I shall not survive this evil day,the first line said. The beat of his ancient heart quickening, Father Devlin read on…
LORETTA VILLIERS CONWAY SAT AT HER DESK, HER BACK AS RAMROD STRAIGHT AS HER MOTHER HAD TAUGHT HER WHEN SHE WAS A GIRL, BUT DESPITE THE PERFECTION OF HER POSTURE, FOR WHICH SHE WAS FAMOUS THROUGHOUT ST. ALBANS AND THE PARISH, HER HAND QUIVERED AS SHE DIPPED HER PEN INTO THE POT OF INK AND SET IT TO THE BLANK PAGE OF THE BIBLE SHE KEPT WELL-HIDDEN FROM HER HUSBAND. A DROP OF THE BLACK FLUID FELL FROM THE PEN'S POINT AND SPLASHED TO THE PAGE, BUT SO DISTRAUGHT WAS LORETTA THAT SHE HARDLY NOTICED IT. SHE CONTINUED WRITING.
I had thought it was the crowing of the cock that woke me. But it was not the cock, as I found out when I stepped out onto the mezzanine of the house that Monsignor Melchior built for us. The cry was louder there, and I recognized it at once as coming from the servant girl, and knew her time had come. Even now I remember thinking that perhaps today Bessie would confess the name of the man who invaded her. But when the babies were born, I needed no confession from Bessie, for the image of the father was clear on the faces of each of the tiny babes. Bessie, who is very strong, took the second one to her breast immediately, and called her Francesca. But Francis-who was my son until I saw the faces of his Negro children-took the second child away.
When I came down from Bessie's room-having tended her as best I could-I heard noises coming from the cellar below the house. It did not matter, though, for already I knew what I must do. The curse that has befallen this family will not be lifted, and I know now that there is but one escape. I know not weather Heaven or Hell awaits me at the end of the noose I shall place around my neck when this paragraph is done. It matters not. It will be enough that I have finally escaped this house.
AFTER NEATLY WIPING ITS POINT, LORETTA VILLIERS CONWAY SET THE PEN ASIDE. WHEN SHE WAS CERTAIN THE INK HAD COMPLETELY DRIED, SHE TOOK THE BIBLE TO BESSIE DELACOURT, WHO STILL LAY IN HER BED, HER REMAINING DAUGHTER CRADLED AGAINST HER BREAST. SHE SLIPPED THE VOLUME INTO THE TOP DRAWER OF BESSIE'S SCARRED DRESSER, THEN TURNED TO THE SERVANT.
SHE BORE BESSIE NO MALICE, FOR IT WAS HER SON WHO HAD BETRAYED HER, NOT THE IGNORANT GIRL.
"I HAVE PUT A BIBLE IN YOUR DRAWER," SHE SAID. "WHEN MY SON MARRIES, YOU MUST GIVE IT TO HIS BRIDE."
SHE STARTED TOWARD THE DOOR, THEN TURNED BACK AND LOOKED ONCE MORE INTO THE FACE OF HER GRANDDAUGHTER. SHE REACHED OUT, ALMOST AS IF TO TOUCH THE TINY CHILD, BUT THEN DREW HER HAND AWAY. HER BACK AS STRAIGHT AS EVER, SHE LEFT THE SERVANT GIRL ALONE WITH HER BASTARD CHILD.
IN HER OWN ROOM, LORETTA VILLIERS CONWAY PUT ON THE DRESS SHE HAD WORN THE DAY SHE MARRIED MONSIGNOR MELCHIOR CONWAY.
SHE TOOK THE VELVET BELT FROM HER FAVORITE DRESSING GOWN.
STANDING ON HER WRITING CHAIR, SHE TIED ONE END OF THE BELT AROUND THE CHANDELIER THAT HUNG FROM THE CENTER OF THE CEILING.
SHE TIED THE OTHER END AROUND HER OWN NECK.
SHE CHECKED BOTH KNOTS CAREFULLY.
SATISFIED THAT THEY WOULD HOLD, LORETTA VILLIERS CONWAY STEPPED OFF THE SEAT OF HER WRITING CHAIR.
NO SOUND, NO CRY OF FEAR OR PAIN DISTURBED THE SILENCE THAT FILLED THE ROOM AS LORETTA VILLIERS CONWAY DIED.
Father Devlin's eyes remained fixed on the last words Loretta Villiers Conway had written a century earlier. So George Conway was not the first of his family to commit the mortal-irredeemable-sin of suicide. There had been rumors, of course. In his younger days, when he'd first arrived in St. Albans, Father Devlin had heard the stories, but he'd refused to credit them, preaching instead against wagging tongues. But now, as the words on the page imprinted themselves on his mind, the old priest finally understood that the stories had been more than mere gossip; that the horror that had befallen George and Cora Conway had somehow happened before. "'For I the Lord thy God am a jealous God,'" he muttered softly to himself, quoting the fifth verse of the twentieth chapter of Exodus, "'visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation.'" But how had it begun?
He reached for the Bible once more, then stopped, his fingers trembling in midair. Did he really want to know? Loretta Conway had died a century ago-there was nothing he could do now except pray for her soul. But even that would do no good, for by her very act, Loretta-like George Conway-had condemned herself to eternal damnation.
The exhaustion of the day, along with his nearly ninety years, caught up with Father Devlin, and his hand dropped back to his lap.
Some other day.
Perhaps some other day he would pursue the matter further. But for now his energy was gone, and his cot beckoned to him. Putting Cora Conway's Bible away, he surrendered himself to the oblivion of sleep.
CHAPTER 7
You guys really gonna live here?" The voice startled Jared so much he dropped his end of the mattress he and Kim were wrestling out of the rented U-Haul, eliciting a howl of outrage from his sister. As she struggled to get a grip on the mattress, she looked up in annoyance at the boy who had just spoken. He looked to be about the same age as Jared, but was a couple of inches shorter, wiry almost to the point of scrawniness, and had a thatch of light brown hair falling over his forehead. The boy grinned at her and grabbed one corner of the unwieldy object. He was wearing torn jeans and a sweatshirt that had had the sleeves torn off. "I'm Luke Roberts," he said. "You want me to help you get this up on the porch?"
"How about all the way up to my room?" Jared countered. When Luke cast a quick glance at the house before answering, Jared asked, "What's wrong? You're not scared, are you?"
" 'Course I'm not," Luke replied a little too quickly.
"You ever been inside the house?"
Again Luke glanced at the looming shape of the huge Victorian. He shook his head. "I got an uncle who says he was in it once," he offered.
"You want to see it?" Jared put just enough of a challenge in his voice to be certain Luke would be unable to refuse.
"Sure," the other boy replied.
Together, the three teenagers wrestled the mattress up to the second floor, where they dropped it onto the box spring that Kim and Jared had already brought up.
"How many rooms does it have?" Luke asked.
Jared shrugged. "I don't know-maybe twenty, I guess. We're going to turn it into a hotel."
They were back out on the landing, and Luke gazed down into the vast entry hall below. "Who'd want to stay here?"
"Well, it's not going to look like this," Kim replied. "Dad says it won't be ready for at least six months."
"I still bet nobody'll stay," Luke said. "Not after everything that's happened." Jared and Kim eyed each other uneasily, reading each other's thoughts: Do we really want to hear? But before either of them could reply, Luke was already telling them, "Sometimes you can hear a baby crying. And lots of people have seen that guy who hung himself."
"That was my dad's uncle," Jared said.
If Luke heard the hint of warning in Jared's voice, he chose to ignore it. "They say he's still here. Looking for the baby."
Kim and Jared exchanged another quick glance, both of them remembering the words they'd overheard at the funeral that morning. "Father MacNeill says nobody knows if it was even true that my dad's aunt was pregnant."
Luke Roberts rolled his eyes scornfully. "Father Mack wouldn't even admit his own mother was ever pregnant! And he sure wouldn't ever believe a woman would kill her own baby."
Kim's fingers flew involuntarily to the cross that hung from her neck, clutching it tightly. "How do you know Aunt Cora did that?" she asked.
"Everybody knows it," Luke Roberts replied. "Just because they never found the baby-"