Blackwood Farm (The Vampire Chronicles 9)

"I lifted up some of the mass of clothing so that the items tumbled down into the lower portion of the trunk, and there I unearthed a mass of jewelry -- pearls and brooches and cameos -- all thrown among the dresses as if no one had cared about them, which was a puzzle to me because I knew when I held them that the pearls were real; and as for the cameos, I lifted them out one by one and saw that they were fine little works, specimens Aunt Queen would like very much, and all of them -- all three -- had gold frames, and good contrast to them, being made out of dark shell.

"Why were they here, so neglected, so forgotten, I wondered. Who had just heaped them here amid dresses that were molding, and when had such a thing been done?

"The noise came again, a rustling sound, and another soft sound like a footstep that made me pivot and face the attic door.

"There stood Goblin, glaring at me with alarm in his face, and very emphatically he shook his head and mouthed the word No.

" 'But I want to know who she was,' I said to him. He disappeared rather slowly, as though he were weak and frightened, and I felt the air grow cool as it often did after his disappearances, and I wondered why he had been so weak.

"By now, you can guess that I was so used to Goblin that I wasn't all that interested in him anymore. I felt superior to him. At this moment, I didn't think much about him at all.

"I set to work laying out the entire contents of the trunk upon the top of another trunk beside it. It was clear that the contents had just been heaped inside, helter-skelter, and all except the cameos and the pearls was a total loss.

"There were beautiful old mutton-sleeve dresses, dresses that went back surely to the days of long skirts, and there were old rotted lace blouses, two or more with fine shell cameos attached at the throat, and what must have been silk gowns. Some items fell apart in my hands. Cameos, all 'Rebecca at the Well. ¡¯

" 'So you loved just that one theme,' I said out loud. 'Were you named for it?¡¯

"I heard the rustling again, and I felt something brush me, soft, as if a cat had brushed my neck. Then nothing. Nothing but the quiet and the dying afternoon around us, and a kind of dread I had to escape.

"There was nothing better than to explore this trunk.

"There were slippers that were dried up now and gnarled as if they were driftwood. An open box of powder had been tossed into the contents, and it still had a bit of sweet fragrance after all this time. A couple of perfume bottles were broken, and there was a small leather book with lots of pages of writing, but all of the writing had almost faded away. It looked like purple cobwebs.

"The mildew had gotten to everything, ruining all this finery and in some places covering the wool garments with a slimy blackness, making them a total loss.

" 'But this is sheer waste,' I said out loud. I gathered up the pearl necklaces, of which there were three, and all of the five cameos, including two I had to take off the old blouses, and I went downstairs with these treasures and sought out Jasmine, who was washing some bell peppers for supper at the kitchen sink.

"I told her what I'd found and laid out the jewelry on the kitchen table.

" 'Well, you shouldn't have gone up there!' she declared. Much to my surprise, she got ferocious. 'You just run wild these days, you know it? Why didn't you ask me before you went up there, Taw-quin Blackwood?' And on and on she ranted in that vein.

"I was too busy looking at the cameos. 'All the same theme,' I said again, ' " Rebecca at the Well," and all so very pretty. Why did they get thrown up there in a trunk with all those things? Don't you think Aunt Queen would want these things?' Of course Aunt Queen had at least ten cameos of 'Rebecca at the Well,' I knew that much, though I didn't know how she had come by the first of them, and if I had known I would have been more engrossed than I already was.

"At supper I told Pops all about it and showed him the loot, but he was no more interested in this than in anything else, and while Jasmine read me the riot act about meddling where I didn't belong, Pops just said in his dead voice:

" 'You can have anything you find up there,' which made Jasmine quiet down at once.

"At bedtime, I gave the pearls to Big Ramona, but she said she didn't feel easy taking them, that there was a story to them and all the things that were in that trunk.

" 'You save them for some day when you get married,' she said. 'And you give those pearls to your new wife. You have them blessed by the priest first. Remember. Don't you give them away unless they're blessed by the priest. ¡¯

" 'I've never heard of such a thing,' I told her. 'A pearl necklace blessed by the priest?¡¯

"I begged her to tell me the story -- I knew she knew things -- but she wouldn't, and she said she didn't remember it real well anyway, which I knew was a fib, and pretty soon she had me saying our evening prayers.

"It was her bright idea that night that we should say an entire Rosary, and we did it, meditating on the Sorrowful Mysteries, and then we made an Act of Contrition as well. All this we offered up for the Poor Souls in Purgatory, and then we said the famous prayer to the Archangel Michael to defend us in battle against the Evil One, and then we went to sleep.

"Next day, I wrote to Aunt Queen about the discovery, and I told her that I had put the cameos with her collection in the parlor showcase, and that the pearls were in her dressing table, if she should want them. I asked if she would please tell me the story that Big Ramona wouldn't tell. Who was Rebecca Stanford? How did her things get in our house?

"I went back up and searched all of the attic. Of course there were wonderful items -- old art deco lamps and tables and overstuffed chairs and couches that were rotting, and even a couple of typewriters of the ancient black species that weigh a ton. Other bundles of old clothes appeared mundane and fit for the rag pile, and there was an ancient vacuum cleaner that ought to have been donated to a museum.

"As for the wicker furniture, I had all of it brought down to be restored, pending Pops' approval, which was granted with a silent nod. The Shed Men were happy to have a new project, so that went all right.

"I didn't find anything else that was really interesting. Rebecca Stanford was the mystery of the moment, and when I left the attic for the last time I took the leather-bound book I'd found in her things, and there came again that uneasy and exciting feeling. I saw Goblin in the doorway and again he shook his head.

"That it banished despair, this excited feeling -- that's what I liked.

"The following day, Thursday, was another quiet one, an in-between day, and the panic started in on me, and after lunch I went outside to walk the avenue of the pecan trees and feel the crunch of the pea gravel under my feet.