Since Jane was busy tending to Fate, I headed to the kitchen to retrieve our dessert (crème brûlée) and coffee, put it all on a tray, and brought it into the living room, where Matthew was sitting in front of the fire.
“Never a dull moment around here,” I said, setting the tray on one of the sideboards and handing him a cup.
“Have you decided what you’re going to do about her?” Matthew asked. “It’s obvious she can’t—shouldn’t—stay here. She needs full-time care.”
“I’m not sure what to do,” I admitted, sinking into a chair. “As soon as I’ve talked to her doctor in Switzerland—first thing tomorrow morning, I hope—I’ll make the decision.”
“There are lots of resources here in town, of course, and I could certainly help you find the right facility for her, but it might be best that she goes back there,” he said. “It has been her home for a half century, after all.”
“That’s what I’ve been thinking,” I said. “I may have to take her back myself. That way, I can check out the place and make sure it’s of the best quality.”
We made small talk while we finished our desserts, but after he put down his spoon, he locked his eyes with mine. “Grace, can I ask you something?”
The energy between us began to swim and bubble, and I got the feeling that whatever he was about to say was important in a way nothing else had been. “Of course.”
He took a deep breath. “What is this?”
I looked around the room. “What is what?”
“This.” He gestured from himself to me. “Us having dinner. Reading the manuscript together. Talking on the phone.”
I smiled, but a sense of dread was wrapping itself around me. I didn’t want to define what was going on—I didn’t know enough to define it—and I had the sense that calling it out, saying its name, might make whatever was happening, if anything was, vanish.
“Well, Amity says you’ve been hanging around a lot lately,” I said finally, bringing my coffee cup to my lips with shaking hands.
“I have indeed been hanging around lately.” He leaned in toward me. “About that, I’ve got something to confess.”
“I thought people were supposed to confess to you,” I deflected.
“Those are the other guys, the ones with the head man in Rome.” He grinned. “We don’t do much confessing in our church. We leave that between each person and God. Thank goodness. I really don’t want to hear that the ladies who run the church social are lusting in their hearts. That I can do without.”
I chuckled. “So what is it you have to confess to me?”
He cleared his throat. “It could easily be assumed that I’ve been hanging around because I’m simply tending to the needs of a parishioner who just lost her mother. And in one way, I’m certainly doing that. It’s my job. But if I’m going to be honest with you—and that’s also in my job description—that’s not why I’m here. At least, that’s not the whole reason.”
A tingle ran up my spine. “It isn’t?”
He shook his head. “No. The truth is, I’m here because I’m finding it very difficult to stay away.”
I wasn’t sure what to say to that. I couldn’t deny that I had felt something the moment I had met this man, and those feelings were growing with every encounter we had. But—a minister?
“I’m finding it difficult to stay away, too,” I admitted, but in the same breath, I glossed it over. “You’re the first friend I’ve had in this town in twenty years. I consider you a friend, Matthew. I hope you consider me one, too.”
“Friends,” he said, nodding and taking a sip of his coffee. “Is that what you’re thinking we are?”
Since he was being honest, I should’ve been, too. But I couldn’t bring myself to say the words. The truth was, I wasn’t crazy about the idea of getting involved with somebody who had the kinds of very public responsibilities a minister had. After all, I had left this town two decades ago because I couldn’t stand the scrutiny of people after my father died. That would be nothing compared to the kind of grilling I’d receive if I were dating the minister of a large church. Why couldn’t he have been a lawyer or a doctor or a car mechanic?
But I didn’t say any of those things. Instead, I said: “I don’t know. What do you think?”
He held my gaze. “I don’t know.”
“Friends is good.”
“Friends is good.” He nodded.
What had I just done?
The whole conversation was making my skin itch, so I got up and walked to the window. It only took a moment for me to realize what I was seeing.
“Matthew. Look.”
He joined me at the open window. “Is that …?”
And there she was, white dress and all. Somehow, she had made her way out of her rooms and down to the lakeshore, and built a fire inside a ring of stones. And she was dancing around and around, her spidery, singsong voice carried by the wind into my ears.
The witch in the wood comes out to play
By the light of the solstice moon
To sing and sway and conjure and pray
Awakening them with her tune!
Come devil, come imp, come monstrous thing
That hides underground in the day
Come alive this night and give them a fright
When the wood witch comes out to play.
She was repeating it, over and over, louder and louder, until her voice, at first so hesitant and shaky, was strong and booming and firm.
“Matthew,” I whispered, locking my eyes with his and grasping at his arm. “She’s supposed to be upstairs with Jane.”
“She’s just a confused old lady, Grace,” he said, but the look on his face betrayed his words.
I hurried to the buzzer. “Jane? Jane! It’s Fate. She’s outside, down on the lakeshore.”
Jane was in the living room in an instant, and together the three of us opened the French doors and walked out into the night.
“Come devil, come imp, come monstrous thing!” Fate screamed, snapping her head toward us, a look of wild abandon in her eyes.
Jane rushed at her and took her by the arms. “You have been very naughty, Miss Fate,” she scolded, her words bringing Fate back into the present moment from wherever she had gone. “You know you were supposed to stay in your rooms. How did you get out?”
“It’s the solstice,” she whispered, her voice a harsh rasp.
And then, turning to Matthew and me. “Friends is good,” she sang. “Difficult to stay away! Friends is good!”
Caught in Fate’s gaze, a coldness seemed to take hold of me from the inside. A seeping, slithering sense of foreboding was working its way through my body, curling around my heart, slipping up my throat, and finally wrapping itself around my neck like a noose. It was fear and terror and insanity and anger all at once, all of it seemingly passing from Fate into me. Like a spell. Devils and monstrous things?
I felt Matthew slip an arm around my shoulders. I looked up at him. “I thought those passageways were locked,” I whispered.
“All right now,” Jane said, her voice stern. “Enough is enough. We’re going back upstairs. And let this be the end of it.”
She took Fate’s hand, and as she led her toward the house, Jane looked back over her shoulder. “Your mother had some sedatives prescribed during her illness,” she said softly. “I think it’s time we used them.”
I nodded, not knowing what else to do.
“Mr. Jameson and I will stay in her rooms with her tonight to watch her,” Jane continued, over her shoulder. “And you should position a policeman outside her door. She’ll not be getting out again, by God.”