Winds of terror (16 page)

The door squeaked ever so slightly as Melanie stepped into Addie's room. The old lady was sleeping soimdly. She did not stir as Melanie crossed the room to the old dresser and quickly flashed the beam of light on the ornate jewelry box. Lifting the lid, a tinkling sound filled the room and she froze! The first notes of "Loma Doone." Now she remembered the jewelry box, a gift from Hartley to his bride, had been musical.

Melanie closed the lid, and did not dare make a move. Addie moaned in her sleep, stirred, turned over. At last, the room was quiet once again.

Now, she lifted the lid just a crack, quickly running her fingertips around the edges until she found the button that controlled the music. She pressed the button down with one finger, and opened the box all the way, shining the light on the ornate jewelry her aunt had collected through the years.

Finally, her heart leaping to her throat, she spotted 120

a long, slender key in the very bottom. "It has to be the right key," she thought in desperation. "I can't make another mistake!"

Releasing her finger from the button and quickly closing the lid, Melanie tiptoed across the room, closing the door behind her. She paused to take a deep breath, feeling lightheaded, and then moved quickly to the door that had not been opened in fifteen years!

Will it squeak noisily, she wondered, praying that it would not. She moved the key to the lock, but suddenly, her fingers trembled uncontrollably; she could not hold onto the key, and it went tumbling to the floor. She dropped to her knees, sobbing in exasperation, searching about frantically.

She found it! Standing up, she again took a deep breath, paused, and then willed her fingers to be steady as she inserted the key into the lock and turned it.

It clicked!

The door swung open, squeaking only slightly. The air in the room was musty, and an invisible hand seemed to reach out to close around Melanie's throat. She swayed in place. I've come too far to go back down now, she told her trembling body. I've got to go ahead .. •

Her fingers tightened around the tiny flashlight, and she began to move its faint beam around the room. It was hard to make out how dirty and dust-covered everything was, but it seemed to her that the room was not as filthy as she had expected. The thing that bothered her was the air—there was something faintly familiar about its nauseating odor, something so familiar that a new wave of fright washed over her.

A cobweb slapped her in the face as she moved forward, and she gasped. Starting from the left, she moved the beam of light across the dresser . . . across the wall ... to the big old chest where the traps were supposed to have been stored.

There it was! Her heart leaped as she made out the lines of the tray that sat beside the bed. Melanie felt her skin prickle with fresh goose bumps as she stared at Uncle Hartley's last meal. It was an ugly sight—The untouched food that had disintegrated into a thick, black powder and was covered with a layer of dust.

She moved the beam of light to the bed ... to the rumpled covers ...

Her scream filled the air. She fought to hang onto her consciousness, her sanity. Dear God, she could not have seen what the beam of light had illuminated . . . Dear God above, it could not be so!

She dropped to her knees, her hands covering her face, scream after scream filling the air! Her whole body rolled and convulsed with horror at the sight that had just met her eyes. It could not be real! But through it all, through the panic that consumed her now, she knew with agonizing awareness that, indeed, it was real!

She had seen a corpse in that bed!

Footsteps came thundering down the hall. A bell began to ring frantically. Someone was yelling from the other end of the house. Melanie was reduced to a sobbing mass of hysteria as she huddled and cringed on the floor of the room.

"What the hell is going on . . . !" Mark cried, charging into the room, a flashlight in his hand. "What are you doing in here? What happened ... ?"

He guided the light around the room and caught the hideous sight of the moldy corpse on the bed. His pained utterance, "Oh, my God," provoked more hysterical sobs from Melanie, whose eyes had followed the beam of light to the bed.

Melanie was only dimly aware of Mark's carrying her in his arms out of the room and down the hall. Addie's voice calling out: "What is it? What's going on out there? Someone answer me .. ."

Melanie was blacking out. She could feel herself losing ground, as she fought against unconsciousness. She could not let Addie see that thing. Addie must not know that she had dared to enter the locked room.

They passed Cale in the hall, pushing along as fast as he could in his wheelchair.

"What's going on, Mark?" he asked, his voice filled with apprehension.

"Get down to Addie's room and keep her in there," Mark barked at him. "Don't let her out whatever you do."

Mark took Melanie into her room and dumped her unceremoniously on the bed. He switched on the bedside light. She was moaning, turning her head from side to side. His hand cracked across her face and she fell silent and looked up at him with wide eyes, terrified now of the man leaning over her, his face a mask of anger.

"Now you listen to me," he snapped, his whole body heaving in fury. "I don't know what's going on around here, but I intend to find out. You stay here. I'm going to call Dr. Ambrose and Sheriff Dixon to get out here right away ..."

"Melanie..."

Mark turned to see Cale wheeling himself into the room.

"I told you to get to Aunt Addie," Mark cried, lunging past him. Just then, the old woman's screams fiilled the air.

"My God, she's gone in there!" he screamed.

Melanie leaped from the bed, forgetting her own fright at the sound of Addie's terrified shrieks. She followed Mark down the hall, with Cale hurrying as fast as his hands could guide the wheels of his chair. Mark got there first, and found Addie slumped on the floor beside the bed.

"Get Dr. Ambrose at once! She's had a stroke!" he called to Melanie, who stood at the door. She waited only long enough to see him lift the old woman in his arms, and then hurried past Cale to the phone.

Time seemed to stand still. No one spoke as they gathered around Addie's bed, listening to her shallow,-uneven breathing as they waited, what seemed like hours, for the doctor to arrive.

A hundred thoughts zoomed through their tormented minds, but neither Mark nor Cale nor Melanie wanted to speak. No one wanted to try to figure out what had happened. No one wanted to say what that horrible thing was lying in Bartley Beecher's bed. All that anyone could find the strength to do at that moment was to stand vigil over Addie Beecher as she hovered between life and death.

Melanie heard the car. Despite her condition, she rushed down the stairs to admit the doctor. He took the steps three at a time while Melanie hurried behind him, trying, as best she could, to tell him what had happened. Slowly, she had started to come out of her own shock, and she was trying to reason things out now.

Dr. Ambrose grabbed his stethoscope from his bag and placed it against Addie's chest.

"Is she all right? Has she had a stroke?" Mark wanted to know, and the doctor shot him an angry glance and waved at him to be quiet.

The doctor adjusted his blood-pressure-gauge, then watched and listened intently. He lifted Addie's eyelids, then rocked back on his heels a moment.

"I don't think she's had a stroke, but she's had quite a shock. I'm going to give her an injection, and we'll just have to wait and see."

Mark slipped out of the room, looking so disgruntled that Melanie thought fleetingly that he seemed disappointed that his aunt had not suffered a stroke. But it was only logical, she assumed, for him to feel like that. After all, he held no affection for the old woman. He would surely like to see her have a stroke and die before she had a chance to change her will and run him off of the plantation for good.

Dr. Ambrose instructed Melanie to stay with her aunt while he went to see what it was in the other room that had caused such a stir. He returned a few moments later, looking ill.

"As best I can tell, it must be the corpse of Bartley Beecher," he said in a harsh whisper.

Melanie nodded, feeling sick. She had already assumed that was who it was. 'That's why she wanted the room sealed. She didn't want anyone to know he was there."

*'0f course, she didn't," Dr. Ambrose snapped. "Look, has anyone called the sheriff about this?"

Melanie told him that Mark had instructed her to do so, but she had forgotten about it in all the confusion.

"Then let's not call him," the doctor said hurriedly. *This will cause quite a scandal, and poor Addie has had enough to face—"

"It's too late," Mark said as he walked into the room, looking quite smug. "The old lady is crazy, and it's time everyone knew it for a fact. You think I'm going to sit back and let her write me out of her will and kick me off this land when it's rightfully mine? Well, I'm not, Doctor. I'm going to have her declared legally insane, and I'm going to take over. What court would refuse me the right to take over and run this place after they find out the old dame's been keeping a dead body in her house for fifteen years?"

Mark laughed and looked at Melanie. "You might as well go pack, baby, because you're getting out of here first thing in the morning. My dear aunt won't be needing

you, because I'm taking her oflp to a mental institution just as soon as I get the papers processed."

He looked at Cale, who sat watching him quietly, thoughtfully. "And you, you beggar," he snorted. "You can get out, too. I don't want you around—"

"I think you're getting way ahead of yourself, Mark,** the doctor interrupted, his voice harsh, his face a mask of determination mingled with disgust. "I think the whole thing is a setup. I haven't had the time—or sufficient lighting—to examine the body, but I don't believe for one minute that Hartley Beecher's corpse has been in that room for fifteen years."

Mark's mouth fell open. "You just saw it!'*

The doctor smiled surreptitiously, as though he were enjoying Mark's obvious perplexity. "I saw a body lying in a bed, Mark," he said quietly. "I don't know who put that body there or why, but I have my doubts that it has been in that room all these years!"

"You just saw my aunt almost have a stroke because she realized the room was open and the body had been discovered, and you can stand there and say you don't know who put it there?" Mark cried indignantly, "You can say you don't think it's been there all along and that's the reason why she kept the room locked all this time?"

Addie stirred and moaned. Dr. Ambrose moved to her side, and wanting to keep her sedated, reached into his bag for a hypodermic needle to administer another injection.

"I haven't had time to examine the body or determine all the facts, Mark," he said, sternly. "I will just have to wait until the sheriff gets here, and then we'll see."

Mark, obviously distressed, hurried from the room. Melanie turned to Cale, who smiled confidently at her. She was sorry that she could not return his smile. She felt a wave of regret as she realized she no longer had any confidence in this young man, perhaps not even a trace of affection for him, either.

At that moment, Melanie did not know what to believe or whom to trust. Her world had become even more puzzling and frightening than before. All she knew for certain was that she would never, ever, forget the hideous sight of that rotting, moldering corpse, eerily illuminated by the beam of herflashlight.

She shuddered, her body swaying diiaily. 125

'

Chapter 16

Sheriff George Dixon's souped-up '50 Ford sped down the dirt road leading to Beecher House, a cloud of red dust billowing behind it. He had been called by Mark Beecher, who had stated that a corpse had just been found in one of the bedrooms of the mansion. The call had awakened the sheriff out of a sound sleep, but it hadn't taken him long to get his clothes on and jump into his patrol car. Strange things had been gomg on out at the Beecher place, ever since Todd Beecher had committed suicide. Perhaps, now it was time to get to the bottom of things.

Turning into the driveway, Sheriff Dixon glanced up and saw that most of the lights were on. It was a grand place, even if folks did think it was haunted. He wondered who had been murdered. That young girl—Melanie, he thought her name was—he hoped it wasn't she. She was a pretty thing, and local gossip said her husband had been killed in Korea.

He thought about Cale. He was crippled and wouldn't be able to ward off an attacker very easily. Was it Addie Beecher? The sheriff shook his head—not likely. He didn't know what to think, but one thing was for certain: If Todd Beecher were alive, he'd know whom to question first. That boy had been a bom troublemaker and just naturally mean. He wouldn't admit it out loud any more than the other townsfolk would, but frankly, it didn't bother him a bit when he heard that Todd had killed himself. He'd always figured the boy would wind up on the end of a rope, somehow.

The car screeched to halt in a whirlwind of red dust. 126

The sheriff got out quickly, adjusted the holster that hung below his big belly, and hurried up the steps. Mark stood in the doorway, beckoning the sheriff to follow him. The sheriff didn't have to ask questions; Mark was already filling him in as they took the steps two at a time.

"Melanie, my stepcousin, went snooping around tonight, and she unlocked the door to my uncle's room, the one that's been closed for fifteen years. His corpse is in there. Aunt Addie has been keeping it in there all this time. Maybe now folks will believe me when I say she's crazy.'' He turned towards the sheriff for confirmation, and Sheriff Dixon nodded his head in agreement.

Dr. Ambrose was waiting in the hall just outside the door to Bartley Beecher's room.

"We need light," he said to Mark, who went quickly back downstairs.

A few moments later, Mark returned with a light bulb. While Dr. Ambrose held a flashlight, he replaced the burned-out bulb in the bedside lamp, and flooded Bart-ley's room with light.