Dark Shadows 2: The Salem Branch

by Lara Parker

  “Barnabas. Stop it! Don’t say such a thing. Don’t even think it. Those days are over. You are neither the protector of this family nor, God forbid, an exterminator of . . . of . . . creatures who would easily destroy you.” She was shaking, and with a wild wrench of her arm, she clutched the back of a chair to steady herself, her body twisted. “Don’t you know how much I have sacrificed to bring you back? How can you possibly think of confronting a fiend? Say you won’t. Please.”

  He could not bear the look in her eyes. “Yes. All right. Let’s not talk about it any more. I’m sorry I told you. Don’t upset yourself further.”

  “Give me your word.” Her eyes implored him. “Say that you will stay away.”

  “Yes. Very well. If that is your wish.” He touched her gently on the shoulder. “Try to get some rest. Good night, Julia.”

  And he left her standing in the middle of the room.

  BARNABAS WALKED QUICKLY back down the stairs and out the kitchen door. It was just past midnight, and this would be the vampire’s hour on the prowl. Perhaps, if nothing else, he might catch sight of a suspicious individual down by the wharves.

  The steering wheel damp beneath his palms, Barnabas concentrated on keeping the car firmly on the road as he drove through a deeply wooded section of ancient oaks. Huge black limbs hung over the road, and great mounds of fallen leaves lay along the borders like crouching beasts. Caught in the whirlwind of the tires, flying leaves sprang up and struck the windshield with such fury he thought they might scratch it. Barnabas had a fleeting thought that the leaves were hostile. The piles mounted higher until, a short distance ahead, he saw a giant mass stretched across the road, completely blocking his way. He braked, and the Bentley struck the mound with a thud. Instantly he was blinded by a shower of debris. He wrenched the car onto the shoulder, and switched the gearshift into park while he panted from a rush of adrenaline which left him limp. His pulse raced, and for the first time in over a hundred years he was terrified. Had the mound of leaves attacked him? Ridiculous. Still, they seemed to have come to life, like furies out of the dark. He stared into the night. Caught in the headlights was a vibrating, breathing carpet of crimson, magenta, and gold.

  Shuddering as he pulled back on the road, and gingerly negotiating the piles, he headed towards town. Attempting to calm his absurd speculations, he allowed his thoughts to turn to Antoinette. She was here in Collinsport, and living in a small apartment, he had discovered, in the Collinsport Inn. She drove a battered Chevy truck that she used to carry furnishings and materials to the Old House, as she was constantly involved in its restoration. Even though he could feel her presence, at first he had done everything in his power to avoid her. At the same time he had waited in a state of anxiety for her to appear unexpectedly, or to attempt correspondence or a phone call. The innocuous letters on the hall table each morning mocked him, and the telephone’s infernal chime had played upon his nerves.

  He caught a glimpse of her once, dashing out of the thrift shop in Collinsport on a hot summer afternoon, and he had recognized her gait—a kind of bouncing walk—before he had realized it was she. Her costume was peculiar and almost deceived him, a long lace petticoat and a sheer camisole—the delicate undergarments of another period in time, perhaps the early 1900s—worn without the dress which was meant to cover them. Her pale hair was loose and long, falling about her shoulders, and she wore sandals, her legs bare. Such wanton apparel would never have been chosen by the Angelique he had known, who had been so fastidious and vain.

  He learned that she had become an amateur folksinger, an odd choice he would never have predicted, and that some nights she sang at the Blue Whale. Once, on a whim, he waited outside until he could see her through the window, seated with her guitar on the small stage beside the bar, and, his heart racing, he had eased himself into a chair in the shadows where he could watch her and not be observed. She played rudimentary chords, kept appalling rhythm, and her voice had a tendency to go sharp. Yet her material was appropriate for Angelique. She sang Childe Ballads of love and abandonment, mountain songs of lovers who murdered their beloveds, and of faithless wives of noble gentry.

  “She step-ped up to Matty Groves, her eyes so low cast down,

  Saying ‘Pray, oh pray, come with me stay, as you pass through the town . . .’ ”

  Her voice had a tinny twang, but she was something of an actress, and she captured her audience’s attention. She possessed the performer’s knack of looking into the eyes of those watching, and focusing a moment on one individual as if to send a silent message.

  “Lie down, lie down, little Matty Groves, and keep my back from cold.

  It’s only Lord Arlen’s merry men, callin’ the sheep to fold . . .”

  Her gaze fell on Barnabas, and his heart pitched. But there was never a flicker of recognition, and her eyes moved on. Discomforted, Barnabas rose and slipped out, but not before he heard the last grim words of her song.

  “Lord Arlen took his fair young bride and led her to the hall,

  And with his bloody beaten sword, he stove her against the wall . . .

  He stove her against the wall.”

  After ten minutes or so Barnabas was driving down the main thoroughfare of Collinsport. Fog had come in from the sea, and the street lamps hung in the gloom, each within a capsule of golden mist. The darkened storefronts reflected his headlights as he moved slowly, the lone car on the street, sliding like a low-slung animal with gleaming eyes. At last he turned towards the docks.

  Passing shrouded warehouses, he spotted the lights of the Blue Whale glittering in the harbor beyond the wharf, and cars parked in front of the tavern. The bar was still open, even at this late hour, and he heard music and laughter coming from within. He might go inside, if only to pretend to have a glass of wine, and then continue his search. No one would know him.

  He was parking the car when he braked, and froze. Antoinette dashed out the front door of the tavern. She was carrying her guitar case, and she seemed to be in a hurry, because she jumped into her truck and pulled away without looking back. Impulsively, Barnabas decided to follow her. But she steered onto the main road heading out of town, and drove at such a breakneck speed that he nearly lost her. He was struck by the coincidence of seeing her, of how strange it was on this night of all nights, to come across her. As he accelerated to keep her taillights within view, a plan formed itself in his mind. When she stopped, he would stop as well. When she got out of her car, he would confront her. He was no longer a vampire. Nor was he a young and romantic youth too easily blinded by her charms. He had changed; and, if he was not mistaken, she seemed changed as well. He might convince her to leave Collinsport. He would offer to buy her out. The Old House should never have been sold in the first place. It was part of the estate. Surely there was some legal angle. He would call the lawyers in the morning. Obviously, she had manipulated Roger into selling it to her, and she could avoid a long involved court battle if she agreed to leave quietly and take her hippie friends with her.

  Watching her taillights and thinking more clearly now, he cautioned himself that when he spoke to her, he must exercise the utmost tact and not threaten her. Then, if she refused to cooperate, he would seek another recourse, one more devious. As soon as this thought crossed his mind, he laughed out loud. Of course she would refuse. Wasn’t that her nature? Perhaps it would be a mistake to speak to her. Would it not be wiser to observe her, as he was this evening, to follow her unnoticed, discover her habits, where she went and with whom?

  Suppose, if he accosted her, she became spiteful and insulted him? If he made demands, she might treat him with scorn; he could already see the fire in her eyes and hear the contempt in her voice. He felt his rage mounting, his fury at her obstinacy. She had cursed him once to eternal darkness, and she would not hesitate to make him a victim of her whims a second time. Without question, her return foretold his destiny. The murdered worker in the basement of her house exposed her duplicity, proved beyond doubt that
she had a vampire in her service, and that she intended to exercise her revenge at this moment in time when he was most vulnerable. Minutes flew by with the miles as he followed her on the dark road.

  He decided what he must do.

  To his surprise, he saw her turn signal blinking, and she slowed and pulled into the main gate of Windcliff Sanitarium. She drove directly to the front of the building and stopped where a portico was brightly lit. Extinguishing his headlights, he eased the Bentley into a spot within the shadows of trees. But before he could make a move to get out of his car, she parked and rushed into the double front doors.

  Waiting for her to reappear was singular torture, and Barnabas was conscious of a perverse desire to glimpse her from afar even as he was determined to approach her unawares. In fact, there had been a certain satisfaction in following her without being seen. But when, after half an hour, she failed to reappear, he began to lose heart. The cold air seeped into the interior of the Bentley, and his breath fogged the windows. More than once he wiped the condensation off the glass as his agitation increased. He felt a fool waiting there in the middle of the night.

  Slowly he opened the door of the Bentley and stepped out. He moved beneath the trees towards the building, his footsteps muffled by dry leaves clinging to his ankles, their stems like tiny claws. Windcliff loomed beyond the main gates, the lone light glowing at the entrance. The building had once been a seaside mansion built in the Italianate style, and even though it had been painted institution white when it became a private hospital and ugly red-brick additions had destroyed its elegant lines, one could still make out the marble pediments above the windows and the stone cornices of an imposing façade. It had been notorious as the state lunatic asylum until it was rechristened as a hospital for the mentally ill. The high dormers of the roofline stood silhouetted against a sky lit by a pale gibbous moon, and Barnabas reflected on those tortured souls who had looked down from those windows, longing for escape even if it meant leaping to the stones below.

  How many times in his other life had he stalked an unwary prey, found its sanctuary, and waited until it reappeared, self-involved and oblivious. She would never see him or hear him; nothing would alert her as he moved with the stealth of a predatory beast. Beside this lonesome building, in this wooded place far removed from town, with the mist rising off the sea and the moon a pale witness, he would end this uncertainty and frustration before it drove him to the brink of insanity, and beyond.

  But when he approached the doorway, he saw within the foyer a night guard seated behind a desk. He pulled back into the dark, his pulse racing. Noise would be a problem. If she should scream, he would be discovered. He crept past the lighted area and drew up against the side of the building. He decided to wait in the shadows beside the portico where he knew Antoinette would exit, his back against the wall, his body tensed for springing. The brick was clammy under his palms as he inched away from the glow and hovered beneath the darkened windows. Gauging the distance to her car, he thought he might wait until she was almost alongside before striking; and then it occurred to him to actually conceal himself in the back seat. When she had driven a short distance down the driveway and braked at the entrance to the road, he might seize her from behind.

  From one of the windows above his head, he heard voices. He recognized Antoinette’s fake English accent, her hysterical inflection. Moving closer, he heard her say, “But why? They know it doesn’t work.”

  She was answered by the soft murmuring of a young girl, speaking in a pleading tone. He heard Antoinette say, “I never, never gave permission for that . . . it’s so cruel.” After that came the sound of weeping.

  When Antoinette spoke again, he could make out few words, but she sounded determined. He heard her say, “Leave that. It’s not important,” then “. . . tell me I can trust you . . .” and, after another murmur, “. . . never mind . . . I have no choice.” There was the sound of scuffling, a door closing, and all was silent.

  Barnabas stared up at the moon, now scuttling between streaks of pale clouds. He heard metallic sounds at the side of the building. Moving quickly to the corner, he glanced towards a fire escape that ratcheted up the wall, and saw beneath it a heavy fire door standing open. Antoinette waited while a young girl slipped out and together they raced towards the truck, Antoinette holding the girl close, running as if they were one creature. Barnabas saw her glance back over her shoulder towards the portico, obviously worried should the guard become alarmed, and he shrank into the shadows. As soon as she had her charge in the passenger’s side, she ran around to the driver’s seat, jumped in, and started the engine. Dumbfounded, Barnabas watched them drive away.

  FIVE

  Salem—1692

  MORNING, AND SHE MUST BE CAREFUL not to wake the children. Miranda opened the door to the back step to retrieve the dough, hoping wild yeast had infected the biscuit, and she was buffeted by a blast of wind that struck her with such force it blew her hair loose from her cap and the tin from her hands. The trees bowed and tossed, and she could hear them moan. She spoke to them and they quieted. She reached the woodpile and gathered an armload as the wind roared about the house. This time she hoped there would be no stones.

  After a long winter, there was little wood. They had burned what was owed the Reverend by the parish—three full cords a year—and a man with a heart as hard as his would let his children freeze and eat raw food before he would buy one stick with the paltry stipend he received. Back in the kitchen, she tossed a handful of pine needles in the grate and stirred the cinders, blowing softly, but the wind funneled down the chimney and ashes flecked her cheeks like dark tears.

  When the tinder caught, she carefully laid on the firewood, whispering to each, only a short time, only a little pain. Extracting a small ember, she went to light the grease lamp so as to see to form the biscuits, and turned the dough out on the wooden slab. Soot from her hands blackened the round shapes, and she could tell by the damp feel of it that the dough would not rise. Still the chores to do in this wind. To feed the chickens would be a waste of precious grain, as it would take to the air. Back in the barn, the sheep pushed against the rails, and the cow lowed. Her hands warmed on the teats but when she reached the last one and felt the scab, her chest tightened. She almost turned over the pail in her haste to return to the house. She found the salve in the cupboard. A sore on a teat was witches’ work.

  Only later, when she had brought water from the well, and left the cream to rise, and set the gypsy kettle on the iron hook above the flame, did she allow herself to think on the night to come.

  The girls had asked her to join them. It was the first time they had reached out to her. Their curiosity had gotten the better of their fears and they had decided to befriend her. She knew they laughed behind her back, said cruel things, but she had let her loneliness delude her into thinking they would draw her into their circle, and she could become a normal village girl.

  Their parents, like the other townspeople, were suspicious of her, growing ever more so. There were whisperings, as when a bird flew too close to her shoulder or when she heard the sound of snow falling.

  Witch they whispered, then turned away and feigned a false silence, and she hated them for their pinched faces, tight lips, beady eyes. What was so different about her? Nothing remained solid—that was the trouble. Nothing remained clear, but drifted into another world, the world of spells and secrets. When she looked at Martha Corey, she saw roaches crawling on her skin, and she knew Goody Easty only pretended to rock and croon to a new grandchild. She saw it for the imp it was as she suckled it to a shriveled breast.

  Witch they whispered, and they knew something, but they knew nothing at all of what she saw when she woke in the night and Sarah Good still stared directly down at her from the scaffold, her eye a fire brand and her tongue a lizard leaping from her mouth. “You. You are the witch. Can you say the Lord’s Prayer?”

  Of course. I know nothing of the Devil.

  There w
ere signs unmistakable, as that morning she could see, before she pulled on her heavy shoes and climbed from her casement, the apparition of a girl floating in the bare branches of the trees under the crescent moon, white petticoats lifted by the wind. She heard it—the choked cry—this was not meant to happen—the sound of crashing.

  The first time suspicion had ebbed around her like a slow rising tide was after the terrible blizzard when the ewes dropped their lambs in the snow. Outside, the air was a tumult of roiling snowflakes swirling against the sky. The field was obliterated, the fence invisible, and the bleating ewes, dumb in their woolen cocoons, eyes lashed by sleet, chose this night of all others to drop blood and lamb to the frozen ground—unaware of the gift they gave, too cold, too confused to nudge a tiny creature to its feet. Slogging into the stinging blast, Miranda had gathered two tiny babies in her arms and carried them inside. Sitting on the bed, she rubbed and dried them. She puffed warm breath into their black snouts and willed them to live. It seemed a fine thing she was doing. Reverend Collins brought in more lambs and placed them in her lap. She wrapped them in rags and, not sleeping all through the night, she fed each one with fingers dipped in milk. Once he looked in with his lantern and caught his breath. “Miranda, thou art like our Lord’s holy mother—sitting there with the lambs about thee.”

  Better they had frozen in the snow since the next morning the ewes would not take them, and only a few could be coaxed to suckle with swollen teats lambs they knew were not theirs. And once again she tugged and caressed each mother, gathered the smell from its hindquarters and smeared it on the lamb, though she had never been a herder and had no experience in these matters.

  Only later was the scene reflected upon in the parish—that she had saved thirty lambs in the blizzard and wielded a power not of this world. Dead they were, frozen stiff and unseeing when he deposited them on the bed, and they had bleated into life, moving their sharp little hooves, batting at her fingers with their tiny mouths. Out of blood and death came the odor of new wool, and mewing was heard in the room. A slip of a girl should not do these things and, although they gave her praise at first, among themselves they whispered the Devil had come to her aid.