The House on Black Lake

by Blackwell, Anastasia

  I swirl the liquid in the glass, take a whiff, and taste the fruity wine. “Very smooth.”

  “Hand me your glass and I will fill it.”

  “If your crazy story is true, then why didn’t you contact the police when you were told a woman had been murdered on the island?”

  “Alexandra, my love, you are not eating your mussels.” André bustles around the table setting out the prepared food. “The information was confidential and second hand. And there was no body.”

  “Isn’t there a missing person?”

  “It was not publicized.”

  “I don’t mean to be disrespectful, but this cult of yours has some pretty sketchy characters as members.”

  “It is not a cult,” he replies with a flash of anger.

  “It’s too outrageous. I don’t believe Ramey Sandeley, or any of them, for that matter, would risk everything for a men’s club ritual.”

  He lights tapered candles, igniting shards of light in the prisms of the candelabrum centered on the table.

  “Perhaps you do not understand—these fraternal organizations are not social; they are ancient and sacred.”

  “Yet they must answer to the laws of society. They are not free from prosecution.”

  He brings a sizzling platter of meat to the table, along with the potatos and French bread. The smell of the boiling oil and seared meat fills the room with a rich, pungent odor.

  “I was told an anointed young man is not allowed to join the men’s club until he is twenty-five years old, although he is groomed as an apprentice from the age of puberty. Once initiated, he must pass many tests of character and ten years of training to be allowed into the private ceremonies. Another decade must pass before he can participate in the sacred rituals. The men in this revered circle are his grandfather, father, his uncles and their closest friends. They are wealthy, powerful men he has known and admired his entire life. By the time he is allowed to witness their sacred practices, he has been fully indoctrinated and has worked long and hard for the privilege of joining this esteemed group of men.”

  “Bon Appetite.” André raises his glass to mine and we drink simultaneously to the toast.

  “The defector told me at Ramey Sandeley’s initiation ceremony they could not break him. You cannot be sworn into the society until your vulnerability has been revealed and you have been broken. The group must have power over you, to trust that you will not betray the secrets handed down for generations. This is especially true of a man who is being groomed to take the leader’s role. I was told they tortured him in every way possible, beat him, covered him in insects and rodents, and locked him in a casket for half the night. They even had male prostitutes work him over. But he wouldn’t crack. So finally, at daybreak, at the end of the initiation, they told him he had failed. By not breaking, he had failed. That is when he broke, when he learned he had failed and would not be allowed admittance into the fraternity. Failure is his vulnerability, his fatal flaw. He was marked at the end of the initiation with the tattoo he wears. That is what I was told by my master. Failure is worse than death to him.”

  “If a person has never known failure, I imagine it would be terrifying.”

  “If one does not know failure, one cannot appreciate success,” André says and rises to return to the kitchen.

  “I would imagine it is Sandeley who must now take over from Schlotter.” He carries a glass dish filled with cherries to the table and ignites the mixture.

  “You mean Roger?”

  “No.”

  “Ramey?”

  “He now owns the island.”

  “How did you know that?”

  “As I told you, my master was a high-ranking officer in the club. He still has connections.”

  He takes a tub of ice cream from the freezer, and scoops in onto the cherry mixture.

  “It has been ten years since the last sacrifice. I was informed it was performed before the vote for separatism. The English won, but the margin was very tight. Undoubtedly, the group believes their sacrifice made the difference between success and failure. The winds are blowing to another ballot. English businesses are leaving Montreal and re-establishing themselves. The remaining English businessmen are losing control. French is now the national language.”

  “Eat your dessert,” he says, and sits back down at the table.

  “The island is secure and safe. Perhaps that is why Sandeley brought you to the island. In fact, he might have planned for you to be sacrificed tonight. It is a full moon and the longest day of the year, the night of the summer solstice.”

  “Your imagination fascinates me.”

  I bring my glass to the edge of my lips, return his seductive smile, and accept his lingering kiss. He follows it with a drink of wine and wipes his lips with the back of his hand.

  “He almost killed my sister.”

  “Who?”

  “Sandeley... Ramey.

  “She cut open both wrists after their affair ended. Luckily, she called my mother before going into the bathroom and slicing herself to the bone. My mother found her lying in a tub of bloody water.” He tears a piece of bread from a crusty loaf and stuffs it in his mouth.

  “I’m sorry...” I say, and reach out to stroke his heavily veined forearm. “There seem to be no end to the betrayals of Ramey Sandeley.”

  “Now that we have finished our dinner, I want to give you your present. Sit with your eyes closed. Don’t open them until I instruct you.” André bustles around the room and I hear the sound of crumpling paper.

  “Now?”

  “I’m not quite ready.”

  “I can’t wait any longer.”

  “All right. You may open your eyes.”

  An oil painting of a dark haired man and a fair woman walking hand in hand away from a house is positioned on an easel in front of me. The couple is viewed from above, as though being watched through a second-story window. The sky is clear and the limbs of the trees on the property are covered in ice. A neglected fence surrounds the grounds, with a gate opening to a pristine landscape covered in a blanket of freshly fallen snow. On the horizon, there is a shadowed opening into a heavy grove of evergreen trees.

  “Beautiful.”

  “I painted it for you.”

  “It’s the most precious gift I have ever received.”

  “An artist does not walk alone.”

  He carries the painting to the back of the room.

  “The light is better here to see the detail.” He turns the easel to catch the diffused glow from a stretched cowhide lamp. The illumination changes the mood. It now appears the couple is taking more than a leisurely stroll. There is a compelling urgency, a hint of the ominous.

  “Where are they going?”

  “Every viewer must ask that question and each response will be different.” He rotates the canvas so that it is covered in partial shadow. Now the twosome move deliberately from daylight into darkness.”

  “Art is the expression of human passion. There are many ways for art to express primal need and there are many benefits of its manifestation. But the foremost function is not to inspire, entertain, or educate. It is to monitor our society. Without art, society has no conscience, no method for reflection, revelation, or change. When it is suppressed or denied in a culture, a society becomes cruel and evil and will eventually self-destruct.

  “If you transform one human being through your perceptions, you may eventually change the evolution of the world. When you convey what is inside yourself, the subconsciousness of humanity shifts. It is true of all forms of artistic expression.”

  He pours the last drops of Bordeaux into my glass.

  “Never surrender your passions.”

  “How do I survive?”

  “Your art will inform you; if you believe in its truth.”

  “The path is not always so clear.”

  He stands up from the daybed and reaches out to take my hand. He draws me close, looks deeply into my eyes, and lets out a melan
choly sigh.

  “What’s wrong, André?”

  “I want to take you on a little adventure,” he says in a somber tone and turns away.

  “Another surprise?”

  “I will wrap the painting and put it in your car.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “The purpose of an adventure is to not know where you are headed,” André tells me and moves to a kitchen drawer where he removes butcher paper and string and begins to wrap my gift.

  CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT

  A TEST OF TRUST

  DARKNESS HAS FALLEN ON THE STORYBOOK VILLAGE AND WITH IT A solemn chill has descended.

  “The rain has stopped, but it looks like there will be another downpour before morning,” André says as we depart his cottage and cross the grounds to the car.

  “My flight leaves early tomorow morning,” I protest. “It’s already past midnight.”

  “This is our last night together. I don’t want to let you go; not yet.” He stashes the painting in the cargo section and beckons me to enter. We drive in silence down a dark country road to a parking lot adjacent to the lake bordering St. Agathe. He leads me down a steep ramp to a pier running along the lake.

  “Here is my boat,” he says, gesturing to a small motor craft. “We will go for a short ride.”

  “André, I told you I can’t swim and am afraid of deep water. Where are the life jackets?”

  “The cushion on the seat is a float. If you fall in, grab onto it and kick your way to the shore. Don’t worry, I will watch over you. I am an expert swimmer. They don’t like motors on the lake. I will keep it low,” he says and draws me down into the boat.

  “Sit next to me so I can steer the rudder and keep my hands on you. Come back, my sweet. We have the lake to ourselves tonight.” As we set out into the lake and St. Agathe Des Monts retreats the air grows colder and a swirling fog envelops us.

  “You are shaking. There is a blanket on the floor under your seat. Here, let me help you,” he says, and wraps it around my shoulders.

  “The other side of the lake is uninhabited. This is swampland.” He steers the boat across the lake to a shore with dense overgrowth, and slips inside a narrow passageway.

  “Sit on my lap and face me.” He draws me onto his lap to straddle his thighs, and peers over my shoulder to guide the motorcraft.

  “Why can’t I see where we are going? There aren’t alligators in this swamp are there?”

  “Only pythons and tarantulas.”

  “Wonderful.”

  “Duck. There’s one ahead,” he says playfully as a trailing vine grazes my head. The air inside the dank boscage stinks of rotting foliage and dead fish. I bat away the gnats and mosquitoes, wrap my arms around André’s shoulders, and scoot my hips forward to support myself firmly against his body.

  “We’re not going to get stuck in here, are we?”

  I turn back to see where this channel leads. The creeping plants and thick vegetation nearly hide a vague ingress to another lake. Through the morass, I catch a glimpse of an unfathomable sight. In a haze of smoke and fog, the charred ruins of the Victorian house on the island looms ahead.

  “This is Black Lake! This isn’t an adventure. It’s a nightmare. I insist you take me back.”

  “Stop fighting or you’ll drown us both,” André says, and grabs me by my wrists.

  His face has transformed into a mask of ruthlessness I would not have believed possible, had I not seen the vicious serpent etched into his skin.

  “Alexandra, you must return to the house to see the destruction, to view the ruins, or it will haunt you forever. If you don’t face the reality, it will remain inside you, residing in your dreams to burn forever. The skulls you found inside the shed... you must witness that the spirits have been set free, their souls released by incineration.”

  His words touch me but my fear overrides his passion.

  “The future cannot be embraced until you have faced the death of the past. You must be bold; there is said to be magic in boldness.” His dark eyes grow luminous as he tightens his grip on my wrists.

  “This is the island where my ancestors are buried; their bones still lie beneath the soil. I want to see the destruction and be assured the spirits of those held captive have found their way to the other side. I wish to say a prayer for the freed souls. Will you do that for me and for yourself?”

  “Have I a choice?”

  “Of course you have a choice.”

  “Do I?”

  “If you wish, I will go back.”

  I am silent.

  “Would you like me to turn around?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why do you fear something that is abandoned and burnt to the ground?”

  “It holds terrible memories.”

  “Why is the past something to fear?”

  “Something bad could happen again.”

  “What would that be?”

  “I only know what my instincts tell me.”

  “Memories cannot harm you unless you give them power.”

  There is a long silence as I struggle against panic and seek a sane decision.

  “If you cannot commit yourself to trust completely, then you can never be trusted.”

  “Not everyone is brave.”

  “We will go back.”

  He abruptly releases my hands and starts up the engine.

  “André, wait.”

  I rise from the hull to sit next to him on the wood plank. Choking back tears, I search for words to express my conflicted emotions. “The day we met was the most difficult day of my life. I had lost everything and was in the depths of despair. You comforted me, helped me face my fear, and most important, you helped me regain trust. If I turn back, I negate all of it.”

  The island looming in the distance is a terrifying sight. Nothing is visible other than a singed bank of trees lining the perimeter of the shore. But I realize this is a test of my resolve. I must make this pilgrimage.

  “I will visit the house on Black Lake one last time to view the burnt ruins and pay respects to the dead. I will do it for the lost souls, for you, and for myself.”

  “Boldness awakens when we trust in ourselves.”

  He draws me up on the seat next to him and wraps the blanket around my shoulders.

  “Think of it as your baptism into a new life.” He dips his hand in the lake and raises it to sprinkle water over my head. “The young natives were submerged in the lake as a part of their ritual initiation. After immersion, they gained psychic powers, were able to communicate with the dead and received spiritual guidance.”

  André steers the boat across the lake to a heavily forested area of the island, near the fire pit. He ties the boat to a tree at the edge of shore and I follow him through the charred forest. The giant oak tree stands beyond the dense overgrowth. It has lost a few branches to wayward sparks, but is largely intact.

  “It is the Holo Kaustus. It means a burnt offering solely for God,” André says as we approach what was once the majestic Victorian, now a parched heap of debris.

  He guides me across the grounds, to where the shed once stood. It has burnt to the ground and there are no remnants of the skulls or pieces of bone visible in the rubble and ash. “I pray the spirits have found peace on the other side,” he says in a reverent voice.

  “I’d like to see the trash bin where Sammy was hidden,” I say, turning away. I don’t wish to linger much longer. There is finality in destruction; but no joy.

  “This island is not a place for the living,” he says and guides me through the wreckage to the shore of the lake. He kicks aside the debris, navigating me through a dredge of muck to where a steel container, covered in soot, is encroached by a slurry of water and wet ash. Petals lost from garlands decorating the barge floats are heaped in piles and covered in slimy crud.

  And there, within, I see the floating remains of the little kitten. She looks untouched, at peace, as though asleep. I shake with sorrow for the lost life
of the innocent creature and struggle to overcome the urge to break down completely.

  “It was a miracle I found Sammy. He must be blessed. He’s had two miracles in his short lifetime.” I embrace André, seeking in him the warmth and comfort of the living.

  “You are shivering, my darling. You will catch a chill if we stay here much longer. Come, let us say a final prayer for the dead and go back to the boat.”

  “Sometimes I wonder if all of life is a façade,” I say, looking up to the empty place where I stood only days before, trembling in fear behind a murky window.

  “It depends on your perspective,” he offers as he leads me across the desolate grounds. “I could be related to this old oak. It might have absorbed someone in my family through its roots,” André says as we reach the base of the oak tree.

  “It does look a bit like you.”

  “Remember the first day we first met, when I sketched you reclining against the trunk, enmeshed in the limbs of a tree? Who would have believed one day I would place you in the same setting?”

  “Life and art are one and the same, are they not?”

  “We must be careful what we bring to life,” he says and takes my hand to lead me up to the tree. He stations my body against the trunk and lifts my arms above my head to recreate my position in the sketch. “Now I will complete the picture,” he says with a mysterious smile, as he sensuously moves his body against me, while making a necklace of kisses along my collarbone.

  “Did you say a prayer for the island, the lost souls, the freedom of the underground, and the safe passage of the spirits?” he whispers in my ear.

  “I did,” I say between shallow breaths, wanting him here, now, to wash away my misery.

  “Recite your final prayer,” he says, as he slips a hand beneath my skirt.

  “André, do you truly believe the men from the club will be here tonight?”

  I gaze into his beautiful dark eyes and search for a signal to give up and surrender.

  “I do.” His eyes flicker side to side. “I belong among them,” he says in a barely audible voice. And with this, something cruel rises up. He grabs my wrists and pins me against the massive trunk, scraping my skin against the brittle bark as he takes me with his full weight.