Chapter Twenty-­Two

I don’t even remember dreaming. There was just nothing. When I regained consciousness I was lying in a bed and Father Jackson was bending over me. He was wearing his stole and he had his prayer book in hand. He was murmuring a prayer and making the sign of the cross over my lips.

“Is it the sacrament for the dying?” I asked weakly.

He nodded, startled. “It’s just a precaution, Maggie. Thank God, you’ve come around.”

“Stop it. I don’t want it. Where am I?”

“In Ashland Hospital. You’ve been unconscious for a long time.”

“How long?”

“Twelve hours or more. You had a concussion.”

I looked beyond him and saw Dr. Fowler at the door. He was wearing a white coat and he smiled at me and came forward, adjusting his stethoscope. Then I remembered that he had been the celebrant at the Black Mass.

“Get him out of here,” I screamed. “He’s one of them!” I suppose it was more of a croak than a scream, but it was the best I could manage and it made my head feel as though it had been hit by a sledge hammer.

Dr. Fowler continued to smile. “She’s hallucinating. It’s not abnormal under the circumstances.” He took my wrist firmly and checked my pulse. I struggled for a moment and then I thought, he can’t do anything to me with Father Jackson as a witness.

I relaxed and let him shine his flashlight in my eyes and then use his stethoscope. I even went along with his tests, counting his upheld fingers and giving the proper responses.

“She’ll be all right,” he said. “We’ll keep her here for a few days though, just to be on the safe side.”

“I’m leaving now,” I said. I tried to sit up, but the room began to spin.

I lay back again as Father Jackson took Dr. Fowler’s arm and drew him to the door. I heard the word “funeral.”

“Will it be on Friday?” asked Dr. Fowler. “We should be able to release her then.” Then he left the room without looking at me again.

“What funeral?” I was afraid to hear the answer. I tried to sit up again, but Father Jackson pushed me down gently.

“It was God’s will, Maggie,” he said.

“Bullshit! Whose funeral?”

“Your husband’s.”

I sighed. Was I relieved? I had been thinking of Duff.

“He had a heart attack last night. It was evidently a massive attack. He died instantly. And he didn’t suffer at all, Maggie.”

Fine, I thought. Great. The poor devil. Then I cried a little, at first because I thought it was expected of me, but then some genuine tears came.

“What about Duff?” I asked.

“Duff is at home.” Father Jackson hesitated. “But Franny’s not too well, Maggie.”

That shook me. “What’s wrong with her?”

“She had a seizure of some sort. She was unconscious for a couple of hours, but she’s awake now although she doesn’t seem to recognize anyone. Her room’s down the hall.”

“Let me see her!” I tried to get up, but again I couldn’t make it.

“In a little while, Maggie. She’ll be all right. She’s in no danger. You were, though. Dr. Fowler was very concerned about you.”

“He belongs to the group, you idiot!” It was all coming back to me now, my flight through the woods and the rest of it.

“Maggie, you mustn’t say those things.”

“Where did Jack die?”

“In the graveyard. We were out looking for you and he was the first to find you after you fell and hit your head on a stone. The shock of seeing you there on the ground evidently caused his heart attack.”

But Jack had seen me before I fell, or at least as I was falling. He also must have seen the General, and so must Franny, who had been standing behind Jack.

“And Franny had her attack at the same time?”

“Then or seconds later. All three of you were on the ground when I got there.”

“Where were you earlier?” I asked bitterly. I remembered leaving the house and his coming after me a short distance along the path.

He shook his head. “I was afraid, Maggie. I’ll admit it. I should have followed you, but instead I went back to the house to get Jack.”

I let him stew for a minute or two and then said, “Forget it. You couldn’t have caught me anyway. I wasn’t Maggie Caine then.”

“Oh, Maggie, don’t start that again.”

“You mean you didn’t see any difference in me, not even in my clothes?”

“When you went out, you were wearing an old dress you must have found in one of the trunks in your house.”

“And when you found me in the graveyard?”

“You were wearing a robe. I assumed you must have slipped back into the house to get it without any of us seeing you. Or else you had it stashed away in the barn.”

“Where’s the robe now?” I asked as calmly as I could.

“Here in the hospital somewhere, I suppose. Maybe in your closet.” He looked. It wasn’t there.

“Never mind the robe. What did you do when you found the three of us—call Dr. Fowler?”

“No, Duff did.”

“Naturally.”

“He was in bed. Evidently he didn’t wake up until he heard you screaming, and then he was only a few steps behind me when I reached the graveyard. I tried mouth-­to-­mouth on Jack but it didn’t do any good. Then Duff went in and called Dr. Fowler and he sent the ambulance. Someone at the hospital must have called the state police too, because a couple of them showed up and asked us a lot of questions. It was finally decided that you had been sleepwalking.”

“You know better than that.”

“No, I don’t, Maggie. That’s exactly what it could have been. Anyway, Duff and I followed the ambulance here in my car. He stayed here for several hours, alternating between your room and Franny’s. Then, when your vital signs seemed to be improving, I took him home and suggested he get some sleep.”

“And you came back to pray over me. I wish you’d use your brains once in a while instead of your prayer book. How long was it between the time you saw me leave the house and when you found me in the graveyard?”

“Ten minutes, maybe fifteen.”

“Bullshit! I must have been gone over an hour!”

“You weren’t, Maggie, honestly.”

Could they compress time like that? My head was aching too much to think about it.

“Where’s Jack now?”

“His body is at the morgue. The coroner will have to do an autopsy, but Dr. Fowler says there won’t be any difficulties, considering Jack’s medical history.” He paused. “Duff says his father wanted to be buried in the family graveyard, Maggie.”

“Oh, my God! When was he supposed to have told Duff that?”

“Shortly after you came here from New York, Duff says.”

I closed my eyes. “I’m sure he’s lying,” I said, “but on the other hand what difference does it make? Jack wasn’t one of them.”

Father Jackson ignored that. “Duff and I arranged for the Nichols Funeral Home in Cainesville to handle everything.”

“Good for you.”

“Duff also asked me to conduct the services at the grave. Even though Jack wasn’t a Catholic, we can do that sort of thing now, you know, since Vatican II.”

“Terrific.”

He arose. “I’ll let you get some sleep now, Maggie.”

Something occurred to me. “Is Duff the person you caught after someone committed an indecency in your church?”

He grimaced. “I’ve been thinking about that, and I can’t give you a flat answer. Duff does seem to resemble him, but on the other hand, that fellow was struggling so much I didn’t really get a good look at his face.”

“Great. Do you want to hear about what happened to me last night?”

“You’d better not talk any more right now, Maggie.”

“Are you concerned about my health, or is it that you don’t want to listen.”

He sat down again and I told him everything, beginning with my leaving the Scrabble game and ending with my falling in the graveyard.

“It could’ve been seeing General Caine for the first time that caused Jack to die of fright,” I said.

“General Caine attacking you?”

“Yes, that’s what he must have seen.”

“Sexually attacking you?”

“Well, I don’t know how far things went along that line.”

He reddened. “Can you tell me a bit more about the woman you saw at Mrs. Reddy’s house? The one you say broke up the proceedings by exhibiting the medal.”

“Small, dark, withered . . . She could have been seventy, or maybe even eighty.”

“Italian?”

“Possibly.”

“Did you know Mrs. Scaravelli, the woman Father Fogarty told you about?”

“No.”

“I called the rectory a while ago and Father Fogarty said that Mrs. Scaravelli’s body had been found in her backyard this morning. Like Jack, she apparently died of natural causes. There was no sign of a struggle or other violence. Of course, there may be no connection.” He waited for a moment before going on. “Father Fogarty said she had a medal in her hand, a small Miraculous Medal. Do you remember what that is from your Catholic days? It commemorates some supposed appearances of the Virgin Mary to Saint Catherine Laboure in 1830. Since that time some superstitious people have ascribed miraculous powers to the medal, which is about the size of a dime, sometimes gold or silver—”

“What do you want me to say? Yes, the woman I saw could have been Mrs. Scaravelli and, yes, she could have had such a medal in her hand?”

“If you’re well enough to be released before she’s buried, I’d like you to go to the funeral home and take a look at her.”

“Just to convince you I’m telling the truth?”

He threw up his hands. “Maggie, I don’t know what to think anymore, what to believe. Anyway, I’m sure you’ll be glad to know that Father Fogarty is happy again. Mrs. Scaravelli’s death will take some pressure off the shrine, he thinks. Maybe she wasn’t cured of cancer, after all. And the fact that she died with a medal in her hand proves to him that good old-fashioned devotion pays off in the end. He thinks the Blessed Mother has put Mrs. Scaravelli on a direct flight to heaven.”

“I hope Jack got on the same flight.”

“I hope so too, Maggie.” He sighed and went out of the room. In a few minutes he was back. “I checked with the head nurse on this floor. Dr. Fowler was here all night. He has another patient who is critically ill and he’s been here since about eight o’clock last night.”

“Was someone watching him all the time?”

He patted my hand. “You rest now, Maggie, and I’ll come back and see you later.”

I tried to sleep but couldn’t. I looked for the call button, intending to ask for something to relieve my headache and help me sleep, but then it occurred to me that sleep might not be a good idea with Dr. Fowler prowling around. Taking an unknown sedative might not be so wise either.

I had to get out of the hospital immediately, I thought. I couldn’t take a chance on spending another night in the place. It didn’t seem to me that Franny was in any present danger, but, on the other hand, if she had really seen the General, she might be considered a threat to the security of Dr. Fowler and the others.

But if it wasn’t the General, could it have been Duff that she and Jack had seen? That pulled me up and onto my feet. I lurched for the door as it was coming around and fell out into the corridor.

“Mrs. Caine!” A nurse came running up.

“I have to see my daughter.”

“But you can’t walk around in your condition.”

“Watch me . . .”

I fell again, but then she realized it was useless to argue with me. There was a wheelchair nearby. She got it and helped me into it, then wheeled me down the corridor to another room.

“You can stay for just a moment,” she said. An elderly woman with a tube in her nose was in the nearest bed, and Franny was in the bed next to the window.

“Push me closer.”

She did. Franny seemed to be awake. She was very pale. Her hands were motionless at her sides and she was staring rigidly at the ceiling.

“Franny, look at me!” I tried to pull myself out of the chair to bend over her, but I was too weak and the bed was too high. “Franny, it’s Mama!”

Her eyelids might have flickered, but otherwise she didn’t move.

“Franny, what did you see last night? You have to tell me!”

The nurse pulled me away. “Mrs. Caine, I’ll have to take you back now. Excitement isn’t good for you with your head injury. Your daughter is going to be all right. There’s nothing physically wrong with her.”

She wheeled me back to my room and helped me into bed. Then she went away and left me in mental agony. My head was pounding more than ever, but that was nothing compared with the torture I was going through in my mind.