Now she was far more afraid of staying. She stepped to the back door and looked out. The sky was a leaden black-a thick cloud blotted out whatever light the stars might have provided-and in the inky darkness she saw all the forces that suddenly seemed to be arrayed against her.
The priest, whose words of warning at the funeral seemed far more menacing in the dark of night than they had in the bright light of morning.
Jake Cumberland, who had stood glowering from the sidewalk as they buried Cora Conway.
All the people whom Ted had told her about over lunch, people who-for whatever reason-didn't want them here, and made no effort to hide their feelings.
Sister Clarence, who had chosen to humiliate her children on their very first day at St. Ignatius.
And what was keeping them here?
A free house, and an income that would allow Ted to drink all he wanted.
Why had she let herself believe that he'd really intended to stop drinking? Stupid! That's what she was-just plain stupid, like all the women she'd seen on those television talk shows who stayed with men who beat them, and cheated on them, and humiliated them every chance they got. So how was she any different from them?
Just because Ted didn't beat her, or cheat on her?
So what?
He lied to her-had lied to her hundreds of times over the years! Why had she believed him this time?
Stupid, stupid, stupid!
Well, ho more!
Stepping back into the kitchen, she closed the door, shutting out the darkness. As she started through the lower floor of the house, her mood began to lighten. A flood of relief told her she'd made the right decision far more strongly than the purely intellectual knowledge that she had no other choice.
If she and the children stayed here, something terrible would happen.
To all of them.
She found Ted slouched on the single tired sofa they'd brought with them from Shreveport and installed in the small den behind the living room. He was clutching a glass, and on the floor next to the sofa was a fifth of vodka, half drunk.
"I'm leaving tomorrow," she told him. "I'll take the kids and Scout-and Muffin, if she's back-and the car."
Ted lurched to his feet and took a step toward her, lost his balance and grabbed at the mantel over the small fireplace to steady himself. "You're not going anywhere," he growled, this time making no attempt to conceal the slur in his speech.
Janet refused to be drawn into a fight. The decision she'd finally made was giving her a serenity she hadn't felt in years. "It's over, Ted," she said, her voice so quiet it riveted her husband's attention. "All the years of lies, all the years of broken promises. I don't want to deal with it." Her glance took in the room; the reality of the life around her. Now, instead of the possibilities she'd seen through Ted's eyes a few days earlier, all she saw was the peeling wallpaper, the stained plaster, the filthy and broken chandelier that hung from a sagging ceiling. And every room in the house was just like it. "Look at this place," she went on. "It's just like our marriage-everything about it is rotten, and it ought to have been torn down years ago." Ted's fist clenched spasmodically, but Janet didn't so much as flinch. "Don't bother," she said. "It won't work. Don't bother to threaten me, don't hit me, and for God's sake, don't make me any more promises." She turned away, but at the door she looked back at him one more time. "And don't bother coming upstairs tonight, either. The bedroom door will be locked." She left the den and walked through the living room into the foyer, then started up the stairs. She was halfway to the landing where the staircase split when Ted's voice thundered through the house.
"You won't leave me!" he bellowed. "You'll never leave me!"
The calm she'd been feeling was shattered by her husband's fury. Racing up the rest of the stairs, she fled into her room, locking the door behind her. The thick oak slab would keep him away from her for the rest of the night, but it wasn't thick enough to protect her from the sound of his rage.
"Do you understand?" he roared from downstairs, his voice echoing through the ruined rooms. "You'll never leave me!"
CHAPTER 12
It was time. Even though he'd been deep in sleep since just after sunset, something inside Jake Cumberland knew it was time. He came awake in an instant, throwing off the ragged coverlet he'd slept under since he was a boy and swinging his feet to the bare wooden floor in a single smooth motion. As he pulled on his pants there was a faint scratching at the cabin door; his hounds, too, had sensed that the time had come. "Give a body a chance," Jake muttered. At the sound of his voice the two yellow dogs fell silent. Slipping his arms into the frayed sleeves of a shirt so old that its plaid pattern had all but disappeared, Jake lit a candle, then moved to the door and opened it just enough to let the animals inside. The dogs-so thin their ribs were clearly etched beneath their scarred hides-slithered into the cabin's single room, their noses already seeking out the food their master might have provided. "Maybe later," Jake said as he shut the door against the darkness outside.
The dogs dropped to the floor, their muzzles resting on their paws. Their bloodshot eyes, glowing like burning embers in the candlelight, fixed on Jake. As he lit four more candles, lining them up on the scarred pine counter by the sink, their bodies tensed and a faint whimper crept from the throat of the smaller one. "Quiet," Jake commanded. The dog flinched and cowered, but emitted no further sound.
As smoke from the five candles filled the room, Jake went to the trunk in the corner-his mother's trunk-and opened it. Just under the lid there was a shallow tray, divided into half a dozen sections, each of which contained an assortment of small jars and vials. His mother's altar cloth lay beneath the tray, but Jake knew better than to touch it until he was certain which of her charms and potions to use.
"Soon's you unfold it, the magic starts to work," she'd told him when he was a boy. "So you got to be ready. Got to know what you want to do, and what to use to do it."
"But how do you know?" Jake had asked, his eyes wide as he watched his mother-whose own eyes were tightly closed-pass her hands over the tray, her fingers plucking out some objects, leaving others untouched.
"It's the magic," she'd told him. "The magic will tell you."
Now Jake knelt before the trunk, and just as his mother had done when he was a boy, he held out his hands, suspending them just a fraction of an inch above the tray. He closed his eyes and lifted his face toward the ceiling.
"Help me," he implored. "Help me, Mama."
The dogs, unseen by Jake, raised their heads, then stood. As the fur on their hackles rose, each of them lifted a forepaw off the floor.
Their tails extended straight back.
They held their perfect point as steadily as Jake held his hands above the tray in the open trunk.
Jake's right hand moved, hovering above the jars and bottles, drifting first in one direction, then another. In the beginning it seemed to be nothing more than random movement, but slowly a pattern emerged, as time after time his hand stopped, suspended over the same five objects.
His eyes still closed, his face still raised toward the ceiling, he began plucking objects from the tray.
The dogs, their bodies tense, kept their eyes fixed on their master's right hand.
When all five objects had been lifted from the tray and placed on the floor beside the trunk, Jake finally opened his eyes again. Gently, almost reverently, he lifted the tray itself from the trunk and set it upon the bed. Then, his hands trembling, he reached for his mother's altar cloth. Never before in his life had he removed it from the trunk-never even so much as touched it. Even now, as the candlelight flickered around him, he hesitated.
The dark bundle, tightly bound with ribbon of a purple so dark it was nearly lost in the black of the cloth itself, seemed to throb in the flickering candlelight as if some unknown life were struggling to free itself from the confining folds.