“You bitch!” he shouted. “You freaking bitch!”
Daphne was running across the room. She spotted what she was looking for, and dove for it. Her hands closed around Gregory’s gun.
She spun around, pointing it at Gabriel, who was lumbering toward her.
He laughed. “As if you’d have the guts to use that, little convent girl.”
“Come any closer,” she told him, “and I will.”
“You don’t even know how to use it,” Gabriel taunted her.
Daphne noticed that while he’d let her go, he hadn’t let go of the razor. He still brandished it in front of him. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Ben try to approach, no doubt hoping to overpower Gabriel. But he fell to his knees, and then onto his side. The tourniquet had come loose on his shoulder, and a waterfall of blood was again running down his arm.
Gregory, too, was still struggling. He’d smashed his face up pretty bad on that direct hit with the floor. There was a lot of blood. He seemed dazed, and was unable to stand.
Alone among them, it was eight-year-old Christopher who stood ready to leap to Daphne’s rescue, if only Gabriel weren’t wielding that long razor in front of him.
“Such gallant knights to the lady’s rescue,” Gabriel sneered. “Look at them. Pathetic.”
“I will use this,” Daphne insisted. “I will blow your head off, Gabriel, if you take another step.”
He stayed where he was.
“A stalemate then?” He laughed. “Because I know you don’t want to have to shoot. You don’t want the death of an obviously poor, deranged soul like me on your conscience.”
“I’ll wait until Gregory and Ben can stand, and then they’ll tie you up,” Daphne told him. “Unless, of course, you make another move, and then I will shoot you dead. I’ll worry about my conscience later.”
He stared at her, obviously trying to intimidate her.
But Daphne was no longer the little girl who had come to this house, easily frightened and suggestible. She stood her ground. Her fear was giving way to anger. More than anger. Outrage.
“I can’t believe you did all this, planned all this so meticulously for so long,” she said, not flinching from Gabriel’s gaze. “Your body had healed, you had been given a miraculous recovery—and yet instead of going out and living your life and making something of yourself, making up for all the time you’d lost, you squandered it all. You squandered your second chance at life. Your bitterness and resentment turned out to be more important to you than even your own life.”
“I don’t need any lectures from a convent girl,” Gabriel snarled.
“Dressing up as a clown, putting those disgusting false teeth into your mouth,” Daphne said, shaking her head. “Jumping out of Dumpsters, hiding in the tower and Christopher’s closet, following me down into the crypt ...” She looked at him quizzically. “You know, I can figure out how you managed most of your ruses. You ran around the block to surprise me in the parking-lot Dumpster. You and Ashlee planned for me to see you in the tower the night you killed Donovan. But how did you get out of the crypt? Was there a secret passageway out of there that I didn’t know about?”
Gabriel looked at her. “I was never in the crypt,” he told her with a sneer of contempt.
“But you were,” she insisted. “The clown came down into the chamber, and it cut me with the razor....”
Gabriel laughed. “That one, missy,” he said, “was your own overactive imagination.”
But Daphne knew it hadn’t been her imagination.
And as if to prove there really had been a clown in the crypt, the music began to play from above.
All around the mulberry bush ...
The music came from the stairs.
They all looked up. All except Daphne, who kept her eyes and her gun trained on Gabriel.
The monkey chased the weasel....
Christopher let out a gasp when the clown appeared at the top of the stairs.
The monkey thought it was all in fun... .
The clown took a step down.
Pop! goes the weasel!
Daphne saw Gabriel, his eyes fastened on the clown, stumble backward. He was muttering in fright.
The inane little tune started again, and ran over and over. Daphne was certain that, this time, there was no secret tape recorder hidden in the clown suit.
The clown, smiling its big blue grin, its terrible teeth exposed, made its way down the stairs. Gregory, Ben, and Christopher watched in openmouthed amazement. But the specter paid no attention to them. Nor did it seem interested in Daphne. It stepped off the last of the stairs and walked directly across the foyer, its gaze firmly fixed on Gabriel.
“No!” Gabriel screamed. “Get away from me!”
All around the mulberry bush ...
The clown reached out and snatched the razor from Gabriel’s hands.
The monkey chased the weasel....
The clown lifted the razor.
The monkey thought it was all in fun... .
The clown laughed.
Pop!
The clown swung the razor.
Goes the weasel!
The blade sliced clean through Gabriel’s neck. His head went flying through the foyer, bouncing off the far wall and ricocheting back, rolling like a bowling ball across the marble floor and coming to a stop only a few feet from where Daphne stood. Gabriel’s eyes still held life, looking up at her, and his mouth was still screaming, “No!”—even if there was no sound coming out of him anymore.
Blood shot up like a geyser from Gabriel’s severed neck. Seconds later, his body collapsed into a heap on the floor.
The clown turned its yellow eyes to Daphne.
TWENTY-FIVE
Daphne kept the gun trained on the clown, even though she knew a bullet wouldn’t do any good against such a creature.
Staring straight at her, the clown laughed again, those revolting teeth gnashing.
And then it was gone.
She didn’t quite see it disappear. It was just there one minute, and gone the next.
Slowly, without saying a word, she lowered the gun.
Christopher bolted across the room toward her, wrapping his arms around her waist. Daphne dropped the gun to the floor. It clattered against the marble. She placed both hands on Christopher’s head, and began to cry.
Gregory had finally made it to his feet and he hurried toward her.
“We’ve got to get out of here,” he said, in a voice garbled by his broken nose. “The fire ...”
Daphne looked up. Smoke was now filling the corridor that led to the basement.
“Ben,” she said.
Gregory nodded. “It will take about ten minutes to get down the hill on the snowmobile. I can take him and Christopher. There are paramedics at the fire station who can get Ben a blood transfusion. But after I drop him off, I’ll be right back here for you.”
“Yes, of course,” Daphne said. “Just go. Hurry. Though you might want the paramedics to tend to your nose, first ...”
“I think my nose can wait,” he said. “If you wrap yourself in a blanket and sit at the front door, with the door open, I think you should be okay. The fire won’t reach here that quickly. I think I could be back in less than a half hour.”
“Yes,” she said. “Go!”
Christopher wouldn’t release his grip on her.
“Hey,” Daphne said, stooping down to look into the boy’s eyes, “you wanted a ride on Gregory’s motorcycle. His snowmobile will be kind of like that.”
“I don’t want to leave you,” he said. “The clown might come back.”
“No, he’s gone,” Daphne said. “I’m sure of that.”
“But the fire ...” the boy added.
“I’ll be safe from that, too,” she assured him. “Come on, let’s help get Ben on his feet.”
Ben could no longer speak. Daphne wrapped his wound again with a scarf she found in the front closet, and then pulled onto him a parka that she’d found there as well. Christopher slipped into his own coat, gloves, and scarf, and then the three of them helped Ben outside, where the snowmobile was parked not far from the front door. They got him on, strapped him in, and then Gregory got on behind him, nestling Christopher in between.
“Less than half an hour,” Gregory called through the still fierce wind. The blood on his face was freezing.
Daphne nodded.
She watched them take off down the hill. The snow seemed to have stopped, though it was hard to tell, since so much drifting was still taking place. She crunched through the knee-deep snow, shuddering from the cold. Once back into the foyer, she pulled another coat down from the closet—whose had it been? Abigail’s? Suzanne’s? Ashlee’s? —and put it on over the one she was already wearing.
Then she thought of Pete.
It wasn’t likely he was still alive, but she had to be sure.
Taking a deep breath, she pushed her way into the smoky corridor. She stepped over the dead body of Axel and through the shattered remains of the study door. She found Pete where she had last seen him, slouched down in his chair in the study.
“Mr. Witherspoon?” she called.
He moaned.
He was alive!
Daphne knew she had to get him out of here before more smoke filled up the room—or worse, the fire made it up the stairs.
“Mr. Witherspoon,” she shouted. “Can you walk at all?”
She saw that it was hopeless. So, she snaked an arm under his slight frame and lifted him to his feet. She gently eased him onto a small rug, and then, clearing the broken wood out of the doorway, she dragged him out of the study and down the hall. How she had the strength, Daphne couldn’t imagine. But she was able to do it. She dragged the old man all the way across the foyer, past the bloody corpse of Gabriel, and to the open doorway. There, she wrapped him in all the coats she could find in the closet, and waited for Gregory to return.
She stared out into the frigid pink morning. Reaching inside her multiple coats, she found the papers she had stuffed into her blouse. Surely the rest of the box marked M was now burned to a crisp. But these she still had.
She discovered she had saved, quite randomly, one very important document.
From a yellowed envelope, she removed a folded piece of paper. Daphne looked down at it and saw it was a birth certificate.
She saw her birth date, and quickly read the rest of the details.
Born in Point Woebegone.
Daphne May ... Witherspoon.
The daughter of Peter Witherspoon.
And ... Maria A. Mastroianni.
But...
Daphne couldn’t make sense of it.
Mastroianni was Mother Angela’s last name.
She couldn’t move. Couldn’t think.
She stared down at the name.
Maria A. Mastroianni.
Maria ... Angela ... Mastroianni?
She looked over at Pete, propped in the doorway, his eyes closed.
What did it possibly mean?
The sound of the snowmobile drew her attention then. Daphne looked up, and not only was Gregory, still bloody-faced, bounding over the snowdrifts toward her, but so were three other snowmobiles, the front one driven by Sheriff Patterson. They stopped a few feet from her, snow flying. The sheriff asked her if she was okay, and Daphne just nodded. He and a deputy entered the house, guns drawn, while a paramedic loaded Pete onto an extra-large snowmobile. Gregory came over to Daphne and helped her stand.
“Let’s get out of here, sweetheart,” Gregory said, and helped her to her feet.
Daphne would barely remember the ride on the snowmobile down the hill. She seemed to come back to life when paramedics at the fire station examined her and pronounced her fine; then she faded out again, thinking only of the name she had seen on the birth certificate.
Maria A. Mastroianni.
Pete and Ben were helicoptered to the hospital in Portland. Gregory had his nose set by the paramedics, then brought Daphne and Christopher to his house. From his windows they watched the spectacular sight of Witherswood burning on top of the hill, bright orange and yellow flames cutting through the deep gray sky. No firetrucks could get up there in the snow, so the old mansion just burned to the ground.
They spoke very little. Gregory made up two guest rooms, and both Daphne and Christopher slept.
In the morning, they dressed and, the roads having been cleared, set off for Portland. Outside Pete’s hospital room, Daphne was startled to see a very familiar woman.
Mother Angela.
“I heard of the fire, and came right away,” she told Daphne, taking her into her arms.
“I know everything now,” Daphne said quietly.
“I figured you did.” Mother looked down at her with sad eyes. “My poor baby.”
“I know everything,” Daphne repeated, “but I don’t understand everything.”
“My poor child,” Mother said, cupping Daphne’s face in her hands. “My parents disowned me when they discovered I was pregnant with Pete’s child. They refused to have anything to do with me. Not only was I expecting a child without being married, but the father was a man they’d never
permit
me to marry—the son of a notorious murderer. So I became dead to them—unless I entered a nunnery.”
Daphne looked up at all the pain that still shone from Mother’s eyes.
“I was underage. I had no choice in the matter. They threatened to make Pete’s life miserable. I expected to leave the convent when I was old enough, but then ...”
“Then what?” Daphne asked.
“By then Pete had married someone else.”
“Peggy,” Daphne said.
Mother nodded. “I decided to stay where I was. I loved the sisters. They had been so good, taking me in. Not only me. They took
you
in, too.”
She kissed Daphne’s cheek.
“But he never stopped loving you,” Daphne said.
Her mother seemed near tears. “Nor I him.” She took Daphne’s hand and led her into the room. Standing beside Pete’s bed, the three were a family, finally, for the first time. Mother stroked Pete’s cheek, and Daphne held his hand, and he seemed to know they were both there.
He died late that afternoon.
Ben, recovering quickly once he’d had the transfusion, told them he’d been made privy to the contents of his uncle’s will. “It was to have been divided among all his heirs,” he said, “but there was one notable addition.” He looked over at Gregory. “One quarter of his estate—which is considerable—is to be set aside as a foundation to help children whose parents have been murdered.”
Daphne saw all the years of hatred and resentment suddenly evaporate from Gregory’s face then. He walked into Pete’s room and stood beside his body. Ben and Daphne joined him, standing on the other side of Pete’s bed.
“Why didn’t the ghost of his father kill him?” Daphne whispered, looking down at the peaceful expression on Pete’s face. “Why didn’t he kill all of us, in fact? Why kill only Gabe, and spare us?”
“Who can say?” Ben asked. “But remember, he only killed one family member the first time. My father. And only when Dad had discovered his crimes. He killed his son only as a form of self-protection, so that he could keep his killing spree going.”
“So ... why kill Gabe this time?” Daphne asked. “Was he ... trying to make up for all the shame and horrors he’d left to all of us?”
“I hardly think that monster capable of good intentions,” Ben said. “I think, in fact, it’s the opposite. If he’d killed us, there’d be no one left to remember what he did. And killers like him, after all, are all about the notoriety. He wanted the credit.”
“Will he ever come back?” Daphne asked, shuddering.
“I don’t think so,” Gregory said, looking up from Pete’s face. “I think his spirit was exorcised when the house burned. He’s gone. I’m convinced of it. Into the flames where he belongs.”
Daphne wasn’t sure why she was so certain he was right, but she was. The ghost of Pete Witherspoon Senior was gone.
But now, of course, there were other wandering spirits on the top of that hill....
That evening, they all returned to Gregory’s house. He had more than enough room to put them up for as long as necessary. Charlie arrived from Portland, worried about Ben’s condition, and was overjoyed to see him doing okay.
That night, they all ate together, a new family arising from the ashes of the old. As the skies cleared above them and the moon slipped out from behind the clouds, Gregory took Daphne out onto the deck, and held her there in his arms as they looked out over the crashing sea.