The Witching Hour

by Anne Rice

  By all reports, the house was extremely cheerful, filled with bright colors, gay wallpaper, traditional furnishings, and books. Numerous French doors opened to the garden, the pool, and the front lawn.

  The entire family seems to have thought it was the best place for Deirdre. Metairie had none of the gloom of the Garden District. Cortland assured Beatrice that Deirdre was resting, that the girl's problems had been compounded by a lot of secrecy and bad judgment on the part of Carlotta.

  "But he won't really tell me what's happening," Beatrice complained to Juliette. "He never does. What does he mean, secrecy?"

  Beatrice queried the maid by phone whenever she could. Deirdre was just fine, said the maid. The girl's color was excellent. She had even had a guest, a very nice-looking young man. The maid had only seen him for a second or two--he and Deirdre had been out in the garden--but he was a handsome, gentlemanly sort of young man.

  "Now, who could that be?" Beatrice wondered over lunch with Juliette Milton. "Not that same scoundrel who sneaked into the nuns' garden to bother her at St. Ro's!"

  "Seems to me," wrote Juliette to her London contact, "that this family does not realize this girl has a lover. I mean one lover--one very distinguished and easily recognized lover, who is seen in her company over and over. All the descriptions of this young man are the same!"

  The significant, thing about this story is that Juliette Milton had never heard any rumors about ghosts, witches, curses, or the like associated with the Mayfair family. She and Beatrice truly believed this mysterious person was a human being.

  Yet at the very same time, in the Irish Channel old people gossiped over kitchen tables about "Deirdre and the man." And by "the man," they did not mean a human being. The elderly sister of Father Lafferty knew about "the man." She tried to talk to her brother about it; but he would not confide in her. She gossiped with an elderly friend named Dave Collins about it; she gossiped with our investigator, who walked along with her on Constance Street as she made her way home from Sunday Mass.

  Miss Rosie, who worked in the sacristy, changing the altar cloths and seeing to the sacramental wine, also knew the shocking facts about those Mayfairs and "the man." "First it was Stella, then Antha, now Deirdre," she told her nephew, a college boy at Loyola who thought she was a superstitious fool.

  An old black maid who lived in the same block knew all about "that man." He was the family ghost, that's who he was, and the only ghost she ever saw in broad daylight, sitting with that girl in the back garden. That girl was going to hell when she died.

  It was at this point, in the summer of 1958, that I prepared to go to New Orleans.

  I had finished putting the entire Mayfair history into an early version of the foregoing narrative, which was substantially the same as what the reader has only just read. And I was deeply and passionately concerned about Deirdre Mayfair.

  I felt that her psychic powers, and especially her ability to see and communicate with spirits, were driving her out of her mind.

  After numerous discussions with Scott Reynolds, our new director, and several meetings with the entire council, it was decided that I should make the trip, and that I should use my own judgment as to whether Deirdre Mayfair was old enough or stable enough to be approached.

  Elaine Barrett, one of the oldest and most experienced members of the Talamasca, had died the preceding year, and I was now considered (undeservedly) the leading expert in the Talamasca on witch families. My credentials were never questioned. And indeed, those who had been most frightened by the deaths of Stuart Townsend and Arthur Langtry--and most likely to forbid my going to New Orleans--were no longer alive.

  Twenty-three

  THE FILE ON THE MAYFAIR WITCHES

  PART IX

  The Story of Deirdre Mayfair

  Revised Completely 1989

  I arrived in New Orleans in July of 1958, and immediately checked into a small, informal French Quarter hotel. I then proceeded to meet with our ablest professional investigators, and to consult some public records, and to satisfy myself upon other points.

  Over the years we had acquired the names of several people close to the Mayfair family. I attempted contact. With Richard Llewellyn I was quite successful, as has already been described, and this report alone occupied me for days.

  I also managed "to run into" a young lay teacher from St. Rose de Lima's who had known Deirdre during her months there, and more or less clarified the reasons for the expulsion. Tragically this young woman believed Deirdre to have had an affair with "an older man" and to have been a vile and deceitful girl. Other girls had known of the Mayfair emerald. It was concluded that Deirdre had stolen it from her aunt. For why else would the child have had such a valuable jewel at school?

  The more I talked with the woman the more I realized that Deirdre's aura of sensuality had made an impression on those around her. "She was so ... mature, you know. A young girl has no business really having enormous breasts like that at the age of sixteen."

  Poor Deirdre. I found myself on the verge of asking whether or not the teacher thought mutilation was appropriate in these circumstances, then terminated the interview. I went back to the hotel, drank a stiff brandy, and lectured myself on the dangers of becoming emotionally involved.

  Unfortunately I was no less emotional when I visited the Garden District the following day, and the day after that, during which time I spent hours walking through the quiet streets and observing the First Street house from all angles. After years of reading of this place and its inhabitants, I found this extremely exciting. But if ever a house exuded an atmosphere of evil, it was this house.

  Why? I asked myself.

  By this time it was extremely neglected. The violet paint had faded from the masonry. Weeds and tiny ferns grew in crevices on the parapets. Flowering vines covered the side galleries so that the ornamental ironwork was scarcely visible, and the wild cherry laurels screened the garden from view.

  Nevertheless it ought to have been romantic. Yet in the heavy summer heat, with the burnished sun shining drowsily and dustily through the trees, the place looked damp and dark and decidedly unpleasant. During the idle hours that I stood contemplating it, I noted that passersby invariably crossed the street when they approached it. And though its flagstone walk was slick with moss and cracked from the roots of the oak trees, so were other sidewalks in the area which people did not seek to avoid.

  Something evil lived in this house, lived and breathed as it were, and waited, and perhaps mourned.

  Accusing myself again, and with reason, of being overemotional, I defined my terms. This something was evil, because it was destructive. It "lived and breathed" in the sense that it influenced the environment and its presence could be felt. As for my belief that this "something" was in mourning, I needed only to remind myself that no workman had made any repairs on the place since Stella's death. Since Stella's death the decline had been steady and unbroken. Did not the thing want the house to rot even as Stella's body decayed in the grave?

  Ah, so many unanswered questions. I went to the Lafayette Cemetery and visited the Mayfair tomb. A kindly caretaker volunteered the information that there were always fresh flowers in the stone vases before the face of the crypt, though no one ever saw the person who put them there.

  "Do you think it is some old lover of Stella Mayfair's?" I asked.

  "Oh, no," said the elderly man, with a cracking laugh. "Good heavens, no. It's him, that's who it is, the Mayfair ghost. He's the one that puts those flowers there. And you want to know something? Sometimes he takes them off the altar at the chapel. You know, the chapel, down there on Prytania and Third? Father Morgan came here one afternoon just steaming. Seems he had just put out the gladiolus, and there they were in the vases before the Mayfair grave. He went by and rang the bell over there on First Street. I heard Miss Carl told him to go to hell." The man laughed and laughed at such an idea ... somebody telling a priest to go to hell.

  Renting a car, I drove down t
he river road to Riverbend and explored what was left of the plantation, and then I called our undercover society investigator, Juliette Milton, and invited her to lunch.

  She was more than happy to provide me with an introduction to Beatrice Mayfair. Beatrice agreed to meet me for lunch, accepting without the slightest question my superficial explanation that I was interested in southern history and the history of the Mayfair family.

  Beatrice Mayfair was thirty-five years old, an attractively dressed dark-haired woman with a charming blend of southern and New Orleans (Brooklyn, Boston) accent, and something of a "rebel" as far as the family was concerned.

  For three hours she talked to me nonstop at Galatoire's, pouring out all sorts of little stories about the Mayfair family, and verifying what I had already suspected, that little or nothing was known in the present time about the family's remote past. It was the most vague sort of legend, in which names were confused, and scandal had become near preposterous.

  Beatrice didn't know who built Riverbend, or when. Or even who had built First Street. She thought Julien had built it. As for stories of ghosts and legends of purses full of coins, she had believed all that when she was young, but not now. Her mother had been born at First Street (this woman, Alice Mayfair, was the second to the last daughter of Remy Mayfair; Millie Dear, or Miss Millie as she was known, was Remy's youngest child, and Beatrice's aunt) and she had said some awfully strange things about that house. But she'd left it when she was only seventeen to marry Aldrich Mayfair, a great-grandson of Maurice Mayfair, and Aldrich didn't like Beatrice's mother to talk about that house.

  "Both my parents are so secretive," said Beatrice. "I don't think my dad really remembers anything anymore. He's past eighty, and my mother just won't tell me things. I myself didn't marry a Mayfair, you know. My husband knows nothing about the family, really." (Note: Beatrice's husband died of throat cancer in the seventies.) "I don't remember Mary Beth. I was only two years old when she died. I have some pictures of myself at her feet at one of the reunions, you know, with all the other little Mayfair babies. But I remember Stella. Oh, I loved Stella. I loved her so.

  "It kills me not to be able to go up there. Years ago I stopped visiting Aunt Millie Dear. She's sweet, but she doesn't really know who I am. Every time I have to say, I'm Alice's daughter, Remy's granddaughter. She remembers for a little while and then blanks out. And Carlotta doesn't really want me there. She doesn't want anyone there. She's simply awful. She killed that house! She drove all the life out of it. I don't care what anyone else says, she's to blame."

  "Do you believe the house is haunted, that there's something evil perhaps ... "

  "Oh! Carlotta. She's evil! But you know, if it's that sort of thing you're after, well, it's too bad you couldn't have talked to Amanda Grady Mayfair. She was Cortland's wife. She's been dead for years. She believed some fantastic things! But it was interesting actually ... Well, in a way. They said that was why she left Cortland. She said Cortland knew the house was haunted. That he could see and talk to spirits. I was always shocked that a grown woman would believe things like that! But she became completely convinced of some sort of Satanic plot. I think Stella caused all that, inadvertently. I was too young then to really know. But Stella was no evil person! No voodoo queen. Stella went to bed with anybody and everybody, and if that's witchcraft, well, half the city of New Orleans ought to be burnt at the stake."

  ... And so on it went, the gossip becoming slightly more intimate and reckless as Beatrice continued to pick at her food and smoke Pall Mall cigarettes.

  "Deirdre's oversexed," she said, "that's all that's wrong with her. She's been ridiculously sheltered. No wonder she takes up with strange men. I'm relying upon Cortland to take care of Deirdre. Cortland has become the venerable elder of the family. And he is certainly the only one who can stand up to Carlotta. Now, that's a witch in my book. Carlotta. She gives me the shivers. They ought to get Deirdre away from her."

  Indeed, there was already some talk about a school in Texas, a little university where Deirdre might go in the fall. It seemed that Rhonda Mayfair, a great-granddaughter of Suzette's sister Marianne (this was an aunt of Cortland's), had married a young man in Texas who taught at this school. It was in fact a small state school for women, heavily endowed, and with many of the traditions and accoutrements of an expensive private school. The whole question was, would that awful Carlotta let Deirdre go. "Now, Carlotta. That is a witch!"

  Once more, Beatrice became quite worked up on the subject of Carlotta, her criticisms including Carlotta's style of dressing (business suits) and style of talking (businesslike), when abruptly she leaned across the table and said:

  "And you know that witch killed Irwin Dandrich, don't you?"

  Not only did I not know this, I had never heard the faintest whisper of such a thing. It had been reported to us in 1952 that Dandrich died of a heart attack in his apartment some time after four in the afternoon. It had been well-known that he had a heart condition.

  "I talked to him," Beatrice said, her manner one of great self-importance and thinly concealed drama. "I talked to him the day he died. He said Carlotta had called. Carlotta had accused him of spying on the family, and had said, 'Well, if you want to know about us, come up here to First Street. I'll tell you more than you'll ever want to hear.' I told him not to go. I said: 'She'll sue you. She'll do something terrible to you. She's out of her mind.' But he wouldn't listen to me. 'I'm going to see that house for myself,' he said. 'Nobody I know has been in it since Stella died.' I made him promise to call me as soon as he got home. Well, he never did call me. He died that very afternoon. She poisoned him. I know she did. She poisoned him. And they said it was a heart attack when they found him. She poisoned him but she gave it to him so he could go home on his own steam and die in his own bed."

  "What makes you so certain?" I asked.

  "Because it isn't the first time something like that has happened. Deirdre told Cortland there was a dead body in the attic of the house at First Street. Yes, a dead body."

  "Cortland told you this?"

  She nodded gravely. "Poor Deirdre. She tells these doctors things like that and they give her shock treatment! Cortland thinks she's seeing things!" She shook her head. "That's Cortland. He believes the house is haunted, that there are ghosts up there you can talk to! But a body in the attic? Oh, no, he won't believe in that!" She laughed softly, then became extremely serious. "But I'll bet it's true. I remember something about a young man who disappeared right before Stella died. I heard about it years later. Aunt Millie Dear said something about it to my cousin, Angela. Later on, Dandrich told me about it. The police were looking for him. Private detectives were looking. A Texan from England, Irwin said, who had actually spent the night with Stella, and then just disappeared.

  "I'll tell you who else knew about it. Amanda knew about it. Last time I saw her in New York we were rehashing the whole thing, and she said, 'And what about that man who strangely disappeared!' Of course she connected it with Cornell, you know the one who died in the hotel downtown after he called on Carlotta. I tell you, she poisons them and they go home and die afterwards. It's one of those chemicals with a delayed effect. This Texan was some sort of historian from England. Knew about our family's past--"

  Suddenly she made a connection. I was a historian from England. She laughed. "Mr. Lightner, you better watch your step!" she said. She sat back laughing softly to herself.

  "I suppose you're right. But you don't really believe all this, do you, Miss Mayfair?"

  She thought for a moment. "Well, I do and I don't." Again, she laughed. "I wouldn't put anything past Carlotta. But if the truth be known, the woman's too dull to actually poison somebody. But I thought about it! I thought about it when Irwin Dandrich died. I loved Irwin. And he did die right after he went to see Carlotta. I hope Deirdre goes to college in Texas. And if Carlotta invites you up for tea, don't go!"

  "About the ghost particularly ... " I said. (Throughout this intervi
ew, it was rarely necessary for me to complete a sentence.)

  "Oh, which one! There's the ghost of Julien--everybody's seen that ghost. I thought I saw it once. And then there's the spook that throws over people's ladders. That's a regular invisible man."

  "But isn't there one whom they call 'the man'?"

  She had never heard that expression. But I ought to talk to Cortland. That is, if Cortland would talk to me. Cortland didn't like outsiders asking him questions. Cortland lived in a family world.

  We parted ways at the corner as I helped her into her taxi. "If you do talk to Cortland," she said, "don't tell him you talked to me. He thinks I'm an awful gossip. But do ask him about that Texan. You never know what he might say."

  As soon as the cab drove away, I called Juliette Milton, our society spy.

  "Don't ever go near the house," I said. "Don't ever have anything to do personally with Carlotta Mayfair. Don't ever go to lunch again with Beatrice. We'll give you a handsome check. Simply bow out."

  "But what did I do? What did I say? Beatrice is an impossible gossip. She tells everyone those stories. I haven't repeated anything that wasn't common knowledge."

  "You've done a fine job. But there are dangers. Definite dangers. Just do as I say."

  "Oh, she told you that about Carlotta killing people. That's nonsense. Carlotta's an old stick. To hear her tell it, Carlotta went to New York and killed Deirdre's father, Sean Lacy. Now, that is sheer nonsense!"

  I repeated my warnings, or orders, for what they were worth.

  The following day I drove out to Metairie, parked my car, and took a walk in the quiet streets around Cortland's house. Except for the large oak trees and the soft velvet green of the grass, the neighborhood had nothing of the atmosphere of New Orleans. It might as well have been a rich suburb near Houston, Texas, or Oklahoma City. Very beautiful, very restful, very seemingly safe. I saw nothing of Deirdre. I hoped she was happy in this wholesome place.

  I was convinced that I must see her from afar before I attempted to speak to her. In the meantime, I tried to make direct contact with Cortland, but he did not return my calls. Finally his secretary told me he did not want to talk to me, that he had heard I'd been talking to his cousins and he wished that I would leave the family alone.