The Lady in Yellow: A Victorian Gothic Romance Page 23

"In here," said the other.

  “What about the deer?” said the other to Mrs. Twig.

  The twins' faces, shining white in the glow of the candlelight, were so exactly alike that they hardly seemed human. An odd slant was coming into their eyes. Glancing at their hands, Veronica saw their palms were filled with white fur now, and their fingernails had grown longer, and more pointed.

  Mrs. Twig glanced uneasily at Veronica who hoped that the horror of watching the twins change did not show on her face.

  “Janet is bringing something up to you. She should be on her way now. You must stay in the windowless room tonight, I don't want to worry about you.”

  They glared at Mrs. Twig as if they hated her. The housekeeper looked taken aback. Her voice went hoarse. "I'm sorry, Jack, but you know how necessary this is."

  Veronica had never seen the eyes of the twins glitter like this before, never sensed that they might turn on Mrs. Twig. Veronica stepped back, but Mrs. Twig grabbed her arm.

  "You take these candles while I lock the door. Stay put. Those stairs are pitch black this time of night.

  Veronica took the candles and waited reluctantly on the landing. Indeed, the stairs were dark. Without candles, one would not be able to see one foot before the other. The light flashed nervously over the walls as Mrs. Twig herded the twins into the windowless room and secured the door. The children's voices bounced around the empty room, forsaken and forlorn.

  Mrs. Twig was brisk. “Take those candles, Miss Everly, and find your way back to your rooms."

  “What will you do for light?”

  “I will wait here for Janet. She will bring her own. I don’t want you to take a wrong turning in the house. Especially not tonight.”

  “What about the twins?”

  “Your room is close enough below. If you hear anything strange, don’t be alarmed. Just come and get me. Everything shall be under control. If you must, just call up the stairs. Let them know you're here for them. But don’t go in, under any circumstances. Do not go in.”

  "All right, Mrs. Twig."

  "And if you see anything unusual, call for me."

  "As you wish."

  Veronica turned down the stairs. Moving along the gallery, she met an unfamiliar girl with a fluttering candle branch that spattered the huge mirror with golden light. Janet followed behind her, wheeling a large covered serving platter of polished pewter.

  The deer.

  Veronica shivered. They passed each other without saying a word.

  *

  Forty-Six

  Veronica arrived in her rooms oppressed by a great melancholy. Fingering the keys to the upstairs room, wondering what she was doing with them, she went out onto her balcony. The sky was so black, it was as if there had never been any rain. Behind the ruined bell tower, the two tall cypress trees rose like horns above the woods. The full moon shone between them, large with mist.

  Profound, poetic humors wafted through Veronica's mind. It was difficult to understand how something as remote and clear and wonderful as the moon could induce madness and chaos. But she was beginning to feel how it could. And it would. Tonight.

  Stiff with tension, she went in and sat by her struggling fire. The Bestiary was on the ottoman, waiting with its great tongue of red silk, to teach her things she did not want to know: Lycanthropy and the mural of Saint Lupine, who was really Sovay, leading her pack of wolves.

  Lupine... Lupus...

  The fire sizzled up. The flames jumped and flashed as if they would leap from the hearth, throwing a dazzle of light over The Book of Unholy Beasts.

  The Bestiary was on the ottoman. With a sigh of acquiescence, Veronica picked it and held it on her lap.

  Homini Lupus...Lupa... the lady in yellow.

  She found a page of the translation with a note attached, just under the ones describing werewolves.

  The Magical Personality

  In order to make his magic more effective, the Magician must shed his ordinary personality for one greater than himself. To this end he creates a Persona, a character who embodies the attributes that the magician needs in order to affect the magical outcome he desires. This Persona, or Magical Personality, is a vehicle in which he may travel to other worlds, a robe of power before which the demonic realm must kneel.

  The note appended to this page was a drawing of a picture Veronica had seen before: a lady in a yellow gown in the jaws of a wolf.

  "I was right. Sovay and Saint Lupine are one and the same," she whispered.

  By putting this bit of information right under the description of the werewolf and adding this drawing of Saint Lupine, it seemed Rafe was trying to tell her, without spelling it out, that Saint Lupine was Sovay's magical personality.

  She read a little further: If over-used, the Magical Personality may overshadow that of the magician. It may take on a life of its own. Such is the danger of the Devil's Work.

  Veronica laid her head back and squeezed her eyes shut. She didn't want to think any more, but sleep was impossible. The door was open now. Maybe she should pack her bags and slip away at dawn, before anyone could stop her.

  A thump on the wall startled her. The dog was barking, whining. He must have come downstairs, desperate for a walk. She would have taken him, but she'd been ordered to stay inside. What would Rafe do if her caught her out outside? Would he strike her with his fist? Would he lock her in for good?

  It saddened her to be afraid of Rafe, to feel this threat, this dread. It was possible that, on a night like this, he was trying to protect her. He knew something she didn't. She'd yet to see how the full moon affected him. It was unthinkable that he might be like the twins.

  What if there were deaths reported in the news tomorrow... of people mistaken for wolves? Realizing how tired she was, she closed her eyes and tried to empty her mind.

  Soft cries wafted through the house. The twins were calling to her.

  Grabbing the keys and a candle branch, she hurried out to the corridor and started down the gallery.

  "I'm coming Jack!" she shouted from the bottom of the stairs.

  With unsteady hands, Veronica grasped the banister and looked up into the darkness. Wolfgang was up there, pawing at the door and whining to be let in.

  A long, low growl drifted down then faded.

  Bang! Smash!

  “Jack, hold on! I’m coming. Just a second.”

  That tune was starting in her head again, making it difficult to think. Drawn by an urgency she could not resist, Veronica started up the stairs.

  “Don’t, Miss Everly! Stop!” Mrs. Twig shouted up from below. "You're not to go in."

  "But I heard a crash. What if they've been hurt?" she shouted down.

  Mrs. Twig looked about to swoon. “I'm sure they've heard you, Miss Everly. Now, please, come down.”

  A moan filled the house, like a low relentless wind. Wolfgang began barking and lunging at the door.

  "Mrs. Twig! I think we should..."

  "No! Come down!"

  Veronica tore herself away, and hurried down the gallery to the stairs.

  Howls fell down from the twins' room, high-pitched and eerie. Veronica froze. No human being could make that sound. Only a wolf could sound like that.

  Wolfgang howled back, and scrabbled at the door.

  The tune grew in Veronica's mind grew louder, more insistent. With a voice that didn't feel, or sound, like her own, she called down.

  "The dog wants to go in to them, Mrs. Twig. He seems quite mad."

  Mrs. Twig raised her voice. “Leave him. Come downstairs!”

  The house was freezing, as if all the fires had gone out. Veronica hurried into her room to grab a shawl. Wrapping it around her shoulders, she looked out the window. The moon had risen higher between the two cypress trees, shedding its light on the ruined chapel and the bell tower.

  The bell began to toll.

  Wrapping her shawl tight, Veronica ran down the stairs. Mrs. Twig's face was a grimace of determination. She handed Ve
ronica another ring of keys.

  "What are these for?"

  “You must help me with something. I want you to go to Mr. Croft. Tell him to come immediately and make sure the windows of that room up there are secure. He'll have to do it from the outside. He'll need a ladder. I don't know why I didn't think of it sooner. But... All of those rooms should have been built without windows. All of them.”

  "But, Mrs. Twig, Mr. Rafe told me not to leave the house."

  "But I have to stay here. I am better prepared to guard the door."

  "The door. Guard it from what? From her?'

  "Yes."

  A high wind blew up out of nowhere, swirling around the house, smashing branches down from the trees. Veronica swallowed hard. She didn't want to go out. It seemed she could see black striations in the wind, flying like a hail of arrows.

  "That wind, Mrs. Twig..."

  "Its not a natural wind," Mrs. Twig murmured, her eyes darting around in the gloom. "It's a magical attack."

  Veronica swallowed hard. It was true. They knew all about such things. “Why must I go for Mr. Croft? I thought you locked the twins in the windowless room.”

  Mrs. Twig’s face was grim. “I did. But those sounds you heard.... I'm not sure the door held out. It's old and weak... and they are strong.”

  “Where is he? Where is Mr. Croft?”

  “He should be in the cottage beyond the stables. Go through the house and find the service door at the far end of the servants’ quarters. You’ll see the lane to Pitchfork Cottage. Hurry.”

  Forty-Seven

  Veronica raced down the hallway to the back of the house where a flight of stairs descended to a narrow corridor with closed doors on either side. A door at the very end opened into the servants’ kitchen that looked out on vegetable garden and a weedy, scraggy dirt lane. Veronica put up her hood and stepped outside. Fighting the wind, feeling buffeted on all sides, she made her way down the lane to a row of spare, white hovels until she found the one marked Pitchfork Cottage.

  As she approached the door, she heard Mr. and Mrs. Croft shouting at each other. A baby was crying. Expecting a hostile reaction, Veronica knocked timidly. The door burst open and out wafted the strong smell of whiskey and the burly frame of Mr. Croft. Even in the house he wore his stovepipe hat.

  “Well?”

  “There are some problems at the house,” Veronica said. “We need you to secure the windows.”

  "On a night like this?" a woman yelled from the depths of the cottage.

  Mr. Croft called back to his wife. “Hold that thought, darling. I’ll be back shortly.”

  “I’ll be here,” the woman’s rasping voice replied.

  Veronica had all she could do to keep up with Mr. Croft as he strode down the lane toward Belden House. She couldn't believe that the wind didn't blow his hat off.

  "All right, where is it you want me to go?"

  "There's a tower room on the third floor, with a row of three tall windows above a balcony. And a room with no windows."

  "I know where it is. Its blasted high."

  "I know." Veronica couldn't imagine how he was to get up there.

  Putting a small cigar in his mouth, lighting it with a snap of tinder, Mr. Croft turned a corner, and headed toward a shed at the end of a small garden. He went in and came out with a heavy-looking ladder that he swung onto his shoulder as if it were weightless. Veronica followed him like a dog, not even thinking of going back into the house.

  When they reached the tower it was cloaked in moonlight, its sinister air increased by bright mists. Veronica slowed her pace and looked up at the topmost window, a narrow black slit clogged with red ivy.

  Rafe was in there.

  "Rafe!" she shouted, reaching up as if to hold him.

  The ivy in the window rustled. A powerful force thrust against the bars hidden under the leaves, making the iron screech. A black arm waved out, then withdrew.

  What was that?

  "Rafe?" Veronica's voice squeaked.

  Fingers circled the bars, tried to bend them, then shook them hard. Snarls poured down. It seemed two eyes looked out through the ivy leaves, sharp yet somehow blind, as if the soul that should have shone there, had been snuffed out.

  "What...what is that?" Veronica muttered, squinting to see more clearly the black paws wrapped around the bars. Shaking, shaking...the bars were loosening...Stone crumbled, and a light cloud of mortar dust rained to the ground.

  Veronica was transfixed. What was in there with Rafe?

  "Rafe!" she screamed.

  Whoever looked out of the tower was deeply silent, yet she felt its eyes upon her.

  Was a lunatic housed in there? Chained with the stoutest iron, caged within a cage within a cage, never to escape? Was Rafe its caretaker?

  A roar broke forth that shook her to her knees.

  "Who are you? What are you?" Veronica's despair echoed out unbidden into the air.

  Then, deep in the core of the tower, a wolf howled, its voice resounding through the tower, rattling the night. The sound faded. Silence rang. The creature's presence was darker than the night that held the moon above the trees.

  The wolf roared, it voice ringing the tower like a great bell. It beat against the bars of the window. Shards of stone fell away. Veronica staggered to her feet. The tower seemed to grow red with the rage of the creature locked within. Stout as they were, would its walls hold? Or would they melt like wax and set the monster free?

  Veronica ran down the lawn calling for Mr. Croft. As if in answer, a chorus of shrieks barked up from the woods and fields beyond the hedges.

  They were coming!

  "Mr. Croft! Where are you?"

  Not finding him, she ran down the slope toward the back of the house.

  A shout rang out as of a man falling from a great height. Veronica hurried toward the sound and found Mr. Croft lying in the grass. Her eyes quickly traveled up the rungs of a long ladder to a balcony under three tall windows that glinted in the moonlight.

  And standing on the balcony, glowing in her yellow gown, was Sovay.

  She seemed vividly alive. So pale she was, yet so bright, that even from the distance, her beauty cast a hypnotic spell. The incantation hummed in Veronica's mind, taking her over, altering her perceptions so that the world seemed altogether unreal.

  Non, no, no!

  Everything was too bright, objects a bit off kilter. Trying to adjust her vision Veronica blinked and blinked. In the midst of her blinking, it seemed that Sovay had drifted down from the balcony and was coming toward her over the grass. Slow and stately she walked; her face, with its crown of twigs entangling her pale golden hair, was as flawless as a mask, her stiff, yellow gown shimmering with little lights. The scent of lilies enveloped her. Veronica's entire being leaned toward Sovay, bowing down like a slave before a queen.

  Sovay's eyes blazed. Her hatred flew like a blade into Veronica's heart.

  "God, help us!” Veronica fell on her knees beside the prone body of Mr. Croft, nursing the pain in her heart.

  When she was able to lift her head, Veronica saw Sovay on the balcony again, passing through the windows into the room.

  She was going for the twins!

  Wild keening filled the woods, the wolves closer than before.

  Veronica leaned over Mr. Croft, and slapped his face. “Mr. Croft, Mr. Croft! Are you all right?” He didn’t answer. “Come on... Mr. Croft… Please! Hurry! We must get out of here. Please wake up!”

  She shook his heavy shoulder. He did not move. She laid her ear on his heart, felt for his pulse, and found nothing. Even his whiskey breath was gone. Utterly helpless, she glanced up at the windows where Sovay had passed into the house, then around at the shadowy, moonlit garden. What should she do?

  “Help!” she shouted. “Mrs. Twig! Someone! Help!”

  A white wolf leaped across the path of moonlight to the lawn, and fastened its eyes on Veronica. Another and another of its kind loped down the lawn to stare. Veronica s
tarted to her feet as more white canines rushed down, baying, to join the pack.

  The wolves were staring at Veronica, their hanging tongues dripping with saliva.

  Dizzy with terror, she sped for the house. Though their paws on the ground were silent, she could hear the wolves panting behind her. She dashed around a sharp corner for the servants' entrance, fumbled desperately with the latch until she got it open and wedged her way in just in time. Hands shaking uncontrollably, she shut the door hard, turned the lock, and backed away.

  Barking and yowling, the wolves threw themselves at the door, clawed at the threshold. Their faces filled the windows, their tongues dripped on the glass. Growling, pushing, but unable to break through the door, they sauntered back, glaring at Veronica through the single window with glowing red eyes. Remembering her night in the oak tree, she grasped her skirts, pulled them close, and sped away down the corridor.

  She heard the wolves everywhere. Their cries, sharp and piercing on the wind, bombarded the house from all sides as if it was giant pot and they were stirring it.

  Seeing no one in the drawing room, Veronica slammed upstairs to her room. Wolfgang was whining. She hurried along the gallery to the third-floor stairs and saw him pawing at the door. Everything in her wanted to take him in to the twins, but Mrs. Twig's admonitions rang in her head: Don't!

  She gripped the banister. "Mrs. Twig... Rafe... Somebody. Help!" The words came out in the barest whisper.

  There was noise in the room upstairs. A high, childlike howl drifted down, echoed by another and another. Wolfgang fired back with a volley of barking, beating his paws on the door.

  Veronica stared up at the door.

  The twins howled again, long and steady, their voices reverberating in the empty room.

  Soft as bees humming an ancient, falling tune, a third voice, a woman's voice, wove its way in.

  Wolfgang went still, ears perked forward to listen.

  “Hold on, Jack!” Veronica shouted. “I’m coming to get you!”

  A blast of preternatural wind took Veronica's voice away, threw her against the banister, pinning her there so she couldn't move. Every spark of light in the house blew out. It was so dark, Veronica couldn't see. She wrapped her hands around the banister, desperately resisting the power of the wind to topple her over to the vestibule below.