Colleen pulled up beside it just where Nurse Patio and Dana had parked and got out of her car slowly. It was a cool morning. The sun had actually just begun to burn the frost off the brown grass and yellow weeds. Cumulus clouds were gathering on the western horizon. Their dark, nearly horizontal bases looked ominous. It was as though they threatened to bring back night and revive the undead. She slung her pocketbook over her shoulder, took a deep breath, and started for the house.
Other than her own footsteps over the gravel and then the flagstone walkway, there were no other sounds until she reached the steps of the porch and went up to the rickety landing. At that point she could have sworn the house moaned. The structure seemed to sway before her. She was surprised to find the door unlocked. Actually it was partly open. The jamb had cracked at the left top corner and the door itself couldn't be completely closed. She pushed it farther open and entered.
There was a short entryway, its hardwood floor buckled and warped in spots. She paused. Why shouldn't she expect one or more of the creatures she had seen the night before to be waiting for her behind one of the doorways ahead? Perhaps they didn't sleep during the day. Few people believed such evil creatures really existed, so how much was actually known about them?
She fumbled with her pocketbook and drew out the large silver cross Audra had given her. Holding it before her like a torch in the dark, she proceeded to go all the way down the entryway to the first doorway on the right, the one that opened onto the room she had peered into the previous night.
The furniture looked far more dilapidated and worn. She could see that the bottom of the couch on which Dana had been held down with the baby at her breast had fallen out. Some of the springs were visible. The chair in which the elderly-looking man had sat supervising the ritual had a long tear down the center of its back. The rug had a wide, oval-shaped hole worn near the middle, revealing the pale brown wooden floor beneath. She stood there studying the room. Had this indeed been the site of that horrifying scene?
She stepped farther into it and looked for some sign of inhabitancy, but there was nothing to indicate anyone had been there recently. She listened keenly. The breeze had picked up, and now a loosened shutter tapped gently against a window frame.
Suddenly the house was filled with many different sounds. Boards creaked, walls groaned, pipes vibrated. Something made of cloth flapped and snapped. To her it was as if the house were trying to warn her, to urge her to flee. She turned around quickly because she thought she heard footsteps, but there was no one there.
Undeterred, she left the living room and went on through the house. She looked in at what had probably been a sitting room and at a room that was most certainly the dining room. Then she went on to the kitchen, where she found the floor literally ripped up, the appliances rusted and broken. It looked to her like vandals had been through the place. Young boys often roamed through deserted houses and bungalows, scavenging, wrecking, having a good old time of it. They must have been here, she thought.
How could this have been the same house she'd looked in last night? she asked herself again. Surely there was something magical; there had to be. She peered in at what was once the pantry and saw that there was a door at the rear. When she opened it, she realized it was the entrance to the cellar, often used to store canned and jarred fruits and vegetables in houses like this.
Of course, it was much darker downstairs because the basement windows had been boarded up, and obviously there was no electricity.
But how had they lit the living room last night
? she asked herself quickly.
Were there lanterns? God, I couldn't have imagined it all. I couldn't have
. However, the contrast between what she had seen and what actually existed was so great, she was beginning to doubt herself.
She searched the kitchen, opening cabinets and looking into drawers. Finally, under the rusted-out sink, she found a kerosene lantern. There were matches there too. Encouraged by her discovery, she lit the lantern and went back to the entrance to the cellar. The light pushed the darkness back, revealing a very sturdy-looking stairway. With the lantern in one hand and her silver cross in the other, she began her descent. Behind her, all the sounds in the house seemed to become amplified. It seemed as if the wind had broken through every window and door and was now rushing about madly from room to room. She even imagined it was calling her name.
But it was too late to turn back; she had come this far, and she would see what had to be seen and do what had to be done.
Teddy had stopped running after her and had stood watching her car go on toward the long driveway that led to the old, deserted farmhouse. He caught his breath and considered his options. Of course, he would have to go after her. He didn't intend for her to rush off like that and go by herself, but now he believed that this would never end. He had to do something to stop it.
He returned to the gas station and went directly to the pay phone. For a moment he thought about calling Lieutenant Reis, just as he had suggested to Colleen, but he opted instead for a call to Harlan. At first he thought he had dialed the wrong number. The male who answered didn't sound at all like Colleen's brother. His voice was deeper and his speech slow, like someone under hypnosis.
"Harlan?"
"Yes. Who is this?"
"It's Teddy Becker."
There was a long pause, and then Harlan, in a voice that sounded more like his, responded, "What's up, Teddy?"
"I'm sorry to have to call you to tell you this," he began, "but Colleen's still on this thing."
"What thing? What are you talking about?" Harlan asked quickly.
"She thinks she saw something horrible last night up at this old farmhouse off Church Road. The driveway is the first on the right, just past Carnesi's garage. She thinks the nurse took Dana there and—"
"I know all about that," he said quickly. "Lieutenant Reis called me last night."
"Yeah, well, she still believes that's what happened."
"Is she going there now?" he asked quickly. "Instead of going to school?"
"Yes. I'm calling from the pay phone at the garage. I was supposed to go with her this morning. I thought it would convince her that nothing had happened, and that it all would come to an end, but I can see that it hasn't. Something's not right with her, Harlan. I'm only afraid that—"
"I'll be right up there," he said quickly. "Wait for me at the garage."
"Well, she's already gone without me. It's deserted now but was recently bought in a tax auction by a family named Niccolo."
"What was that name?"
"Niccolo. Colleen says—"
"Did she tell you the name?"
"No, Steve Carnesi did. Anyway, Colleen says—"
"Just wait there. I'm on my way," Harlan said, and hung up before Teddy could say any more. He held the receiver in his hand a moment, shrugged, and then cradled it.
He looked up the highway toward the old farmhouse. Maybe he should have just gone up there with her as they had planned, he thought. He didn't like just standing there waiting for Harlan.
No, he decided, he had done the right thing. What if she went bananas on him up there? He wouldn't know how to handle it. It was better that her brother would be coming too. He got into his car, leaned back in the seat, and closed his eyes. He would wait.
Colleen stopped at the foot of the basement stairway. Just as she had thought, the basement floor was hard-packed dirt. The fieldstone foundation walls were uncovered. Pipes running under the upstairs floor were exposed, as was some of the electric wiring. So much had been done after the house had been built. It was one of those old places that would always have an unfinished look.
To her left and just ahead was a wall of shelves. There were still some empty jars and some old, rusted utensils on it. To her right was the water heater and the water pump. When she turned all the way to her right, however, she confronted the main area of the basement, a large underground room that ran the length of the house. She lifted the lantern and directed the light in that direction.
Almost immediately she saw them: three narrow crates shaped like coffins. She hesitated, the lantern shaking in her hand. The illumination trembled over the floor and walls of the dark, dismal basement, making the shadows shudder. That now familiar, horrible scent of decaying animals reached her and she gasped. She fought back the urge to dry-heave, even though her stomach churned painfully, and then she went on. As she did so, the moving light changed the shape of the shadows. They looked like ghosts sliding along the walls, following her progress.
The floor of the basement was wet and soft here. Some underground spring had broken out in the far right corner. There was a great deal of clay in the ground, and that gave the earth a bloody tint. The dampened dirt floor clung to the bottom of her feet like wads of discarded chewing gum. Once again she had the sense that the house was warning her off.
She paused at the first coffin and lifted the lamp so the light would wash the darkness off the lid. Then, holding her cross and the lantern in her right hand, she slid the lid off and looked in.
Laid out in a dark black suit, his ebony hair dull and even somewhat gray was the tall man she had seen holding down Dana's right arm the night before. His face was bone-white, but there was an amber ring around his eyes. His lips, although mostly turned in, were as black as charred wood. That odor of rotting flesh was so strong, she had to hold her breath.
At least she had found him, she thought. Now all she had to do was bring Lieutenant Reis back here. She was about to leave and do just that when the tall man's eyes snapped open. For a moment she could not move. His gaze was mesmerizing. Then he smiled and revealed his long teeth.
She screamed, but before she could move, he reached up and seized her left wrist. Instead of sitting up, however, he began to pull her down into the coffin with him. She struggled, but his grip was so powerful, she felt her skin begin to tear and slide away from her flesh. It was as though he had fingers of fire.
She started to bring her right hand down, intending to drop the lantern and struggle to free herself. He looked up at the light just as she lost her grip on the cross. It struck him in the chest, and then he screamed the most shrill and chilling scream she had ever heard.
He released his grip on her wrist and waved his hands at the cross, as though he were trying to put out a small fire that had started on his chest. Indeed, smoke rose from the area on which the cross lay. She stepped back quickly and turned to flee. His continual screams reverberated throughout the basement. She had to cover her ears. After another moment, however, they ended.
She turned and looked back at the coffin. Puffs of dust rose up out of it. For a long moment she just stared in anticipation, but nothing happened. She raised the lantern and looked around the basement, but nothing moved. Content that she was safe, she went back to the coffin and peered within.
The gray-black dust continued to rise up from around the decaying skeleton, and out of the sockets of the skull oozed a green slime. The skeleton still seemed to be sizzling. She saw that the cross had burned through the tall man's rib cage and now lay on the bottom of the coffin. She covered her mouth and backed away.
But she didn't rush up the stairs and out of the house. Now it was clear to her what had to be done. She reached into her pocketbook and took out the additional crosses she had instinctively taken from Audra's bedpost that morning. Then she went to the second coffin, slid off the lid, raised the lantern, found the female who had held down Dana's left wrist during the ritual the previous night, and dropped the cross between her breasts just as her eyes opened.
The female's scream was no less shrill than the tall man's had been. However, she was able to sit up in the coffin and gaze out at Colleen, even though the cross had already burned a hole through her chest. She reached out as if to plead for help, and then crumpled into dust and bones right before Colleen's eyes. The skeleton collapsed back into the coffin. She looked in at it and saw the same gray-black dust rise around the decaying bones and the same green slime emerge from the eye sockets.
Then she went to the third coffin, found the elderly man who was supposed to have been Dr. Claret, and followed the same procedure. His scream seemed deeper. She had the sense that he was much older than the other two. He didn't pull himself up, but he extended his arms and clasped his hands together, as if there were an invisible rope dangling from the ceiling and he was trying to grasp it and pull himself up and away from his destruction. His arms crumpled and his hands fell downward. When she looked into his coffin, she found the same results she had in the other two.
She stepped back from the three coffins. At least that was over. The horrid creatures were no more. In the quiet moments that followed, the full impact and realization of what she had just done came upon her and she began to sob. Crossing her left arm over her breasts and holding the lantern out, she started for the stairs. She was nearly there when she heard her name being called and turned to look out at the darkened basement again. At first she saw no one. Then a dark shadow coming from the far left corner took shape. It was Audra.
"Audra," Colleen said as she approached her friend. Audra backed away from the light, holding her hand up in front of her face. "The light bothers you?" Colleen placed it on the dirt floor and took another step toward her.
"Yes," Audra said.
"What happened to you? What did they do? Have they kept you prisoner here? Your mother is so worried."
"Yes, I am their prisoner," Audra said.
"I've destroyed them," Colleen said proudly. "I used your crosses. They can't hurt you anymore. Come on. Let's get out of here quickly."
Audra smiled.
And Colleen saw the lengthened, sharpened teeth.
"Oh, God, no!" Colleen stepped back.