I climbed out of the car and approached the cottage with a terrible sense of foreboding. A stray shutter clapped at an upstairs window: the hook had been pulled free from the outside wall during the high winds of the past few days, and unless I wanted it to bang all night, I was going to have go up on a ladder and fix it. I opened the front door, and went into the house, and it was just the same as when I had left it. Chilly, stale-smelling, without warmth or atmosphere or any sense of contentment.
The first task was to light the living-room fire. When that was licking up, I poured myself a drink, and walked into the kitchen, still wearing my raincoat, to see what I could make myself for supper. There was Salisbury steak; or chicken-in-gravy; or hot tamales in a can. I didn't feel like any of those. What I really had a hankering for was one of Jane's chilli-con-carnes, fiery with pepper and thick with beans. I felt very sad for her then, and sad for myself. The flickering apparition of her which had been haunting me these past three nights had half-distorted my real loving memory of her, and when I thought of her now I couldn't help picturing that horrified electrical face.
'Jane,' I whispered to myself; maybe a little bit to her, too. Dante had written 'nessun maggior dolore che ricordarsi del tempo felice nella miseria' — there isn't any greater sorrow than to remember a time of happiness when you're in misery. My old boss at MidWestern Chemical Bonding had taught me that one.
'John,' a voice whispered back.
She was there, in the cottage. I knew she was there. In the wind that sighed down the chimneys, in the beams and the woodwork and the lath-and-plaster walls. There was no way of exorcizing her, because she had become the cottage, and in an extraordinary way she had become me, too. I knew intuitively that however far I travelled, even if I went back to St Louis, or across to the West Coast, Jane would always be there, whispering, cajoling me to make love to her, drawing me deeper and deeper into the half-world of electrical purgatory, and making it impossible for me to continue to lead my life. I had loved her when she died, but if she kept on haunting me I knew that I would end up hating her. Perhaps that was what had happened to Mrs Edgar Simons. She had refused to submit to her dead husband's demands, and he had killed her. How long would it take before that happened to me?
It seemed to me that the dead were jealously possessing the living. Charlie Manzi's marriage had been ruined by the ghostly appearance of his dead son. George Markham was growing increasingly anxious about his brother. My relationship with Gilly was in suspense until I could lay Jane's spirit to rest. And God knows how many other bereaved people in Granitehead and Salem were finding that the overwhelming demands of their dead loved ones were making it impossible for them to give affection and attention to the living.
The other night I had wondered whether I would meet Jane again if I were to die. What had she whispered to me, as I struggled under the water this morning? 'Don't leave me,' as if she wanted me to die, too, so that we could be together again. I wondered if the same thing had happened to Mrs Goult. Had she been called by her recently-dead mother? Had she felt that the only way in which she possibly be happy was to commit suicide, and join her mother in that flickering, restless world of ghosts?
Perhaps I was being too inspirational, like Edward. But I began to believe that all of these hauntings had the same purpose: to alienate the people whom the dead had loved from the real and physical world, to encourage them to believe that death would be their only chance of contentment and happiness. It was as if the dead were trying to exorcize the living, instead of the other way around. And whether it had anything to do with the David Dark or not, I believed then that Edward was right, and that some powerful and malevolent influence was at work.
I finished my drink and walked back into the living-room to pour myself another. The long-case clock in the hallway whirred, and then struck six. It was later than I had thought: time seemed to have jumped, the way it sometimes does after four p.m. The fire was crackling, and popping, and I stacked on another couple of logs.
It was then that I glanced across at the painting of the David Dark, which Edward had left propped up against the side of my armchair. It was different, somehow; although I couldn't understand why. I picked it up, and examined it under the lamplight. It appeared to be gloomier, in a way, as if the sun had gone in. And I was sure that when I had first looked at it, there hadn't been such a menacing build-up of clouds on the right-hand side of the picture.
Perhaps this painting was like spiritual litmus. When dangerous events were in the air, it darkened, and grew more threatening. Even the painted waves seemed to be rougher, and the painted trees were bending in an unseen wind.
I put the picture down again. I was beginning to think that tonight was going to prove to be something of a showdown: a frightening confrontation between me and the Bedfords and the ghosts of Granitehead. A squall of rain lashed against the leaded window, as if in temper, and I stood where I was, chilled in spite of the fire, and wished to God that I knew how to bring this grotesque and terrifying dream to an end.
Nineteen
I was praying all evening that the Bedfords wouldn't come, but a few minutes after the half-past eleven chimes had struck, I heard the crunching of tires on the lane outside, and when I went to open the front door, there they were, in their shiny gray limousine, bouncing to an expensive stop behind my used-looking Toronado.
I hooked my golf umbrella out of the forged-iron stand in the hallway, and took it out to the front gate, so that Mrs Bedford wouldn't get showered on. She was wearing a dark mink jacket and her hair must have been waved that afternoon, for it swept up from her forehead in a blue-gray wing, and her little black hat was perched on top of it precariously. She presented her right cheek to be kissed, and when I duly did so, I smelled a heavy Italian perfume that probably could have been used to fuel municipal buses.
Constance Bedford was a handsome woman, there was no question about that. But she could also be suspicious and snobbish and tiresome, and all those characteristics showed in the slittiness of her eyes, and the dragged-down wrinkles at the corners of her mouth. I looked over her shoulder at Walter Bedford, and I could tell by the tight, tense look on his face that he had warned Constance to be on her best behaviour. He wanted desperately to see Jane, and he knew that the price of that was for Constance at least to be cordial.
'I see you haven't done very much to the cottage recently,' said Constance, as she stepped into the hallway and looked around. She twitched her nose a little, as if she didn't approve of the smell.
'I've been busy,' I told her. 'Can I take your jacket?'
'I believe I'll keep it on for a moment, thank you. It's not exactly climate-controlled in here, is it?'
'Jane always liked a log fire,' I replied.
‘I’d like a log fire,' put in Walter, trying to keep the party sociable. 'A log fire, and a glass of punch. Nothing like it, in the winter. It's the most romantic thing you can think of.'
'When was the last time that we sat in front of a log fire with a glass of punch?' Constance asked him, sharply. She turned back to me, and pulled a face that showed that even if Walter were actually to offer, she wouldn't be seen dead in front of a log fire with a glass of punch. 'Walter's idea of romance is halfway between a second-rate ski-lodge in Aspen and the centre-spread of the Christmas issue of Playboy,' she said, stalking ahead of us into the living-room.
'Well,' she sniffed. 'You haven't done very much in here, either.'
Walter said to me, sotto voce, 'Let her settle down, John. Give her time. She's very up in the air about this; very emotional.'