When he spoke, it was almost in sadness. “I don’t know what to say, Pamela.”
Say you believe me, she willed as she deftly closed the last gap and stepped hesitantly around the screen. But he wouldn’t. She could see it in his face, in the way his great head cocked toward her, like a man to a willfully lying child pretending great innocence.
“You don’t like her anymore, I know that.”
“Father — ”
He held up a hand: Hush while I’m talking.
“I can understand that because Saundra is not the same woman who left Oxrun Station three years ago. She’s grown. She’s seen the world. She’s met new people and learned new things. She’s worldly and much more wise than the girl we used to know. Our correspondence over the past six months — ”
“ — six months?”
“ — has proved that to me beyond a doubt.” He was sitting on the edge of her bed, his left hand pulling absently at a string loose in the quilting. “And I had hoped you two would still be friends when she returned.”
She crossed to the vanity and sat on the velvet-tufted stool. A brush, pearl-backed and silver, worked its way briskly through her hair. “We were,” she said. “At least I thought so.”
“Well, you obviously aren’t now, and this little story of yours proves it.” His head shook slowly. “Do you not want me to marry again so much?”
“Father, that isn’t it,” she said earnestly. “It isn’t. You know I want nothing more that your happiness.”
“Then — ”
She turned and held the brush like a shield in front of her chest. “But not with her, Father. My god, you’ve got to believe me!”
He stood clumsily and almost staggered toward the door. “My darling, there is nothing in this world I wouldn’t do for you. But what you’re asking now is too much. It’s really too much.”
Tears of frustration welled in her eyes. “What do I have to do to prove it to you?”
“Nothing,” he said, finally letting bitterness creep into his tone. “Nothing, because there is nothing to prove.” He paused at the threshold. “The first guests should be here in an hour. I would hope you’d have the civility to come down and greet them.”
The door closed softly.
Pamela flung the brush at it and let the tears fall.
“Well, I don’t give a damn what you say, Mr. High-and-Mighty Timmons,” Amy said crossly. “I saw what I said I saw, and that there back door was open. And it weren’t open when I went down there.”
Timmons held back an acid retort, remembered instead she would want more stray bits of silver and such now that her husband was gone; and if he wanted to keep the same payments it wouldn’t do to have her annoyed. So he smiled tolerantly, patted her shoulder and left the kitchen to the bellowing cook. A moment later he was at the cellar door, suspiciously peering down at the shadows.
There was someone there. He could hear someone moving despite the noise upstairs.
He was only at the third step when Saundra Chambers appeared at the bottom, a dusty wine bottle held carefully in one hand. She smiled at him as she climbed upward, the midnight blue gown offsetting her pale shoulders, the rise of her breasts not veiled by lace. He swallowed his initial fear and backed away as she neared him, nodded as she passed with a shadow-brief smile, and when she had turned into the kitchen he looked around and rushed down.
The door was closed, the lock in its place.
His puzzlement put a frown on his brow, but he thought little of it. Not until he reached the hall again and saw Miss Chambers enter the dining room. Without really knowing why, he followed quietly, watched as she examined the place-settings, picking up the silver plates, nodding and replacing them exactly as they’d been. As if she owned the place, he thought sourly. And he decided it was his job to caution her about disturbing what had taken so long to prepare.
He hurried up to her then, just as she held another plate to her face.
Timmons gasped — as he looked over her shoulder he could see his dark features distorted in the high polish. Saundra Chambers, however, cast no reflection at all. He backed away as she turned and stopped when her lips parted in a smile.
“Well, Mr. Timmons, checking up on the guests?”
“No, Miss,” he said, barely avoiding a stammer.
“Then please don’t hover. It’s annoying.”
She walked past him to the doorway, turned and smiled again. “Besides,” she said, “no one will believe you. I know you’ve tried and they didn’t believe you then. Be brave, Mr. Timmons. If you keep quiet, you’ve nothing to fear.”
Timmons felt his bowels loosening, his heart begin to pound. Sweat broke on his pale palms, and a trickle of ice snaked down his spine.
If he knew nothing else, he knew she was lying.
But he had not taken more than a dozen steps into the hall when the door suddenly slammed open and Ned Stockton burst in. His hair was wild, his coat undone, and under his left arm an awkward bundle of something wrapped loosely in burlap.
“Timmons!” he snapped as he swept the hall and rooms with a gaze that seemed panicked, “has Miss Pamela returned?”
“Yes sir,” he said, his voice trembling.
Ned looked at him curiously. “Is she all right?”
“Yes sir.”
Ned started for the stairs, paused and looked back. “Timmons, you were right, you know. God, you were right. “
“Yes sir, I know that.” And he started to say something else when Saundra Chambers appeared on the landing.
Stockton saw the butler’s startled expression and looked up. The moment froze, was broken only when Squires came down the righthand steps.
“What the hell … ?” he demanded, and yelled wordlessly when Saundra suddenly broke into a run that shoved him against the bannister. Ned instantly took after her, the bundle slapping at his waist, and as he reached Squires’ sprawling form, the man grabbed his arm.
“Just a minute, sir!” he bellowed.
“No time,” Ned said desperately. But when he yanked his arm free, the bundle slipped from his grasp. The burlap unwound, and stakes and hammer clattered down the stairs.
“God!” Squires said, gaping at the weapons. “My god, you are mad!”
And before Ned could move, Squires had grabbed one of the stakes and was pounding him fiercely with its side.
Several blows struck his coat, and he groaned as he heard the sound of glass breaking. Foolishly, he looked down to see dark stains spreading over the cloth. And in that moment Squires lay the stake hard against his temple. He staggered and fell back, unable to fight the darkness gathering behind his eyes. And the last thing he saw, then, before the dark came, was the chandelier beneath the glass dome.
It was lighted. And it was swaying.
17
The black was edged with redfire flames feeding on human skulls, multiplying and spreading; there were greenfire spirals whirling slowly through the dark; there were suns and there were comets, and there was pressure barely felt, a pressure that grew as the coldfire, redfire, greenfire faded, the black shaded to grey, and the grey to a face that bent anxiously over him.
“Ned? Ned, are you all right?”
He tried to sit up, but the fire returned and he moaned, fell back and realized he was lying on somebody’s bed. Pamela’s bed. He looked without turning his head, and closed his eyes against the light.
“Ned, darling, I know what happened. What are we going to do now?”
“Brastov,” he said, chilled that he sounded so much like Webber before his dying. “And Saundra.”
He reached a quivering hand to his head and felt a thick bandage wrapped around it. There was blood over the right temple. There was a damp, cold cloth lying atop it. When he opened his eyes again, Timmons was there as well, a pewter bowl of water cupped in his palms. The butler nodded, and Ned unthinkingly nodded back. The agony returned, and he groaned.
“You must lie still,” Pamela ordered softly.
“I can’t. There’s too much to do. All those people, they’ll be here any minute.” But his urgency was incapable of surmounting the throbbing in his head, and Pamela hushed him, stroked his brow lightly and pleaded with Timmons to think of something. Now. The butler, however, was too afraid to do more than minister to Stockton and she ground her teeth in exasperation until she spotted the bundle of stakes lying on the floor. Ned’s coat was beside it, hastily thrown over a chair. Quickly she rose and hurried to it, fumbled through the pockets until she found a single unbroken vial. She held it in her hand and looked to Ned, who had lost consciousness again. Then with a silent admonition to Timmons to keep the man there, she slipped soundlessly out of her room and headed for the stairs.
Her father was below, shouting still at the top of his voice and terrifying the servants.
She blocked out the noise as she climbed, one hand on the bannister, the other gripping the vial. She had no idea what to do with it, but there was no time left to think of a plan. She had to confront Saundra before the house filled, confront her and find out where Brastov was hiding.
She knocked on the door.
There was no answer.
She knocked again. “Saundra? Saundra, it’s me, Pam. I … I want to apologize for what I said last night. It was foolish of me, I know that. I would dearly like to make it up to you. Saundra?” She knocked. “Saundra?”
She tried the glass knob.
The door swung open.
Saundra was standing by the windows, idly brushing her hair. “There’s no need for pretense, my dear,” she said as Pamela entered and closed the door silently behind her. “We both know, don’t we.”
Pamela covered her mouth with one hand, to stop a sob from escaping. “Why?” she asked. “Why?”
Saundra turned, as beautiful and cold as the night framed behind her. “Gregor? Because he loves me, my dear. Because he can give me anything I want.”
“Love?” Pamela scoffed. “What does something like that know about love?”
“Enough,” she said, taking a step forward. And when she smiled, Pamela saw the vampire’s fangs gleaming. “More than enough.” An abrupt hesitation. “You shouldn’t have come here, Pam. You shouldn’t have, you know. In less than two hours it will all be over.” Pamela glanced around the room, trying to think, trying to stall so that Ned could regain his strength and help her. “Rick,” she said suddenly. “Where is Rick?”
Saundra’s lips pursed. “Rick?” she said musingly. “Rick. Ah! You mean that little man who works with your lover?” She walked across the room, backing Pamela away, and stopped in front of a closet. “He thought he knew, too.” she said. “He didn’t know enough.” She yanked opened the door and Pamela screamed.
Rick Driscoll’s body fell out, face down, the skull landing on the carpet with a sickening thud.
“You see,” Saundra told her, “if you drink it all at once, there’s no hope of return. A pity. We might have used him.”
Pamela refused to look at the ghastly white, bloodless corpse. Instead, her left hand buried in the folds of her dress worked to unstopper the vial she held there. “Ned got the others, you know,” she said bravely, her chin up, not quite quivering. “Pierson and the others, he got them.”
Saundra only nodded. “So I would gather. But while that’s unpleasant, Pam, that’s not the end. There’s another, you know.”
It took her a moment before she said, “Horace. Lord, I forgot about Horace.” Saundra shrugged. “If you say so.” Then she looked toward the clock on the mantel. “But now I must go, darling. There are guests to greet, and your father to keep happy. “
Pamela growled low in her throat and pulled out the vial, the stopper falling to the floor. Saundra glanced at it idly, did not stop walking.
“No,” Pamela said, moving quickly to stand in front of the door. “No, you’re not leaving here.”
“Please, Pam, don’t make this difficult. Your time will come.”
“Not if I can help it.”
“Pamela, you’re being silly. There is no stopping the inevitable and you know that as well as I do. Just step aside, dear, and I’ll be sure that Gregor treats you well.” Another smile, and the teeth, and the breath of the dead. “I think it would be fun to be together, forever, don’t you? Yes, I think it would be great fun indeed.”
Pamela shook her head rapidly, fear trapping her words in her throat.
Saundra glared. “All right, if you insist.” She drew herself up. “Do you like wolves, Pamela? Do you like wolves?”
Pamela stared as the woman’s form began to shimmer and her face slowly mingled with the face of a black wolf. She wanted to cry out, she wanted to scream, but nothing she thought of could stop the transformation — until she remembered the vial in her hand.
Suddenly, with a shouted “Damn you!” her arm snapped up and the water flew across the space between them. The vial dropped to the floor, and shattered while she watched, horrified, at the results.
Saundra shrieked as the liquid splashed into her face. Her hands snapped up to rub at the fire there, pulling away great strips of burning, melting flesh. Bone poked through her cheeks. Her eyes widened as her hair caught fire. The dress smoldered and burst into flame. She shrieked again and staggered backward, hands flailing now as the blessed water shredded her lips. A foot caught the leg of a chair and she was tossed backward, her hips slamming against the window sill. Her arms shot up one more time, high out of the flames, fists damning heaven as she catapulted through the pane. Silently. Slowly.
Pamela raced to the window and leaned out, just in time to see Saundra crash through the greenhouse roof and land on a pedestal that once held winter roses. The force of the fall slammed the marble into Saundra’s back, trapping her, impaling her as the fire did its work, the flames gouting up once before subsiding and dying.
“Oh my god,” Pamela whispered, “Oh my god.”
“I think, my child, it’s a little late for that.” And when she turned, Gregor Brastov stepped into the room.
Ned groaned and rolled painfully into a sitting position. When Timmons attempted to push him back again, he thrust the hand away and sat on the edge of the mattress, holding his head and waiting for the dizziness to pass, the pain to subside.
“Where is Pamela?” he demanded when he realized they were alone.
Timmons told him.
“Idiot!” he said, staggering to his feet. “Idiot, you shouldn’t have let her go.” He did not wait for an excuse, however. He swayed, put a hand to his temple and waited for balance. Then he reached down and grabbed a stake and the hammer from the pile on the floor, stumbled to the door and flung it open. The house was silent except for the wind, and with a swallow of bile that had jumped to his mouth he moved cautiously to the stairwell, looked up, looked down. Grandon Squires was striding across the hall, and Ned called to him as he hurried as fast as he dared.
“I have sent for the police,” Squires told him when he reached the open landing. Then he looked disdainfully at the stake, at the hammer, and at Ned’s bandaged head. “You will be taken care of.”
“Mr. Squires, you don’t understand!”
“I understand perfectly well, Stockton. And you can be sure your father will be looking for a new position as well. I will not tolerate such — ”
The crash interrupted him, and they both stared as Timmons bolted past him and raced for the back.
“Damn you, Stockton,” Squires said as he advanced toward the staircase, “if this is more of your doing — ”
He choked into silence and lifted a hand to point while a stunned amazement crossed his face. Fearfully, not wanting to move, Ned looked over his shoulder. Count Brastov was coming down behind him, holding Pamela before him with a rigid arm across her throat. He was too numb to move, too suddenly filled with despair when they passed him, Pamela’s eyes wide with pleading.
“You may drop that thing now,” Brastov told him with a look to the hammer.
The
stake fell from his grip, and the hammer clattered down the steps to land at Brastov’s feet.
“Now back away, little man.” When Ned did not, could not move, the Count’s eyes flared. “Back away!”
Despite himself, Ned felt his legs taking him back up the stairs to a point halfway to the second floor. Pain welled in his head and he reached out blindly, grabbed the chandelier’s chain and hung on as Brastov turned to Squires, who was frozen to the spot.
“I do not believe we have been formally introduced,” the Count said with a feral grin. “As you can see, however, I do know your daughter.”
Squires looked desperately to Ned, then back to Pamela who was limp but still conscious in the vampire’s unrelenting grasp.
“As a matter of fact,” Brastov continued, “I shall know your daughter even better before this night is over. Much, much better.”
Ned closed his eyes tightly and fought with the pain, ordering it, willing it to fade just enough to give him strength, just enough to let him think.
Timmons appeared, then, running around the staircase to stand beside Squires. “Sir,” he said, “It’s Miss Chambers.”
“Ah yes,” Brastov said. “She did well … for what she had to do. A little greedy, perhaps, but she did permit me to enter this fine house. My house, Mr. Squires, soon enough as you’ll see.”
Squires gulped for air, for words, and the only thing he could say was, “My … my guests … ”
“But of course,” Brastov told him. “I haven’t forgotten your guests at all. We shall have them in, won’t we. Just as you wanted, and just as I planned. We shall have them in. All of them. Now, sir — ” But further instructions were cut off when Pamela tried to bite down on his wrist. He laughed and slapped her hard with his free hand. And when Grandon made to leap for the stairs, he tightened his grip and glared. “Heroics,” he said quietly, “are for dead men, sir. I shouldn’t do that if I were you. Nor,” he said more loudly when Timmons tried to slip away, “would I try that either. No, we will wait here for the first guest, I think.”
The Universe of Horror Volume 1: The Soft Whisper of the Dead (Neccon Classic Horror) Page 12
