Evelyn chuckled. “From what I’ve heard about this place, fifty years ago it probably would’ve stacked up pretty good against the Savoy. But it’s not quite as big as I remembered it.”
They wandered around for a bit, going from room to room, looking at the gutted elegance of the old house. There were gaping holes in the walls where stained-glass windows had been, empty doorways where elaborate mahogany doors had hung, and exposed lathing where rich paneling had been stripped away. Even the bannisters on the stairway had been taken.
“Oh, look,” Evelyn moaned as she peered into a room stacked high with baled hay. “They’re storing hay in the… what did they call it, the conservatory?”
“Looks like a sun porch to me,” Harold said.
“I’m sure Mrs. Hindley called it the conservatory,” Evelyn said.
They finally settled in a small room off the kitchen which still had doors and windows and was reasonably free of trash and wasps. Henry rubbed his hands together. “All right, children, there is absolutely no time to lose. Angel’s training begins this very minute. I do not imagine it will take Haverstock any great length of time to find us. If Angel does not prove to be an apt and ready pupil, I fear our future is rather bleak.”
So they began. They sat in a circle on the faded linoleum and coaxed Angel, tested him, bullied him, loved him, but nothing worked. Angel tried, eagerly pursuing any procedure suggested, but nothing worked.
Then it was late afternoon. Evelyn fed them from the picnic hamper they had brought, and they worked while they ate.
A blade of dry grass lay on the linoleum before Angel’s crossed legs. He gnawed a chicken thigh and looked at the bit of grass. He concentrated on it, willed it to move, demanded, cajoled it to only twitch. He looked out the open door, across the pasture land, listening to the brittle buzz of grasshoppers, the trill of meadowlarks, the metallic screech of cicadas, ignored the blade of grass. He willed it to move without thinking about it.
But it lay as if pasted to the floor. Angel released his breath and slumped back, easing the ache in his spine. He looked up hopelessly.
“I know it’s difficult, Angel,” Henry said quietly. “Your problem is you’ve never used the gift consciously. You’re like the famous centipede who walked very well until he was asked by a beetle how he could possibly manage all those legs. The centipede started thinking about it and was never again able to do anything but lie in the ditch twitching.
“Think about the time at the river when Evie almost fell in. Do you remember what you did?”
Angel shook his head in bewilderment.
“Close your eyes and picture it,” Evelyn said and took his hand. He closed his eyes and lowered his head in concentration, holding her hand firmly. “We were sitting on the bank,” she said slowly, watching a furrow appear on his brow. “Tim was beside you. He said something about how you weren’t supposed to leave the wagons, but he thought you needed some sun and fresh air because you looked a little peaked.”
A smile flickered on Angel’s lips.
“I got up to leave,” Evelyn continued. “You stood up also. I started to go, but my foot slipped on a slick rock. I started to fall. You reached for me…”
Angel concentrated. His face was placid for a moment, then a tiny wrinkle appeared between his eyes and spread across his forehead. His lips compressed and a drop of perspiration rolled down his temple. He began breathing heavily and his face twisted. Air hissed raggedly in his throat. Suddenly he pounded his knees with his fists. Evelyn grabbed his hands and held them in hers, feeling the same pain he felt.
“We’re going about this the wrong way,” Henry sighed.
“What other way is there?” Tim grouched.
“You’re trying too hard, Angel. I’m beginning to doubt you’ll ever be able to evoke the gift consciously. If one of us were a hypnotist, that would solve the problem.”
They took a breather and sat with their own thoughts. Angel slumped against the wall in dejection. Evelyn sat beside him, touching him, feeling his warmth envelop her in spite of his mood.
Suddenly Harold looked up with a deepening of the perplexed frown that had been hovering about his face since they left home. “You’re absolutely sure that Mexican guy was in the barn?” he said.
They all turned toward him, trying to hide the amusement they felt. “Yes, Mr. Bradley,” Henry said. “We told you everything that happened.”
“But I was looking in the car the whole time. I swear he never left.”
“As soon as you went out the front door,” Evelyn said, “we went out the back door. We were hiding in the wash and we all saw him in the barn.”
Harold shook his head. “He never left the car.”
“It may be fortunate that it happened,” Henry said. “Maybe it convinces you that Haverstock’s powers are as great as we said they were, that the danger we’re all in is as great as we said, that secrecy is as important as we said, that every precaution must be taken…”
Harold raised his hand. “All right. I’m convinced. At least, I think I’m convinced. I still haven’t seen anything with my own eyes.” He stood up and stretched. “Well, it’s time for me to be heading back.”
Evelyn walked with him to the porch. “What will you tell Mama and Daddy?” she asked.
“I’ll think of something.” Suddenly he grinned. “How about: you were kidnapped by painted savages wearing nothing but banana leaves and bones in their noses to be sacrificed to their volcano god?”
“They might put you away.” She grinned in spite of herself.
“They certainly would if I told them the truth,” he said and grunted.
“Yeah, I guess the truth is to be avoided. There’s always the chance they might believe you. Then they’d be in danger too.”
He gnawed on his bottom lip for a moment, then raised his eyes. “Be careful, huh?” He took her hand and looked at her with such big-brotherly concern and love her eyes began to sting.
“Sure.” She squeezed his big strong hand. “Harold, thank you. I take back all the hateful things I ever thought about you.”
“Yeah,” he grunted. “’Bye, Evie. I’ll sneak some more food to you tomorrow.”
“Good-bye, Harold.”
He released her hand and walked away through the dry grass, sending grasshoppers buzzing away in panic. She watched him until he topped the rise. He turned once and waved, then went down the other side. She went back in the house and joined the others.
The Hindley house at night seemed to deserve its reputation among the small boys of Hawley. It looked haunted, and perhaps it was. What house had a better right to contain spirits that could not rest? Will Hindley had dreamed and worked for greatness, even empire, only to have the dream demolished on the verge of fulfillment by a drunken ranch hand. Even that wouldn’t have ended the dream; the dream would have continued through his son. But what the drunken ranch hand had begun, Hindley’s feckless wife and wastrel son had finished. What spirit had a better excuse for eternal unrest, seeing the center of his empire become a weather-beaten, termite-nibbled pile of lumber used to store hay?
Had the boys of Hawley seen the house that night, even the most doubting realist would have been convinced that it was haunted. It reared up from the flat prairie in a black Gothic pile silvered by the moon. Ghost clouds streaked the sky. The air sparkled and glittered with fireflies, entwining the house like wandering souls.
Inside the house, immune to the spell, all of them slept except Angel. Henry and Tim slept uncomfortably on the hard floor, resting fitfully, having worried dreams. Tim slept close by Henry, touching him, fearful because they had seen evidence that owls roosted in the house and, worse, gnawed bones where four-legged predators had visited the ruined rooms.