Waiting Spirits (11 page)

“What happened next?” Lisa asked, after a moment of silence.

She could feel her grandmother stiffen beside her. “My mother sank completely into her madness. She began to hallucinate. She would imagine herself drowning as Carrie had drowned. I could hear her in her bedroom, gasping and choking and crying out for help. Then she would faint, and all would be silent for a while—until the next spell.

“Sometimes she claimed Carrie was still alive but lost. Other times she claimed Carrie was dead, and her ghost was in the bedroom with her, haunting her, and would not let her rest. Sometimes she cried out that the walls were closing in on her, green and dripping with algae.

“I was not allowed to see her very often. She wasn't eating well, and she couldn't sleep. She continued to lose weight. Her eyes grew darker and more sunken by the day.

“And yet somehow she remained beautiful. It was as if her tormented spirit was a candle burning within her failing frame and the more it consumed, the more it illuminated her. There was something ethereal about her during that time, something unbelievably lovely.” Dr. Miles stopped, groping for words. “She was like a vessel that had been filled with moonlight,” she said at last.

Lisa nodded. In some strange way she understood.

“It always frightened me when I had to go in and see her,” continued Dr. Miles. “After that first episode I never knew how she was going to react to me. She never called me Carrie again. But sometimes she was delighted to see me and would throw her arms around me, and other times she would simply cry out and ask to have me taken from the room because I reminded her of Carrie.

“Father kept Ellen McCormack on to care for me because he could not do it himself. All his attention was given to Mother. He never blamed Ellen for what happened, and he needed her help. But we had to keep Ellen's presence a secret from my mother. Sometimes when she was having a spell, she would curse Ellen for letting Carrie die. I can remember seeing Ellen then, her face white, the tears falling. It's doubtful Carrie loved Ellen as much as she loved our mother, no matter what Mother thought. But I'm certain Ellen loved Carrie every bit as much as my mother had.

“Mother took to wandering the house at night, searching for Carrie. She claimed she could hear her, that Carrie was calling her to come and rescue her.”

Again Dr. Miles tightened her grip on Lisa's hand. Lisa looked at her grandmother, whose eyes were focused on the past once more, wide and bright with remembered horror.

“She would mimic Carrie's voice. I would hear her roaming around, crying out in childish tones, `

‘Mother? Mother where are you? Come and rescue me, Mother.'

“Then she would switch to her own voice and call back, ‘I'm coming, Carrie. I'm coming for you.'”

Dr. Miles shuddered. “I would lie in bed, shaking with terror that she would come into my room and think I was Carrie. But she never did. Once she opened my door and peered in. But when she saw me lying there, she began to scream. She slammed the door, and I could hear my father come running up the stairs. They scuffled, and then I heard a little cry that let me know she had fainted.

“I think Ellen McCormack and my father grew closer than they should have in that time. He was so weary with caring for my mother, and they were both so burdened by the loss of Carrie that there was a natural sympathy between them. But Mother never knew about this; she didn't even know Ellen still worked for us.

“It was Mother's midnight wanderings that caused the final tragedy.” Dr. Miles paused. “Fire and water. Those were the things that took my family. Carrie by water; the rest by fire.”

Her hand lay limp in Lisa's, as if the telling had exhausted her.

“That last night, Mother was wandering the house, calling out first in Carrie's voice, then in her own. I was in bed, quaking in fear, as usual; afraid that my door would open and I would see her again, the person I most loved and feared in all the world.

“She was carrying a candle, I was told later, and she was too lost in madness to be careful. She stopped to stare out a window, I believe. Perhaps she thought Carrie was out in the yard waiting for her. Anyway, the candleholder was later found on a windowsill.

“The curtains caught first.” Dr. Miles's voice sank to a whisper. “The curtains caught, then her nightdress. She began to scream, which was not unusual. But there was something different in her voice this time, something that terrified me in a way I had not felt before. I jumped from my bed and threw open my door. I saw my mother standing in the hall, her clothes blazing around her, her skin blistering. Her long hair looked like some hellish halo, a crown of flame around her face.”

Dr. Miles stopped for a minute, and Lisa was not sure she would be able to go on. She was panting, her breast heaving as if she were not merely telling the story, but reliving it.

“The last thing I remember of my mother was her looking me in the eye, her own eyes glazed with madness, and crying out, ‘You let your sister die!'

“Then Father came hurtling up the stairs and knocked her down. She screamed and screamed as he tried to beat out the flames. By this time the hallway itself was on fire. I was screaming too.

“Ellen McCormack had come out of her room and was trying to help Father.

“‘Get Alice!' he cried to her. ‘Take care of Alice!'

“But the smoke overcame Ellen and she toppled down herself.

“I went and hid in my closet, as children sometimes do during a fire. I was lucky. When I woke up two days later, I found that the fire department had come in time to save the house and me. But that was all. My father, my mother, and Ellen were all dead.

“I was utterly alone.

“There was some money, fortunately. Father had established a trust fund for me in his will. A friend of the family was appointed my guardian. The house was sold, as was our home in the city. I was sent to a boarding school, and… well, you pretty much know the rest. But that's the story of this house, Lisa. And if there is any place that has a right to be haunted, I think this is it.”

She swallowed heavily. “I don't know why I brought us all back here. Maybe I thought somehow I could finally get it out of my head. You don't know how it has haunted me, Lisa; how it waits in the back of my mind, past all my science, all my walls. You can't imagine it how hur… hur—”

Suddenly the old woman began to shake. Her tears burst forth, streaming down her cheeks.

Lisa gathered her grandmother into her arms and let her cry on her shoulder, weeping for lost childhood and lost innocence, and for a mother she had never really known.

Somewhere in the distance she could hear another voice weeping, too.

Then Carrie began to scream.

Chapter Eleven
Dr. Miles Steps In

Dr. Miles bolted out of her bed. Lisa came scrambling after her, tripping on her nightgown and lurching to her feet again. They shot down the hall and burst through the door of the room that Lisa and Carrie shared.

Carrie sat upright in bed, her face distorted with terror. Her hair was soaking wet.

“Mommy!” she was screaming. “Mommy, help me!”

Lisa threw her arms around her sister. “Carrie,” she crooned. “Carrie, it's all right. It's me, Lisa.”

Carrie continued to scream, until Dr. Miles reached forward and gave her a solid slap across the face. Carrie gasped, but suddenly her eyes seemed to focus. “Gramma!” she cried, throwing herself forward and flinging her arms around her grandmother's neck. She began sobbing on the old woman's shoulder, much as Dr. Miles herself had been sobbing on Lisa's shoulder just moments before.

“It's all right, sweetheart,” whispered Dr. Miles. “We're here with you. Lisa and I are here.”

Slowly Carrie's sobs began to subside. She pulled away from her grandmother and looked at Lisa. “You
weren't
here,” she said accusingly.

“I was with Gramma,” said Lisa, swamped by guilt. “We were talking.”

Carrie rubbed her nose on her arm. “I'm sorry,” she snuffled. “I just had such an awful nightmare.”

The moonlight spilling through the window made puddles on the floor and across the bed. Carrie sat in a pool of it, drenched by the light—and by something else.

The rank smell of pond water filled Lisa's nostrils as Carrie took her hand. “I was drowning,” she whispered. “I was drowning and I couldn't breathe.” She shuddered. “The fish were poking at my eyes. I screamed for Mommy, but she didn't come. I screamed and screamed, but he wouldn't let me up.” She started to cry again.

Looking over Carrie's shoulder, Lisa caught her grandmother's eye. “What do you mean,
he
wouldn't let you up?”

Carrie shook her head. “I don't know! I was drowning. He wouldn't let me up.” Her sobbing was softer now. The tears rolled slowly down her cheeks. “It was awful. Lisa, I'm scared.”

Lisa enfolded her sister in her arms. Carrie lay against her, shivering occasionally, sniffing, and crying. After a time she was silent. Her body relaxed, and she began to sleep again.

Dr. Miles pulled a chair beside the bed and sat holding her younger granddaughter's hand.

When the dawn light came spilling over the windowsill, she was still there.

At nine o'clock that morning Alice Miles marched Lisa and Carrie out of the house and into the village to the library, where they proceeded to take out as many books on spirits, ghosts, and haunted houses as the bemused librarian would allow.

“The only way to fight something is to understand it,” pronounced Dr. Miles as she led the girls back to the house. “I spent too much time denying what was happening because it didn't fit my version of reality. My mistake, and a big one. Now I've accepted it, with humble apologies to you, Lisa. So. It's time we did something.”

“Why don't we just get out?” asked Lisa.

Dr. Miles looked as if the idea had never occurred to her. She faltered for a moment. “Is that what you want?” she asked at last.

Lisa looked at Carrie. Carrie looked at her grandmother. “Are we in danger?” she asked softly.

“I don't know. That's why we went to the library this morning.” She patted the pile of books she carried. “I'm still a novice when it comes to ghosts and hauntings. Let's find out.”

The phone was ringing when they entered the house.

Lisa rushed to pick it up.

“Whew!” said Brian. “I was just getting ready to head over and see if you were all right.” He paused. “
Are
you?”

Lisa glanced at her grandmother. “I guess so,” she said softly.

“Anything happen last night?”

“It was a little rough. They were up and at it again.”

“They?”

“Yeah. There are three that I'm sure of. Possibly four in all.”

“Lisa, are you serious?”

“Dead serious.” She grimaced. “Sorry. Bad choice of words. I got the whole story from Gramma last night. It's pretty wild. She told Carrie this morning. It really shook her up.”

“Can I come over?”

“Let me check with my grandmother.”

A moment later she picked up the phone again and said, “Gramma says come on over. We're doing ghost research and we need all hands on deck.”

Dr. Miles, Carrie, and Lisa were sitting at the kitchen table, surrounded by books when Brian arrived. He took a seat across from Dr. Miles. He didn't pick up book, however. Instead he looked at Dr. Miles and said flatly, “You've got to get out of here.”

“Young man, I don't ‘got' to do anything!”

Lisa had to give Brian credit. He was standing up to her grandmother's steely glare better than most students had ever been able to. “Then stay,” said Brian. “That's your choice. But send Lisa and Carrie someplace else, for their sakes.”

Lisa caught her breath. She could see he had scored with that shot.

Dr. Miles hesitated. “I have led a rich life,” she said at last. “It has been remarkably interesting and full of surprises. The primary reason is the fact that I have never run away from anything I didn't understand. I don't think it does any good—and I don't want to train my granddaughters to be that way.” She paused. “Now, do you want to help? Or would you rather head out?”

Brian and Dr. Miles locked eyes. Their gazes held for what seemed an eternity. Finally Brian broke the contact.

He looked hopelessly at Lisa.

Then he reached forward and took a book.

At noon Lisa left the table and began to put together some lunch—chicken sandwiches made with leftovers from the previous night's meal. The other three stayed at their seats, absorbed in their reading. Occasionally one of them would mark a page with a paper clip from the box Dr. Miles had set in the center of the table, or make a note with the pencils that Carrie had gathered for all of them.

Lisa smiled. The pile of books beside her grandmother had shifted from her left side to her right. She was moving through them at a remarkable pace. Lisa wished she could read like that. She looked fondly at Brian and Carrie. It was almost laughable. How many people would head for the library when faced with a problem like this?

“Well,” said Dr. Miles, slamming shut the fifth book she had completed that morning, “I don't think we have anything to worry about!”

Brian looked up. “Weird as it is, I think you may be right. As near as I can make out, what you've got here are a bunch of restless spirits; scary as hell if you're not used to this kind of thing—”

“And who is?” interjected Carrie.

“But not really dangerous,” continued Brian, as if he had not been interrupted.

“That's what I think, too,” said Dr. Miles. “It's classic stuff: Tragic deaths and unresolved conflicts. So they stay here in the house where they died, rather than moving on to the next world where they belong. They haven't been able to let go—”