Come Near Me (36 page)

“Oh, all right, Daventry, have it your way. I
do admit to hearing her. Got a voice that could shatter the distant
stars, the old besom. However, to get back to what I was saying, if
I might? As you say, I
tempt.
It’s up to man to refuse or be
tempted. It’s called precipitance, I believe. Lovely word. You drop
yourselves—or I sometimes help drop you—into a situation, and you,
in your fear or your greed or your arrogance or your slothfulness,
whatever, act with rather undue haste to find the easiest way to
solve your problems. I’m usually that easiest way. Resist
temptation? Goodness, Daventry, you mortals cannot even resist a
second serving of cake. You
race
to offer me your profound
adoration, your most passionate and deepest allegiance. But, then,
evil is quite an easy choice. It is, as you’ve found out, only good
that is difficult. My congratulations.”

“Thank you,” Adam bit out, longing to do
murder. But he wanted to keep Edmund talking. “How exactly did you
get in here? I saw you produce the plums. You can also actually
walk through walls, something like that?”

Edmund tipped his head to one side, smiled
indulgently. “Now, really, Daventry, do you honestly feel you have
to ask that question?” He took a step away from the fireplace,
bowed to Sherry. “I’ve lost, haven’t I? Or have I? Surely there’s
bound to be something I can do for you,
slave
that I
am.”

He looked at Adam. “That really wasn’t very
nice, Daventry, you know. You read that in this book? How droll,”
he said, picking it up, looking at it. “I don’t think we need this
anymore, do we?”

As Adam watched, the book began to smolder,
then burst into flame in Edmund’s hand, disappearing a second later
as if it had never existed.

“Now that was lovely, truly it was,” Chollie
said, rising to his feet, his hands bunched into fists at his
sides, his chin jutting forward belligerently. “Would you be
wanting to show us another bowl of plums now, or can we just get
down to it?”

“Chollie,” Adam said warningly, knowing his
friend’s Irish temper was swiftly getting the best of his good
sense.

“I’ll do this my way, thank you, boyo,”
Chollie said, lifting his fists in front of him and slowly
advancing on Edmund. “Come on, you black devil, you. Going after
sweet little girls and worried husbands. Let’s see what you can do
in a fair fight. Come on, come on. Ah, the pleasure it will give me
to knock you down!”

“You keep him as a pet, don’t you?” Edmund
drawled, smiling at Adam. Then he lifted his hand, pointed a finger
at Chollie, and the Irishman was suddenly flung, backwards, into a
chair a good ten feet away from where he had been standing.

“You’ve killed him!” Sherry exclaimed,
half-rising to her feet before Adam could push her back down.
Chollie was lying sprawled in the chair, his limbs limp, his eyes
closed.

Edmund rolled his eyes. “No, I didn’t
kill
him, my dear. I really, really don’t know where I
acquired this horrible reputation. He’s merely sleeping, and will
do so as long as I’m here. When he wakes, he’ll remember very
little about me. Nothing about tonight other than that there was a
masquerade, nothing about any of what has been happening these past
months—our little game, as you call it, Daventry. In short”—he
looked at the now softly snoring Chollie—”and in long, the man is
superfluous.”

Sherry closed her eyes for a moment, tamped
down her fear, her anger. Adam had been asking the questions, and
receiving some frightening answers. Now, she decided, it was her
turn.

“When did you choose me? How?” She shot a
quick look at Adam. “Why?”

Edmund smiled, then indulged her. “I came to
meet your very unhappy mother, actually, and saw you. That’s the
when and how of it, I suppose. But why? Ah, Sherry, you were simply
too good to be true. Beautiful, innocent, depressingly honest. Oh,
and before you start begging me to release your mother or any such
drivel, let me tell you that my kingdom is not peopled with those
who wish for something as silly as a better bed partner, or those
who spit in the gutter or steal a loaf of bread.” His smile was,
for want of a better word, devilish. “We’re overcrowded as it is,
you understand.”

Sherry laced her fingers together to stop
their trembling. “But I was at Frame Cottage because of you, wasn’t
I?”

“Of course.”

“I met Adam because of you, didn’t I?”

“Adam. Always hated that name, Daventry. Do
you wonder why? But, I admit, it did amuse me to pick you, and I
picked you because of your name. I picked you, and then I placed
Sherry where you could find her. Call me frivolous if you will, but
I take my small pleasures where I find them.”

Sherry reached up her hand and Adam took it,
squeezed it. “You set the bull loose?”

“I did. My, confession
is
good for the
soul, isn’t it, if boring?”

“And the garden?” Sherry pressed, needing to
hear more, so that she could at last believe.

“Mine, too,” Edmund said, sighing. “But,
before you ask, I had nothing to do with Geoff’s accident. Or Baron
Gilesen’s, if you were about to ask that too. Well,” he added with
a smile, “perhaps I had a little to do with Gilesen’s. He annoyed
me. As for Geoff? People most often create their own consequences,
my dear, as I’m quite sure Daventry’s headstrong little brother has
learned.”

Sherry sank back into the cushions, crushed
by the weight of her new knowledge. “Then none of it was real, was
it? Adam and I—we fell in love with a dream.”

“Did you?” Edmund asked, and his smile made
her shiver. “Let’s think about that, shall we? I created the
setting. A paradise, an Eden. Then I mixed in a little temptation,
a little jealousy—that’s all it usually takes.” He looked at Adam.
“Then I stand back and watch. I usually don’t have long to wait.
You’re never happy, none of you, not even with perfection. You
always want more, more,” he said, pointing to Sherry, “or less. I
don’t understand that. That you’d want less, that you’d even
question perfection.”

Adam sat down beside Sherry, lifted her hand
to his mouth, kissed her fingers. “No, you probably can’t, Edmund.
But we do. However, let’s get back to you for a moment, all right?
You must be rather proud of yourself, yes? I mean, you knew that
Chollie and I had once been young and silly enough as to race
blindfolded—you did know that, didn’t you, as you
can
know
the past—and then you used that against me. Clever. Very
clever.”

“Don’t try to flatter me, Daventry,” Edmund
said, a thin white line appearing around his mouth. A vase on a far
table exploded into a thousand pieces, so that Sherry gave an
involuntary yelp, then buried her face against Adam’s shoulder.
“But, yes. I know the past, and I use it to my benefit. Wouldn’t
you, if you could? Isn’t that what most mortals would happily sell
their souls to do? And yet the past keeps repeating itself so very
well. Especially by those who have been given perfection, just to
be tempted by their need for more, and more. Adam and Eve. Cain and
Abel—they were a special treat. Arthur and his Guinevere. I could
go on, but I believe you understand. That’s why I continued the
game, broadened it. To have Sherry would be wonderful. To have you
both? Ah, sublime!”

“But you don’t have us, do you? Adam’s
right,” Sherry dared, rallying. “You
can’t
have us, because
we love each other, and we don’t need you or want you. We had the
paradise you gave us and nearly lost that false love, but we’re
happier now, for all that you tried to destroy that happiness.
Happier without that perfection. Our love is real now, and strong.
How we must sicken you!”

The fire flared loudly in the fireplace, the
flames burning white-hot for a moment before subsiding. This
unexpected explosion was quickly followed by another as a jumbled
mass of white feathers and heavy breathing burst into the room only
to stop, resolve itself as the person of one Lady Gytha Jasper.

“Ah-ha!” she exclaimed, ripping a bent and
broken halo from her hair and slamming it toward the floor. “I
thought so. What are you doing here, Edmund? Have you taken them?
Have they been so stupid as to hand themselves over to you?”

She looked at Adam, at Sherry. She frowned at
the figure of Chollie as the Irishman snored on in his chair. “I am
too late. I am. Oh, God help me!”

“God, my dear lady, has nothing to do with
it,” Edmund all but purred. “You’ll sit down now, please. Over
there, beside the Irishman.”

“But I—”

He held out his hands. “No, no. Don’t talk.
Sit.”

Lady Jasper shot a desperate look toward Adam
and Sherry, which Sherry did her best to ignore, even as she felt
herself succumbing to a small bout of sympathy for the woman. “But
I—” Lady J said, then her eyes shot wide as her mouth slammed shut,
reducing her to muffled mumbles. With her hands pressed to her shut
mouth, she sat down beside Chollie, her entire body trembling with
fear.

“You’re horrible,” Sherry said, even as Adam
laid a hand on her arm, obviously to warn her to silence.

“Horrible? Really?” Edmund turned to her,
walked slowly toward her... and there was Dickie. Sherry blinked,
shook her head, opened her eyes once more. And it was still Dickie
who stood where Edmund had been. Dickie. Smiling, and handsome, and
with those strange, unforgettable blue eyes.

“Dickie?” she breathed, barely able to push
the word past her numb lips.

Vaguely, just vaguely, she felt Adam touch
her arm. “Sherry? What are you talking about? It’s Edmund. See?
Look at him. It’s Edmund.”

“He can’t hear me, Sherry,” Dickie said,
holding out his arms to her. “It’s only you here, only me. You know
who I am?” He spread his arms. “This is who I am. Temptation. And
he’s wrong; Daventry is oh so very wrong. I can take souls. I can
take his soul. You don’t want that, do you?”

Sherry felt the tug, the invisible pull of
Richard Brimley. His voice. His eyes. She tried to get up, wishing
to confront him. That’s all. Just to confront him. “You’re wrong,”
she said, her voice trembling. “You can’t take him. I won’t let
you.”

She was held in her seat; strong arms held
her to her seat, making it impossible for her to rise. She fought,
frantic to be free. “Sherry! Don’t look, darling. Don’t
listen!”

Dickie’s arms were still reaching for her,
urging her on. “Come, Sherry. Come near me... come to me. I’m the
only one who can save him. I will save him, for you. If you come to
me.”

“Sherry! Sherry, stop! Damn you, Edmund! Let
her alone!”

Someone was yelling. Someone was holding
her.

But all she could see was Dickie. Dickie’s
eyes.

“Dickie?” Sherry pushed at Adam’s hands,
tried to be free of him. “Don’t hurt him. Please, I’ll do anything.
Just don’t hurt him!”

Dickie’s smile was beautiful. Angelic. So
warm, so caring, so potent “That’s it, little doll. Come to me...
come to me.”

Sherry shivered, shook her head violently.
Little doll.
How she hated that. She looked at Dickie again.
His smile wasn’t beautiful. It was mocking. He was laughing at her,
toying with her.
Little doll.
No. No, she wasn’t his little
doll.

“Oh, Adam!” she cried, as Dickie’s features
melted back into Edmund, as Edmund reached into his pocket,
casually took snuff, then turned away from her. “Oh, Adam, I almost
went to him. I almost went to him!”

She tried to clutch at Adam for his support,
but he moved away from her, jumping to his feet to confront Edmund.
“Damn you, Edmund,” he gritted out through clenched teeth. “Damn
you to—”

“Hell?” Edmund finished for him. “Not very
clever, Daventry, but then I suppose you might be feeling a bit
overset at the moment. Wasn’t that interesting? I gave her Dickie,
but she resisted. So I gave her Edmund. But it was Dickie who
proved the stronger.” His smile was rather self-deprecating. “But
not strong enough, obviously. As I said, Daventry, you seem to have
bested me. Ah, well, it was a harmless amusement.”

There was a long mumble from her left, and
Sherry looked at Lady Jasper, seeing that the woman had nearly been
able to turn her closed mouth into a smile. “You said you only
tempt, that you don’t take,” Adam said accusingly. “And yet you
just tried to take my wife. Didn’t you?”

“Well, of course I said that.” Sherry watched
as Edmund smiled, rolled his eyes. “And I lied, Daventry. I
lied.
Why on earth does that surprise you? You didn’t really
think you’d learned all my secrets from that silly book, did you?
Understand all my powers, all my motives—all my desires? I love
souls, Daventry. They’re very tasty. There, is that what you want
to hear?”

“Adam, sit down,” Sherry begged, tugging on
his coattails. “He lost; he has to leave. Let him go, Adam. For
your love of me, let him go.”

“You’re right, darling,” Adam said, reaching
down to take her hand. “He can lie all he wants, but he still has
to go now, has to play his game by our rules at last, bow to the
inevitable. And he will go. Just as Shakespeare said: ‘the prince
of darkness is a gentleman.’” He lifted his chin, gesturing to
Edmund. “Isn’t that right?”

“Ah, dear Will,” Edmund said, smiling. “The
stories I could tell you—but enough. It is time I was gone, I
suppose. I’d hoped to play a little longer, but then it will soon
be Christmas here. My least favorite holiday, you understand. And I
am rather bored. To you, I’ve been here for months, haven’t I?
That’s how it feels when one isn’t accustomed to eternity. For me,
this was a blink of the eye, less than a blink, no more than a
momentary diversion. One I’ll soon forget.” He turned on his heels,
as if to leave, then turned back once more, looking straight at
Sherry.

She lowered her gaze, afraid he might turn
into Dickie once more, tempt her once more.