The Vanishing (17 page)

I tossed and turned, but try as I might, sleep would not come. Even the hypnotic rhythm of the dogs’ breathing didn’t calm me the way it had the night before. I couldn’t stop thinking about Drew prowling the corridors alone. If what I suspected was true—that one of Jeremy’s victims who had set fire to my house in Chicago had indeed followed me here—then Drew might well be walking into danger because of me. I knew what he had told me to do, stay in my room behind a locked door, but my entire body was vibrating with the guilt that I had placed him, and everyone else here at Havenwood, at risk.

Maybe I could find him. I crawled out of bed, pulled my robe around me, and lit the lantern. I slipped out the door, the dogs close behind me. I hoped they knew me well enough to spring to my aid if I were threatened.

We crept down the grand staircase, the lantern casting a soft glow that bobbed from side to side as we made our way along. The house was deathly quiet. As we moved through the inky corridors, the only sound I could hear was my own breathing.

I had no intention of venturing anywhere near the library and the east salon, no intention at all. Adrian had warned me about that. But as I glanced down the hallway, I saw light coming from under the library’s closed doors. But… how could that be? We were still without power, as far as I knew.

I stood there, peering down the hall for a few moments.

“Who’s in the library, girls?” I whispered to the dogs, now sitting at my feet. “What are they doing?”

Maybe it was Drew. Or Mr. Tucker. Maybe they had found our visitor. Maybe it was the visitor himself. I decided to make my way down the hall to find out.

As soon as we reached the door, I heard rumblings from the dogs. Not growls, exactly, but yowls, almost like speech, soft and low. It was as though they were talking to one another, getting their plans straight for whatever might be coming next. I pulled open the doors, wholly unprepared for what I would find awaiting me there.

The room was ablaze with light from what seemed to be a thousand candles that had been set all around, casting their warm glow as far as the third-floor balcony, the books on the shelves illuminated so that their spines shone with color. A fire roared in the fireplace. And in an armchair in front of that fire sat Mrs. Sinclair, wearing her robe and slippers. She was staring into the flames and obviously had not heard me come into the room.

“Mrs. Sinclair?” I said. “What are you doing down here, out of bed at this hour?”

But she didn’t respond to me. She didn’t even look away from the fire. It was as though she didn’t hear me at all. Was this one of her “episodes” that Adrian had spoken of? Part of her psychosis?

I took a step toward her, intending to put a hand on her shoulder and let her know I was there, but I didn’t get the chance to do that because the dogs stood directly in my path. Molly locked eyes with me and let out a low, short growl. I understood perfectly. She was telling me not to move. I did as I was told.

Tundra and Tika were staring at Mrs. Sinclair, their heads down, their ears on high alert. Their tails, normally held high and curled, slowly dropped. At the same time, I noticed the fur on their backs bristle and stand up.

And then all three of them began to bark. Their massive chests produced a sound that might have come from a bear or a lion—a
deep, threatening, snarling, terrifying sound loud enough to shake Havenwood’s very foundations. Loud enough to wake the dead. But not Mrs. Sinclair. She didn’t turn around; she didn’t even look at us. She didn’t have any idea three 140-pound animals were barking at her.

I wanted to go over to where she was sitting—maybe she was asleep?—and shake her. She needed help getting back upstairs to her suite, obviously. Where was the omnipresent Marion? But I couldn’t move. The dogs had positioned themselves between Mrs. Sinclair and me, and there was no way I could get around them without losing an arm.

“Mrs. Sinclair!” I cried, hoping she could hear me above the din. “Amaris! It’s Julia!”

At this, she turned her head slowly toward me. She was smiling. “Julia,” she said.

“Mrs. Sinclair, what are you doing here? Can I help you back to bed?”

She turned her body toward me and gently eased herself off the couch.

At first, I didn’t realize what I was seeing. Had she spilled something on herself? Tea, maybe? But then the realization hit me like an icy wave. The front of her white robe was red. She was covered in blood. It was dripping off her and pooling on the floor.

I dropped my lantern as my hands flew to my mouth. “Oh my God, Mrs. Sinclair! You’re hurt!” I wanted to rush to her side, to help her, to stop the bleeding, but I still couldn’t move. “What’s happened?”

She took a step or two toward me, and the dogs stopped barking. Now they were growling, teeth bared. They looked like a pack of giant wolves, ready to take down a bull moose. Mrs. Sinclair didn’t seem to notice them. She seemingly had no idea her life was in danger.

“Julia,” she said again, a slight smile curling up the edges of her lips.

And that was when I realized she wasn’t hurt at all.

As the dogs snarled, standing firm between Mrs. Sinclair and me, I looked into her eyes. They were inky black, devoid of expression. Not the dancing green eyes of the woman I had come to love over the past several days. I had no idea who was in the library with me, but it wasn’t Mrs. Sinclair.

She just stood there, smiling a terrifying smile, the smile of a killer very much enjoying the moment just before it strikes its prey. The smile of someone who loves eliciting fear.

“Julia,” she said. “Juuli.”

While Tundra and Tika stood their ground, heads low, ears back, growling terrible growls at Mrs. Sinclair, Molly turned to me. In one awful moment I thought she was going to bite, but she nudged me backward, yowling in the way only sled dogs can, staring directly into my eyes. Again, I understood perfectly. She was herding me toward the door.

I backed up, one unsteady foot after another, keeping my eyes on Mrs. Sinclair all the while. When I reached the door and pulled it open, the other two dogs turned and followed us, and once they were through the door behind me, I slammed it shut.

I tore off down the pitch-black hallway—I had dropped my lantern in the library so I couldn’t see an inch in front of my face—but I could hear Molly in front of me and the other two dogs behind me. My heart was pounding and my breath was coming in short bursts. I think I was crying but I don’t quite remember because all I could think of was that terrible thing that was masquerading as Mrs. Sinclair. I was running full out down what I knew to be the hallway past the empty rooms, which would lead to the main foyer and grand staircase. I had been in this house long enough; I didn’t need to see to know where I was going.

But then, down at the other end of the hall, I saw the soft light of a lantern. It had to be Drew or Mr. Tucker.

“Hey!” I cried out, my voice shredded by the terror that was gripping me. “Help!”

“Julia?” I heard in the darkness. “Is that you?”

“Yes! Yes, it’s me and the dogs!” I ran toward the lantern’s glow and soon Adrian’s face came into view. I finally reached him and threw my arms around him, sobbing into his chest. The dogs paced around us nervously.

He pushed me back and looked me in the face. “My God, Julia. What’s happened?”

I bent at the waist, trying to catch my breath. “I’ve never been so glad to see anybody in my whole life,” I said to him.

He took hold of my arms. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

My body wouldn’t stop shaking. “Worse than that,” I managed to squeak out. I took a deep breath and held his gaze. “Adrian, there’s something in the library.”

He nodded, furrowing his brow. “Yes. We talked about this earlier.”

I shook my head. “No! No, we didn’t talk about this earlier. Adrian, whatever is in the library, it looks just like your mother.”

He squinted at me. “I don’t understand, Julia.”

I took another deep breath, trying to calm my racing heart. “Drew told me he was going to patrol Havenwood tonight,” I said, my voice still vibrating with fear. “I started feeling a little guilty about that, because if someone is here, it’s because of me. So I thought I’d try to find Drew and help. Maybe we could patrol together.”

“Okay,” Adrian said. “What happened then?”

“I was walking around, the dogs at my heels, and didn’t see anything until I got to the hallway leading to the library,” I said, turning my head to look behind me. “I saw light coming from the library doors. I went to investigate because I thought it might be Drew. It wasn’t.”

“You’re saying it was Mother?” His face went blank.

I nodded. “It looked like her, but Adrian, it wasn’t her. At first she didn’t hear us come in, but my God. The dogs were snarling and barking—”

He put a hand up. “The dogs were barking at Mother?”

“I thought they were going to tear her apart!” I told him. “They were barking and snarling and stood between me and Mrs. Sinclair. But she didn’t even hear them.”

“Didn’t hear them?”

I shook my head. “They were barking at her and she didn’t even look up. She just stared into the fireplace. That’s what I’m telling you, Adrian. It looked like her, but it wasn’t her. It wasn’t until I said, ‘It’s Julia,’ that she turned to me. And then she just kept saying my name over and over. Julia, Julia, Julia.”

His eyes grew wide. “Where is she, did you say? The library?”

I nodded.

“Can you get back up to your room by yourself?” he asked me.

“I think so.”

“Good. Take the dogs and lock your door. And for heaven’s sake, Julia, do as you’re told this time and don’t come out again until morning.”

With that, he turned to make his way down the hall.

I reached out and grabbed his arm. “Adrian!”

He looked into my eyes. “What is it?”

“She was covered in blood.”

I saw the color drain from his face. “Is she hurt?” His voice was small and very far away.

I shook my head. “She didn’t seem to be hurt.” My voice dropped to a whisper. “But, Adrian, I have the awful feeling that she hurt someone else. Where else would all of that blood have come from?”

He closed his eyes and swallowed, hard. “Julia, do as I say. Go back up to your room. Lock the door. And don’t come out again until morning. I’ll handle this.”

“No!” I protested. “I don’t know what’s in the library, but it’s not your mother. Its eyes were black, Adrian. It just kept smiling and repeating my name. I’m not going to let you do battle with whatever that is on your own. We should find Drew and Mr. Tucker
and get whatever kinds of weapons exist in this house and, I don’t know, maybe call the police and—”

But Adrian’s tentative smile stopped my words. “Please, Julia. Do as I say now.”

And then he turned and was gone, swallowed up by the gloom. As I stood there watching him until he disappeared into the darkness, my stomach seized so violently that I was afraid my dinner was about to make its way back up. The blood on Mrs. Sinclair’s robe was all I could see, my vision red with the thought of it. Whom had she—or whatever that creature was—hurt?

I tried to block out that thought, knowing that if I simply made my way upstairs, I could find my room and be safe on the other side of a locked door in very short order. But someone in this house was hurt, perhaps even dying. I couldn’t go back to my room in the face of that.

I had to find a way to get in touch with Drew and Marion and everyone else at Havenwood to make sure they were okay. But how? Go from room to room in this enormous house in the dark, without so much as a candle to light my way?

I closed my eyes and opened them again, trying to get my bearings. I was standing in the middle of the foyer—the grand staircase behind me, the maze leading to the kitchen and breakfast room on one side. Then I remembered seeing Marion produce a flashlight from a kitchen cupboard a few nights previous. If I could get there, I figured at least I would have a source of light to help me get upstairs, if I didn’t find anything else first.

“We can make it,” I said to the dogs.

We set off through the blackness, staying close to one wall so I could feel my way along.

Slowly, my eyes became accustomed to the darkness, and I began to see shapes. A chair here, a sideboard there, even outlines of the frames holding the paintings on the walls.

They are certainly quiet,
I sniffed to myself. Ever since I had
arrived at Havenwood, the paintings had shimmered with life. And now, when I needed some help, they were silent.

But then Mrs. Sinclair’s own words echoed in my head—something she had said to me days before—and a chill descended around me and held me where I stood:

Don’t be surprised to encounter the odd spirit wafting down the hallways here, Julia. Be surprised when you don’t. That means something a bit more sinister is at work.

Something more sinister. Is that what I had just seen? Were the very spirits of Havenwood afraid of whatever had Mrs. Sinclair in its thrall?

I tried to put those thoughts out of my mind and hurried toward the kitchen, pushing open its swinging doors with such force they thudded against the wall.

“Marion!” I called out, my voice shattering the silence of the house and echoing through the emptiness. “Hello! Are you here?”

I realized she was probably in her room for the night, and I had no idea where it was. Off the kitchen? Upstairs on the third floor?

No matter. With or without her, I needed a source of light. I began rummaging through the drawers, not quite remembering where Marion had found the flashlight, when my eyes fell on something standing in the middle of the countertop. A lantern! I picked it up and turned it on, and sure enough, its soft glow illuminated the room. I held it up and turned toward the door, and only then did I see her.

It was Marion, standing in the opposite doorway. Her hair wasn’t in her usual severe bun, but down and loose at her shoulders. She was wearing a white cotton nightgown, and there in the soft light of the lantern, she looked much younger somehow, her skin unlined and glowing. I jumped back, holding the lantern in front of me, its light shaking to and fro like a strobe.

“Do you need something, miss?” she said. “I heard you calling.”

I exhaled, bending over at the waist and placing one hand on
the counter for support. “Marion, you scared the life out of me,” I said to her, managing a slight chuckle.

But when I looked up at her again, she had disappeared. Nobody was in the opposite doorway. That door was closed tight.

“Marion?” I whispered, knowing full well nobody was going to respond.

“Oka-a-a-y,” I said aloud. “I’m done.” All thoughts of finding others to warn them about what I had seen in the library vanished. The only thing I wanted was to be back upstairs in the safety of my room. I should have known better than to creep through the halls of Havenwood at night, especially that night. What was I thinking? I should have listened to Drew and Adrian when they told me to stay behind my own locked door.

I hurried through the maze of rooms and up the grand staircase holding the lantern in front of me, the dogs behind me, hoping nothing was lurking in the darkness. When I reached my hallway, I saw light coming from under the door of my room, and first the dogs, then I, took off at a run toward the sanctuary I imagined it would provide. I fumbled with the knob and slipped inside the door, closing and locking it behind me.

I watched as the dogs made for their water dishes right away—I supposed all of that barking and growling had left them thirsty. After drinking their fill, they did a few circles near my fireplace and slumped to the ground with a thud, tails curled around their noses. I wondered how they felt about seeing Mrs. Sinclair—their mistress—like that, defending me from her. They weren’t my dogs, after all; they were hers.

I took a long sip of brandy before draping my robe over a chair and curling down under the covers. The fire in the fireplace was still crackling, and I stacked my pillows behind me so I could watch the flames. The wind seemed to be picking up outside, rushing around the exterior corners of the house, whooshing and whooping like a banshee.

Every time I closed my eyes, Mrs. Sinclair’s ghoulish face floated through my field of vision. Adrian had said whatever I saw in the library was part of the story he had begun to tell me earlier in the evening. Was it somehow related to the reason why she had stopped writing and ended up in that mental institution? Did she kill someone? Or was it more than that? If it truly was Mrs. Sinclair in the library earlier, she seemed—I hesitated to even formulate the word—“possessed” by something dark and horrible and monstrous. When I looked into the face of whatever it was in the library, I did not see the Mrs. Sinclair that I knew. It was as if the eccentric, sweet-natured lady had vanished and something dark and menacing had taken her place.

The whole evening was like something out of my worst nightmares. Was that what I had chosen by coming to Havenwood? To live in a nightmare?