"It seems to be. Maybe you should investigate."
"Maybe." The corporal's shrug conveyed total indifference. "But we are short-handed here, as you have seen. I seem to remember we wrote to the immigration people, telling them of our suspicions concerning the man's papers, and they haven't replied yet. Of course; if they ask us to go to Legrun and bring him out, we will do so. Or try to."
Leaving the police post, Sam had a chance for the first time in hours to talk to Kay alone. Mildred had lingered to sign some papers concerning her father's jeep, and to use the bathroom. "When am I going to see you again?" he asked, reaching for Kay's hand as he walked with her across the station yard. She and Tina would be returning to the hospital now in her jeep while Mildred and he drove on to the capital.
She turned her head to study his face. "Do you want to see me again, Sam?"
"You know I do."
"It's been a long time. You didn't write. You didn't phone …"
"Pal, we've been over that before. How could I, after what happened?"
She was silent for a moment, then nodded. "All right. There were better times than our last one. What are your plans now?"
"I agree with Mildred that her father must be in the capital. We'll be trying to find him."
"And I'll be taking Tina there to her uncle. It will mean an overnight for me, at least."
"The Calman?"
"Will you be there?"
He nodded.
"Then I'll go there, too. Let's leave it at that for now, Sam."
He took the keys from her hand and started the jeep for her, to be sure it felt and sounded right. Then he lifted Tina in, pressing his face to the child's while she had her arms around his neck. After watching Kay slide in behind the wheel, he leaned forward to try a kiss he was not sure would be welcomed.
Surprisingly, it was. But then, as if angry with herself, she ground the vehicle into gear and drove off so fast that he barely had time to step back out of the way.
34
The book-lined study of the house in Turgeau.
Dr. Bell sits facing his host,
gazing at the man
the way Margal taught him to.
"Why?"
"But I have told you why, Dr. Molicoeur.
Is it so very hard for you to understand
that Margal wishes revenge
for the loss of his legs?"
"But why are you so involved?"
"Because I went to Legrun
to talk to him.
And because a young neo-Nazi
all the way from Schleswig-Holstein
had arrived there before me,
begging to be taught the powers
that might make him another Hitler.
But he offended Margal with his arrogance
and mysteriously became something else."
"Leaving Margal with an idea, I presume."
"Leaving Margal with something
that became an idea,
then a vast ambition
when I turned up in the Nazi's footsteps.
‘You wish to learn from me, Dr. Bell?' he asked.
'Whatever you can teach me,' I replied.
But the pupil became the servant,
though without quite dying first as the Nazi did.
Now I serve Margal
but am your master, my friend."
"Dr. Bell, I do not wish to murder my president!"
"But you will."
In the privacy of the study.
The door is locked.
Dr. Bell lifts from his pocket a small glass bottle full of
colorless liquid.
"Margal called this 'the three deadly drops.'
You talk with the president frequently."
"I do."
"Then in due course I will give you this
and you will know what to do with it.
But first you must make preparations.
You will form a government with yourself at its head.
You can do this.
You have important friends."
"Why must I form a government?"
"Because Margal wishes you, Dr. Molicoeur,
to succeed the man you will kill.
At the proper time,
he will go on to the larger powers
envisioned by the Nazi."
"And if I refuse?"
Dr. Bell's gaze fastens on the other's eyes.
His own eyes acquire a luminosity
strangely intense.
"I am at this moment commanding you
to do something, Dr. Molicoeur.
What is it, please?"
"You are commanding me to kneel before you."
"Why are you not kneeling, then?"
The Haitian scholar hesitates but a moment,
then slides forward on his chair
and sinks to his knees,
his head bowed,
his eyes closed.
"When will you begin
the task assigned you, Dr. Molicoeur?"
"As soon as I can."
"Be warned.
Margal is not a patient man."
The eyes slowly open.
The Haitian whispers, "Dr. Bell?
This monster you call Margal is a peasant
and we are men of learning.
Is there not some way we can fight him together?"
Dr. Bell returns the other's pleading gaze
and his hands clench.
"I wish to God there were."
A convulsion grips his body.
Agony leaps into his face.
Hoarsely, he cries out,
"No, no!
I am not defying you!
I will do as you say!
Margal, do not torment me."
35
"He was here," Victor Vieux said, "but he is not here now."
Sam stood with Mildred at the Calman's little bar, sipping a rum and soda which the proprietor had just handed him. "And you don't know where he is?" -
In his familiar white shirt and black bow tie, Victor Vieux resembled a penguin as he solemnly wagged his head. "He came here first about noon—let's see—three days ago."
The day Milly and I reached Vallière and she first talked to him.
"Marie thought she saw him and told me," Victor said, "and when he returned in the evening he admitted he'd been here. He had just returned from Legrun, he told me, and stopped by to change his clothes and have a bath before calling on a friend. 'Now I am here to pack a suitcase and leave again,' he said, 'because the friend has invited me to be his house guest for a few days.' "
"He didn't tell you his friend's name?"
"No, Sam."
"Suppose we go upstairs and have a look in his room," Mildred suggested. "He may have left a note for us. You did tell him we're here in Haiti, didn't you, Victor?"
"Of course."
Sam finished his drink and, putting the glass on the bar, turned to look at her. She was tired after their long journey from Trou. The road had been rough, the day hot, and the hour was now nearly midnight. Neither of them had yet been upstairs for a bath or a change. Woodenly extracting themselves from the jeep in the driveway and walking into the pension on legs that ached from every pothole, they had found Victor at the bar, waiting for guests to return from a folkdance performance so he could lock the doors.
Victor handed Sam a key now. "This will open his door. Return it in the morning, eh?"
Sam led Mildred to the stairs.
They climbed in silence, Sam remembering the many times he had ascended these same stairs, at about this hour, with the girl who now, if all had gone well for her, should be asleep in her room at the Schweitzer. Opening the door of Dr. Bell's room at the end of the upstairs hail, he stepped in and switched on a light.
Following him in, Mildred looked around and said, "He must have been in a hurry."
Sam frowned at the bed. It was strewn with clean things her father had apparently removed from b
ureau drawers, and then decided not to take with him after all. Tossed on a chair were soiled, sweat-darkened khaki clothes which he must have worn on his return journey from Legrun.
Sam walked over to the bureau, looking for the note Mildred had hoped they might find. As he stood there with his back to her, he heard her take in a quick breath, then became aware of another sound in the room's stillness.
It was one he had heard before in this room: the faint but rhythmic beat of a voodoo drum. Turning, he peered at the drum beside the bureau. Was it moving? Could he be certain its goatskin head was actually vibrating? As he tried to make up his mind, still another sound demanded his attention. This one was a quick, soft tapping on the bureau top.
His gaze went to the two earthenware jars there. Were they doing what they seemed to be? Swaying? Quivering? He recalled what Victor had said on leading him into this room days ago: Victor seated on the bed, watching him while the drum seemed to whisper and the govis appeared to dance.
"Put your ear to them."
He leaned forward now and did so again, first to the black and white jar, then to the rose, red, and green one. Both were softly singing. He could not be mistaken.
Behind him, Mildred suddenly cried out, "No! I can't!"
He spun around to face her.
She was ghastly white as she walked backward, staring into space and sobbing, "No, no, I can't… I won't." Violently trembling, she sank onto the edge of the bed.
Sam strode to her and took her hands. "Easy, now. Take it easy, Milly. What's going on?"
"It's this room. Oh, God, Sam, get me out of here!"
He lifted her by the elbows and put an arm around her, but she could not stop shaking. "No, no!" she kept whimpering. "I won't!" He led her to the door and over the threshold into the hail. All the way along the hall to her room she kept moaning, "I won't… I can't…"
The master key opened her door and he walked her to the bed. Helped her to lie down. Then closed the door and lay beside her and talked to her in whispers until her trembling finally subsided.
"Who was it?" he said then. "Margal?"
She nodded.
"Telling you to do what?" At Saut Diable, Margal had told her to kill Kay, no? What was it this time? Something about her father?
"I don't know, Sam."
Lying. She had to be or why had she kept saying she wouldn't do it? But this was no time to question her. "Go to sleep," he told her gently. "I'll be right here with you. We can talk about it later."
Go to sleep, she thought. He doesn't know. Oh, my God, if he knew! But the warmth of him beside her, even though they were both fully clothed this time, was comforting, was what she needed. Maybe, knowing he was here, she really could go to sleep and shut out the memory of what had happened just now. The drum… those things on the bureau … Margal's voice reaching her through the drumming and chanting.
I won't do it! I won't! I love him!
But could she resist? At that awful place called the Devil's Leap, she had not been able to resist him when he ordered her to turn on Kay Gilbert and drag her over the edge.
But she was tired now. So tired after the long jeep ride and what had happened in Daddy's room. Her eyes closed. With Sam's arm around her, giving her a feeling of security, she at last fell asleep.
Later, much later, she heard her father's voice and realized she was awake, alone on the bed. Sam was no longer beside her.
There was torment in the voice, an agony, as though Daddy were being forced to use all his strength in his effort to reach her. As though he were hanging by his fingertips from the cliff trail at Saut Diable, knowing he must fall but scratching to hold on just a little longer.
"Turgeau, Milly. … I am in Turgeau. Please try to find me, but be careful… oh, God, be careful. He is a fiend, that man. Don't let him into your mind or he will own you …
The word "Turgeau" was repeated several times. Then the voice faded away to nothing, and she fell asleep again.
Downstairs, Sam Norman was on the telephone. He had been there for half an hour, trying to get through to Jacmel despite the late hour. At last, a voice answered, and it was the one he wanted—the proprietor of the pension at which he had lived while working there.
"Leon? Sam Norman. Sorry if I got you out of bed, old boy, but—"
"Who is speaking?"
"Sam Norman. So soon you forget, hey?"
"My Sam Norman? It can't be! Sam! What are you doing back in Haiti? When did you arrive? How long will you be staying? When are you coming to see me?"
"Whoa, Leon, whoa. One thing at a time."
"But I am overwhelmed. I never dreamed—"
"At the moment, I need some information, Leon, and it's late. We can talk about other things later, hey? Just tell me one thing. You remember that fellow Fenelon the sorcerer, bocor, witch doctor, whatever he ought to be called? The one I fought with because he was taking so much money away from my farmers?"
"Of course, mon ami."
"Just tell me one thing. Is he still there in Jacmel?"
"Is he still here? No. Not since just after you left."
"Where is he?"
"Nobody seems to know, Sam. He had an accident. Some strong-arm fellows from the capital came out here and beat him half to death. Broke his legs so badly they had to be amputated. When he recovered, he left, but I can't tell you where to. Some say he feared another attack and went to hide himself in the mountains. Others say he was born in the mountains anyway and just went home. Why? What do you want with such a man?"
"Nothing, Leon, believe me. It's a long story, one I'll have to tell you later when we have more-time."
"Come and see me!"
"I hope I can. I want to very much."
"With that lovely woman of yours. That nurse. Have you married her yet?"
"Not yet, Leon."
"You're an idiot. Anyway, come see me and bring her with you. I'll kill a pig in your honor."
"Thanks. In any case, I won't leave Haiti without calling you again."
Sam hung up and made himself a short drink, then stood at the bar sipping it while remembering his long-ago war with the man now known as Margal.
36
The narrow blacktop streets had been fairly crowded earlier with cooks, maids, houseboys, and yard boys going to work in the area's elegant homes. With marchandes, too, singing out the virtues of their wares as they trudged along under head-loads of laden baskets. "Min bel pois! Min bel café"
But now, at ten A.M., with most servants at work and the automobile traffic thinned to a trickle, the district seemed all but deserted. The blacktop glistened under a blazing sun and sent up shimmering waves in front of Sam's prowling jeep.
"Nothing?" he asked wearily—just as he had asked all day yesterday and the day before. They had concentrated so fiercely on finding Mildred's father that he had scarcely spoken to Victor yet, for God's sake.
Beside him, looking desperate, Mildred opened her eyes and shook her head.
"But he did reach you again last night. You're sure of that?"
"Yes, Sam." And so did Margal, interfering with what Daddy was trying so hard to tell me. I'm sure of that too, God help me.
Sam scowled. "I can't think of any other place-name that sounds like Turgeau." In his mind he toured the city, naming the parts in which a man like Dr. Bell might be invited to stay at a friend's house. It was no help. If Milly had heard the name "Turgeau" they were in the right place.
But, though for more than two hours she had concentrated fiercely on establishing contact with her father, they had drawn only a blank so far.
"Shall we call it quits for now, Milly?" He could use a drink back at the Calman. Some breakfast, too. They had been in such a hurry to get started, they had had only coffee. Good Haitian coffee, but still not much to build a morning on.
"Please … just a little longer, Sam. He wants us to find him. He said so. And he sounded so … so much in need of us."
"Okay."
Quiet stre
ets, mostly up or down hill. Handsome houses with walled yards and lots of trees. Frangipani. Jacarandas. Mangos. Breadfruit. Congo-pea hedges and gaudy yellow-red flame vines. Now and then a marvelous, uplifting aroma of coffee beans being roasted over a charcoal fire in someone's yard. But nothing from Daddy.
Not a word.
Not a whisper.
"Let's go back and see what Victor has for lunch," Sam said at ten minutes to twelve by his oft-looked-at watch. "We can come here again this afternoon."
"Well … all right." Daddy had said, "Find me, Milly," as if his life depended on it. Why was he silent now?
With a sigh of relief, Sam turned the jeep down Avenue de Turgeau to Rue Capois and around the Champ de Mars to the pension. When he pulled into the Calman's driveway he found himself stopping behind a jeep from the Schweitzer Hospital and knew that Kay Gilbert had kept her word.
Suddenly, nothing else mattered very much.
They lunched on crab soup at the back-yard table under the almond tree, and Kay said she had delivered little Tina to her uncle an hour earlier.
"She'll be all right. He's a lot like her father, warm and decent, without the father's peasant ignorance. In the long run, it will be even better for her than if she had been accepted in Bois Sauvage."
"Good," Sam said. "She's a nice girl." He told how Mildred and he had spent the morning—and yesterday, and the day before that—unsuccessfully trying to locate Dr. Bell.
Lunch over, Mildred said she would like to go to her room for a while. "It doesn't make sense for us just to go back there and continue driving around, Sam. Perhaps if I lie down and concentrate, I can reach him again." Just once, please God, without interference. She stood up. "Can I look for you in about an hour, say?"
"I'll be here."
She nodded to both of them and turned away, walking slowly across the red-brick yard to the rear door of the pension. Kay looked at Sam and frowned.
"Can she do that? Get through to her father whenever she tries?"
"Not whenever. Sometimes."
A Haunting of Horrors: A Twenty-Novel eBook Bundle of Horror and the Occult Page 207
