Death Watch (61 page)

Silas tried to reach his pocket to get at the death watch, but his hands were bound behind his back.

There was no need.

His cousin’s ghost began to take shape and crouched by the leg of the table that held his corpse. Adam’s ghost cocked his head to one side, looked at Silas with an uneven smile, and began to gibber and shake in excitement.

“My son lived his entire life in this room until he died two years ago. After he died, he had the run of the house, but that was a difficult time. So again, he was bound in this room. But what problem exists that cannot be solved by the application of learning?” Uncle gestured to the shelf and tables piled with books—tomes of magic and demonology; bindings and protective charms like the ones on the Camera’s door; a copy of
Good Parenting
magazine; several open, waiting tins.

“So here he remains. Waiting only for—”

Silas interrupted, “What became of Adam’s mother?”

Uncle looked up and away from Silas.

“Unable to bear the responsibility of what her corrupted blood had wrought, she fled. Disappeared.”

But at the bottom of the glass jar were bones, forming a kind of nest below the honeyed corpse.

“Lots of people seem to disappear from this house.” Silas said, full of implication.

“Some people are the cause of problems,” Uncle said, looking at the bones, “other people resolve them. I am the latter type. I live only for resolution. Silas, I am a
helper
. It’s in my nature, part of my parenting instinct.”

Uncle began to walk in circles around the room, then stood behind Silas and continued.

“Who else but the most loving father could perceive the lasting perfection a son such as this might achieve despite his shattered form? The form, his body, was a gift from his mother. But he carried my blood as well—our blood, I should say. So you see, by excellent parenting and the vigor in our shared blood, death was cheated for a time, for surely my son should not have enjoyed even a moment of life, not if there ever were a God of mercy. I will not lie to you, Silas; while he lived, Adam was not an easy child. He was not like other children. Of course I tried to make him comfortable, but, oh Silas, his poor tortured soul. You cannot imagine the terrible length of every day while he lived. But I knew it was my task to keep him here for this great experiment. I patiently waited for his miserable life to end, and life everlasting to begin. That took sixteen years—”

Silas knew that he and his cousin were nearly the same age. He began to understand that his uncle would never let him leave this house again. But instead of pleading for himself, it was the Undertaker in him that spoke. “You must let go of your son! Let him have some peace … the peace he didn’t have in life. Why keep him here, as a prisoner? You have to let him go. I can see him. There. In this room, still trapped in the hell you’ve made for him. Let me help you. We can bury him. Honor him together—”

Whatever remained of Uncle’s composure finally broke, and
he struck Silas hard in the face with the back of his hand.

“After everything I’ve told you, you sue for
more
corruption? Bury him? When he shall live forever? Do you really think you’re qualified to lecture me on how to raise a child? What I do, I do for both of you, for the peace of this family. Can’t you see? He has no rest while he is alone. My son wants for a brother. It took me some time to see the truth of it. I thought he wanted a father in spirit, another parent to rest beside him in eternity. But my son already has a father. What matter if I am not yet joined to him in a more eternal form? Perhaps, then, a mother? That, alas, did not work out. But a friend, a
brother
. That’s what everyone needs. Is that not so?”

“You killed your brother!” Silas screamed.

Slowly Uncle nodded.

“Yes. That was very unfortunate. But Amos did not approve of my parenting. He suspected that when Adam died I had not dealt with him in the—
accepted
way. How that infuriated my brother. But who was he to sit in judgment over me, over the dead? Was he become Hades himself? No! Not yet. Not even for all his skill and arrogance. I could not let anyone disturb the plans I had set in motion. For my
son’s
sake, you understand. This is all for him. I had hoped Amos’s spirit would remain here, someone to watch over Adam, but I had not yet fully understood the use of mummiae in restraining the dead. Amos’s spirit fled in the instant of his demise, and I could not bring it to heel. So you see? Even in death he continued to avoid responsibility.”

“Where is his body then? What have you done with him?” Silas pleaded.

“Oh Silas, do not think on him again. Indeed, if you were to see him now, you would find him not so pleasant to look at. Nature, who ravishes all she touches, has had her way with him.

“I am sorry to upset you, but consider: Amos was to me a brother only in flesh. I have never known the comfort of a
true
brother. I speak of brothers
in spirit
. What you and Adam shall soon be. Only spirit endures the ages and is a holy and mysterious thing. Very shortly, you shall know much more of this sacred matter even than I. This is a hallowed business, a thing that most people could not aspire to, could not dream of. Let kin keep kin and let the dead keep the dead. I am sure you must agree this is the best way.”

Silas was now aware of exactly what his uncle was capable of, and the fear-taut muscles of his legs began to loosen with terror. He frantically considered the implications of what his uncle was saying, and of what he was preparing to do. The idea of dying was a small thing compared with the possibility of being trapped, forever, in his uncle’s Camera. This room would become his tin.

Uncle came around the table and stood again in front of Silas. From his apron, he drew out a small, thin scalpel.

“You should prepare yourself. We are family and I love you. I will take care to be sure this causes you as little pain as possible. One brief moment, a pause at the threshold, a mere comma in your life’s tale, and then you’ll feel no more pain, ever.”

In his rising panic, Silas saw how little his uncle understood about death and what might follow it. The walls of the room seemed to press in on him, and he heard himself begin to scream.

Uncle hummed quietly, preparing a large cloth around Silas’s feet, perhaps to catch the blood. Silas thrashed his head from side to side, and the feet of the chair he sat in began to rock on and off the floor, but the ropes and knots held him. As Uncle drew the scalpel close to the light of the lamp to inspect its edge, a great
booming noise was heard downstairs. Then there was another. Uncle’s face knotted in anger.

“Oh, eternity! How long must thou wait?”

Uncle picked up the fallen ax and, checking Silas’s bindings once more, excused himself and went to see who was trying to break down his door at such an inconvenient moment.

M
RS. BOWE STOOD AT THE EDGE
of the salt marshes, below the stick-woven nests. Before her gathered the mothers of the lost, the Night Herons. Out of deference to the Wailing Woman, the ghosts appeared, high in their bowers, in maternal raiment. Tall women in dark gowns that spilled like tattered banners from their nests into the reeds of the marsh.

Mrs. Bowe spoke quickly, but there was little need to say anything more than Silas’s name: Silas, who had brought the lost ones home. Silas, who had brought them heart’s ease and freed them from suffering. Silas was in peril, and they would come. Instantly the air of the marshes began to churn with a great wind, whipping the reeds in frantic circles. When the women of the marshes descended from their bowers, they were terrible to behold. Some moved as tall, impenetrable shadows, cowled still in their mourning weeds. Others took less discernible forms, anthropomorphic nightmares whose features became the blurred masks of horror-birds, beaks sharp and tipped in flame. Many of their lately restored young accompanied them, eager to repay their debt to Silas Umber. These cut through the air as a host of daggers, their small wings edged all in bloody hues, their eyes as fiery jewels burning deep in their sockets.

As Mrs. Bowe walked from the marshes, the air behind her rose in wrath like a mighty wave cresting on the surface of a
storm-churned sea, and it followed her like the tide in flood as she made her way toward Temple Street.

Mother Peale and a host of men from the Narrows were turning from Prince Street onto Fairwell when they saw Mrs. Bowe and the dreadful storm that followed at her heels. The heavy air was filled with frightful sounds. The calls of birds and angry wails rose together into a vengeful chorus, and Mother Peale bowed her head and raised her hand slightly, saying only, “We are with you,” then joined the nightmare procession as it moved toward the Umber house.

Mrs. Bowe and Mother Peale climbed the front steps of Uncle’s house. Mrs. Bowe struck the iron door with her walking stick. The knock rang hollow through the house, but there was no answer. Mrs. Bowe could feel Silas somewhere inside, as sure as she knew her own name. She looked at Mother Peale, and in silent acknowledgment Mother Peale raised her fist and hit the door with it, shouting a name in a voice that rattled the glass in the windows:

“Grey Lady of the house, the mother of the Narrows calls you! Sister, open the door!”

For a moment, all was silent. Then Mrs. Bowe and Mother Peale could hear the draw of the lock, metal against metal, and the door opened. Mrs. Grey stood far back in the entrance hall at the foot of the stairs. Her head was hanging down as if in shame, and it was hard to see her face. She was mumbling confusedly but said to Mrs. Bowe and Mother Peale as they came through the door, “I serve the house—”

“And you shall continue to do so. Be easy, now we are come,” Mother Peale said as she mounted the stairs. She looked back toward the door. The men of the Narrows poured in, filling the
hall. Beyond them, the front of the house was torn by frantic winds risen from the beating wings and billowing mourning gowns of the Night Herons. Feeling the rising wrath of the apparitions, the men parted to either side of the door and only watched as the ghosts stormed into the house, following Mrs. Bowe and Mother Peale up the stairs.

Halfway up the stairs, Mother Peale turned and called down to her folk, “Until it’s done, no one leaves this house!” Below, the men closed the iron door and locked it again.

From the landing, Uncle saw Mrs. Bowe and Mother Peale coming up the stairs. The air about them bristled with fury, and though the front door had been closed, a wind whipped up the leaves and dust behind them as they climbed the stairs. Fear rose fast in him, and Uncle turned and ran back to the Camera Obscura. Crossing the threshold, he quickly closed the door behind him and tried to lock it. The locks resisted him, so he left the door open and turned back to the room. What he saw set his hands trembling so hard that he dropped the ax.

Silas was standing now. The chair he’d been tied to was shattered into kindling, and the rope spilled uselessly around his feet. His fists were clenched, and next to him a form took shape in the agitated air, framed of dust and motes of amber light. The golden thing moved in front of Silas, as if to protect him.

Uncle’s whole body began to shake, and his mouth moved but no words came. “Adam,” he tried to say. Then, without warning, he threw back his head and laughed triumphantly. “See? He has risen forth in eternal gold!” He began to sob, and then laughed again in mad elation.

Outside the Camera Obscura, a great roaring came upon the air, like a train streaming down the hall, and the door burst and
fell away from its hinges. Uncle’s head and neck snapped up into a straight line, and then he fell to the floor, frantically scrambling for the ax. Holding it above his head, oblivious to what was happening in the room, Uncle stood and moved toward Silas through a blizzard of dust and papers that had been whipped up into the air. His voice rose above the wind. “A golden Eden awaits you, and today shall be the first morning of all the world!” Uncle ran at Silas, but three steps were all he took before the furious air held him fast.

Silas strode over to where Uncle was suspended just above the floor, unable to move. He reached out and put his hand around Uncle’s wrist where it hung motionless, held by an unseen force.

“I want to show you something,” Silas said, tightening his grip. “I want to show you something of the world you’ve made and the world you’re going to.”

He clutched his uncle’s wrist, and with his other hand, he reached into his pocket and opened the death watch.

“Let the dead keep the dead,” Silas said, repeating Uncle’s own words. He pushed down on the watch’s hand.

The air in the Camera Obscura became a tempest.

Uncle could now see the Night Herons in all their terrible wrath as more and more of them rushed forward to take hold of him. Uncle’s eyes were wide with what he beheld, and he began to scream. Silas stepped away to stand next to Mrs. Bowe and Mother Peale. In the far corner of the room, a tall woman, her features soft but veiled, held Adam close to her, her arms about his neck and shoulders, protecting him. The ghost looked once at his father and then hid his face in his mother’s voluminous gown.