The Vanishing at Castle Moreau, page 11
She knew that somewhere in the castle, Virgie was ensconced in her own bedroom, and Deacon must have found some other room in which to spend the night. The place seemed more abandoned than inhabited, and even though it was nighttime, Cleo tried to calm herself with the knowledge that she wasn’t the only one in Castle Moreau. She reassured herself that Deacon Tremblay wasn’t about to let anything happen here that would sully the Moreau-Tremblay family legacy.
Another bang echoed through the air, and Cleo gripped the doorjamb. She glanced at her watch. Just past two o’clock in the morning. There shouldn’t be anyone moving about. But then she was awake, wasn’t she?
A glass of milk might help in calming her nerves. As a child, milk had been her go-to—before she was taught other ways to dull her senses. It was Grandma’s plan to counteract Grandpa’s influence. Milk. Whiskey. Friend. Foe. But she’d never been close to Grandma. It was always Grandpa. Cleo reached for her necklace and rubbed his thumbprint, then stuffed the chain under her T-shirt.
She reminded herself that haunted castles were objects of speculation that couldn’t be proven. Milk had been proven. It was tangible, and it was in the kitchen. She was still wearing joggers and a T-shirt, and she was used to going barefoot. She shot a look toward Murphy. The cat had relaxed and was nosing around the bottom of the bed.
“I’ll be right back,” she told Murphy, as if he were keeping tabs on her whereabouts.
Cleo wove her way through the east wing until she reached the balcony overlooking the main entrance. Its cathedral ceiling cast eerie nighttime shadows. She could hear the ticking of the grandfather clock.
Tick. Tock.
Tick. Tock.
Padding her way across the balcony toward the staircase, Cleo paused, eyeing the half-open door to the left of the stairs. A former study, she’d been told earlier by Virgie, who had reluctantly given her a tour of the castle.
“I put all my father’s things in there, so don’t mess with that room. It doesn’t need any organizing,” Virgie had warned. She hadn’t invited Cleo even to peek into the room.
Now Cleo was pulled toward it out of pure curiosity. She stretched out her hand, pushing the door all the way open.
The study was unlit, but the three floor-to-ceiling windows across the room were void of draperies. Cleo could see out into the expanse of woods—a deep green turning almost to black—just beyond the lawn. The moonlight was dull, as it wasn’t full, and yet it gave enough light for Cleo to locate a light switch to the left of the door. She flicked it.
Nothing.
She tried the switch again: down and up. Still nothing.
Then a low moan from the far corner of the room stole Cleo’s breath from her, chilling her into a frozen stare.
The form of a woman stood there. Cloaked, shrouded, her features uninterpretable. Cleo could tell the woman was looking at her and yet she couldn’t see her eyes.
“Hello?” Cleo didn’t move. She wanted to move backward, out of the room, but she couldn’t get her legs to cooperate. There was something inhuman about the woman. Something otherworldly. “Can I help you?” Her voice trembled.
The woman remained still, unmoving. Cleo squeezed her eyes shut. Was it an apparition or were her eyes playing tricks on her? There couldn’t be a woman standing there—not garbed as if she were from the turn of the century!
Cleo released her breath when her eyes opened and focused again. The woman was gone. The form, the apparition, or whatever she was, was no more. Had she ever been there?
Giving life back into her blood, Cleo hurried from the study, not bothering to shut the door behind her. She dispensed with the idea of a glass of milk. Instead, she longed for the whiskey in her vehicle, but wild horses couldn’t drag her outside in the dead of night to retrieve it. No. She would retreat to her bedroom with Murphy and the collections of photo albums and books and notecards and dusty old magazines. She would bury her face in her pillow like a child and whisper bedtime prayers until all the ghosts of Castle Moreau fell asleep too. Fell asleep and left her alone.
The Girl
AUGUST 1801
Papa told me that Maman was not long for this world. I stood by her bedside and stared into the face of the woman who had nurtured me to the age of six. I was young, but even I could recognize death. It hovered over her body like a vulture over a carcass in the field. It sucked life from Maman, leaving her face gray, her eyes sunken into her head, and her mouth hanging open in a silent scream. Only instead of a scream, it was a gurgle. A rattling that formed deep in her chest and made its way up her throat, a gasping breath for life.
“Bid your maman farewell, mon chéri.” Papa nudged me closer with his hand.
I did not want to go closer to Maman. This woman holding hands with death was not the woman I knew as Maman. She was a shriveled-up shell with bloodstains in the corners of her mouth where she’d coughed it up.
“Chéri . . .” Papa nudged me again, and this time I resisted. It was the first time I recall ever being disobedient to my father. It would not be the last, for I was soon to discover that in my father’s world, disobedience was rewarded with acquiescence.
I backed away from Maman’s bedside. I remember my eyes were wide and burning because I forgot to blink away the sight of her.
“It is not Maman,” I whispered.
“Kiss her farewell,” Papa urged. This time there was a crack in his voice. Yet his emotion did not sway me. Not the mind or heart of a child held only by the grips of terror. Death was a frightening thing to look upon, and bestowing affection by way of a kiss was abhorrent.
I turned and fled the room. My father’s shout followed me as I raced down the hallway, my thin shoulder bouncing off the mahogany-paneled walls. Out of the west wing my feet took me. Across the balcony and into my father’s study.
I found a reprieve from the horror underneath his desk, curled into the darkness there, huddled in its shelter. I could not weep, for I had no tears. Tears were becoming rarer as I aged. Things like disappointment and sadness sometimes intrigued me more than they toyed with me. But now, at this moment, I stared out from my hiding place.
The smell of Papa’s tobacco lingered in the air.
I could hear the ticking of the tiny brass clock that sat above me on his desk.
My hands pressed against the floor, the wool of the carpet prickly and itchy against my palms.
Then, in the stillness, I heard her.
The rustle of her skirts.
I saw the outline of her feet as they stood in front of my father’s chair.
She never made a sound. The woman with the crooked hand. But, unlike everyone else in the castle, she would not leave me alone either. It was both exhilarating and terrifying. I could not see her face, only her feet.
I closed my eyes against her presence, and when I opened them moments later, she had vanished.
Such was the way of the woman with the crooked hand.
fourteen
Daisy
1871
Very conscious of Lincoln Tremblay’s instructions, Daisy assumed she should begin her day with a peek into the world of Madame Tremblay. She could not get Elsie off her mind, and her instinct was to check on the young woman first. Her leg, if it became infected, would create a whole new set of difficulties. What would she do? Ask Mr. Tremblay for help, since he knew of Elsie’s existence and yet had made no attempt to throw them out?
It wouldn’t be good to get on his bad side, and Daisy figured the fastest way to do that would be to shirk the duty he’d given her to observe his grandmother.
She hesitated outside the room where Madame whiled away the hours, pen to paper. How many more years could the aged woman write such Gothic horrors? A rap on the door garnered no bid to enter. Daisy hesitated, then twisted the knob and peeked inside. Madame was bent over a small writing desk by the window that overlooked the drive and the front lawn. Her spine looked gnarled and crooked, but she wore an elegant violet dress like a queen, her hair swept into an updo that was impressive considering she had no ladies’ maid to assist her. She wore spectacles, Daisy could tell, because a delicate chain looped against the side of her face, attached to the brass arm that rested behind her left ear.
“It’s rude to stare at a person’s back,” Madame announced without lifting her head, turning, or ceasing the scratch of her pen against paper.
“I’m sorry, Madame,” Daisy answered quickly. How was she to explain her presence here? “Would you—like some tea?”
The pen stilled. A small sigh. And then, “I told you not to pester me with things like tea. Do I look English? No. I am French.”
And French people didn’t drink tea? Daisy did not know so she sealed her lips. She thought she’d read of Frenchwomen having afternoon tea in a novel. Surely, the English weren’t the only ones to enjoy such a tradition.
“And in America, unless you’re trying to be aristocracy, you do whatever you please,” Madame said, her pen picking up its scratching again.
“Yes, Madame.” Daisy nodded, even though the old woman wasn’t looking at her.
“You are quite the mouse, aren’t you?” Humor laced Madame’s voice now. “Perhaps I should make you a character in my story. You could be the young woman plagued with the pox, who is gnawed upon by rats in the dark hours of night but is too polite to shoo them away.”
Daisy blanched. Madame was no Jane Austen, that was certain.
“Go to my desk, child,” Madame instructed, her head still bent over the paper.
Daisy turned toward the large desk that sat at the opposite end of the room. It was far more masculine and imposing, similar to Mr. Tremblay’s desk. She hurried to the desk, her eyes scanning the walls. She was being watched. Watched by the portrait of a gray-haired, thin-nosed man with a blue cravat, pale-blue eyes, and skin so pasty he looked half dead.
“There’s a box by the lamp,” said Madame. “Bring it to me.”
Daisy tried to ignore the portrait and the way the man’s eyes seemed to follow her. Instead, she swept her gaze over the desktop, settling on the wooden box intricately carved with forget-me-nots. She lifted it and was surprised by how light it felt in her hands.
Daisy brought the box to Madame at her writing desk, and the old woman set down her pen and twisted in her seat to reach for it. As Daisy placed the box in Madame’s hands, she saw that the woman’s fingers, though stained with ink, were straight and young-looking. Her skin was weathered, yes, but her knuckles weren’t arthritic, and her nails were well-trimmed and fine.
She caressed the box before setting it beside her papers. “I suppose you wish to know what it contains, don’t you?”
Daisy did but wasn’t sure she should admit it.
Madame lifted her chin, a smirk settling on her lips. “I married Raphaël Tremblay when I was but sixteen. He was the son of a French trapper, who had married—marriage by common law, not a legal marriage—a woman of ill repute. Raphaël was their third born. He was handsome, and my father did not approve of him. But I did as I wished, and we were married.”
Daisy wasn’t sure why Madame was telling her this.
She tapped the lid of the box. “When my husband died—twenty years after our marriage—I asked for his heart as a keepsake.”
Daisy blanched. Her breath caught midway in her chest, and she stared at the box. It couldn’t be true!
Madame’s smile stretched across her wrinkled face. Her white hair accentuated her dark eyebrows, which winged upward. “They would not give me Raphaël’s heart. They found my request barbaric. One person even condemned it as ‘pagan.’”
Daisy swallowed with difficulty.
Madame continued. “I argued that we keep locks of hair from a loved one’s corpse. Why can we not keep a heart—especially if it is calcified?”
Daisy didn’t know what that meant.
Madame chuckled and turned, resting her hands on her lap and looking up at Daisy with a bold stare, not unlike her grandson’s. “So, do you know what I did?”
Daisy shook her head wordlessly.
“I paid them to remove my husband’s heart and to bring it to me.” This time her laugh was a trill and filled the room. “Money causes so many miraculous changes of the heart!”
Madame’s eyes narrowed as she studied Daisy’s face. Daisy attempted to maintain an impassive expression but knew the shock and horror of the story was etched into her every feature.
“Humanity takes itself too seriously.” She waved off Daisy’s silence, drumming her fingernails on the box that held Raphaël’s heart. “It is in the dark corners, in the places we avert our eyes from, where truth lingers. Truth is not palatable. In fact, most cannot manage the truth.”
Festus dropped a basket of bread and cheese on the table in the kitchen. He had already brought in a steaming pot of stew that made Daisy’s mouth water.
“Give your wife our thanks,” Daisy offered.
Festus shot her a quick look from under bushy eyebrows. “Sure. She don’t need no thanks, though.”
“I would like to meet her sometime,” Daisy tried again.
Festus groused as he fumbled around the cold kitchen, collecting the remnant containers from the noon meal at the castle. He haphazardly tossed a cloth napkin into a basket. “My wife don’t like to meet no one.”
His declaration disappointed Daisy. She’d hoped that perhaps she could befriend Festus’s wife, who had to be an older woman. Perhaps find a kindred soul in a castle filled with dark, brooding characters—one of whom had paid others to remove her late husband’s heart, and another who had hired a woman under the guise of a maid to spy on his own grandmother.
Festus himself was no parcel of joy, and even now the storm clouds on his face made Daisy bite her tongue. “Make sure you get some soup into Elsie,” he admonished.
Daisy startled, locking eyes with Festus. Not only had he also become aware of Elsie’s presence in the servants’ quarters but he knew her name!
His chuckle was congested with age. “You think you’re a mite sneaky, eh? This place has eyes, girl, and don’t you forget it.”
Daisy frantically searched for something to say, something to convince Festus that Elsie wouldn’t get in their way.
“She is injured,” Daisy began.
“I know.” Festus gave a nod. “There’s a poultice in the basket there my wife made up. Bind it around her wound. It will help keep out the pus.”
“Th-thank you,” Daisy said helplessly.
Festus waved a knobby hand toward the stairs that led to the lower servants’ quarters off the kitchen. “She don’t belong here. Once she can walk, she goes home. I know her brother ain’t here, but she goes home all the same.”
Daisy opened her mouth to reply, then snapped it shut.
“Speak your mind,” Festus barked.
Daisy considered whether to question him. She’d promised Elsie after all. Or perhaps not promised, but she’d heard the plea and was hard-pressed to ignore it despite her own misgivings. “Did you know Elsie’s friend, Hester May?”
Festus’s head shot up so fast, his newsboy cap fell off and landed with a plop on the stone floor. His hazy eyes drilled into hers with a ferocity she’d not anticipated. Apathy or disinterest toward Hester May’s disappearance, Daisy would not have been shocked at that. But Festus’s expression was severe.
“Whaddya want to know of Hester May?”
“I-I . . .” Daisy fumbled. “Elsie told me she—”
“That this place ate her up, eh? Made the girl disappear? Along with the others?”
Daisy nodded.
He shook a finger at her. “Says everyone, that. No-good Needle Creek gossips. On second thought, you can send Elsie packin’ for all I care. No one needs bother about Hester May. The Tremblays had nothin’ to do with her going missing.”
“I never said—”
“Didn’t have to.” Festus bent slowly to retrieve his fallen cap. He smashed it on his head of thick graying hair. “Don’t say that name here. Ever again. Ya hear?”
Daisy nodded fervently.
Festus grumbled under his breath, snatched his wife’s basket and empty containers, and charged from the kitchen, leaving through the door that faced the stables.
“Please!” Elsie was sitting straight on the bed, her wounded leg propped on a pillow, her face white with terror. Wide-eyed, she reached for Daisy as she entered with a tray of stew and bread. “Please don’t leave me here alone anymore!”
Concerned, Daisy set the tray on the dresser and glanced toward the window. It was midafternoon. “What is it?” She noticed Elsie’s trembling hands.
“You don’t hear it?” Elsie lowered her voice as if someone were in the hallway eavesdropping.
“Hear what?”
Elsie shivered involuntarily. “The knocking on the wall!” she replied in a loud whisper.
Daisy listened. She shook her head. “I don’t hear it.”
“Not now,” Elsie hissed. “Every so often, though, I hear it. Tap, tap. Like someone is knocking on the door—only they’re not.”
It might have been Festus, who for some reason had come upon Elsie in the servants’ quarters. “The handyman, Festus—” Daisy began, but Elsie interrupted.
“It wasn’t the old man!” Elsie’s voice turned watery, panic-stricken. “I saw him outside the window. He saw me. No. This is inside. Inside the room. As if I were to lift my eyes and look into that corner”—she pointed to the far wall—“I would see someone standing there, rapping their knuckles on the wall.”
Daisy wasn’t sure what to say. She struggled to come up with an explanation, something to bring comfort to the young woman, to ease her mind and help her rest.
Elsie shifted on the mattress, wincing as she dragged her injured leg in an attempt to swing herself off the bed and onto the floor. “I will not stay here another night. Not alone.”
Daisy reached for Elsie, but Elsie batted her hand away, leveling a determined look on Daisy. “They’re coming for me. I need to get out.”
