| |
Clara could not sleep. Though Mrs. Nan had come to see her to bed and the house was silent, Clara lay awake. She stared at the ceiling until finally, frustrated, she threw off her covers and began to pace. The room was chilly and she snatched her shawl from where it was draped on the end of the bed. Her mind was reeling, going over the same thoughts of Wesley being ripped away from her... of Wesley behind bars... of the mysterious Quatre Portes and the power that they wielded. Wesley's death at the Beltza's hand would be just as final as any death from the mummies and ghosts and demons they had faced before. Oh! That she had the constitution of Marguerite to look at such dangers and attack them straight on.
She lit her candle from the warm, banked embers in her fireplace and quietly opened up the door to the room. The hallway was silent. She crept down the stairs and into the parlor. The room had been shuttered for the night. She sat down in the chair, her eyes falling upon the metal safe deposit box with its false bottom and the note written in Thomas's hand. She picked it up, tracing the letters with her finger. "What does it all mean, Thomas?" she asked.
At that moment, the temperature of the room dipped into a familiar chill. She had been through this enough times to know what would happen next. The young girl's ghostly glow appeared near the open door to the parlor.
"Minnie?" Clara asked, unable to stop the shiver and chatter to her teeth. Her words came out in a plume of misty fog, not unlike a winter's day. "Oh, I wish the afterlife was not so cold..."
Minnie, the ghost of Wesley's departed sister, stood silently waiting for Clara, but it was unclear what she was waiting for.
"Minnie, I see you. What is it that you have to show me?"
Minnie beckoned with her hand, motioning for Clara to follow her. Clara put Thomas's note into her pocket and trailed behind.
Minnie walked through the foyer with its black and white tiled floor and into the library, where she had taken Clara the first night. Minnie pointed at the wall safe. Clara was suddenly struck with the strange thought that perhaps she had failed her ghostly companion with all of their recent adventures. Perhaps Minnie had been trying to say something else all together.
Clara went over and spun the lock. She pulled out the papers and looked inquiringly at Minnie. "I do not know what you wish me to do?"
But Minnie had no more instruction. She vanished into thin air and all that was left was the memory of that biting cold. Clara shook her head and walked back into the parlor where the light of her candle would allow her to read the papers.
She knew the stack was only the deeds and floor plans and other papers she had put there herself. But why, that night when Violet had ransacked Horace Oroberg's study, had she gone for his safe, too? Was there something there?
Clara pulled out the deed to the house, the one drawn up by Lord Oroberg's lawyer and began examining it. On a hunch, she pulled out the note from Thomas and compared them. They were the same! They were both written on the same paper. Had the deed been drawn up at Thomas's firm? Or perhaps Thomas had dealings with Lord Oroberg's lawyer, too?
She held up the paper to the light and realized there was a watermark at the bottom. The light shone just a little clearer through the page. She held up Thomas's note. The watermark was there, too. A chill ran down her back. It was a familiar shape. A simplified architectural rendering of a room with four doors. Here the symbol was again. Her hand began to tremble. Her very home was tied to the Quatre Portes.
"Minnie?" she said to the thin air. "How I wish that you could speak..."
There was a gentle scratching at the window. Clara turned, but there seemed to be no one out there. The scratching came again. This time, she rose. She blew out the light so as to see the street better.
There were gas lamps lining the foggy road, which cast an eerie light. Standing beneath the lamp was a strange fellow. His skin was sallow and gray. His clothes hung in rags off of his gaunt bones. His hair was white and wild. Fear began pounding in Clara's veins, the same fear as an animal when it catches sight of the hunter. She knew instinctively this was not a man, though he may have held a male shape. His eyes pierced the darkness and they were on her from the moment she pulled back the curtain. His lips curled into a satisfied smile, revealing sharp teeth that seemed almost feline. With a bony hand, he tipped his hat to her.
Clara froze, unsure of how to respond. Suddenly, he was gone. But before she could think what to do, his face was opposite hers, just on the other side of the window. Nothing but the thin plate of glass divided them. Before she could even scream, he disappeared once more.
Her heart pounded in her chest as she stumbled back, gripping onto a chair arm for strength. What was this creature who stalked her? Where had he come from and what did he want?
A small voice inside her answered that question: he wanted only her doom.