The strangest sensation of all, however, was how much he missed Carolyn. In the last few days before she headed back to New York, they had spent a great deal of time together. On the night before she left, sitting on the stone bench out near the cliff, she had shared with Douglas the pain of her mother’s death. He’d learned of Carolyn’s sister, living in a home, and Carolyn’s deep sense of responsibility for her. But most significant was hearing about the horrible relationship Carolyn had endured. To think she had been sleeping next to a murderer. Douglas had been unable to restrain himself. He had reached over and placed his arms around Carolyn. She had seemed grateful for his embrace. Slowly, tenderly, he took her chin in his hand and moved his lips to kiss her…
But then a twig had snapped, and they had looked around. Chelsea and Ryan were heading toward them. They had separated quickly, moving apart on the bench. Douglas’s cousins were rattling on with questions about whether the curse would end if the house was razed. “I doubt it,” Carolyn told them. “Your uncle said he believes that if that were to happen, it would simply cause the kind of slaughter we’ve seen when periodically the strict rules of the lottery weren’t followed to the letter.”
“Well,” Chelsea said, impatiently, in a tone of voice she never used around Uncle Howard, “eventually, when our dear uncle is gone, someone will have to decide what to do with this house. I wouldn’t want it. So many horrific things have happened here.”
Douglas thought she spoke as if she had no fears at all about being chosen to enter that room. All she was concerned about was what happened after. As if she knew she’d come out just fine.
The worst part was that he and Carolyn never got to finish what they started. The next morning she was packed and heading out to the airport, being driven by one of Uncle Howie’s chauffeurs to the airport. Douglas had offered to take her on his bike, knowing how much she had enjoyed the ride before, but she declined briskly with a smile, saying her bag was too heavy. She seemed cool, a little distant, though she gave him her files to read while she was gone. They barely said good-bye. Uncle Howie was there, so Douglas couldn’t say what he wanted to say to her.
That he thought he might be falling in love with her.
It’s crazy, he thought as he walked across the grass now. I’ve known her for just a couple of weeks. But her strength, her confidence, her will in the face of all this had made a huge impression on him. Never before had he met a woman like Carolyn.
“Terrific,” he said out loud. “I finally meet someone I think I could really fall for, and I might have to lose my life to a pitchfork-wielding ghost.”
He realized he had walked to the place where the woods began intruding onto the well-manicured lawn. Just ahead lay the path that wound its way down the steep side of the hill into the village.
An enormous black crow high in the tall oak tree in front of him let out a cry, startling Douglas. The bird flapped its wings, then took off soaring down the side of the hill. Douglas kept his eyes on it, listening to the cries it made.
That was the moment he realized he wasn’t alone.
He turned his head, and Beatrice stood in the brilliant sunshine not three feet away from him.
“You’ve got to help us,” Douglas said instinctively. “You don’t want this killing to go on, do you? It’s not you doing it. I know that. So please help us!”
She looked at him with pitiful eyes. She seemed to Douglas the manifestation of sadness, what sadness would look like if it took human form. She cocked her head at him, as if looking for something there. Then she turned and walked away, toward the path.
“Wait!” Douglas called after her.
But she kept walking, the breeze moving her flowing white dress. Douglas realized she was leading him somewhere.
And he thought he knew the destination.
Beatrice disappeared into the trees. Douglas followed, certain that he knew where he’d find her. And he was right. Rushing along the path, skillfully jumping over the protruding roots of trees, he emerged into the old Young family cemetery. And there stood Beatrice, forlornly gazing down upon a patch of tall yellow grass.
Douglas hurried over to her. But even as he approached her, she vanished into the light, a flickering static of incandescence.
He reached the spot where she had been standing. Why here? There was nothing here. The nearest stone was a good three yards away. This was just a stretch of empty ground, covered with grass and the occasional black-eyed Susan.
But then he felt something underfoot.
He bent down, pushing aside the grass.
A sparkle of granite.
There was a stone embedded in the earth. A flat stone overgrown with grass and weeds and moss. He scraped at the moss, peeling it back like a moldy carpet. He saw what was inscribed on the stone.
Just the letter M.
And above it, a carving of a small cherub.
Douglas stared at the stone.
“Why did Beatrice want me to see this?” he asked out loud.
He traced the M with his finger.
Malcolm.
Perhaps it stood for Malcolm.
Was that Beatrice’s last name? Was this the place where they had buried her? Here, in an unmarked grave. Forgotten by the world.
But the cherub…
Something about the cherub.
It frightened him. Cherubs were little angels. Symbols of love. Cupid was kind of a cherub. With his little boy’s body and his magic arrows of love. There was nothing frightening about Cupid.
But this little winged figure set Douglas’s heart racing.
It had been roughly carved. A local stonecutter had most likely been hired to do a rush job. Someone had told him to carve a cherub above the M. And so he had etched a rough approximation of a human face and attached two wings in place of ears. The mouth on the face was open, perhaps in song. But it looked as if it were crying.
Or screaming.
Suddenly Douglas felt a terrible chill. He stood up, letting the grass obscure that terrible cherub once again.
M.
What was M?
What lay buried under that stone?
Chapter Fifteen
It felt good to be back in New York. Carolyn took considerable comfort in the bleating of taxicabs and the rumble of the subway. She felt safe here, far away from the mysteries of Mr. Young’s house in Maine. It was good to see Andrea, to spend a little time with her, to hear her laugh. And it was ever so good to get back home, to her own apartment, and pretend for a few stolen hours that the room in Mr. Young’s basement was just a figment of her imagination-or at least something so far away that it couldn’t touch her.
But touch her it did. Unless she could prevent the lottery, it waited to claim another life.
A life that might be Douglas’s.
She closed her eyes now as she waited for the green WALK sign. She was at the corner of Houston Street and Avenue A. This wasn’t her neighborhood. Carolyn lived in Hell’s Kitchen, rapidly transforming itself into one of Manhattan’s trendiest areas. Here in the East Village, bohemia still clung tenaciously to the streets. She opened her eyes and looked across the street. Somewhere in that block lived one of the most unusual people she had ever met in her entire life. And she was depending on her now to provide the solution to the problem that plagued the Young family. It was no longer just an assignment for Carolyn. It was no longer just a means for making money.
It had become personal.
As the light changed, Carolyn began a brisk walk across the street. She couldn’t deny the feeling that had surged up inside her the moment Douglas had moved to kiss her. She had shared so much with him. She hadn’t felt that comfortable with a man-with anyone-in a very long time. She had told him about Mom, and about Andrea. She had even told him about David. She figured she might as welclass="underline" who’s to say Howard Young would not tell him at some point?