One song credit--- "Ruby Tuesday" by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. . .

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"COMMONPLACE EVILS" by Lorraine A. Balint

Part Four---CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

Carolyn took the long way home, driving down the ocean beach road, turning up a back road that passed the Henderson house, and came to an end in a gully between the Old House and Widow's Hill. She got out of her car, and began to climb a set of ancient stone steps that led up to the lookout point on the cliff. She held a bottle of Scotch in her hand, and took a swig from it when she reached the top. The biting, bitter taste of it hurt her mouth, but the warmth she felt inside, when she managed to swallow, drove her troubled thoughts a little further away with each mouthful.

She didn't want to go straight home, and face her mother or Cellie, either of whom would immediately apprehend that there was something wrong. Carolyn wanted neither Elizabeth's sympathy or the younger woman's empathy and advice. Once, she'd overheard Cellie tell Julia she would happily welcome any child Willie might have fathered on his travels.

It was easy enough for Cellie to talk about a hypothetical child that would, in all likelihood, never show up on her doorstep to claim its father's love and attention. She didn't have to face having to jump right in and raise a ready-made family, or fear losing her primacy in her husband's affections (which appeared to survive no matter what blows their relationship sustained.) Carolyn was deathly afraid of both. She had lost Tony once, already. She didn't want to lose him again. And as for his little boy. . .

Once, Carolyn had complained to Cellie of her "fatal flaw" when it came to attracting and maintaining relationships with men. She was worried about an even deeper, more serious "fatal flaw": the poisonous relationships between Collins parents and their children. She wasn't even sure she wanted her OWN children, recalling her lifelong difficulties with her own mother, and David's with his parents. Someone had to come from the outside to help straighten out the worst of their differences, and re-order their priorities, sometimes against great opposition.

Years ago, it had been Vicky Winters, who was just a little older than Carolyn, and had never known parents of her own, but who'd displayed common sense and a degree of courage. Now, it had to be Cellie, who was a few years younger, and overburdened with her family troubles. Carolyn knew she couldn't keep running to Cellie, or her mother, or anyone else for help and advice. Better not to be burdened in the first place, she decided, as she looked over the spot from which her husband had fallen. . . She thanked God Jeb hadn't left her pregnant. She finally admitted to herself that she had never wanted that kind of responsibility! Perhaps, if Jeb had lived, she might have come to the same conclusion about the responsibilities of marriage, as well. Nothing THAT ordinary would ever satisfy her for long. She must have taken after her father, in that way.

Even as she thought along these lines, she began to cry, a forlorn

keening that carried over the cliff which had witnessed so much of the same kind of despair. She leaned over the safety rail, seeing pictures of her life in the waves that crashed over the rocks below. She saw Tony's face, heard her angry, foolish voice saying terrible things, and squeezed her eyes shut. She couldn't bring herself to see him anymore, even if he returned from Boston, and begged her to.

This thought made her cry the harder. The pain she felt inside made her collapse against the rail, made her wish that someone would come out from the house. . . It made her wish that her father would appear before her, telling her he wasn't really dead, that he'd take her away someplace where she wouldn't have to feel so lost. . .

She felt a hand on her shoulder. She whispered, sobbing, "Father?," and looked up behind her. In an instant, she stood up straight, and began to walk away. The same hand gripped her shoulder firmly, a little painfully. "Get away from me, Nicholas," she demanded, forcing firmness into her voice.

"Or you'll do what, Carolyn?" he replied calmly. "Summon forth a

memory of one of Mrs. Loomis's impromptu Karate lessons, and toss me

over the fence? Why this immediate, intense hostility, anyway? I saw you from my window. I became concerned by your abject attitude, a serious matter, indeed, when one considers what once happened to you on this cliff."

Carolyn could almost visualize the whole scene. A man whom she'd once regarded as her friend, attempting first to push her from the cliff,, then seizing and shoving Jeb over, as her husband cried out to her to get away. . . But she was frozen, and watched, a scant second longer than she should have. . . "You were to blame for what happened then, Nicholas! I know that now!"

"An over-reaction by an overzealous, and deeply disappointed convert who'd just lost his entire fortune, and his wife. He lost his own life shortly afterward, so I can't imagine why you still harbor such bitterness towards me!"

"The whole mess was your doing, from first to last." Carolyn asserted. "It took a long time for me to work it all out in my mind. The only good thing to come out of it was my marriage, and you robbed it from me, whether you were directly involved or not."

"What did you really lose that day, Carolyn? A man who was literally a shadow of his former self! You were selected for that union because it was felt you would turn out to be something special in your own right, and not just an enhancement and adornment to a Lord of the new world order. If Jeb had survived in his human form, he could never have succeeded in any human endeavors. He wasn't created for such mundane things. Life for you would have been a constant struggle. The man who killed him did you a favor!"

Carolyn flew at Nicholas, hitting him with her fists, kicking his ankles. He grabbed her by her wrists, and bent her over the railing. "Are you going to push ME over, too?" she gasped.

"Is that what you want, Carolyn? Did your stable, reliable lawyer

friend let you down, as all the other men you've ever known let you down?" Nicholas taunted. "Instead of looking ahead to future opportunities, it's SUCH a Collins trait to cave in, get drunk, come to Widow's Hill, pitch oneself off. . ." His voice became softer. "I don't want that to happen to you. I knew you were special when we first met. Alas, I got tied up with someone less worthy, and when I saw you again, I was under strict orders to fulfill the destiny set for you from infancy. Now, we are both free of these burdens. I know Tony's gone. Carolyn," he murmurred, gradually lifting her from the railing, and easing his arms around her waist, "I wouldn't ever let you down. I want you to rise, to take that place I've always envisioned for you."

"I don't want any place, if it's anywhere near you! I'd rather die, or live in the slums---" Carolyn jerked herself around, but Nicholas held her tighter, and pushed her against a nearby tree, so that she would be forced to face him. She dropped the liquor bottle, to which she had been clinging tenaciously, at their feet. Miraculously, it didn't break right away. It rolled off the cliff, and shattered on the rocks below.

He gazed deeply into her eyes. "You, live in a slum?" he chuckled. "Now, that's true courage for a Collins! But we both know, that's NOT what you want, anyway. Not that what you want would be of any consequence, under normal circumstances." He held her with one arm, as he stroked her throat the same way he had the previous summer, at the Antique Shoppe. She'd ceased to fight, and even panted a little when he kissed her. "You want what I want, after all," Nicholas said, with satisfaction, as Carolyn nestled against him.

"Yes. I guess this is what I really wanted. This is better than a father, or a husband with a nine-to-five job, or children. . ."

"Well, marriage will be involved, eventually," Nicholas said, as he caressed Carolyn. "But I can assure you, marriage to me will never be tiresome or toilsome as with a mere mortal. Your beauty won't fade under the cares of ordinary life. You won't have to bear any children, but it will be your privilege to help me raise one. I know you balked at dealing with Tony's child, but I doubt you'll find spending a little time each day with a future world leader a terribly onerous task, especially with the child I have in mind---"

"Sarah Teresa," Carolyn said. Her eyes widened, and she started to behave as though she'd come out of a trance. "NO! I can't be with you, if it means taking the baby from Cellie! You can't kill her, or Willie, either! You'll have to kill ME first!"

"No, no, no," Nicholas replied, as he kissed her again. "I'm not

going to kill anyone. That's not part of the Plan. I have other things in mind for the little girl's parents, but I don't believe you'll object. At least, not once we are one."

"When will that be?" Carolyn asked.

"As soon as possible. I need some time alone, to prepare. . ."

"Please, take me with you now! I can't go home. Cellie will know

right away what's going on with me."

"If that's what my lady wants, that's what she will have. You won't even need to pack. My housemate has closetsful of clothes and lingerie she seldom gets around to wearing. She won't object if you use them." Nicholas led Carolyn down the steps to her yellow Mustang. At his direction, she drove it back down the lane, to a half-hidden back driveway that led to a cellar-level garage. He took her through the cellar, up to the second floor of the house. He opened a door to a plainly-furnished room. "I'm sorry the accommodations aren't more luxurious, but soon, you'll have all the comforts you desire. If you're hungry, there's plenty of food---"

"All I'd really like right now, is some wine, or brandy, or whatever, you know, to warm me up and settle my nerves."

"I was just about to suggest that." When Nicholas saw Carolyn was about to follow him out of the room, he motioned for her to stay. He left her alone for a minute, and brought back a decanter and two glasses. "Would you like to make a toast to the future?"

"Oh, not right now. I'd like to unwind, by myself, for a while."

Nicholas clearly hesitated to leave the room. "Just a sip together."

"Oh, alright." Carolyn stood by as he filled the glasses. She took hers, and sipped lightly, watching as he placed his glass to his lips.

"Well, until tomorrow, then," Nicholas said, kissing her chastely on the cheek. He went out the door, closing it behind him. As soon as she heard his footsteps fading down the hall, Carolyn spat the tiny mouthful of wine into her glass. God only knew if he'd spiked it with something when he was out of her sight, but she wasn't taking any chances. There was a small bathroom next to the closet. Carolyn went to the sink, discovered it worked, and rinsed her mouth out thoroughly.

Then she ran to the door, with the intention of sneaking out to explore the house. It was locked! Then she heard Nicholas's sneering

chuckle outside the door. "I thought you'd try something like that, dear Carolyn. You DO want what I want, I can sense it, but you need a little more preparation."

"I'll jump out the window!" she screamed.

"They're sealed. But that's no problem. In a few minutes, you won't want to leave. You see, I found it necessary to pull another little trick on you. The wine wasn't drugged. But the water in your bathroom is. Very soon, you'll want nothing but to immerse yourself in that water. Then, you'll want nothing but me."

"I WON'T! I WON'T DO IT! LET ME OUT!"

"See you soon, bride-to-be!" Nicholas's contemptuous laughter faded as he went back down the hall, for real, this time.

After a few futile minutes of banging on the door, Carolyn began to feel extremely warm. She began to sweat profusely, and before long, her clothing was soaked. She knew what Nicholas intended for her to do, and she resisted as long as she could, but it became impossible to sit or stand in her wet clothes. She stripped them off, tentatively at first, then hurriedly, as she began to crave the feeling of hot water enveloping her. She almost lept into the tub. She ran the shower first, with the drain plugged, to feel the water crawling all over her skin, like fingers. When there was a couple of inches of water in the tub, she sank down, and turned on the faucet, the hotter the better. She covered her mouth a few times, when she believed her moans of lust could be heard outside the door.

She rose from the bath, so tired now, that she only had the energy

to wrap a large towel around herself, and stumble to the bed, where she collapsed, murmurring Nicholas's name. Within minutes, she was fast asleep.

That was how Nicholas found her, when he let himself in, a while

later. He gazed at her body wrapped in only the towel, which was falling open in places. He resisted the temptation to open it all the way, and take her, unconscious as she lay. There were certain protocols to be observed, certain proscriptions to be obeyed, certain rituals it was necessary to perform, to fix their relationship for all time, and she would have to be awake. Still, he couldn't just keep her drugged for days on end. He needed an opportunity to bring her to get used to lusting for him, so the guilt would be shared; his longing and her shame would seal their union. In the meantime, it wouldn't hurt to confuse matters for her.

Nicholas lifted Carolyn carefully from the bed. The towel slipped even further, as he carried her down the hall to his bedroom. He laid her, almost tenderly, on the red satin sheets. He pulled the towel away, and made himsel cover her up. Then, he laid himself on the sheets next to her. To his annoyance, she snored a little, but it gave him an excuse to handle her body, to turn her on her side, away from him.

* * * * * * * * * * *

Elizabeth thought her days of staying up all night to fret over Carolyn's whereabouts were gone forever. Yet, here she was again, pacing in precise laps around the foyer and drawing room, and downing quarts of strong coffee, and hovering by the phone, as she had when her daughter was a troubled teen-ager. Where could she be? Elizabeth wondered. And where was Tony, for that matter? After numerous calls to the lawyer's apartment, and the homes of several friends with whom he and Carolyn were known to socialize, Elizabeth's blood chilled with terror. She knew that her daughter and Tony had visited Pavlos at the hospital after the incident at the Koffeehaus. Perhaps the man who'd attacked Hallie, the Greek, and David's ex-girlfriend had run into the couple.

Elizabeth's hands shook as she picked up the phone to call Lester

Arliss. Just then, Cellie popped into the drawing room, bearing her crying baby, and yet another bottle. Everyone in the house had done all they could to calm Sarah Teresa. Finally, they'd tried to leave her alone in her crib, but her continuous wailing jangled their already frayed nerves, so the whole cycle of checking diapers, feeding, walking and rocking began all over again. Cellie flung herself into Mrs. Johnson's rocking chair, as her daughter shrieked.

"FOR GOD'S SAKE, CELLIE, HUSH THAT BRAT RIGHT NOW!"

Elizabeth cried. Then, ashamed, she covered her face and wept.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" Cellie replied in tones of humility, as she instinctively rose to console the older woman. Sarah Teresa, apparently shocked into silence, chewed on her hand, as she huddled on her mother's shoulder. "I'll take Sarah somewhere else," Cellie offered. "It's just that the rocking chair usually does the trick, after she's been at it this long." She slid her arm around Elizabeth's shoulder. "What's happened, now?" Cellie asked with concern in her voice.

"I'm--I'm sorry I bellowed at you, Cellie, but I'm completely on edge. I can't locate Carolyn, or Tony, for that matter. I know they're adults, and maybe they've just gone out of town for the night--- I can't blame them for wanting to escape the atmosphere around Collinsport right now! But, dear God, it's two in the morning! Even when she's going to stay with Tony---" Elizabeth choked a little on that statement "--- I don't approve at all, but they're pretty discreet, and they WILL be married soon, God willing--- Anyway, she usually calls David, at least, to let us know. It's not like them to be unreachable at this hour!"

"Call Lester, then," Cellie advised.

"I was about to, when you came in. I still will, if I can't reach them in another hour," the older woman replied. "But, with all the trouble in the town now, I doubt the sheriff will go out of his way to search for two normal adults who've only been gone a few hours."

"On the other hand, you could pitch the possibility that they may have run into the same man who hurt Hallie, Annette, and Pavlos," Cellie suggested. "Plus, the fact that Carolyn is very reliable about calling you before it gets too late."

"Perhaps, you're right. The sooner I call, the better." After Elizabeth talked to the Sheriff, she sat on the bench near the fire. "Lester promised he wouldn't put this on the back burner. Still, I feel like I should be out looking for Carolyn, though I haven't any idea where to begin."

"Could it be, that Tony and Carolyn eloped?"

"I hope that's the worst thing that happened," Elizabeth fretted. "I wonder if Helen Peterson's talked to her son, lately? I suppose, if she tried to contact him, and thought there was something amiss, we'd have heard from her by now. I hesitate to call her at this hour. . ." Just then, the phone rang. Elizabeth grabbed it immediately. "Lester?" she began, breathlessly. "Oh, Helen. . . Yes, I was wondering the same thing. They weren't here at all. . . I called Lester Arliss. With the attacks and my cousin's disappearance, we both agreed it would be worthwhile for the police to keep an eye out, just in case. Please call me, the instant you hear anything. . ." After she hung up, Elizabeth turned to the girl. "I guess it's just going to be an all-nighter for me. The baby looks like she's finally dozing off. You should take her upstairs, and try to get a little rest, yourself, Cellie."

"I don't want to leave you to wait, alone."

"I can get Roger to sit up with me, if I need him, or David. . . Mrs. Johnson has put in so many hours, helping to keep Julia company, she needs to rest, also. Cellie, there's something I need to ask you."

Cellie felt her insides tightening, fearing that Elizabeth would ask if she thought Barnabas was responsible for all the trouble. "What?" she said, shakily.

"Cellie. . . I know you have a--a sensitivity. You used it to help Hallie and Paul and Julia. You see things when you 'read' people, don't you?"

"More and more, but it's not predicting the future. It's impressions, of the present and the past. It's stronger with some people, than others."

"Were you close enough to Carolyn, to be able to 'read' her? Could you do it now?" Elizabeth wore a mournful, pleading expression.

"Yes, I've done it for her, but she'd have to be pretty close by, if I was to try it again. I'll give it a shot, if it makes you feel better." Cellie gazed toward a point behind Elizabeth, into the fire. The flames gave off an especially vivid orange glow. Cellie always wondered if that had anything to do with the properties of the species of firewood used. Orange, she thought, the color of lust. Suddenly,

she broke into a sweat, and fidgetted in the rocking chair, despite the fact that she was still cradling her daughter on her lap. She knew SHE wasn't feeling any lust, and that it wasn't emanating from Elizabeth, either. She doubted it was coming from anyone else in the house.

"You're very red in the face, Cellie. Are you alright? I'm sorry I asked that of you---"

"I feel, well, how can I put it nicely, desire. . . And," she murmurred, gazing at the flames, which were blue-violet in the center, "Fear. It's running with the desire, so it can't be your fear. But I couldn't tell you whose fear, or whose desire, or where it's coming from, except it's not in this house."

"Could it be coming from that wretched Nicholas Blair's house?" Elizabeth asked. "He's a most perverse individual."

"I suppose, but he's always blocked me, before. I'm sorry, Mrs. Stoddard. I do know Nicholas has a 'thing' for Carolyn, but if Tony's missing with her---"

"I can't see a circumstance where he'd be likely to lure both Tony and Carolyn to his house." Elizabeth sighed. "Thanks anyway, Cellie. You get up to bed. I'll call you if there's news."

When Cellie had gone upstairs, Elizabeth paced some more, and thought and thought. She wondered if her daughter and Tony had a fight. That was a common enough occurence between them, especially these days, when tension crackled the air like the frequent thunderstorms on the coast, near Collinwood. That could have separated them long enough for Carolyn to fling herself into harm's way. She was still so immature, sometimes, even though she would be twenty-six on her next birthday.

If she made it to her next birthday. . .

Three o'clock in the morning. . . Elizabeth couldn't wait any longer. Something told her that Carolyn wasn't far away. Maybe she was at Nicholas's house. She thought of calling upon her brother or her nephew, but they would surely try to dissuade her from going out. Cellie might have come, but it wouldn't have been right to wake her up, and ask her to leave her baby alone. If she called the Sheriff's office, she doubted she could convince Lester to investigate Nicholas in the absence of better evidence than her mother's instinct. That is, if Lester was even still on duty. It had been an exhausting couple of days for him, too, she remembered, sympathetically.

Elizabeth ran to get her coat and a flashlight. She left the Great House, and made her way up the well-lit pathways, until she came to the point on the pathway between the Old House and Abijah's cottage, overlooking the Henderson place. She gingerly eased herself down into the dark gully, and made it to the gate. She was about to walk up the flagstone path to the steps, when she heard a whirring noise above her, like a helicopter's engine. She glanced up instinctively. To her shocked amazement, the sky, which had been so full of glinting white stars just moments before, was now dotted with what looked like tiny green Christmas lights. At first, Elizabeth wondered if this was some kind of freakish atmospheric inversion, similar to a "blue moon," which she had seen a couple of times in her life. It had been so long since she'd been out at this hour, she wasn't sure, anymore, what the night sky was supposed to look like at three in the morning.

Still, she resolved to ignore the phenomenon, and struck out on the path. The whirring noise became louder. Green lights showered down around her face, prickling and blinding her. Elizabeth crouched to the ground, shielding her eyes, and sobbing with fear, as the whirring noise became unbearably loud. To make matters worse, she heard a voice, sugary-sweet, but one that had, in the past, filled her with dread and obsessive thoughts of death. "No, Cassandra," Elizabeth muttered, "You can't be in on this, too. Why do you persecute me like

this, after so many years?"

A female figure in white appeared to her. The apparition wore a veil over her hair, but Elizabeth could SEE Cassandra's thick-yet-silky-looking bobbed black coiffure in her mind's eye. "I haven't come to hurt you, Elizabeth. I will never harm you, or yours again. I have come to save you! Nicholas will blind you, and drive you incurably insane, if you linger here."

"How can I believe you? And my daughter, my Carolyn--- she's in there, I know she is! You hated her, too---"

"All in the past. You must believe me, or you will be lost. You can't help Carolyn, that way. Please, come---" Angelique reached toward the older woman cringing on the flagstones. "He will destroy you."

In spite of her fear and loathing for the being before her, Elizabeth knew it was hopeless to try to go on. With no other option available, she reached out her hand. A warm sensation, like feathers in a pillow, enveloped it. Her fears evaporated. "You must close your eyes, lest the lights pierce them," Angelique said. "I will guide you. You must have faith, and trust me."

The tiny, hot lights stung at Elizabeth's cheeks, as she squeezed her eyes tightly shut, and allowed the warmth around her hand to turn her around, and lead her from the Henderson property. Then the stinging, and the warm sensation disappeared, and Elizabeth opened her eyes.

Cellie and David stood before her, now. Cellie was wearing an old overcoat her husband sometimes used when he came during the winter to shovel the walks. Her baby was nestled beneath it. "Neither of us could relax," the girl explained. "I had the feeling you'd try to storm Nicholas's castle. So I dragged David out of bed, and we came to check on you."

"I couldn't--couldn't get near it," Elizabeth wept. "The green lights--- the green lights--- Cassandra saved me! I can't believe it! But Carolyn's still gone. If she's not in that house, then where can she be?"

"We'll find out, Aunt Elizabeth," David reassured her. "Come home. We'll get Julia up. Maybe she's still got some kind of sleeping pills she can give you. I don't think I'll be able to get back to sleep, so I'll sit by the phone."

"Oh , David. You still have to get to school," his aunt protested. "You have to carry on, as best you can. It's the Collins way."

"So's staying up for days on end." He smiled sadly. "I just have a test in the morning. After I take that, I'll plead family troubles, and head home. Don't worry about me. I'll be okay."

* * * * * * * * * * *

Tony's train made it to Boston at one in the morning. It occurred to him to head to the hospital right away, but as he'd already told Lee Anne, doubted he would be allowed to see his son--- amazing how he already thought of the unseen, unknown infant as his son! He wondered whom this little Tony resembled--- Tony's own long, thin, slightly swarthy face, or Lee Anne's perky, freckled, heart-shaped countenance.

Lee Anne, he thought with alternating pangs of pity and irritation. How could she have kept such a secret from him? He barely remembered the last time she'd wheedled and begged him for one last stand, when she already knew she was losing him. Perhaps, she'd never really had him to begin with.

Carolyn had always existed in the back of Tony's mind, a lost dream from his adolescence of serving the whims of the wealthy in order to earn money to supplement his scholarships. He'd watched her from afar, as she sailed and golfed and danced, as he tended the catamarans she favored, caddied her and her friends' golf bags, served her soft drinks; even spied some of her friends spiking her Seven-Ups. Then, when they were all grown up, or so he'd thought, she'd approached him. She was full of ulterior motives then, involved in some convoluted plot against Julia, and had used him. But he was hooked, probably for life. If only that damned Cassandra hadn't chased after him. . . Still, he had some hopes of regaining lost ground when Roger's troublesome second wife was gone for good.

Unfortunately, Carolyn was tied up with someone else, much as she denied it. Tony often suspected that the man who'd assaulted him, and several others, was her secret lover, but he could never find proof. Thoroughly weary and disgusted with his lack of progress, both personally and professionally, he accepted the first good job offer that took him far away from his boyhood home. He avoided dating like the plague, until he met Lee Anne at a party given by a mutual friend of his and Ernest Hoffman's. Ernest had met Lillian at the same party, a decidedly eclectic gathering of the various strata of young Boston professionals.

Lee Anne proceeded to chase the moody, arrogant attorney with whom she'd become fascinated, until Tony turned around and caught her. He told himself he loved her, in order to justify intense sessions in the bedroom that only briefly made him forget the past. He suspected Lee Anne of being unfaithful, but she showered him with so much giddy affection, he let himself be swayed into an engagement. Then, came the conflicting job offers from the New York firm, and Brownley and Townsend's, outside of Collinsport. He saw Lee Anne's true colors then, he thought. When he told her he wanted to return to his hometown, she pitched a worse tantrum than Carolyn ever had in their worst days. Before the bitter end, in late January of 1972, she'd made her last stand, appearing at his apartment with a bottle of his favorite wine, and wearing very little under her down coat, a favorite custom of hers. Tony distinctly remembered her assuring him that she'd taken her Pill that day.

In spite of her final, spirited attempt, Tony drew away gradually, putting her into his past as deliberately and thoroughly as he'd cleared his belongings from his office at McCauliffe's. Even if he no longer had a chance with Carolyn, he was still relieved to be free of Lee Anne.

Well, in the end, he supposed, he would never be free of her, ever again. Carolyn had been right about one thing. If he wanted to establish and maintain contact with his son, his former lover was, inexhorably, part of the package. He just hoped she wouldn't pull that wine-and-down-coat manuever again.

He checked into his motel room. He thought of calling Ernest sometime during his stay, after he visited the hospital. He fell asleep quickly, and was up an hour before his travel alarm went off, at eight A.M. By nine, he was at the main desk at the hospital.

"Carruthers? Carruthers, Anthony, in Pediatrics, you say?" the receptionist, asked, as she checked her library of files. "Mother, Lee Anne Carruthers? I'm sorry, there's no such file here."

"Maybe she used the surname 'Peterson', P-E-T-E-R-S-O-N."

The receptionist ran through her files again. "There's a couple of Petersens, with an 'S-E-N', and none of them are on Pediatrics. They're not even children. Are you sure you have the right hospital, sir? There are several in Boston, and some people get confused, especially when they're from out of town."

"No, she said 'Mass. General', quite distinctly. I'm no stranger to this area, either. She didn't check the baby out, did she? He had whooping cough. He didn't--didn't pass away, did he?" A tear slid down Tony's cheek, a circumstance that surprised him as much as it moved the receptionist.

"I'm sorry, sir. I'll call the head doctor down from Pediatrics. He'll clear this mystery up. Then, if you'd like, I can call the other hospitals for you. Perhaps your son is in a nearby hospital, well on the way to recovery." She smiled sympathetically.

"Yes, please. Thank you for taking the trouble."

After the pediatrician came down to the reception desk, and denied that an infant boy by that name had ever been a patient in the hospital, hadn't even been born there, the receptionist kept her word, and called down her list of hospitals, not only in metropolitan Boston, but the surrounding suburbs. No five-month old named Anthony Carruthers or Peterson had been treated recently in any of them. As the infant in question was alledgedly suffering from whooping cough, such an illness would have been recorded for public health purposes.

Tony didn't know whether to be worried or relieved. Lee Anne was lying, probably to get money. But he'd told her he'd go to the hospital first thing in the morning. Okay, Tony told himself, maybe there's still a baby, but it's not in a hospital. He decided to call Lee Anne at the number she'd given him. The flat, recorded voice of the operator told him the number was no longer in service.

Tony called a cab, and gave the driver the address he'd been given. When the taxi turned down West Allerton, Tony was shocked to see only warehouses and dingy factories. 3457 West Allerton turned out to be the address of a nondescript building whose gaudy sign proclaimed it to be the headquarters of Apogee Records, where, Tony knew, Cellie had done some recording work. He was perplexed, and more than a little frightened. Someone had obviously played an elaborate prank on him, for what purpose he didn't know. There was still a chance that Lee Anne was mixed up in it somehow. He gave the driver the address of her designing company. If everything else she'd told him was a lie, then, it followed that the part about losing her job was, in all likelihood, a lie, also.

The taxi arrived at the gentrified neighborhood where the studio was located in a restored turn-of-the-century brick tenement. Tony told the driver to wait, as he ran up the oak steps, to the loft studio. When he knocked on the door, Lee Anne herself opened the door. "Tony!" she squealed, in dismay or delight, he couldn't tell.

"So, where's the baby, Lee Anne?" he demanded angrily.

"Baby? What baby? Who's got a baby?" she asked in what appeared to be genuine surprise.

"Don't play games with me, Lee Anne. I know you were angry when we broke up, but this early April Fool's joke has gone too far!"

"Tony, I don't understand---" A man stepped up behind Lee Anne, and slid his arm around her waist. She turned to him, a tender look on her face.

"Your old boyfriend giving you a hard time, baby?" the man asked.

"Not--not exactly, Kenny. It seems we're both the targets of a nasty practical joke," she replied.

"Someone who sounded just like Lee Anne called me in Collinsport and told me that she had my five-month-old son in the hospital, and that she'd been fired---" Tony began.

"Lee Anne has never been pregnant since I've known her, as far as I could tell, anyway," Kenny said. "And I'm her boss, so I would know whether she was fired or not." He squeezed Lee Anne's slim waist. "No danger of THAT happening anytime soon."

"I never called you, Tony. You have to believe me. I've moved on with my life, and have nothing against you and Carolyn," Lee Anne insisted. "I can't imagine who would pull such a cruel prank. But it wasn't me, or Kenny, if that's what you're thinking. I'm awfully sorry you went through all this."

"I--I'm sorry I had to bother you. I can only hope that Carolyn will be as understanding."

As soon as he got back to his motel room, Tony called Ernest, who was as puzzled about the hoax as Tony. Then, Tony called Walter.

"How much you want to bet that Nicholas had something to do with this?" was what Walter had to say, when Tony told his story. "With a healthy assist from his gal-pal, the former abortionist?"

"I take it, you would advise that I get back to Collinsport and Carolyn, A.S.A.P.?"

"Exactly, my friend. Just pray it's not too late."

Tony flung his belongings into his suitcase, checked out of the motel, and rushed to the train station.

* * * * * * * * * * *

CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

Nicholas, carrying a silver tray laden with croissants and coffee, unlocked the door to his room, and stood gazing down at Carolyn, who was still asleep in his bed. He laid the tray on his night-stand, and sat on the bed next to her. When she turned over, facing him, he gave her a passionate kiss, which made her sputter awake.

She jumped up in the bed, so dazed she absent-mindedly allowed the

red satin sheets to cascade down. At first, she was in a dream, where she and Tony had reconciled lustily. Then she noticed the red sheets, as shiny as the inside of a huge mouth. Tony favored light blue sheets. "Oh, My God, Oh, My God," she wailed, as she looked into Nicholas's smirking face.

She drew up the sheets around her. He placed his hands over hers, and gazed into her eyes. "Why are you embarrassed now, Carolyn? You weren't, last night."

"You mean I--we--- Oh, God, what have I done?" She turned her reddened face from his. "I was mad at Tony. . . But not that mad! Oh, why did I ever come here with you?" She began to cry.

"Don't play the innocent virgin with me, Carolyn. You came here of your own free will, and we did what we've both wanted to, for a long time."

"But I can't remember! You spiked my bathroom water, of all things!"

"It felt good, didn't it, Carolyn, the hot water caressing you all over, and after, when I caressed you? It doesn't matter if your mind doesn't remember. Your body does." Nicholas grasped the shrinking, sobbing Carolyn by both shoulders, and kissed her again. This time, she pulled him down with her, for a frenzied embrace.

A few minutes later, Nicholas gently extracted himself from her arms. "Soon, that's the way it's going to be all the time, Carolyn. But I have business to attend to this day."

"I don't understand myself," she sighed. "I never wanted anything to do with you. I only wanted Tony. I still only want Tony, but you're messing with my head. . . Let me out of here! Please!"

"I'm not 'messing with' anything, my dear. If I kiss you again, or touch you again, it will be Carolyn Hawkes herself who craves me, without the help of drugged water, or spells. . . Do you really want to go home, anyway?"

"I--I can't face Mother. She'll know where I've been right away. And Tony. . . If he ever comes back, he won't want anything more to do with me."

"If he ever comes back to you, and you accept him, I can promise that he won't survive the encounter."

"NO! You can't kill him! You once said he was too insignificant to kill."

"That was before he had you, Carolyn. I understand that you two made up for lost time rather quickly, after I left last summer. That makes him a bona-fide rival. Still, I have no great love for killing. As long as you make it clear to him that you've chosen me over him, he will be spared. He may even prove useful to me, if he doesn't protest your parting too strenuously." Nicholas took one of the napkins from the tray, and patted Carolyn's eyes. "Now, stop crying. In no time at all, you will forget Tony, and any other attachment you've ever had."

Carolyn became very quiet. Then she said, resignedly, "I made my

bed. Now I have to lie in it. God, it's going to be hard---"

"And stop addressing HIM in my presence, or I'll keep you stringently confined until our wedding!"

"When will that be? Will I be free to leave the house, then?"

"Then, it won't matter where you go. I'll have everything arranged to mine and my Master's satisfaction."

"I suppose I won't even be allowed one phone call? Even arrested criminals are allowed one phone call."

"Only one, to your mother."

* * * * * * * * * * *

Tony retrieved his car from the train station parking lot, and drove directly to the front doors of Collinwood. He stood on the steps for ten minutes, before he could work up the nerve to ring the bell. When he received no response, he knocked loudly on the door. Both doors opened wide.

Elizabeth Stoddard stood before him. "Thank God you've returned,

at least, Tony," she announced in a relieved tone.

"What do you mean? Isn't Carolyn here?"

"She's been missing since last night! We thought she was with you, but nobody knew where you two went. You'd better call your own mother. Helen became anxious when she called your home and office numerous times, and even your secretary had no idea where you could be reached. Your whereabouts were a mystery, until Walter Hoffman saw fit to call Cellie this afternoon. Tony, do you have any idea where Carolyn is? What happened between you two? Even I could figure out you must have had an argument."

Tony turned beet-red. "I'm--I'm kind of ashamed to tell anyone,

but maybe it will give you some kind of clue." He explained, from first to last, the circumstances of the call he thought Lee Anne had made, and its consequences. "I wish to God, now, that there had never been any REASON for the possibility of a child with Lee Anne to exist. I imagine you think my moral standards are pretty low, and that I've dragged Carolyn down with me. All I can say is, I tried to put matters to rights, once I heard that I was a father, and that I offered Carolyn an opportunity to join me, to decide what level of participation she wanted. . . What level she could endure. . ."

Elizabeth turned from her daughter's lover, and looked into the drawing room, toward the fire. Even from that distance, she could see into the spitting, flickering flames; they formed pictures of a night a quarter-of-a-century ago, when she'd stood at the hearth, with a poker in her hand, arguing violently with her late husband about his neglect towards her and their daughter, his greed, and his infidelity. . . Paul was all packed, and ready to go. He was going to take a considerable amount of money, as well as small but valuable household items, she found later, after she'd knocked him out. While Jason was busy "disposing of the body," she had some time to check the contents of Paul's luggage.

There was more, she discovered, than the expected money, stock certificates and trinkets. There were tear-stained letters from her butler's niece, Betty Hanscombe, who'd grown up at Collinwood with her younger brother, but who had gone to live in New York City a couple of years earlier to train for a career, subsidized by Elizabeth's father Jamison, in appreciation of his butler's service. In the interim, Paul and Jason had arrived, and Jamison died, all within the space of a year. In the confusion of grief over her father's death, and her elation at capturing the seemingly eager Paul for a husband, quickly followed by her longed-for-but-difficult pregnancy, Elizabeth soon lost track of much that had once been important to her, including caring about the family retainers who had almost been like family.

In that period, Betty Hanscombe's exact whereabouts had become a mystery even to the uncle who'd raised her (her younger brother was away in the service by this time, and unaware) until Elizabeth checked the contents of her "late" husband's suitcase.

The letters told of a baby girl born to a distracted, poverty-stricken single mother, whose frantic pleas to the baby's father for financial aid and some hope of a future marriage went unanswered. The last letter, which must have really grabbed Paul's attention, since it was carefully saved in its original envelope, reported that the despairing Betty had been driven to leave the child on the steps of an orphanage. She gave its address, and her own, a charity mission house near the orphanage, where she had earned her keep by doing chores and odd jobs, to stay close to where her child was living.

Elizabeth doubted her husband was going to join Betty and rescue his child, but it seemed likely that he was going to settle some money on them before he departed for greener pastures. She had the matter investigated; she then took on the task of supporting the baby, now almost three years old, at the orphanage, and paying hush money to her mother, while nimbly evading the younger woman's questions about Paul.

Deeply ashamed, but relieved of her responsibilities, Betty retreated into an obscurity occasionally replenished from her 'rival's' coffers. Apparently fearing that her support would be cancelled, she never even told her uncle the truth about her sojourn in New York. Old Hanscombe went to his grave believing his niece had been lured from her planned, sensible path on the promise of a recording contract (she had a fine voice, much like Cellie's, Elizabeth suddenly realized), and had fallen into some low way of life from which his warm-hearted mistress had rescued the girl.

Eventually, Elizabeth brought the "orphaned" child to Collinwood, ostensibly as David's governess, but with the real intention of determining the worth of her character, with an eye to providing accordingly for her future.

To her utter surprise, Victoria Winters proved worthy of trust, consideration, and eventually, a warmer affection than Elizabeth could sometimes muster for her own daughter by Paul. There was one stumbling block to complete confidence. Elizabeth had spent so many years protecting the secret that she'd killed her husband (or, as it turned out, very nearly killed him), that she was morally paralyzed by the concept of revealing the truth of the governess's identity, even within the bosom of the family. It had been horrendously difficult for Carolyn to accept the hard truths about her parents' relationship and its violent denouement, even with Vicky's devoted efforts to console the disappointed daughter and the grief-stricken mother. If Vicky, upon whom everyone, even Roger, had come to regard as the family's

Rock of Gibraltar, was to discover Elizabeth's contribution to the break-up of her own family, they were sure to lose her.

Elizabeth, who felt that she, herself, lost so much already, was not about to give Vicky up, for her own sake, as well as her family's. So, on the two occasions when Vicky had become engaged, and would have appreciated some information to pass on to her own children, Elizabeth kept her counsel, even from Roger. Soon after, Vicky disappeared into the oblivion of the past with her new husband, without ever learning that the woman she'd come to regard almost as her own mother had kept her from learning the truth about her natural mother and father. Even now, when Elizabeth thought about that, she suffered stabs of guilt. Perhaps Vicky would have understood, after all; maybe she wouldn't have been so eager to leave what she evidently thought of as a rootless life behind. And Carolyn, who often said that Vicky was almost like a sister, might have been happy to discover the governess was her half-sister in fact; perhaps she wouldn't have felt so alone, so rudderless. Alas, Elizabeth had allowed too much time to go by, to easily explain why she hadn't told the truth in the first place.

Elizabeth often wondered what would have happened if Vicky had still been around when her 'real' father came back in 1970. There was something odd about the reunion that was. Paul Stoddard had freely admitted to both his ex-wife and his daughter, those faults that had driven him from them the first time. He accused his former friend McGuire of sealing the separation with his threatening behavior, once Paul had recovered from Elizabeth's blow. All this, Elizabeth could readily accept as truth, especially once Paul started exhibiting what even she could tell was genuine concern for their daughter.

But never, in all his revelations, did the subject of Betty Hanscombe, or the lost child who grew to be Vicky Winters, come up. How could a man who so eloquently expressed his new-found fondness for one daughter, completely ignore the fate of the other? Elizabeth briefly believed that, perhaps, Jason had planted the letters she'd found in Paul's luggage, and that HE was the child's real father. But, although the earlier letters didn't refer to Paul by name, that last, desperate

one did, as though Betty was past caring who might intercept such correspondence. There was nothing in it about Jason, as one might have expected at that point, if he was the true father. Elizabeth came to the conclusion that the memory of the affair with Betty had been erased from Paul's mind with the blow from his wife's poker---

Elizabeth's thoughts came back to the present, to the man standing beside her, the man who'd involved himself in a situation similar to Paul Stoddard's. There were crucial differences, of course. The baby in question turned out to be an illusion. Tony was no irresponsible gigolo; he loved Carolyn for years, and he must have had love for that Lee Anne, if he was willing to sacrifice his current happiness for a child of theirs. He'd been honest with Carolyn. It was Carolyn who'd behaved like Paul Stoddard, ready to drop everything when ordinary life became too complicated and bothersome.

"Tony," Elizabeth said, finally, "I may not approve of many modern customs, as far as intimate relationships outside of marriage go. But you've been ready to marry, in both instances, and you DO love my daughter. Perhaps Carolyn has confided to you about some of my troubles with her late father. There are things I still can't bring myself to discuss with anyone about that time. But rest assured, I will never be the one to cast the first stone, or any stones. You could say, I've walked in your shoes, myself. At least you're honest with yourself, and others. I wish I'd raised my own daughter to value that kind of honesty."

"She always does in the end, Mrs. Stoddard," Tony replied earnestly. "She's just so insecure--- If only she'd come straight home to you, and told you. I could have stood you thinking poorly of me, so long as Carolyn was safe."

"Well, Sheriff Arliss hasn't had anything to report," Elizabeth said anxiously. "We've all been out at various times to search. Last night, I even thought she was at Nicholas Blair's house, and got into so trouble on my way there. There were stinging green lights in the air, and a deafening racket. . . I know that sounds crazy, but you've had odd experiences here in the past."

"How did you escape?"

"You really won't believe me. . . I had a vision of Cassandra."

"Cassandra! She's come back?" Tony sounded frightened now. "She's hurt Carolyn---"

"No! That's what I thought, at first. But she wasn't a person anymore, she was a ghost, and she swore she wouldn't hurt us anymore. She told me Nicholas had caused the problem, and she led me from the lights and noise. She didn't say it outright, but she intimated that Carolyn had been in his house. But I couldn't get close enough to find out. I doubt anyone, even the police, could."

"Even a call would be better than nothing, but after last night, I'm starting to doubt the veracity of phone messages," Tony said.

At that moment, the phone rang. Elizabeth pounced on it. She heard her daughter's voice, hesitant and shy, saying, "Mother?"

"Carolyn!" Elizabeth cried. Tony leaned close to her, trying to listen with her. "Where are you? We're all terribly worried."

"I--I can't tell you right now," the quiet, depressed voice on the other end of the line said. "I had to get away. But I'll come to see you all, in a while, once I get settled."

" 'Get settled?' You mean, you're not going to live here, anymore? Where are you now? Are you even still in the state?" Elizabeth demanded.

"I can't tell you, right now. Soon, you'll know. I just knew I couldn't come back after--after---"

"Carolyn," Elizabeth said firmly, "Tony is right here with me. He came back from Boston, and explained everything to me. You must talk to him. Then, you might change your mind---"

Tony grabbed the receiver away from her. "Carolyn, please listen---"

"I'm not supposed to talk to you, Tony. I don't want to talk to you, anyway. It's better this way."

"Listen, Carolyn," he pleaded. "I found out it was all a lie, a trick. There's no baby. There never was---"

"Please stop," Carolyn replied, a sob in her voice. "It doesn't matter. Please don't try to find out where I am. I can't see you anymore, Tony. You know we're always going to have these kinds of fights. . . You deserve better than that. And you might get hu--- Just don't come looking for me. I have to get off, now. Give my love to Mother. I'm sorry." She hung up.

Tony sighed. "I hope that was Carolyn. I don't know what to think, now--- She says she doesn't want me anymore, but I can't believe it's all over, just like that. I have to find her."

"If she isn't at Nicholas's, then he must, at least, know where she is," Elizabeth replied with certainty. "But if you go looking for her there, you might run into the same kind of trouble I had. Maybe Cassandra would help you, too. Cellie explained she was trying to make up for things she did in the past. Still, you can't depend upon that sort of intervention."

"Help or no help, I have to get down there, and see for myself," Tony said. "Even if Nicholas turns me away at his doorstep, and sends the Seven Plagues after me, maybe I'll get a glimpse of her in a window, or I'll come upon some clue. . ."

"I'll come with you, then," Elizabeth offered.

"No, you've been in danger once already. I can't ask anyone else to come, either. But if I don't return here within an hour, call Lester Arliss." Tony left the house, and headed down the gully. He stepped right up to the front door of the Henderson House without any interruption.

The door opened before he had a chance to knock. Nicholas stood on the thresh-hold, a glass of wine in his hand. "I can't say I wasn't expecting you, Mr. Peterson. I caught Carolyn on the phone to her mother. I told her the family would be sure to come stampeding down here when they heard the news."

"What news? I don't understand. You're not denying Carolyn's been here since last night? Her mother came here, and---"

"Please! One question frought with confoundment, at a time! First, I am not denying Carolyn has been staying with me since last night. She was at the end of her rope, so to speak. . . and the end was dangling from Widow's Hill."

"She--she was going to kill herself, over our argument? I can't believe that! No matter how upset she was at the time, she knew I would be back from Boston, in order to discuss our future plans. As it turned out, all the fuss was over nothing. But I suppose, you didn't know anything about that, Mr. Blair?"

"Only what Carolyn told me, Mr. Peterson. I must say, I am indignant on her behalf, although, as a man, I do completely understand your circumstances. A fellow must take pleasure where he can find it, and well, occasionally, these little complications can arise. But you know our Carolyn. She's got that unfortunate Collins tendency to fly off the handle when her pride has been hurt."

"I don't think you have any conception of my circumstances---"

"If I recall correctly, your circumstances involved a conception," Nicholas chuckled. "It's happened to the best of us."

"There was no conception!" Tony thundered. "I went all the way to Boston, and discovered that there was no baby in the hospital, no listing of a certain telephone number, no baby-safe apartment on West Allerton, and no danger that my ex-fiancee was about to lose her job because of our child. There was NO child! She swore up and down, that neither she or her Bohemian associates had any knowledge of such a rotten, cruel prank, that could tear me away from my future wife!"

"YOUR future wife!" Nicholas smirked. "Well, that brings us to the part about the news Carolyn was going to share with her mother, until you tore the phone from her hands! Happy as I am about this announcement, I do sincerely regret the disappointment you are about to suffer. You see, last night, when I found Carolyn on the cliff, we had a long talk about her real hopes and desires in life. I shared some of mine. We discovered we had much in common. After what I admit was an impetuous decision to spend the night together, I--we both became convinced that our compatibility extended to the daylight hours, now and forever."

"You became lovers? In one night?" Tony sputtered in disbelief.

"Not only lovers, Mr. Peterson, but affianced lovers. Carolyn and I are going to be married very soon."

"I can't believe any of this! I really can't believe Carolyn would marry a man who was somehow responsible for trying to kill her own mother, last night!"

"I have no knowledge of any such attempt."

"Mrs. Stoddard came here last night, rather late, and was attacked by stinging lights and painfully loud noises. It was only by a miracle she was saved!"

"Perhaps she came after I retired. I have one of those new-fangled security systems that's supposed to deter intruders by jangling their nerves, while, at the same time, alerting the local constabulary."

"Did Lester Arliss come out to investigate?" Tony wheedled.

"Alas, no, Nicholas replied. "That part of the system has a considerable, shall we say, 'glitch' to it. As you can tell, though, it's not in operation now, or you wouldn't have gotten past my front gate."

"Thanks for that bit of consideration," Tony groused. "Well, so you and Carolyn are engaged, on the basis of a one-night stand. If you feel so secure in your relationship, I suppose you won't mind if I speak to her for a few minutes, to congratulate her?"

"Congratulate me, first, Mr. Peterson." There was a threat in

Nicholas's tone. "If you're so ready to accept your defeat, make it sincere. Or nobody will get to see Carolyn!"

Tony's face became very red. "I--I don't know if I can---" There was a rustling from the landing above. He looked up, to see Carolyn, clad in a peignoir, gazing down at him with a tender, guilty look.

"Please, Nicholas, let me talk to him," Carolyn pleaded from above. "I can make him understand."

"Remember what we discussed, sweetheart," Nicholas warned with

a smile, as Carolyn inched her way down the steps. When she reached the doorway, he kissed her on the lips, no more than twelve inches from Tony's unhappy face. Then he went up the stairs. Halfway to the second floor, he turned to look down upon the couple standing near the plainly-carved newel post below. "I'll be waiting for you, Carolyn. Don't linger."

Tony began, "I won't say anything stupid like, 'How could you do this?' But, Carolyn, just last night you told me you wished Nicholas and Anissa would go away. You've told me you never liked Nicholas from the day you met."

"I found out I was mistaken. About a lot of things. About us. . . Like I said on the phone, we're always going to have a communication problem. I've finally figured it out---"

"With Nicholas's help, no doubt!"

"It's not Nicholas! It's just that you and I are traveling on separate paths. I thought we could help each other out, and maybe arrive at the same destination. But we don't want the same things! We don't want to go to the same place! You want a woman who can roll with the punches, who can settle down and help you make a home that will stand no matter what hurricane hits it. I'm not the one for the job. I'm not Cellie! I don't want children! I don't want to be tied to Collinsport! I've had enough of working and worrying, only to be rewarded by disappointment and boredom."

"You've worked so hard!" Tony jeered. "Oh, please! Tell the truth, Carolyn, you just don't want to grow up! So, Nicholas will help you escape all that, I take it? Of course you can trust his promises! After your deep, meaningful night of passion--- Spiteful passion! Vengeful passion! How good WAS he, Carolyn that you can throw away the last year?"

"He was--- he was--- Oh, God! I can't even remember. . . I don't remember much, but I woke up in his bed. He said it was good. . ."

She appeared so flustered with confusion, Tony softened toward her immediately. "Carolyn, " he whispered urgently, "he must have slipped you a 'Mickey', or something of the kind. If you can't remember what really happened--- Then all the other things you're feeling for him right now might be the result of drugs, or a spell. . . Even I could believe in that, after what your mother told me. She came here last night, Carolyn. Did you know that? She was right outside the house, when she was attacked by stinging green fireflies, or wasps, and a terrible noise--- I guess you didn't hear it. She would have died, or gone crazy, if Cassandra didn't save her."

"Cassandra? Oh, yes. I've heard she's gotten some of that old-time religion and she's behaving now. I'm grateful she helped Mother. I really am. But it doesn't change anything, Tony. I do love Nicholas, in my own way. And he's promised me a wonderful life. I have--want to marry him. Please go now, Tony."

Tony, heedless of where he was, grabbed Carolyn by the shoulders, turned her around, and kissed her, forcing her mouth open. She struggled for a few seconds, then relaxed, her body curving against his. A moment later, she abruptly pushed him away.

"No more, Tony," she sighed, tears springing to her eyes. "It's over for us. This is my new life, now. You have to go. I don't want anything to happen to you. Don't tell me you're willing to give up your life. . . You are all your mother has. If you leave me alone now, there's a chance you could go on, find someone else---"

"I tried that, Carolyn! It didn't work before, and it won't work now, any more than you will with Nicholas!"

"Then you will be lost. . . If you really love me, Tony, then you'll let me go, and give me the satisfaction of knowing you're still around, somewhere. . ." Carolyn was crying in earnest, now.

Nicholas reappeared, at the top of the stairs. "Is he ready to go, yet?" He sounded impatient.

Tony gazed up at him with a withering expression which he forced into a polite smile. "Yes, I'm going. I was just congratulating Carolyn, and she was overcome with--with happiness. I'll say 'Good Evening' now. Have that wonderful life, Carolyn. And you too, Nicholas." Tony opened the door,and gradually faded from view as he made his way up the path. His shoulders, Carolyn saw, were slumped in defeat.

Nicholas came up behind her, and nuzzled her neck. "You look like

you could use another one of those special baths. Then, you'll join me in my room."

"Yes," she said in a faltering voice. "You'll leave him alone now, won't you?"

"That depends on how steadfast he is about staying away from you.

But he will be all right for the time being."

As Carolyn walked up the steps with Nicholas, she asked, "You know, since I've been here, I haven't seen Anissa. Where is she?"

"Out of town on some vital business."

* * * * * * * * * * *

Tony walked right through the front doors of Collinwood and stood

on the thresh-hold of the drawing room. Cellie was kneeling on the carpet, holding Sarah Teresa by the hands as the baby struggled to stand. "Now, Peanut," her mother teased, "You're way too young to even THINK of running around yet. No fair for you to get a jump on your old Mom that way. I didn't even TRY to stand until I was TEN months old." But when she tried to set the baby down, Sarah Teresa squealed in frustration. "Hey, sweetie, you're sounding more like your Daddy everyday. You'd better get a handle on that Loomis temper, before you learn the fine art of scooting away from me."

Sarah Teresa managed to balance on her tiny feet for a full three seconds. Then, with her mother's help, she gently collapsed on her bottom, and started to crawl around. Cellie applauded her daughter's efforts, but, Tony noticed, with a sad smile. A minute later, she turned to face him. "Oh, Tone, I didn't hear you come in," she said. "Mrs. Stoddard told me where you went, and why. She went upstairs to sit with Aunt Jule, while she was waiting. I'm sorry if it seems like I'm just fooling around. But Sarah Teresa woke up, bursting with energy, when I had hopes of her sleeping through the night for a change. I had to bring her down here. She's running in reverse, I think. She slept better when she was brand-new."

"She's just very sensitive, like her mother," Tony sighed, as he

sank into the sofa near Cellie. He reached out and stroked the baby's

curly red-gold hair. Sarah Teresa looked up at him with an absurdly

serious expression that somehow displayed all her dimples.

Cellie picked up her daughter, who became even quieter when in

close proximity to Tony. "You're not running right upstairs to see Carolyn's mother", she observed. "The news is bad. Your heart is breaking. Tell me about it," she whispered, clutching his hand.

"She's--she's not coming home," he replied, choking. "I can't talk about it, just yet. Hurts--hurts like hell."

"You MUST tell me!" Cellie urged. "I'll help you." She began

the process of draining off the raw, dripping midnight blues and mauves,

which glowed like fresh lava. As she felt the hopelessness flow into her system, Tony gave a halting account of his visit.

"And you say, she couldn't remember just what they did together?" Cellie asked, incredulously.

"Even if she did, I doubt she would have shared the gory details, and I wouldn't have stayed around to hear," Tony replied. "But I firmly believe she's being coerced. She tried to warn me off, without actually warning me, if you know what I mean. Well, what difference does it make? She's with Nicholas; she's going to marry him. It's all over for us," he concluded glumly. "I just hope he allows her to see her mother, at least."

"Tone, don't take this as a signal to leave town, again," she pleaded. "There's more to this than what's happening to you and Carolyn. This is 'Divide and Conquer'. Barnabas is. . . gone. Carolyn is with Nicholas. Will's in the bin. Elliot's tied up with Hallie---"

"And your stepfather is damn near a basket-case, himself," Tony added.

"My line of defense is falling like dominoes," Cellie said, fear in her voice. "I'm sorry! I shouldn't be whining like this. Of course you should cut and run, Tone."

"I haven't decided, yet, what I'm going to do," he said. "But I know I have to face Elizabeth." He rose, and went upstairs.

Cellie wished she could leave the baby with someone, and go prowling around Nicholas's house. She touched her Indian necklace, thinking, perhaps, she and David could try exploring the general area of the Henderson property, to see if there were other ways in and out of the house. Then she chided herself for even thinking of putting her best friend in danger. If she lost David, she wouldn't be left with much, not even Roger, who would surely be broken with grief.

"I need help, from someone Nicholas doesn't know very well, but

who I can count on in a pinch," she thought. She thought back over her

roster of friends. She would have picked on Dimitrios, but Pavlos and her mother needed his help at the Koffeehaus. The Texeiras were out. They were probably on the top of Nicholas's "To Do Next" list, anyway. Ditto for the Hackett family. There had to be someone who had a nodding acquaintance with the supernatural, who was interested in doing something for the powers of good, and had no fear of death. "Who?" Cellie thought, and then she remembered. . . a man who'd been given a second chance to mend his ways and stay out of Hell. . .

She yanked the desk drawer that contained the phone book, so

hard that the whole thing almost fell to the ground. She frantically picked through the pages with one hand, till she came to the letter "P". "Plante, Plath, Plavcan, Plavnicky. . ." Three Plavnickys, Bertha, Jeffrey, and Raymond. . . In such a small town, they all had to be related. Maybe Bertha was the old mother, Raymond was the son, Jeffrey the grandson. . . Cellie had never written up a sale for Mr. Plavnicky, so she couldn't recall his first name. She dialed Raymond first. When

she mentioned the heart attack, he said, "Oh, you must want my brother,

Charles. . . He lives with our mother, Bertha. . ."

For a minute, Cellie hesitated to dial Bertha's number. If the elderly lady answered, how could Cellie explain her desire to talk to the son? She wondered if she had the right to tear Mr. Plavnicky from his mother's side. He might be her sole caretaker. Oh, well, he would have to make up his own mind.

She thought of some excuse she could use with Mrs. Plavnicky, something to do with a lost receipt from the Antique Shoppe. Fortunately, she didn't have to use it. Charles Plavnicky, himself, answered the phone. He remembered her, right away. "My fellow alumnus of the Afterlife!" he sang. "How have you and your family been?"

"Not so good, Mr. Plavnicky," Cellie sighed. His greeting indicated that the man wasn't a maven of local gossip. "My husband's in the hospital. But the baby's fine."

"You must watch her carefully, Mrs. Loomis," Mr. Plavnicky said. "She's a living miracle, and this sinful world receives so few. As for your husband, well. . . I admit I've heard some stories around town, about a fight with the Sheriff. . ."

"Please, I don't want to talk about that---" So he DID keep up with local gossip.

"Don't be embarrassed, my dear. I remember Lester Arliss quite well as a boy. He was the pastiest-faced, most spoiled child I ever met. His mother fell all over herself indulging him, after his father left. His uncle George, may he rest in peace, tried to be a toughening influence on the lad, getting him into sports and convincing him to join the police. He straightened out nicely, I thought, but he does, still, have a spoiled streak. Wrecked all his little romances, or so my mother says."

"I wasn't having a romance---"

"Of course you weren't, my dear. People like us, who've seen what's in store for us on the other side, don't have quite the same reactions to these overtures as ordinary folks. I'm just sorry your poor husband had to get involved. Now, what do you want of me? I know this isn't just a friendly call to let me know the Antique Shoppe will be opening again, soon. Though I know that, already."

"What--what do you mean?"

"Why, when I saw your Uncle in the back yard of the store, where

you used to live."

"When was this? Did you talk to him?"

"Very early this morning, as I was on my after-work constitutional. I work the 'graveyard shift' at the cannery. I was some distance away from the place when I glimpsed him, but when I hurried up to greet him, he'd already gone in. Evidently, he didn't see me! I tried the back gate and the front door, but both were locked. I've heard he's been away---"

"Yes!" Cellie gasped. "You didn't call the Sheriff, did you?"

"Goodness, why should I have? The man was on his own property.

Or did he sell out? I hope not."

"No, no. It's just that, well, he's been away on--on a buying trip, and we were expecting him, but he has this tendency to get sidetracked. We were kind of worried, and were looking out for him."

"Now, now, Mrs. Loomis, I've been a frequent customer of your

Uncle's since the Shoppe opened, and the worst I can say about him is that he's one of the most fascinating, not to say, entrancing, eccentrics I've ever met, myself included. When he speaks of his antiques, it is as though he is speaking of his beloved children. No doubt, he got caught up in reviewing his purchases, and whatever is left of his original inventory. Odd thing, though, I didn't see his

vehicle---"

"He must have taken a taxi directly from the train station," Cellie temporized. "He said he was only going to buy small things he could keep in a box on his lap on the train."

"I suppose you're right. Well, now that mystery is cleared up, what brought you to call me in the first place?"

"Well, before I ask you, I have to know, do you take care of your

Mom? All by yourself, I mean."

"Me, take care of Mother?" Mr. Plavnicky's laugh rang through the phone lines. "Good Lord, no! Mother is quite independent, quite feisty, at the age of seventy-five. She's on a bus trip to Rockport with her chums from the St. James Seniors! She'll be gone till tomorrow night. Truth to tell, I need her more than she needs me, sometimes, since the divorce."

"Yours?"

"No, HERS! Mother just expedited her third divorce. Even at my

age, I find it trying to adjust to a new stepfather, and then saying good-bye, once we find we have something in common. This last fellow had a fondness for antiques. I suspect Mother divorces them the instant she discovers I'm getting along with them."

This last was almost too wierd for Cellie, who'd already experienced quite a lot of wierdness. "Oh, so you're not married?" she inquired politely.

"I was indeed, but my wife passed just after my return from the land of the Dead, just when I had begun to reform and repent. We hadn't gotten along for years, until that time, and it was cut short. . ." Mr. Plavnicky sounded as if he was starting to cry. "My son went to live with my brother, and now he lives in the same boarding house that Lester used to. . ."

"Mr. Plavnicky," Cellie interrupted. "I called, because I need a little help. I need someone to talk to, about my 'experience'. It hasn't bothered me much, until things started going wrong lately, with my husband and my Uncle behaving erratically, and my parents tied up with their new spouses, and the attacks on those girls. . . You're the only one I can trust, the only one who understands. I'd like to invite you to Collinwood for brunch tomorrow, just you and me. We could take a walk around the estate. It would help me out in so many ways!"

"Well. . . I'm getting ready, now, to work the third shift at the

cannery. . . Third shift runs ten-thirty P.M. to seven A.M. I'll need to change, afterward--- one gets a bit 'fishy', you know! I will be there at nine A.M. Then I must go home to sleep, if I'm to pick Mother up from the church before my shift starts."

When she'd hung up, Cellie realized she had someplace else that she needed to re-examine. The Antique Shoppe---the cellar! Of course! That had been the first place she, David, and Carolyn had searched for Barnabas after they'd exhausted the possibilities of the houses and caves on the Collins estate. Barnabas probably thought they'd given up on his returning to his old surroundings. He could probably leap-frog from hiding place to hiding place, as he had in the past, as long as he could get some kind of a coffin in there.

This was the break Cellie and Professor Stokes had been hoping for--- well, "hoping" wasn't the precise word. Cellie shuddered at the thought of what would have to happen. Still, there would be closure to Barnabas's travails, and he would have peace. That was the most important thing. Alas, the Professor was spending the night near where both Hallie and Annette were staying, the "safe place" with whose name even she, Cellie, couldn't be trusted with, lest Barnabas come to her,

and force her to tell.

She couldn't tell her aunt; Julia would want to go down to the Antique Shoppe right away, to protect her husband. If she told David, he'd also be far too eager to go, no matter what Cellie had planned for her uncle. Cellie remembered well, what her friend had told her, about the history of his own relationship with Barnabas. His long-buried fear and anxiety might emerge, mixed with his sometimes hyper enthusiasm for adventure, and interfere with Cellie's lead-weighted resolve to carry out her dead-serious plans.

The news would have to wait until after Mr. Plavnicky had left; Elliot promised to be back up to Collinwood around one P.M.. By then, Cellie would be free to leave Sarah Teresa with Mrs. Johnson and Julia, and take the fatal ride with the Professor. With any luck, this part of the nightmare would be over by two.

Cellie looked at the baby in her arms. Sarah Teresa had been quiet through her mother's talk with Tony, and the phone call to Mr. Plavnicky. Now, she became agitated once more. "Meh-meh! Tees 'awn DJeh-djeh, Djeh-djeh! Go Biss-Biss! Biss-Biss!" Cellie carried her back to Mrs. Johnson's rocking chair.

* * * * * * * * * * *

CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE

Cellie spent an interesting morning with Mr. Plavnicky. The surprisingly cultured cannery foreman was overwhelmed by his first visit to the Great House. He cornered Roger, who politely tried to escape the guest's seemingly-inexhautible stream-of-consciousness chatter, and his estimates of the age and value of the many Collins family heirlooms. Cellie managed to forestall her guest, before he would have mentioned having seen Barnabas the morning before, or asking if he'd returned home yet. As she led Mr.Plavnicky to the kitchen, she quickly explained that her uncle had returned just after their phone conversation, nursing a cold, so that he wouldn't be coming downstairs this morning. Fortunately, nobody else mentioned Barnabas in his presence. They were all too full of the sadness of his absence, to speak of him in front of a stranger.

Mrs. Johnson, who was acquainted with the entire Plavnicky clan, shook her head at Cellie's choice of a guest; still, at least Charles Plavnicky wasn't Lester Arliss. He had a larger appetite, though. Within a half hour, he consumed three eggs, four pieces of toast, a bowl of warmed-over chicken soup, a sausage link or two, and two large mugs full of black coffee. "Where does he put it all?" the housekeeper wondered, as she observed the thin man. "It probably jams up on its way around his heart. No wonder he had that heart attack. Some people never learn," she thought with disdain.

Cellie was eager to get Mr. Plavnicky out of the house. She left Sarah Teresa in her baby seat, chattering to her Teddy bear and Mrs. Johnson, linked her arm in Plavnicky's, and led him out to the terrace, just as Julia came down to the kitchen. "Who's that with Cellie?" Julia asked Mrs. Johnson.

"Oh, just a stray dog she's befriended," the housekeeper replied, sarcasm in her tone. "Chuck Plavnicky. Works at the cannery, going on thirty-five years, already. He was one of my late husband's greatest drinking buddies. Goodness, he was EVERYBODY'S greatest drinking buddy for years, until he had a heart attack and his wife passed on. Now, he's some kind of religious nut. I guess Cellie needs someone else to talk to, since Pavlos isn't feeling well after trying to help Annette. Dear Lord, Julia, when I hear about such things, it takes me back. . . back to a time I've prayed we would never have to revisit. All I can say is, thank God Willie's not here, to catch the blame for anything like that. I wish Mr. Barnabas would turn up, safe and well."

"So do I, Mrs. Johnson," Julia sighed, her hand instinctively seeking her middle, which, the housekeeper observed, had a noticeable roundness.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have mentioned---I never know what to say,

anymore. . ."

"That's okay, Mrs. Johnson. You know, when I feel him moving

inside, I get a little strength. It's like Barnabas is sending me a message through our son---"

"So you think it'll be a boy?"

"I don't have to think. I KNOW."

"Now, I hope you don't mind me saying so, Julia, but you shouldn't set yourself up for a disappointment. You'll surely be glad with whatever the Lord sends you, so long as he or she is healthy. We're all doing our best to see that comes about. Plus, if you're counting on signs, like carrying high, to tell you what you're having,

I can tell you from personal experience, it doesn't always work out

that way. When I was expecting the first time, everybody from my grandmother down told me it would surely be a girl. She even did the needle-on-a-string over my palm! But lo, and behold, my Harry was born. The same kind of mistake happened the second time, and I had my Phyllis."

"It just goes to show, you're unique among mothers, Mrs. Johnson," Julia said, a sad smile lighting her face.

"Or that my Phil drank so much, he even managed to get that sort of thing backwards," Mrs. Johnson joked. "It's good to see you smile, Julia. You keep smiling. It's good for the baby. That's one piece of advice my grandmother gave me that I could always trust."

* * * * * * * * * * *

Just outside, Cellie took Mr. Plavnicky directly to the pathway that overlooked the Henderson Place. Along the way, she breathlessly explained what she wanted him to do. "You don't have to go anywhere," she said. "Just stand here, and watch me. If you see anything, signal." She handed him her binoculars. "Even if you see the curtains rustle, let me know."

"So this is what you believe your vision told you to do?"

"Mr. Plavnicky, we both believe people have these Near-Death Experiences for a reason, to clean up their lives, to take care of unfinished business, to perform a meaningful action that will benefit others. . . There's something coming this way, something evil. . . You've lived here all your life. You remember the events of several years ago. . ."

"Indeed I do. My niece was molested by whoever committed all those crimes, by whoever took Maggie Evans. . . I want you to know, I, for one, NEVER thought your husband had anything to do with that incident, Cecily. People who come from outside, who are different, who may have some bad habits, are always the first suspects in such affairs, and yet, one usually finds the true culprit in one's own backyard, so to speak. But then, you have reason to know that, yourself. I suspect the person hurting these girls is the same as whoever did the same thing, years ago. He's been in our backyard all along, and we were just missing the signs. I wonder what set him off this time?" Mr, Plavnicky mused. "What a question! If we only knew what set him off the first time! Do you think that whoever lives in that house has something to do with these events? If so, perhaps you should have called Lester Arliss,

uncomfortable as that might make you."

"No, not exactly," Cellie replied. "A friend of mine is in that house. She ran away because she was hurt. But she ran to the wrong person, someone who takes advantage of vulnerabilities. . . I hesitate to tell you more, lest you end up in danger. I have reason to believe she will want to leave at some point. She may need help getting away---"

"Is it a cult? Perhaps a de-programmer would be of service. There's a very famous one making the rounds, who charges on a sliding scale if you're poor. I could ask Reverend Brand," Mr. Plavnicky offered.

"Maybe an exorcist would be more useful. . ." Cellie mused. "Never mind that. The fewer people involved, the better. Her family is terribly concerned, but they don't want a splashy scandal, or a lawsuit. I just need to scope out the exits, and report back to them. They'll do the rest."

"This person doesn't have a gun or anything?"

"No. I'll be okay. But watch me." Cellie ran down the hill to a

group of bushes near the gate. She looked back up at Mr. Plavnicky, who

had moved back a little, so that he wouldn't be as visible from the Henderson House. He saw her, and gave her the "thumb up" signal.

Cellie cautiously slid around the bushes, and, after watching the windows, dashed to the side of the house. She had her back to the clapboards, moving to the rear of the house, when she saw what looked like a flashbulb on the hill. She guessed it was Plavnicky, signalling by reflecting the sunlight on the binocular lenses. He must have seen something. She suddenly realized she was under a window. She heard noises in the house through the window. She hoped nobody in the house had seen the flash. She heard the noise of the window being opened.

She skittered down a short stone staircase, which led to a cellar door. The door, large, and made of heavy metal, was flush to the granite wall, with no doorknob, or visible lock. Cellie decided the door was a very recent addition to the house.

She peeked up timidly from where she crouched on the cellar steps.

A blonde woman was looking out the window. Not Carolyn, but. . . Anissa! Cellie heard her call behind her. "No, Nicholas, there's nothing out here. Check your mirrors first, before you interrupt my preparations."

Preparations for what? Cellie wondered. A ritual of some kind? Or a new trick to injure the Collinses and all their friends? She tried to figure it out, as she came out of the cellar area, and edged her way down a small gully that suddenly sank behind the house. Cellie almost fell, then righted herself. She glanced back up the hill. She could barely make out Mr. Plavnicky, who seemed to be looking for her. She waved. She could see his head bob in acknowledgement. Then, she slowly crawled down the embankment.

She passed another, smaller, older door cut into the foundation. Perhaps it was a storage closet, but Cellie remembered that old houses had a variety of differently-sized exits and entrances, especially those built during periods of Indian raids and religious unrest. Perhaps the tiny door led to a secret passage or a hiding place. Cellie knew that some of the Hendersons had been in the slave trade, but then, so had a couple of the Collinses. Yet they'd managed to produce an Abijah Collins who was an abolitionist (however tainted with mendacity) with his own stop on the Underground Railroad.

The tiny door had a knob, which she tried. Of course, it was locked, so tight that when she tried to shake the door, it barely jiggled; it was sealed as though glued to the house. She moved down, to where she could see the garage. Her heart nearly stopped as she watched the closest of the three bays open. She jumped behind a cluster of rhododendrons.

She saw Anissa backing her flashy sportscar out of the garage. The vehicle must have had automatic windows; the glass pane slid silently into the driver's-side door, as Anissa stuck out her hand, which held a small remote control. "Wow, what a damn show-off, when, as far as she knows, nobody's watching," Cellie thought.

Before the garage door came down all the way, though, Cellie saw Nicholas emerging from one of two doors she glimpsed at the far end of the garage's interior. He went right up to Anissa's window, and appeared to berate her in harsh whispers. She held up what appeared to be a hatbox. Then, Nicholas ducked back under the half-closed garage door. Cellie observed that he took the left-hand door, nearest to where she stood. When he opened it, she could see furniture. She supposed the other door led to the cellar. Before the automatic garage door snapped shut, flush to the driveway, Cellie noticed something else, beyond the sleek Black Mercedes in the middle bay. A flash of

yellow. . . Carolyn's car was there, all right.

She made a quick survey of the other side of the house. Fortunately, past generations of Hendersons had favored a vast quantity and considerable variety of greenery in their yard, which provided excellent cover. She noticed an oddly-shaped ridge that ran across the front yard almost to the other side of the garage, like one of those grass-covered underground tombs the Indians built. It appeared

as though the knoll extended to precisely behind where that "cellar" door was. She wanted to follow its line to the other end, but it would have involved running into the open.

After, Cellie had to find a way to rejoin Mr. Plavnicky, without being seen. She ran from bush to bush to the dirt road at the foot of the driveway. She ran up to the end, below Widow's Hill. It was there, she made another discovery--- a set of doors seemingly built into an embankment, nearly concealed by bushes. There was a big lock holding the doors together. The ridge she'd observed came to an end, just above them.

Cellie mounted the old stone steps to the Widow's Hill lookout, ran down the pathway away from the cliff, and met Mr. Plavnicky as he trudged toward her from his own hiding place.

"Dear Lord, Cecily," he gasped. "I thought they got hold of you, God Forbid." His lips were turning blue, and he clutched at his chest. "Oh, Jesus, no. . ." he whispered. "It's not time yet, it's not

time. . . Mother. . ." Mr. Plavnicky collapsed at Cellie's feet.

Cellie fell upon him with a cry, as she searched for a heartbeat, a sign of respiration. There was none. There was no time to panic, no time to get help--- She had a vague memory of having seen a demonstration of that new method of reviving heart-attack victims. There was a risk she might screw it up, that she might break his ribs or jump on his solar plexus. . . She had no choice, but to try. She had her empathism to help her sense any damage she might cause. She just prayed she could stand giving him mouth-to-mouth. . .

She ran her fingers down his breast-bone, to what she hoped was the proper place. Was it two inches above the point, or one? She put her fingers on her own chest, to feel her own heartbeat. Two inches seemed right. Before she knitted her fingers over his chest, she tried mouth-to-mouth. She tasted coffee-breath. "Yuck," she thought, but managed to fill his lungs like a fireplace bellows.

Push and pump, inhale, exhale, every now and then, breaking to shout for help. . . Cellie faltered a couple of times, when she felt a pain in her chest that corresponded with some mistake she was making in positioning her hands on her friend's chest. She concentrated on transferring some of her own energy with each jab. She sweated profusely, which chilled her to the bone, but she persisted. After what seemed like an hour (when Cellie checked her watch, she was surprised to

find that only ten minutes had gone by), Mr. Plavnicky's blue lips turned salmon-pink. Cellie put her ear to his chest. She almost died with relief when she heard a faint thumping. His chest moved up and down, haltingly.

She hated to leave him lying on the path like that, to run back to the house to call an ambulance. Fortunately, Mr, Plavnicky was in a place where he couldn't be seen from the Henderson house, and it was a warm day for late March.

He was fully awake, and sitting, when Cellie (bearing Sarah Teresa), Mrs. Johnson, and Julia ran up to him, to tell him the ambulance was coming. Julia tried to examine him, but he waved her off gently.

"Please," he said, "I have just been on another amazing journey. Fortunately, your dear niece rescued me before I entered the point of no return." He smiled up into Cellie's tear-stained face. "Don't cry, anymore, Cecily. When I was traveling, I thought I heard God's voice. He was telling me that the next time I show up on His doorstep, there would be a place for me, but not today."

"It's your diet that will grease the skids to His doorstep, you old fool", Mrs. Johnson warned. "Imagine, scaring all of us half-to-death like that, and it's your own fault."

"No, it's mine," Cellie mourned.

"It's my fault, I admit it," Mr. Plavnicky said. "I just hope I'll be out of the hospital in time to intercept Mother's bus."

Elliot Stokes drove up behind the ambulance. When the attendants

had deposited the protesting Mr. Plavnicky in the back, and drove it away, the Professor got out of his own car, and joined Cellie, who was holding her baby, and still sniffling, as she talked earnestly to Julia.

"It IS my fault he almost died!" she sobbed. "I just needed a spotter, to keep an eye on me while I prowled around Nicholas's place. I had him pumped full of bull that it was part of God's plan, because we both had near-death-experiences, and we must have survived for a reason. Okay, so maybe, his downing all those eggs didn't help matters much, but how do I know if Nicholas or Anissa saw us, and zapped him?"

"It is an interesting coincidence," Elliot said.

"Interesting!" Julia exclaimed. "Cellie, you mustn't try to involve anyone else in our troubles, even though our troubles may soon be theirs. You don't have enough experience to judge when it's time to call in total strangers. We have far too many strangers involved already, including hostile strangers like Lester Arliss."

"Aunt Jule, what else can I do? I don't want anyone to get killed, like they did years ago. I don't want Mr. Plavnicky, or Pavlos, or anyone else to be my Dave Woodard---" Cellie stopped abruptly, when she saw her aunt blanch. "Oh, God, I'm sorry I tossed that up. . . I don't know what to do, I admit it. It seems like our army is being broken up from the inside. And it's all falling on me. . . Why is this happening? Why are we smack in the middle of this big old world full of people, and yet there's nowhere to run, no-one else to turn to?"

"That's the way it always seems, even when it's commonplace

troubles," Julia replied. "I ran a whole hospital full of people who were alone."

Elliot said, "Maybe it's because the world is too full of individuals, who've used the last million years of evolution closing their senses to some universal inner call. You've observed the orderly activities of ant colonies. You've seen how geese gather together to fly South, in a tight formation. You've read about groups of apes with complex social systems that require no speech. You still see pockets of vanishing human tribes, lost in a jungle or a desert somewhere, who run their lives according to an almost instinctual, seamless set of ancient rules. It is from such groups that the esoteric arts come, from people whose daily lives are so orderly, and so devoid of material distractions, that they can allow their minds and senses to receive

the essential messages that defeat the isolation of individualism."

"You've brought people together for a common cause before, Cellie," Julia said. "But that was because the problems were easily understandable in simple, material, human terms. What person with a spark of decency wouldn't stop to assist a helpless baby, or a troubled soldier who did his best, or a confused woman coerced into making a drastic decision about her pregnancy? It's when you get into the supernatural end, that which can be just as real as the natural world, but harder for everyone to accept, because it isn't easily explainable according to the rules they understand. . . Because they can't, or won't open themselves to the possibilities, good as well as bad. . ."

"Even when there's a kind of inner knowledge that they're living in a place where these things are more than possible---" Cellie broke off.

"Some people lose themselves in denial, in order to survive," Julia said. "Some immerse themselves in religion, thinking it will make them immune, or even superior. Some simply cringe in fear of any unknown. Many feel bound to this place, because their ancestors lived here for three hundred years. . . They can't break away, and yet, they can't face that they're living their lives in a vortex. Such denial isn't permitted to us."

"Neither is relief," Cellie commented sadly.

"Certainly, not to the reliever," Elliot commented, as he patted Cellie's shoulder.

"Well, I'm all done in for now," Julia said. "I need to lie down for a while. Call me if anything changes," she sighed, as she headed indoors, to the lift mounted near the grand staircase.

Cellie tugged on Elliot's arm. "At least cultivating Charles Plavnicky wasn't a total waste," she said. "I saw Carolyn's car in Nicholas's garage. She isn't going anywhere else soon. I saw Anissa again, driving off on some unGodly errand, I'm sure. Nicholas himself came outside to see her off. I noticed what's probably a secret entrance to a lower level of the Henderson house. And, most important, Charles said he saw Barnabas."

"Saw him where?"

"At the Antique Shoppe, very early yesterday morning, before the crack of dawn! Carolyn and I looked there when he first disappeared, as soon as we couldn't find him on the estate. The building has a huge cellar with a passage that runs the length of the backyard, with an exit through the shed. When we covered that, we gave up, thinking he wouldn't dare take a chance staying there. I guess we were wrong."

"Then, we must go there right away, Cellie. I'm terribly sorry."

"I know," she sighed. "There's just one place we have to visit, before we do the deed. I saw Pavlos yesterday, and he was still in a terrible state, after the attack. I knew right away, that he'd seen Barnabas, his denials to the contrary. I tried to read him, to pry at the root of his trauma. He blocked me! He never did that before. There was a huge, violet-blue block---"

"There's something I didn't tell you, Cellie. It was supposed to be between Pavlos and myself," the Professor said, shame-faced. "You see, just before I took Hallie away, Pavlos visited her. He wasn't supposed to, but he read her anyway. He removed, and absorbed the dormant summons of the vampire. He must have followed that call. I would surmise that when Barnabas realized his summons wasn't going to be answered by Hallie, he went after Annette, only to be stopped by Pavlos."

"And when Barnabas learned what Pavlos was up to, he beat him up, like he used to beat Will!" Cellie concluded. "Oh, God, Professor! Pavlos is his slave, only he couldn't have been bitten, or they would have noticed at the hospital the other night."

"Barnabas can influence someone, even without blood contact," the

Professor explained. "You know how he's intimidated your husband for years, long after the original curse was terminated. Barnabas has a very powerful personality of his own that feeds into the total capacity for domination that's an essential component of vampirism. Pavlos's empathism may have been all that was necessary to respond to the subjugation of his will. I'm not sure you should try to relieve your stepfather's 'violet-blue' block of total fear. It's likely his way of protecting you. If you absorb the summons from him, that will be Nicholas's coup-de-gras for you. Once Barnabas is destroyed, Pavlos will be back to normal."

"Well, I'd still like to see him. AFTER we do what we have to. Have you the necessary equipment?"

"I have several methods available. I have the stake and mallet, but my fastidiousness leads me to prefer the silver bullet shot directly into the heart."

"As long as you have both within easy reach," Cellie said firmly.

"I prefer the comfort of a back-up method, anyway. I don't want to get this wrong. I've made up my mind that it's going to happen, and I'm resigned to it."

After convincing Mrs. Johnson to look after Sarah Teresa for a little while longer, Cellie rode with Elliot to the Antique Shoppe. She pulled out her extensive set of keys, and opened the back gate. She sighed, as she saw the tiny green crocus sprouts she'd planted last autumn, after she'd recovered from her attack and returned to the Shoppe with her husband. . . She wondered what Willie would think of her, once he learned she had helped to destroy the man he almost regarded as a god. She had supplanted the god, but she knew there would always be a twisted connection between her husband and Barnabas. Maybe Willie would even hate her.

She couldn't worry about that, now. She opened the kitchen door, and, when she and the Professor were inside, discovered that the cellar door was locked from the inside. "That's okay," she said. "We'll go out back. The shed door can only be locked and unlocked from the outside." Before she went outside, she deactivated the alarm system. She didn't want to set it off, to bring Lester and his minions, sirens blaring, lights flashing, and tires screeching, to the Antique Shoppe.

They approached the shed cautiously, even though it was midday.

Cellie unlocked it with trembling hands. "You have a flashlight in that bag you're carrying, Professor?" she asked. "We kept the lights going in the house, but we only left lightbulbs in the main part of the cellar. There are plenty of dark nooks and crannies, especially in the tunnel from the shed."

"Right here," Elliot replied, reaching into Hallie's canvas tote bag. He switched the flashlight on, as he led the way down the worn steps. The two friends snake-hipped past stacks of empty boxes in the underground passage. Before they reached the main area of the cellar, Elliot reached into the bag, and extracted two more items, large, clumsily-carved wooden crucifixes affixed to leather-string necklaces. "Let's put these on, now," he whispered.

Finally, they came into the main cellar. There were several free-standing shelves set up, some with dusty, ancient jars of preserves still on them. The various crates, some still filled with the less-expensive merchandise, were piled haphazardly against the shelves. Cellie switched on the two surviving ceiling lamps. Their naked bulbs cast a queer, dim light, and formed plum-colored shadows over the crates and shelfs that stood close to the center of the cellar. She and Elliot fanned out, and covered the entire area quickly, looking between the unlit rows of shelves. Within minutes, they came to the same dismal conclusion.

"He's gone," Elliot announced, almost unnecessarily. "There are

several large crates that he could have used, but he's not in any one of them."

"Oh, Geez," Cellie nearly wept. "He must have seen Mr. Plavnicky

out for his walk, and decided to take a powder. But where to, now?"

"I'd guess, one of the empty wharf buildings, though it wouldn't hurt to check the houses at Collinwood again. I don't know how we can even begin to search those huge places near the docks. They're all dark, the floors are probably rotting, and the cellars may all be linked in a veritable maze. That's the way they used to build factories in the old days, I'm afraid. I wish to God we could confide in Lester, but I know our tongues will be tied, again."

"Maybe Pavlos knows," Cellie said.

"We must see him, then. You can't empathize with him, but he may

be amenable to some kind of hypnosis."

They left the building as swiftly as they could, after Cellie had carefully re-locked everything. It wasn't until they jumped into Elliot's car that she made a mental tally. "I took care of everything," she said.

Back at the Antique Shoppe, mice who'd feared the low hum of the alarm grid emerged from their holes, and began to chew on the upholstery of the red velvet settee. The rodents didn't need the tiny light that usually flashed from the control panel to find their dinner, anyway.

* * * * * * * * * * *

Janice opened the door to the Koffeehaus kitchen, to admit her daughter and the Professor. "Thank God you're here," she said. "Constantinos has been so logy today. He has a low-grade fever, too. He must have caught something, the night he was attacked, and his system has no resistance."

Cellie went out to the bar, where her stepfather sat, staring apathetically at Latilda, who was singing to the lunch crowd.

"If I listen long enough to you,

I'll find a way to believe that it's all true.

Knowing that you lied, straight-faced

While I cried. Still, I look

To find a reason to believe. . ."

A slow tear oozed down his ruddy, furrowed cheek. Cellie kissed him on that cheek.

"Little flame," he whispered. "My true daughter. The daughter of my heart." He bent his head on her breast.

"Pavlos," Cellie whispered urgently. "Come with me, into the storeroom."

Once they were inside, she closed the door. "Pavlos, I know you know where Barnabas is. I know you helped him get there. Mom said you were extra tired. I'll bet you snuck out last night while she was sleeping. You're going to get very sick, if you don't tell us, if you don't let us help you."

"Please, Cellie. Say no more. I cannot answer a direct question, without the sorrow and pain overwhelming me. It must not be your pain, as well."

"I'm not reading you now. The Professor wants to help. He'll

hypnotize you. You won't feel a thing. He'll protect your mind from Barnabas's mental daggers."

"How many methods were tried on Willie, on Maggie, on anyone who survived encounters with Him? The only method which works, short of more black magic, is ours. You would have to read me, and I cannot permit that. He would ensnare you, my beloved child. You can't find Him, lest He take you. . . Go from me, Flame. I can feel your mind trying to find the 'back door' into mine."

"I'll try not to, Pavlos. But you must allow Elliot to at least try his idea. Barnabas has only gotten two girls, and Jack, so far. They're all safe for now. But there will be more victims. We can't truck every woman under the age of forty out of here. Sooner or later, there will be a murder. Then, there'll be two vampires, and then, the amount will increase exponentially, because we'll never catch up to all

of them."

"He will NOT kill! I have heard---" Pavlos grabbed his head with

both hands. "It hurts, Cellie. . . Yet I know I must put the good of the many over my own good---"

"If we can get to Barnabas today, you will recover, Pavlos. I love him as much as I love you, but I believe if he's gone, even the people he's hurt in the past will be a lot better off. My husband, for one. If only he could lose that sad, distracted look he gets in his eyes, sometimes, the memories I can't take away from him. . ."

"What if Willie becomes what he was before Barnabas got him, Cellie? You had a taste of the ugliness and cruelty he once wallowed in, the night he fought with Lester. Maybe a part of him still needs Barnabas around, to supplement the positive changes you've inspired in his character. And what will become of your aunt? She is very brave, and her child will be fine, no matter what happens to its father, but she will probably never recover from her husband's passing."

"I've considered everything, Pavlos. As you once observed, it's what I do best! It's also what will paralyze me, if I let it get to me. I even have to face that killing Barnabas will have an adverse effect on my child. Barnabas's sister's spirit has resided in her body since she almost died at birth. I have to hold onto my faith that Sarah will understand. She tried to control her brother when he was first released, years ago. I pray she'll understand now. But even if it means an end to all I hold dear, something must be done. Barnabas can't be cured this time. He WILL kill, no matter what promises he may have made to you. And you know, if I have to lose my child because of this, at least Nicholas won't be able to get her." Cellie hung her head.

Now she was crying. "Nicholas hasn't given any indication that he knows that anyone else in my family is expecting a child just like Sarah Teresa. Apparently, my brother's unborn child bears no Fraser or Sisk traits. The world will be safe, at least until another such child is born. Since I can't provide one, that may not be for hundreds of years."

"Cellie," Pavlos crooned. "If you can face making such a sacrifice, then I must. Let the Professor hypnotize me."

Cellie and her stepfather walked out of the storage-room, hand-in-hand. In the kitchen, Pavlos sat before Elliot, who fixed his attention on the glittery case of his pocket-watch. Cellie convinced her mother to leave the professor and the Greek alone together.

Elliot said, "Pavlos, you must transfer your empathism to me. I know your will is subject to another's, and that might inhibit some of your responses, but I may still get the desired information. Open your heart to me, my friend. Let me relieve your mind, as you relieved my niece's, her young man's, and so many others."

"You must hold my hand," Pavlos answered. "I can distract my

mind by gazing upon your watchcase, but physical contact is necessary for the emotional bond to shift. But be forewarned. The summons must not be transferred. If it comes your way, our contact MUST be broken."

Elliot took Pavlos's hand without hesitation. He swung the watch

before the Greek's face. Within a minute, Pavlos's eyes, already dark-ringed with exhaustion, drooped satisfactorily. At the same time, Elliot nearly staggered under the weight of a profound, guilty sorrow. He wondered how Pavlos could bear it. He wondered how Willie had borne it, and how Cellie had ever been able to relieve her husband of it.

While he could still think straight, Elliot gasped, "Pavlos, I only have time to ask the one question---Where is Barnabas now?"

The Greek answered in a snapping tone, which was instantly familiar to the Professor. "You think you can evade the punishment for betraying me. YOU ARE WRONG!"

Elliot screamed, clawing at his head with one hand, the other clutching Pavlos's hand convulsively, as though he was being electrocuted and couldn't let go. Cellie ran into the kitchen at once, and ripped Pavlos's hand from Elliot's grasp. Now, the Greek was panting and rubbing his temples. "I warned you, Elliot," he said, sorrowfully. "It's hopeless."

"No, Pavlos. Where there's life, there's hope," Elliot said in a shaky voice. "We'll keep searching on our own. I don't believe Barnabas can go far away. The end of his leash is still held by Nicholas."

Janice came into the kitchen, and immediately enveloped her husband in her embrace. "Why are you playing these games on my husband?" she asked. "He's very sick, can't you see that? I heard his scream. I had to make up some excuse that he had to move the refrigerator, and the wheels squealed."

"It was I who screamed, Janice," Elliot said.

"No! It was Constantinos's voice," Janice insisted.

"No, Dearest One, it was my soul crying out through Elliot's," Pavlos said. "It was very selfish of me, to put that upon another man."

"You wanted to help us, Pavlos, in spite of what could have been a

heavy price to yourself," Elliot insisted. "Poor Charles Plavnicky almost paid the same price today. You two probably won't be the last. Greater Love hath no man. . ."

* * * * * * * * * * *

CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

Another night; the sidewalks of Collinsport had become empty of all but the most essential foot traffic, especially that of the female population. Those who'd regarded the attack on Hallie Stokes as an isolated incident, now stayed home from the nightspot they'd once regarded as the most secure, the Koffeehaus. Even the sophisticated owners of the bars on well-lit Main Street wrung their hands and wailed that Collinsport was one step away from rolling up their sidewalks after dark.

The only women one saw after sundown were fearless matrons, usually over forty, some of whom insisted on doing tasks like shopping and picking up dry cleaning for their daughters, married as well as single. They remembered well, a similar set of circumstances, six years earlier, when some of their mothers and fathers performed the same favors for them.

Drivers of buses and taxis made a point of dropping their female passengers, and some of the younger males, directly in front of their homes after dark, and waiting until the riders were safely inside. One such driver watched Nurse Maria Fatima Texeira, whose car had broken down earlier in the week, and her best friend from Collinsport General, Nurse Lucy Fedders, on the steps of the Texeira home He received a message over his dispatch radio, a request for a ride from a young cashier who had to get to her shift at the Superette.

The driver observed the two nurses laughing and chattering as Maria Fatima rummaged in her purse for her keys. He fidgetted in his desire to claim the cashier's fare. Pickings were slim these days, with so few people going out at night. When he saw the Portuguese nurse pull the key from her shoulder bag, he drove away quickly.

Maria Fatima was still engaged in conversation with her friend, whom she'd long intended to introduce to her shy brother. Jorge was always using his erratic hours at the Superette as an excuse not to date often. "I hope he comes home early enough," Maria Fatima said, as she inserted her key. It slid from her hands, and bounced off the porch, into the woodchips that surrounded the bushes.

"We'd both better search," Lucy suggested, a little nervously. The street on which the Texeira home stood was a quiet cul-de-sac, with little traffic. The other three houses around the circle were almost concealed by old bushes and trees. Still, the two nurses saw the glow of lights in the windows they could see. They doubted anything would happen to them, not without warning, anyway. Plus, both had been attending O.O.M.A.A., and making great progress at Jiu Jitsu.

Maria Fatima agreed that, working together, she and Lucy would have a better chance of finding the key. She still had hopes that her brother or her mother (who was at a P.T.A. meeting), would show up soon. So she motioned to her friend to join her down behind the bushes. Lucy went down toward the end of the house, and Maria Fatima stationed herself near the steps. Between the two of them, they ran their fingers into the musty woodchips, hoping to feel the sharp cold of the keys.

There was a rushing, fluttering sound, like something brushing against the spokes of a bicycle tire. Lucy yelped, more in surprise than fright, when whatever-it-was brushed against her back, and toppled her, face first, into the woodchips. She pulled herself up, grasping at the branches of the bush nearest her, only to see someone in a dark overcoat or cape struggling with Maria Fatima, near the steps.

Lucy gave a blood-curdling war whoop, and pounced on the attacker, who had her friend's neck in his grasp as he bent his head toward her throat. He released Maria Fatima, who fell, gasping, into the wood chips. Lucy hung from the man's neck as she kicked and fought, beating hardest on the man's lower back. In the distance, she could see a light flashing on over the porch next door, and made out a neighbor running towards the Texeira home with a gun. Unthinkingly, she raised an arm, and called out. The attacker gave a violent shake, and dropped her against the cement porch. Her head hit the rough edge of the

porch, and she slumped into the woodchips.

The neighbor man saw the attacker run out of the bushes. he drew a bead on the fleeing figure, but when he cocked the trigger and fired, the back of the gun blew up. In his frenzy to protect his face from the flying debris, he barely had time to notice that the man had disappeared. Before he could reach the two prostrate women, what appeared to be a large bat brushed against him, causing him to stumble.

The Sheriff's car arrived minutes later. Lester Arliss emerged from the vehicle in time to see the neighbor man who'd carried the gun, laying his jacket over Lucy Fedders's face.

"She died trying to save me!" Maria Fatima shrieked in her sorrow

and guilt. "I was just about to get up, and help her get away!" She huddled in the woodchips, hugging her knees, her ordinary confidence completely gone.

"Maria Fatima," Lester said gently, "Did you check Lucy yourself,

to make sure she was dead?"

"No," the neighbor said, "as soon as she saw her friend out cold like that, she touched her face once. . . Then she freaked. I don't get it. Nurses are supposed to keep their cool, right?"

"If it was YOUR friend, and you were both attacked, and she was hurt trying to defend you--- Would you think rationally, at least, right away?" Lester demanded. He uncovered Lucy's face, and touched her throat lightly. There was no pulse beat.

Maria Fatima roused herself from her grief just enough to show Lester the right place to check. He felt one faint beat, then

nothing. . . then, half a minute later, another. . . "Did anyone call for an ambulance yet?" the Sheriff asked.

"I told my wife to call both you and the ambulance, before I left my house," the neighbor said. "It should be here any minute---"

Now the ambulance came careening down the quiet cul-de-sac. All the neighbors came streaming out of their houses. The attendants fastened Lucy Fedders carefully onto a stretcher, and Maria Fatima was gently led to the ambulance by Lester and Cameron Hurley. Along the way, Lester tried to get the nurse to tell him about the attack, but she was still distraught. In the brief moments before Cameron shut the doors to the ambulance, another E.M.T. was strapping Maria Fatima to a stretcher. Suddenly, he whistled, and said, "Hey, Lester!'

The Sheriff, who was standing outside the ambulance, jumped aboard. "What happened in here? Nurse Fedders pass away?"

"No man," the E.M.T. said. "Look," he said. Lester and Cameron

bent close. Under the light, the three could make out bruises. Not only finger-mark bruises, but bruises around two tiny but deep indentations along a throbbing vein in Maria Fatima's neck. The skin was just barely broken in one.

"Almost what happened to Nettie Cadieux!" Cameron exclaimed.

"You'd better make sure the blood and saliva and whatever else in

that wound gets tested," Lester said, as he got out of the ambulance.

* * * * * * * * * * *

Willie had just finished clearing up the dishes in the patient's cafeteria at WindCliff. After he'd brought the last trayload into the kitchen, he went on his break. The breaks were getting longer and longer, with every good day he had. He had nearly enough time to read half a magazine, now. What he really wanted to do was read a newspaper, but those were forbidden to all but the patients who were about to be released, as part of their re-adjustment therapy. He didn't have enough money on him, to bribe one of those patients, and the doctors' and nurses' lounges were in the mansion portion of the building, locked away from the patients.

He needed to read one, more than ever, since he had a very strong

feeling lately, that Cecily was less than truthful about certain matters when she visited every day. He would ask her about Barnabas and Julia, and wonder aloud why Barnabas, at least, hadn't visited him at all, since Julia was supposed to be so much better, and was staying at Collinwood now. Willie was especially distressed that Pavlos hadn't come to see him. Cecily would suddenly get a terribly sad look on her face, and David also, when he came with her. Once, Willie had been put into a kind of "time-out" room, and tranquilized, when he was observed grabbing at his wife's shoulders as he demanded the reason that his surrogate father, her own stepfather, couldn't take time off from the Koffeehaus to visit.

He got blank stares from his wife and their friend, when he made a joke about Carolyn getting around to tying the knot with Tony, already. The only pleasure he'd gotten from these visits, was when Cecily brought Sarah Teresa. "She's trying to walk already, Will!" Cecily announced.

"Just as long as she doesn't learn to run, right off, like me," he sighed, as he held the baby so she could hear his heartbeat. No matter how agitated or cranky Sarah Teresa was when her mother first brought her into the visiting room, she always quieted down when her father embraced her thus. Willie also felt more secure, cuddling his daughter, and holding his wife's hand, but not enough to say, "Cecily, I know you're not telling me the truth about what's been going on at home." He tried to accept that she knew best about what to tell him, but that didn't stop the series of bad dreams he'd been having, dreams in which he knew his little girl, or Pavlos, or Barnabas were in some kind of danger, and only he, Willie, could help them. Only he knew what to do about Barnabas, especially.

Willie sat in the solarium, trying to read an automotive magazine, but the desire to get his hands on a regular newspaper was too strong. The temptation to form a plot to obtain one was far too powerful to resist. He tried to think of some way he could get into the mansion part of WindCliff. Maybe there was some way he could get one from a trash-can. He'd noticed that the patients who worked in the gardens had to go through a passage in the mansion. Maybe he could get on that work detail, and take a side-trip on his way to and from the gardens.

He found Doctor Emmons at the nurse's desk. "Please let me go

out to the gardens, Doc," Willie pleaded. "I've been working real hard around the inside of the place. You can check with the kitchen and housekeeping staffs. I feel like I gotta stretch my legs more, get some fresh air, and so forth. I'm not going to walk out of here, if that's what you're thinking. I want to get better, 'cause my wife and baby need me."

Doctor Emmons plucked Willie's chart from the file cabinet, and read it. "Well, Willie, I've been thinking of sending you out there, anyway. Mr. Garofalo, the gardener, mentioned that he needs some people to dig a new bed for Dahlias. A crew's heading out right now, if you want to give up the rest of your break."

"I'll go get my coat, right now," Willie replied eagerly. When he had on his old pea coat from his shipping days, he followed Dr. Emmons through the passage. The psychiatrist introduced Willie to the gardener. When the doctor had left, Mr. Garofalo immediately had an errand for Willie to run. "You know where the gardening shed is, don't you, Willie?" he asked.

"The little castle-looking shack over yonder?" Willie pointed.

"Right. I have a couple of boxes of Dahlia tubers left over from last year. They're all clearly labeled. I want you to bring me the 'dinnerplate' reds and yellows. . ."

Willie went into the shed. He discovered that some of the boxes and trays were lined with old newspaper. Too old for his purposes,

but--- wait a minute! There was a pile of recent-looking papers stacked in a corner, for use in lining yet more boxes. He checked the dates quickly. The latest one was dated from the day before yesterday. There was a tear in the lining of his coat. Willie was able to tuck the first two sections of the newspaper into the hole. Then he quickly grabbed the boxes of dahlia clumps, and ran to Mr. Garofalo.

"Thought for a minute, you didn't understand my directions, Willie," the gardener shrugged as he took the boxes. "Now you, and Carl and Pat, take those shovels, and turn over clods of dirt. I'll help. The orderlies will keep an eye on us."

When he was back in his room, Willie drew forth his booty. He hid it under his mattress, as he went to take a shower. When he was in his hospital-issue pajamas, and felt warm and comfortable in his bed, he settled himself in for his reward. He unrolled the front section of the paper. He hadn't really paid attention to the headline, when he was checking the dates earlier. He hoped to be surprised. He was rather more than surprised.

"ANOTHER ATTACK IN THE NIGHT IN 'QUIET' COLLINSPORT!" the headline almost shrieked at him. "The latest in a series of mysterious assaults

on young local women occurred at approximately ten o'clock last night, on an ordinarily peaceful, tree-lined Collinsport street. Two nurses just off-duty from Collinsport General Hospital were accosted almost at the front door of the home of one of them. Lucy Jane Fedders, 24, of Chartville was seriously injured, and listed in grave condition at Collinsport General, according to the latest statement issued by

the hospital. Maria Fatima Texeira, also 24, at whose home the assaults took place, fortunately sustained only minor injuries. She was released this morning, to what is termed a 'safe haven' already being utilized by Hannah Lynn 'Hallie' Stokes, 19, of Orono, and Annette Cadieux, 17, of Collinsport, who both suffered similar attacks in the last three days.

"A local business man, Constantinos Pavlos, 54, who owns the

popular 'Koffeehaus' All-Ages Club, the site of Ms. Cadieux's incident,

has also been injured, reportedly due to his efforts to protect Ms. Cadieux. Information about the specific nature of the nurses' injuries hasn't been released, out of respec