There was only one place to look for the answers. Regina called her building garage and told the attendant to get her car ready. “And put the top down for me, please,” she added responding to the sun shining brightly outside her window.
She changed to a thin summer blouse and hot pants. If it was as warm as it looked, she might as well be comfortable. Then she slipped on leather thongs and went down to pick up the car. The sun was still beaming awhile later when she pulled onto the Thruway and headed upstate.
But she was still an hour from her destination when it stopped shining. One of those summer storms which sometimes darken the Adirondacks and make the mountain woodlands seem as ominous as the Black Forest had blown up so suddenly that the effect was like that of an eclipse. Regina was forced to pull off to the side of the highway and engage in the usual struggle it took to put up the top of the Mercedes roadster.
Cursing at the stubbornness of the convertible top in refusing to fit into place, and at herself for having neglected to take along a raincoat, Regina finished the task under a deluge of summer raindrops. She scrambled back into the car and rolled up the windows. She was soaked. The blouse was plastered over her bra-less breasts. The chill of the rain made her nipples stand erect against the thin material; they ached from the strain. Her tight hot pants were clammy against her skin. She was afraid to turn on the heater in the car to dry them because then they would only become tighter and even more uncomfortable.
Resigned but shivering, Regina pulled the car back onto the Thruway. About twenty minutes later she exited onto an East-West highway. By then it was dusk, the storm was worsening, and it was growing darker quickly. Regina turned on her headlights.
It was pitch black when the beams picked out the dirt road which would lead her to Calvin Cabot’s sprawling estate. She ignored the signs cautioning that it was a private road, that she was trespassing on private property, that trespassers would be prosecuted to the full extent of the law, that she risked a fine, or imprisonment, or both. The Mercedes followed the winding road up a steep hill, and through dense woodlands, straining against the thick mud and the deep puddles collecting in the downpour.
Finally Regina came to a fork in the road. She could just barely make out a large house—a mansion really -—looming up out of the storm in one direction. The narrowing road in the other direction wound around and down the hill and into the woods.
Regina decided to bypass the house for the time being. Later, perhaps, she would seek an interview there, but first there was something she wanted to locate. It was an off-chance, but if luck was with her . . .
The river of mud which was the road ended in a small clearing deep in the woods. A footpath ran off at an angle from the clearing. The rain was still beating down, a full-fledged summer storm now, complete with mounting rumbles of thunder and intermittent flashes of lightning.
Regina sat in the car a moment and thought. She didn’t really know how big the estate was, and she wasn’t even sure that what she was looking for was within its boundaries. If she did get out of the ear and brave the storm, she might wander around all night and never find what she was seeking. There was a limit to how far she could follow a hunch.
She decided to go back to the house. But just as she reached for the ignition key to restart the car, something happened to change her mind. She spied a light moving down the trail through the underbrush. It was moving away from her, deeper into the woods.
Regina took a flashlight from the glove compartment. She stepped out of the car and found herself knee-deep in a puddle. By the time she’d slogged the few steps to the beginning of the trail, she was once again soaking wet. She turned on the flashlight, pointing it at the muddy ground and shielding it so that the rays wouldn’t betray her, and she set off down the path.
After about a quarter-mile, she spied the other light again and doused her own. Moving as furtively as she could, she continued on the path, following the light which was well ahead of her. Finally the light came to a standstill. Cautiously, Regina kept going until she came to another clearing. The path ended there.
The clearing was dark. Regina could only see a few feet in front of her. She was afraid to turn on her own flashlight again. She stood there a moment, undecided what to do next, the rain drenching her. Already soaked to the skin, she ignored the rain.
A prolonged bolt of lightning lit up the clearing. Regina saw a lean-to — three sides of shingles and a tin roof—of the type used for stacking firewood, on the far side of the clearing. A figure in oilskins — slicker and rain-hat-—-was silhouetted inside the lean-to, its back to Regina.
Skirting the edge of the clearing, moving in a wide circle, Regina made for the structure. She’d gone about three-quarters of the distance when the doused flashlight in her hand bumped against something metallic. Kneeling to examine it, Regina found a wrought iron fence, waist-high, spiked on top, rusted with age. Her hand trembled as she touched it. Had she inadvertently stumbled on what she’d been seeking?
She followed the fence, moving away from the clearing. When it cornered, she kept following it. She was out of sight of the lean-to now, shielded from it by the trees. She risked turning on her flashlight again.
The beam swept over the fence to a gate. Regina went up to it. It was locked. She sighed. There was nothing else to do. She climbed over the fence.
It was easy enough, except for the spikes. But just as she was poised carefully on top of it, about to jump into the muck on the other side, a sudden loud clap of thunder startled her. Instead of jumping, she lost her balance and dived head-first into the mire. The flash of lightning which followed revealed her stuck momentarily, ostrich-like, her head in the mud, her bare derriere jutting out from the wide rip where her hot pants had split.
Muttering curses, Regina got to her feet. The rain was cold on her rear end. She retrieved her flashlight, moved some distance away from the fence, and swept the beam in a wide arc over the area.
It was as Regina had hoped. The rays lit up several tombstones. She was in a small graveyard!
Examining a few of the gravestones, Regina determined that it was a family cemetery. Most of them were very old, going back to colonial times. Even the ones from Civil War days were crumbling with decay. And then her light picked up a gravestone set apart from the others. It shone white even in the rain, not weather-beaten like the others. Regina moved to examine it more closely.
This was it! What Regina had been seeking! Carved neatly over the dates on the headstone was the name of Faith Venable!
A sudden clang of metal against metal pierced the steady patter of falling raindrops and echoed over the graveyard. Startled, Regina doused her flashlight. She saw another light moving from the now-open gate in the fence and picking its way through the tombstones. It was moving steadily towards her.
Regina looked about her wildly for some sort of cover. She made out the outline of a large tombstone a dozen yards to her left. She ran behind it and hid.
Just in time. A bright streak of lightning lit up the graveyard. It illuminated the figure in the oilskins heading straight for Faith Venable’s grave. In one hand the figure held a small shovel. In the other was the flashlight, and a hatchet, the kind of tool used by Boy Scouts.
The figure knelt beside the grave, propping the flashlight and the axe against the tombstone. Then it started digging, clearing away the wet mud on the surface of the burial plot. The digging didn’t go on for very long. The shovel was set aside and the figure crouched down on hands and knees to brush excess dirt away.