“That smells like sage,” Aunt Ibby said. “Very pleasant.”
A few of the witches, marching in rhythm to a low, humming chant and each carrying a single item, approached Megan and passed the items through the smoke.
Primrose turned in her chair to face me. “What are they doing?”
“It looks like some kind of a cleansing ceremony,” I said, watching as the items were then carefully placed in a precise pattern around the cauldron. There were candles, black and white ones, a clear glass chalice, a sharply pointed knife, a chunk of rock, and a wooden wand.
“Do you know what it all means?”
“I don’t. Ask Therese later,” I said. “Look. Here’s Duke.”
The big man entered the balcony, removed his hat, and sat at the other end of the back row. “Hi, everybody,” he said. “Sorry I’m late.”
I hadn’t seen Pete anywhere yet, and Sammy was still among the missing, but it was good to see that Duke had, at least temporarily, overcome his fear of witches and ghosts.
Maybe rose quartz crystals really work.
River’s voice sounded over the chanting, and her theme music, Danse Macabre, began. “Good evening, friends of the night,” she said. “Welcome to this very special edition of Tarot Time with River North.” A camera rolled in for a close-up of her face. “This night you will see a coven of witches perform an ancient ritual in an attempt to contact the spirit of Tabitha Trumbull, who once lived in this very building.” River lowered her voice, adding a dramatic flair to her words. “As the ritual progresses,” she said, “television cameras will roam throughout this apartment, which was Tabitha’s home during the final years of her life. Watch for signs of her presence along with us, dear friends, and send good intentions for Tabitha’s release from the bonds tying her to this earthly realm.”
No one had noticed that Duke had left the door to the balcony ajar. That is, no one except O’Ryan, who took the opportunity to sneak out from under Aunt Ibby’s cape and bolt for the spiral staircase.
“O’Ryan! You bad boy!” Of course he ignored me. “Aunt Ibby,” I whispered, “if I catch him, I’ll just take him back to my classroom and watch the show from there.”
She nodded her understanding, and I chased the cat down the curlicue staircase, through the long dining room, into the blue-walled parlor, and out into the fourth-floor foyer. A yellow blur, he tore down the stairs, heading for the third floor, with me thumping along behind him. He sprinted past the dorm rooms, skidded to a stop at the head of the stairs leading down to the second floor, then picked up speed. I huffed and puffed and ran, wishing I hadn’t quit going to the gym. I reached the balustrade overlooking the deserted mezzanine and main floor and leaned against the railing, catching my breath.
I spotted Sammy Trout just then, standing directly behind the seated security guard, both men facing a portable television set obviously tuned to Tarot Time with River North.
Good old Sammy. Late for the show, but on time to help me catch this crazy cat.
I was about to call down to him when the words caught in my throat. Sammy held a length of rope with the ends coiled tightly around his hands, and those hands were raised above the guard’s head. I watched, momentarily frozen with fear and disbelief, as he pulled the rope taut around the man’s neck. I backed slowly up the stairs, watching the silent struggle before the guard finally fell to the floor.
Sammy bent, deftly removing a gun from the man’s holster. He looked up and locked eyes with me. Shoving the gun under his belt, he lunged toward the main staircase, while I continued backing away. Sammy took the stairs two at a time, rapidly closing the distance between us. I turned, searching for a way out.
The closest door was the one to Mr. Pennington’s office. Had the director meant it literally when he said, “My door is never locked”? I had to chance it. My phone was in my purse in the balcony. If I could get into the office and lock the door behind me, I could use the phone there and get help before Sammy could get in. I ran for it.
Mr. Pennington had told the truth. Pushing the door open, I slammed it shut behind me. Fumbling in the darkness, I twisted the center of the doorknob until it gave a satisfying click, then stumbled across the room, bumping into the desk.
I searched my memory. Where did Pennington keep his phone? I remembered an old-fashioned gooseneck lamp with a green shade, and a silver tray with a pen and an inkwell and a letter opener. Desperately, I felt along the broad surface, while Sammy pounded and kicked at the door. I found the lamp and pushed the switch, illuminating the room with a pale greenish glow. The telephone was on the opposite side of the wide desktop. I heard wood splintering behind me as I reached for it and then turned toward the sound. Before long that lock would give way, and he’d have me cornered.
Think fast. There’s no time for a phone call now, and there’s no one around to hear me scream.
The door began to collapse. I grabbed the letter opener. It wasn’t much of a weapon, but it was better than nothing. I ducked behind the safe. I could see Sammy Trout’s shadow on the wall.
How can such a small man cast such a huge, wavering shadow?
His voice, that network announcer–quality voice I’d so admired, was harsh and menacing. “Come on out, Lee. I’m going to have to take you with me.”
The shadow moved closer, and I could see his legs inches away from where I crouched. I had to take a chance. I plunged the letter opener into his leg.
He groaned and swore, bending to pull it out. “Bitch!” he said. “That’s my bad leg. I’ll kill you.”
I ran for the splintered door and escaped into the hall. He limped close behind, the gun pointed at me. I reached the top of the main stairway, knowing he’d catch up with me in seconds, and barely even thinking about it, I straddled the gleaming wide bannister and slid all the way to the bottom. I ran for the glass doors and freedom.
But the Tabby was in full lockdown mode. I faced three locks, including a dead bolt, and Sammy was gaining on me, blocking my path to the mezzanine and the upper floors. The locks on the doors leading to the diner and to the student theater would be locked just as securely. No time and nowhere to run.
Except to the basement—and the tunnel.
I had to step over the silent form of the guard to open the door with the NO ADMITTANCE sign. No one had locked that one. Why would they, with an armed officer guarding it?
River’s voice issued from the television set. “A camera is now entering Tabitha’s bedroom. Some of you may remember the player piano, which once entertained Trumbull’s shoppers.” I glanced at the TV screen as I pulled the door toward me. It was Tabitha’s bedroom, all right—and her chair was gently rocking.
I slammed the door shut behind me and ran down the stairs. In the basement, lights blazed and the wall panel was propped open with an ordinary automobile jack. Lifting the panel, I ducked through the opening, kicking the jack aside. The movable panel slid shut just as Sammy appeared at the foot of the stairs. Now what? Would the ladder still be in the hole? Would I be able to get to it before Sammy pushed the silver button in the floor?
I stood beneath the stone archway that I’d seen on television, facing toward where I knew the hole leading to the new tunnel was located. But even though small lights glowed in neatly spaced niches, I couldn’t see any hole.
Pete told me they’d strung lights down here. I don’t see any wires. These look like neat little lamps set into the stone wall.
I heard a small rustling sound nearby.
A small “mrrup” told me that O’Ryan was close by my side. I knelt on the damp floor, hugging the cat. “Good boy,” I whispered. “I don’t know how you got here, but I’m so glad to see you. Let’s get out of here. Come on.”
Instead of moving straight ahead to where Bill had fallen into the hole, O’Ryan made an abrupt left turn, then looked back at me. I shaded my eyes and watched as he trotted slowly along what looked like a long brick-lined corridor. I followed, wondering why Pete hadn’t told
me the digging crew had made so much progress. The brick walls looked clean and new, and I saw the metal tracks imbedded in the hard-packed dirt floor, where bootleggers used to move their cases of illegal whiskey.
Pete had told me that it was like a deep freeze down here, and he was dead right about that. I pulled my jacket close around me and shoved my hands in the pockets. I felt the coin Pete had given me for luck, and fervently hoped it would work. The cat and I walked at a fast clip, moving deeper into the tunnel. Every so often, I paused, listening and looking behind me for any sign or sound of Sammy. Once I thought I heard him calling my name, but the sound was so muffled, it seemed to come from somewhere below the metal tracks.
We’d probably walked about a mile when I saw her.
Tabitha Trumbull, young, smiling, and beautiful in her white wedding dress, stood not ten feet ahead of me at a bend in the tunnel. I stopped and stared, but O’Ryan walked right up to her. She raised a jingling key ring above her head and disappeared around a corner, the cat following behind.
It was exactly the scene I remembered from the vision in the shoe. But the cat wasn’t an anonymous tunnel cat. It was O’Ryan, the witch Ariel’s cat. The woman wasn’t a vague, wispy ghost. She was Tabitha—and following her to wherever she was going seemed like my best option at the moment.
I rounded the corner, almost running, not wanting them to get out of my sight. Then, ahead of me, I saw Sammy. First, I saw his head, then his shoulders, then his trunk and his legs. He seemed to be rising up from the path. He held a very large flashlight in one hand, the gun in the other, and he was closing in on Tabitha and O’Ryan.
The woman and O’Ryan stood against the wall, and Sammy limped right by. Oddly, he didn’t seem to notice them. After a moment, Tabitha beckoned me to follow her deeper into the tunnel.
Sammy was not far ahead of us. What if he turned back and saw me, illuminated by the lights in the wall? Would he be able to catch up with me if I reversed direction and ran back to the basement? Didn’t matter. He had the gun. If an explosion down there sounded like a door slamming, a gunshot would be like a snap of the fingers.
We walked on. Tabitha stopped and, smiling, pointed over her head. I looked at where she pointed. There was a round shape there in the ceiling, and intermittent flashes of light shone through small opaque windows. I smiled back at Tabitha. It was the sidewalk grating Megan had talked about. We were under Derby Street, and the light came from the cars passing overhead.
That smile faded fast when I heard Sammy call my name. “Lee, you bitch. There you are!” Somehow, he was behind me now, with the gun pointed at my head. I began to run, looking back over my shoulder. I stopped short, amazed, as Sammy began to disappear from the bottom up! His legs seemed to melt into the floor, then his chest and arms and finally his head. Just as quickly as he’d appeared, he was gone.
I got it.
Impossible as I knew it was, I got it. Tabitha and O’Ryan and I were in the old tunnel, exactly as it had been in the 1930s. Sammy was in the new one. Sammy and I were not just in different tunnels; we were in different centuries—except for the few places where the two tunnels merged.
As long as I was with Tabitha in the old tunnel, I was safe. Sammy couldn’t see me, and I couldn’t see him. “The damn thing goes up and down like a roller coaster,” Pete had said. That was why Sammy seemed to disappear into the floor whenever he entered the new tunnel. Tabitha knew her way around the old one, and for some reason, she’d chosen to take me along with her. I was sure that we were headed for the entrance behind Greene’s Tavern, and that both tunnels ended up there. If we were already underneath Derby Street, it wouldn’t be long before Sammy Trout and I would be in the same place at the same time—and in the same century.
CHAPTER 32
I thought about Pete and Aunt Ibby and the witches back there at the Tabby. Was the show over? Had they seen the shattered door to the director’s office yet and found that poor man lying in front of the television set? The police would probably search the building first. How long would it take Pete to realize that we were in the tunnel? More importantly, would he figure out where we were going to end up?
I hurried to keep up with the ghost woman and the witch’s cat—figuring if I had any chance of getting out of there, it was by sticking with them. I was so close to Tabitha that I could see the details of her dress—the tiny pleats in the sleeves, the satin-covered buttons at the wrists and the collar. Curiously, there wasn’t so much as a trace of dust on the gown, even though the train had been dragged across a dirt floor for a couple of miles, while I had splotches of mud on my pants and shoes, and even O’Ryan’s yellow coat looked grimy.
I heard the jingle of Tabitha’s keys as she rounded another corner. I lost sight of her then and, for a moment, felt a rising sense of panic. A loud meow from O’Ryan led me to where the two of them waited in front of a bright red door.
The woman bent down and turned one of the keys in a shiny brass keyhole. The door swung open, and I followed her inside. She lit an electric lamp on the wall of the playhouse, then went directly to a red wooden chest. She used the other key and lifted the lid. The chest was filled with long piano-roll boxes, just like the ones I’d seen in the attic room. Soundlessly, she closed the chest and led us back into the tunnel. There she stopped, closed the red door, put a finger to her lips, smiled . . . and began to fade. A pale figure, she moved backward into the tunnel, growing smaller and fainter, until she’d completely disappeared.
As I watched, amazed, the paint on the red door began to fade and peel, and the shiny brass lock became tarnished and rusted. I rubbed my eyes as a brick wall began to appear, hologram-like, between me and the rapidly aging door. I took a step back, and O’Ryan gave a low growl. I caught just a flick of his yellow tail as he darted into a wide crack near the top of the now solid brick wall. I heard a sound behind me, whirled around, and found myself face-to-face with Sammy Trout.
Sammy looked just as surprised as I’m sure I did. “How the hell did you get here ahead of me?” The gun was tucked under his belt, and he put his hand on it. “Never mind. Here. Start digging.” He handed me a small trowel and jerked his thumb toward a patch of loose dirt. “And keep quiet, or I’ll kill you right here.” He shone the flashlight into my eyes, pointing the gun. “You know I can do it.”
He’s already decided to kill me.
I knelt on the ground. “Where am I supposed to dig?”
He pointed. “Right there.”
I began to dig. The soil was dark colored, cold, and claylike, but it felt loosely packed, as though it had been disturbed recently.
“I got one of them this morning,” Sammy said, his tone surprisingly normal. “There should be at least one more.”
“What are we looking for?” I asked, trying hard to sound as though this was an ordinary conversation.
“Shut up and keep digging,” he snarled. “Saves me the trouble.” He leaned against the brick wall, favoring the injured leg. “As if you don’t know what we’re looking for.”
“The gold, I suppose,” I said.
“Gold? What gold? Did you think that dollar sign on the map meant gold? Please. I can turn it into gold, though.” He laughed. “At least two kilos. Uncut cocaine. Maybe more.”
What does cocaine have to do with anything?
“Y’know,” he said, “I don’t think Wilson knew what he was looking for, either. By the time I got here, he already had the cover off that bomb shelter thing.” He shook his head. “Smart bastard. Had his coat off, his sleeves rolled up, and he was digging away with that little trowel. Hell, he’d already dug up a nice two-pound coffee can full of coke. Looked surprised as hell when he saw what it was.” He laughed again. “Not half as surprised as he looked when I shoved his hedge clippers in his throat and took it away from him.”
I tried to gauge whether or not I could use the trowel somehow as a weapon and get away. I struggled to keep my voice calm. “Why’d you do that?”
H
e shrugged. “Had to. He recognized me from the school.”
Keep him talking. He’s enjoying bragging about what he’s done.
“How’d you know about this place, anyway?” I watched his eyes as I dug.
“Keep digging. And keep quiet.” His voice was low. “They’ll be starting to look around here again in a few hours, when it gets light.” He shifted his weight, moving his leg carefully. “It was the map. Guy I met in prison had one just like it. Benny Gable. Kept it under his mattress. The stupid jerk didn’t know I looked at it every chance I got.” His laugh was harsh.
He went on. “Had that sucker memorized. The guy used to run a boat for Trumbull, trading guns for drugs. He even told me he had a nice clean stash of coke hidden somewhere in Salem. That’s how come I picked your school. Salem . . . Trumbull. Funny, but I always thought it was a street map. Then the big, dumb cowboy figured it out. It’s a regular maze down here, you know. Blind alleys everywhere. But once I knew what the map was for, it was easy. Now I know where all the exits are.” He laughed again. “These stupid bomb shelters are in backyards all over the place. Most people don’t even know they’re there. But I know!”
I heard a slight clinking sound as the trowel hit something solid. Had Sammy heard it, too? I guessed he hadn’t, because he kept talking.
“The hedge clipper thing was kind of messy, but it was all I had to work with.” He caressed the gun, and his shrug was casual, indifferent. “I figured I’d better get out of there fast and come back later for the other can. Splashed a lot of blood on my jacket, so I put on Wilson’s coat, rolled mine up nice and neat, and stuffed it inside of his. Then I wiped my prints off of everything I’d touched, picked up the coffee can, and strolled on back to school.” He smiled. “Just a man in a big fat coat out buying himself some coffee.”
“You changed your shirt and came back to class as though nothing had happened.”
“Right. Stashed my can of coke and the jackets and went to class like a good boy.” His smile was chilling. “I still don’t know how Thom got blamed for it, but it works out fine for me!” The trowel clinked again, and this time he heard it.
Tails, You Lose (A Witch City Mystery Book 2) Page 29
