closed.

Julie giggled softly and glanced at her father out of the corner of her eye. “For a second I thought she was going to spank you.”

“For a second I did too,” Kevin agreed. Then his grin faded and his expression grew more serious. “Did Jeff really believe her?”

Julie shrugged. “Who knows? He probably did—she almost had me convinced until you came in.”

“Well, if she tells you any more stories, don’t believe her,” Kevin replied. “Ruby’s a wonderful woman, but she’s as full of superstition as everyone else around here.”

Julie started to nod, then her eyes clouded. “But what if it’s true?” she asked. “I mean, if everybody believes the same thing, there has to be a reason, doesn’t there?”

But before Kevin could answer, Anne came into the kitchen. “There’s a phone call for you,” she said. “A boy. Someone named Kerry Sanders?”

Julie flushed red, then nodded eagerly. “I met him yesterday,” she said, her voice tinged with excitement. “He said he was going to call this morning. He wanted to know if I could go to the beach with him and some other kids. Can I?”

Anne shrugged. “Why not?” When Julie was gone, she turned to Kevin. “So. Anything been going on this morning?”

Kevin shook his head. “Nothing worth talking about,” he told her. “Just the staff, telling local ghost stories to the kids.”

*      *      *

Sam Waterman prided himself on his ability to read the outcome of any meeting before he went into it. A lot of it, he knew, came simply from age—the older you got, the more you knew, and he was nearly eighty now. But there was more to it than that: he’d always had a knack for reading character, and that had always given him a little extra edge—if you knew whom you were dealing with, you knew how to approach him.

Today, however, he had no idea what he might be in for, and as he steered his car out onto the causeway to Devereaux Island, he shoved a Tums into his mouth to try to quench the ember of worry that had been burning in his belly all morning. The trouble was, he didn’t know Anne Devereaux at all, and even Kevin, whom Sam had known since the day he was born, had become an enigma.