In the parlor, Don held the skillsaw but couldn't get the cord to hold still long enough to grab the power end. It was like a snake, dodging, dodging. And then, suddenly, sparks leapt from the extension cord on the floor, arcing like a welder, blinding him for a moment. The extension cord and the skillsaw power cord still didn't touch, were yards apart, in fact, but the power sparked through the air to join them. A current flowed, dazzling white and blue in the air. Don's finger found the trigger of the saw and it whined into life. He wasted no time, no matter what the house flung at him. He made his cuts, post after post. Of course only the posts in this room were exposed, but that had to be enough. Cutting these down had to be enough.
The house's strength was growing feebler all the time. What it threw at him struck with less and less force. He glanced over to see that Sylvie still hung in the house's grip, but it was no longer trying to break her neck or strangle her. It only held her, held on to her.
"Please," moaned the face in the glass. "I didn't mean anything by it. I didn't mean to do anything bad." Don had no pity. He knew what Lissy was and what had to happen to her now. He hefted the sledgehammer and began striking the cut timbers. It took three blows with the first one, but after that the house was weak enough that a single blow broke each timber apart. The whole second floor sagged. The house's back had been broken.
The glass face rippled, thinned, then collapsed back into the original flat surface. Only a shadow of it remained. Only the whisper of a voice.
"Don't kill the house, Sylvie," said the face. "It loves you."
The ceiling above them, pulled downward by the weight of the timbers, bowed more and more; plaster in the ceiling cracked. Plaster dust and fragments began to fall, more of them, faster and thicker. As the house weakened, its power to heal itself, to hold itself together faded and its age began to tell on it. Don cared only for Sylvie, still held by plaster hands, wooden hands. They didn't let go but they didn't grip her tightly, either. They were dead. The house had lost the power to extrude them, but along with it had also lost the power to draw them in. Don used the sledgehammer, aiming carefully so as not to break Sylvie's bones. He struck once, again, again. The plaster hands shattered into dust. The wooden ones broke off in splinters at the wrists. Nothing held her. She was free.
Behind them, the stairway itself, no longer anchored to anything on one side, groaned, sagged, lurched downward. Sylvie looked at it, looked up at the cracking ceiling above her as Don fumbled with the deadbolt. The key was gone from the lock. He had one in his pocket, but he wasn't going to look for it. "Out of the way," he said to Sylvie. She moved behind him as he swung the sledgehammer one last time, knocking the deadbolt clear out of the door. The door itself rebounded from the blow, falling open. Don grabbed Sylvie by the wrist and half-dragged her out onto the porch. It buckled and sagged under the weight of them. He bounded down the steps, then held out his arms and she jumped to him, he caught her and staggered back, turning around and around, out on the lawn in the rain, in the wind, free of the house. He held her in his arms, dancing again, only this time no dream of old waltzes, now it was real and cold and wet and the woman in his arms was alive and crying and laughing for joy.
He stopped. He kissed her. Her lips were wet with rain, but her mouth was warm, and she held him, not lightly, but with tight, eager arms.
22
Freedom
A voice came from across the yard. "Pardon me, but don't you two have sense enough to come in out of the rain?"
They looked over at Miz Evelyn standing behind the picket fence, holding an umbrella. Even by the light of the streetlamp she looked stronger than yesterday. Invigorated.
"We did it, Miz Evelyn," he said. "We put things back to rights."
"House is weaker now but it ain't dead."
"It will be soon," he said. "And we're alive."
"Just barely! Look at you, bleeding like a stuck pig."
It was true. Blood was still seeping from the wound in his hand. Now that he thought about it, now that the adrenaline was wearing off, he hurt all over.
"Oh," cried Sylvie softly. "There are nails still in your head. Turn around."
"Get over here," said Miz Evelyn. "I can help." As they walked around the picket fence and into the carriagehouse yard, Miz Judea came out onto the porch and waved them over. "Get on up here out of the rain," she said. "Come on, I've got what you need." Steam rose from a pitcher. She held a basket full of bandages and ointments. Some of them looked like the FDA had never certified them, but he figured Gladys knew things that the FDA never heard of, so there on the porch he stood while they pulled nails out of his legs and backside.
"Somebody nailed you good," said Miz Judea. Then she cackled with such mirth, you'd think she hadn't laughed for years.
As soon as he could, he sat on the porch swing and let them strip off his shirt and start anointing his wounds with foul-smelling salves that stung and then felt good. The old ladies introduced themselves to Sylvie and Sylvie smiled and introduced herself back again. Don just sat and watched, deeply weary but also satisfied.
"So you're the haint that's been living in that house all these years," said Miz Evelyn.
Sylvie reached up and touched her own cheek. "Not anymore, though," she said.
"I told Miz Judy here, I said if anyone can put things to rights, it's that boy Don Lark."
"Said no such thing," said Miz Judea. "You just said nobody could ever put things to rights."
"The memory is the first thing to go," said Miz Evelyn.
They watched as a man in sweats carrying an umbrella padded across the street to them. "What's going on in that old house there?" he demanded. "I thought I heard such a crash. And a woman screaming."
"That was us, I'm afraid," said Don. "I'm the one who's been renovating it. It wasn't as sturdy as it looked. A main load-bearing wall collapsed."
"That house ought to be condemned."
"You're telling me," said Don. "I'm not spending another night under that roof. I'll have a wrecking crew out here to tear it down first thing tomorrow."
"Wait till after eight in the morning, would you?" said the neighbor.
"Count on it," said Don.
"Can I give you some coffee?" said Miz Judea.
"No thanks, ma'am," said the neighbor. "I don't want to be awake."
"They barely escaped with their lives," said Miz Evelyn.
"Yeah, well, nobody was hurt, right?"
"All of us are fine," said Don. And, in fact, with Gladys's salves going onto his body and Sylvie there in the flesh before him, it was true.
The neighbor trotted back across the street.
"I think the rain is letting up a little," said Miz Evelyn.
"I love the rain," said Sylvie.
"You'll love the sun, too, come morning," said Miz Judea. "Now let's get this poor boy inside and in to a bed. I'm afraid he's going to have to buy himself some new clothes. Everything he's got is either in that house or full of holes and covered with blood."
"I guess I can go shopping for him in the morning," said Sylvie. Then she burst into tears. "Oh, Don," she said. "I can go shopping. I can go out."
In answer he held her hand, and with the old ladies fussing around them, they went inside.
A week later, the demolition was complete. Don never went into the house again. He was afraid that some shadow of Lissy would remain alive in there. He didn't want to hear her voice again. Didn't want to walk into her lair where she and the house might have one last trick up their sleeves. So his tools were a dead loss. The only things he might have missed were his pictures of Nellie, but those were in the photo album in the glove compartment of his truck. So he could lose the rest.