“That one!” broke in Bill Bracy, not very politely. “He’s one of those crusty old characters that got weaned on a pickle. We met him when we first came here, tried to make friends, and he just turned the acid on us.”
“I’ll try to neutralize his acid,” said Thunstone, and he rose. “I’ll go now, but I have a cheeky favor to ask. I want to come back here tonight and stay.”
Prue blinked at him, very prettily. “Why,” she said, “we don’t have a spare room, but there’s this sofa if you don’t have a place to stay.”
“I’m checked into the Sullivan Motel in town, but right here is where I want to be tonight,” said Thunstone. “The sofa will do splendidly for me.” He went to the door. “Thank you both. Will you let me fetch us something for supper? I’ll shop around in town.”
He went to the soft-lighted grill room of the Sullivan Motel, for there, Packer had told him, old Mr. Ritson habitually sat and scowled into a drink. Sure enough, there at the bar sat a gray man, old and hunched, harshly gaunt where Thunstone was blocky. It must be Ritson. He was dressed in shabby black, like an undertaker’s assistant. His lead-pale hair bushed around his cars. His nose and chin were as sharp as daggers. Thunstone sat down on the stool next to him. From the bartender he ordered a double bourbon and water. Then he turned to the old man.
“I think you’re Mr. Ritson,” he said.
The other turned bitter, beady eyes upon him, clamped the thin mouth between sharp nose and sharp chin. “So you know who I am,” came the grumpiest of voices. “I know who you are, too—this Thurston fellow who’s come to poke into what ain’t none of his business, huh? And you want to ask me something.”
“Yes,” said Thunstone evenly. “I thought I’d ask you what you’d like to drink.”
“Eh?” The beady eyes quartered him, then gazed into an empty glass. “I’ll have what you’re having.”
The bartender brought the drinks. Ritson gulped at his. Thunstone lifted his own glass but did not sip.
“I’ve been told that you know past history here, Mr. Ritson,” he tried again. “About the case of a man named Marrowby, long ago hanged for murder and buried here.”
Skimpy gray brows drew above the unfriendly eyes. “Why in hell should I tell you a word of what I know?”
“If you don’t,” said Thunstone, “I’ll have to go to Mr. Packer, the clerk.”
“Packer?” Ritson squealed. “What does he know? Hell, Mister, he wasn’t even born here. He doesn’t know old-time town history, he just sort of mumbles about it.”
“But if you won’t talk to me, I must look for information wherever I can get it.”
“What information could Packer give you? Look here, my folks was here ever since the town was built, away back before the Revolution. Sure I know about the Marrowby thing. When I was a boy, my great-grandmother told me what she’d heard from her grandfather, who was young here at the time—better than two hundred and forty years back, I calculate.”
Ritson swigged down the rest of his drink.
“Bring this gentleman another, Thunstone told the bartender, putting down some money. “Now, Mr. Ritson, what did you hear from your great-grandmother?”
“It happened long lifetimes ago. They’d had Marrowby up for his magic doings—he could witch people’s dinners off their tables to his house, he’d made a girl leave her true love to come to him. All the law gave him for that was just a year in the jailhouse.”
“But he was hanged at last,” said Thunstone.
“That he was, higher than Haman,” Ritson nodded above his second drink. “The way it was told to me, he killed a preacher—can’t recollect the preacher’s name—who’d read him out of the church.”
“The preacher’s name was Walford,” supplied Thunstone.
“Whatever the name was, he died of a stab in the heart. And at Marrowby’s house, they found a wax dummy of the preacher, with a needle stuck in it.”
“Where was Marrowby’s house?” asked Thunstone.
“Why, out yonder where the Trumbull house is, where them young folks took over. Maybe the charge wouldn’t have stood, but Marrowby pleaded guilty in court. And they built a scaffold in the courthouse yard and strung him up.” Ritson drank. “I heard the whole tale. He stood up there and confessed to black magic, confessed to murder. He said he had to repent, or else he’d go to hell. He warned the folks who watched.”
“What was his confession?” Thunstone asked.
“Seemed like he warned all who were there, not to follow black magic. Said he must confess and repent. And he said a tiling I don’t know the meaning of.”
“Here,” said Thunstone, “I haven’t touched this drink.” He shoved the glass to Ritson’s hand. “What did he say?”
“It didn’t make sense. He warned them not to be familiar.”
“Familiar?” echoed Thunstone, interested.
“Said, ‘Let familiar alone.’ The like of that—strange words. Said, ‘Rouse him not.’ And swung off.”
“And that’s all?”
“Yes. They buried him outside the churchyard, and drove an ash stake into his heart to make sure he wouldn’t rise up. That’s the whole tale. But don’t you go writing it.”
“I won’t write it,” Thunstone promised him.
“Mind that you don’t. Now, I’ve told you what I heard, and I hope it’s enough.”
“I hope the same,” said Thunstone. “Will you excuse me? Good afternoon.”
“What’s good about it?” snorted Ritson, halfway through his third drink.
Thunstone went to his motel room and changed into tougher clothes, chino slacks and a tan shirt and a light brown jacket. He threw a flashlight into the jacket pocket. Around his neck he hung a tarnished copper crucifix. He found a lunch stand and bought a plastic bucket of barbecued ribs, a container of slaw, and bottles of beer. Then he drove to the Bracy house.
The Bracys welcomed him in and enthused hungrily over the barbecue. “It just so happens that I’m baking cornbread,” said Prue. “That will go well with it.”
As the sun sank toward the trees, they ate with good appetite. Prue asked about Thunstone’s crucifix, and he told her he had inherited it from his mother. When they had finished eating, Prue carried the dishes to the kitchen and came back with blankets over her arm.
“Will these be all right for tonight?” she asked.
“They’ll be splendid, many a night I’ve lain on harder beds than your sofa. But before I do that, there’s business to be done outside, as soon as it gets dark.”
“I’ll come along,” volunteered Bill, but Thunstone shook his massive head.
“No, two of us out there will be a complication,” he said quietly. “This business will require careful handling, and some luck and playing by ear.”
“Whatever you say,” granted Bill, and Prue looked relieved.
“I won’t promise to win ahead of things,” went on Thunstone, “but I’ll be specially equipped. Look here.”
He grasped the shank of his cane in his left hand and turned the crook with his right. The cane parted at the silver ring, and he drew out a lean, pale-shining blade.
“That’s a beautiful thing,” breathed Prue. “It must be old.”
“As I understand, it was forged by Saint Dunston, something like a thousand years ago. See what these words say at the edge.”
Both Bracys leaned to study. Bill moved his bearded lips soundlessly.
“It looks like Latin,” he said. “I can’t make it out.”
“Sic pereant inimici tui, Domine,” Thunstone read out the inscription. “So perish all thine enemies, O Lord,” he translated. “It’s a silver blade, and Saint Dunstan was a silversmith, and faced and defeated Satan himself.”
Bill was impressed. “That must be the only thing of its kind in the world,” he ventured.