"Here it is," Mark said, leafing through the genealogy. "Edward Bates, born 1845, died 1915. A ripe old age. And here is a picture of his father, John Bates."
The portrait, waist-length, showed a man wearing a dark suit, his hands folded. The stiff points of his white collar, which was encircled by a broad neckcloth, jabbed into his cheeks. Heavy horizontal creases disfigured his forehead, but all the other lines in his face were severely vertical, even to the cleft in his protruding, prominent chin. The dark hair, which had retreated from his brow, stuck out in luxuriant tufts on either side of his face. It was an uncompromising face, Pat thought, and yet there was something rather attractive about the steady dark eyes, and the shape of the full lips belied the rigidity of their setting.
Pat reached out and turned the page. Mark had mentioned seeing portraits of the two Peters girls, and here they were: arms around each other's waists, simpering at the camera. They must have been in their early thirties when the picture was taken, for if the families had indeed split over political issues it was unlikely that the sisters would have been shown together in such amity after the late 1850's. In truth they did not look much like sisters; Louisa was at least thirty pounds heavier than Lavinia, but it was not only extra weight that broadened her cheeks and gave her face the gentle, maternal look Mark had described. Lavinia was more elaborately dressed and bedecked with jewelry-heavy earrings, bracelets, brooches, and chains. Her hairstyle was a bit too girlish for a face that was already slightly haggard.
Pat handed the book to Josef, who waved it away.
"I've seen it-and the other books as well. This is fine, Mark, as far as it goes; but it doesn't really go very far. All you've proved is that the families disagreed. What the hell have you got that ties this situation, potentially tragic as it may have been, to our poltergeist?"
Before his critical stare Mark's eyes fell. He scraped up chocolate icing with his forefinger, and licked it.
"Just a hunch," he muttered. "But give me time. I'll prove it."
II
At midnight they took up their positions, but not until after there had been a heated argument. Kathy wanted to be near her father. Why couldn't she stay in another room of the house, or at least in the apple tree outside the window? The others unanimously rejected both suggestions, arguing that Kathy's proximity would negate the experiment. To Pat the discussion had an element of sick humor. How did one calculate the geographical limitations of a ghost? Eventually Kathy agreed to remain inside the Robbins house, provided Pat stayed with her.
As soon as the men left, Kathy bolted for the stairs. Pat was right behind her. She lost ground as she climbed- Kathy was younger and in better condition-but reached Mark's window in time to see her son and Josef pass through the gate of the house next door.
Since the houses were mirror images of one another, Mark's corner room directly faced the windows of Kathy's bedroom. From that height they could see over the fence and into the backyard. Kneeling, her forehead pressed against the screen, Kathy gripped the sill with clenched hands.
"You can't stay in that position for an hour," Pat said. "Pull up a chair and make yourself comfortable."
Kathy ignored her; so, with a shrug, Pat followed her own advice. However, her heart was beating fast and her stomach felt queasy. Her view of the two tall figures had been both comical and touching; the slight suggestion of bravado in the swaggering walks, the false implication of comaraderie in the face of danger… They had known that their womenfolk would be watching.
The sound of distant revelry, from neighbors entertaining and being entertained, came faintly to Pat's ears. However, the noise was not loud enough to cover the sound of the front door in the neighboring house when it opened and closed again. Mark came around the corner of the house and disappeared behind the shrubbery. Then they saw him again at the base of the apple tree. The blossoms were fading, and the leaves were young; it was possible to follow his progress as he climbed. When he reached the branch nearest to Kathy's window he was clearly visible, though only in outline. The black shape shot out an arm which waved vigorously; then it settled down, its back against the tree trunk, and remained motionless.
"How much longer?" Kathy whispered.
Pat answered in the same low tone, though there was really no need for quiet. "About fifty minutes."
They had agreed on the time, if on nothing else. It had been a few minutes after one a.m. when Pat burst into the house in response to Kathy's shrieks. Mark had been careful to note the time of the next demonstration. One of the strongest points in favor of his theory was the coincidence in time-one a.m., almost to the minute.
The wait seemed a good deal longer than fifty minutes. For someone who paid little attention to the dictates of time and schedules, Mark had a passion for clocks. Several of them shone in the dark. The two women followed the crawling progress of the faint green streaks of the hands with disbelief. Long before they came close together, at the top of the dials, Pat was kneeling on the floor beside Kathy.
She had almost decided nothing was going to happen, and that Mark had fallen asleep on his perilous perch, when the boy's dark outline jerked forward. The window of Kathy's room, which had been a black square between the white-painted shutters, began to glow.
Pat's hand clamped on Kathy's forearm as the girl started to rise.
"No-wait! We promised."
Kathy subsided, with a moan of distress. Pat continued to clutch her arm. It was almost more than she could bear to remain where she was; on the other hand, she was reluctant to lose sight of what was happening. By the time she got down the stairs and out of the house it would be too late to render assistance, even assuming there was anything she could do to help.
In spite of her self-control she let out a yelp when Mark started crawling along the branch toward the window. He did not try to enter, but remained in a crouching position. He stayed there for an interminable period-almost a minute, in real time-and then Pat realized, with indescribable relief, that the light was not growing stronger. Between one breath and the next-and she was breathing quickly-it vanished altogether, as if a door had slammed between one world and another.
"Where's Dad?" Kathy demanded. "Where is he? I'm going over there!"
"No," Pat said again. "It's gone… I think. It's all right. Look, Mark is waving."
He waved both arms, then slid down from his perch and went toward the front of the house. When he came back into sight, on the walk, Josef was with him.
Pat realized then that her anxiety had not been solely for her son. Josef also turned and waved reassuringly. Then the two men stood by the gate talking. Pat saw Mark's arms move; he always gesticulated when he was excited.
"Men!" She exclaimed angrily. "They know we're dying to hear what happened; why don't they come? I'm going out to the gate and make rude gestures at them."
"I…I think I'll go and wash my face," Kathy said.
Her voice betrayed that she had been crying. Well, Pat thought, naturally she was nervous about her father, but all the same… Then she remembered how she had felt as she stood on the outer fringes of the unspeakable aura. Kathy had been in the thick of it, not once, but twice.
"Good idea," she said, and patted the girl on the back.
She went quickly down the stairs. After the darkness of the bedroom the lamplit hall looked warm and serene. However, she must have left a window open somewhere; there was a draft of cold air blowing…
Pat stopped in midstride, her nose wrinkling. Without quite knowing how she had gotten there, she found herself backed up against the kitchen door, staring down the length of the hall. Both doors were closed. How could there be a draft? There had been none on the stairs. And… no, surely not; surely it was her imagination. It must have been imagination, for it was gone now-the faintest possible suggestion of that foul, well-remembered odor she had sensed under Kathy's window.