Chapter 8
When we finally arrived in Sloatsville, I drove slowly through the sleepy little town until I reached Victoria Elmwood-Ravensburg’s house. It was a big old sprawling mess, like one of those houses in an old, black-and-white horror movie. It loomed in the back of a large piece of property full of twisted trees and surrounded by a towering, wrought-iron fence.
I circled around her house, looking for a place to park the mini-van. The entrance to her driveway was barred by a tall, metal gate which was padlocked and chained, so I had to park across the street and hope the busted-up mini-van wouldn’t draw the attention of the local cops.
Aching all over, I got out and stretched for a few moments. The air was cool and the sky was full of stars. I suddenly remembered that Niagara Falls was around here somewhere; maybe Kristin and I could go see it after all of this was done.
Ha, ha. Good one, Charlie.
I shook Kristin by the shoulder.
“We’re here,” I said.
She looked at me groggily.
“What time is it?”
“Late,” I said. “Come on.”
“Already?”
I shook my head, yes.
“Grab some of the books,” I said.
She snatched me by the wrist and squeezed.
“Charlie, let’s get out of here.”
I looked at her, kind of puzzled.
“Forget about this Elmwood-Ravensburg lady. Let’s follow the original plan, go to Mexico, someplace safe, maybe an island with a beach, or a sleepy little town by the seaside. We could eat shrimp and drink beer, and, I don’t know, look for sunken treasure.”
“We can’t do that,” I said.
She let go of my wrist. I could feel it throbbing.
“Why not?”
“Oh, come on,” I said.
“I don’t think this lady is going to help us,” she said. ‘We’re wasting our time.”
“You’re scared, aren’t you?”
“No,” she said.
“We’re in over our heads,” I said. “This lady is our only chance. Otherwise...it’s over. We’re dead. You know that, don’t you?”
Kristin looked at me and slowly nodded.
“I know.”
She looked away, put her hand over her mouth.
“We’ve come this far,” I said. “We have to try.”
She shrunk a little, and I put my hand on her shoulder. She tried to smile, but couldn’t do it.
“I guess so,” she finally said.
We each took a handful of books. Kristin looked up at the big house and froze, her eyes wide and uncertain.
“Eggrolls,” rasped Curtis.
“What?”
“Eggrolls,” he said again, pointing outside.
“Another time, buddy. Okay?”
He stared at me, his large zombie eyes looking almost sad.
“Um, you have to stay in the car now, okay, Curtis?”
He said nothing.
I elbowed Kristin in the side, and motioned toward Curtis.
“Please stay, Curtis,” she said.
His hand slowly dropped to his lap and his eyes glazed over.
“Hopefully this lady can help you too, okay?” I said.
But Curtis said nothing.
We walked around to the main gate of the estate, which opened for us on groaning hinges. There was a long, winding path up to the front door. It was difficult to tell in the moonlight for sure, but the yard and the gardens seemed to be well kept.
I felt a sudden twinge of nervousness, wondering about our reception. Would she agree to talk to us? Help us? Or would she just call the police?
And in my eagerness to get here, I kind of forgot it was the middle of the night.
Kristin seemed to walk slower with every step, like she was being led to her own execution. On the front porch she froze again.
My hand went to ring the doorbell, then hesitated.
“Charlie,” she whispered. “Don’t.”
I pushed the bell.
For a few moments, nothing happened. You could actually hear the crickets. Then a light went on upstairs, followed soon after by another light in the front hall. Finally, the outside light came on, illuminating us in all our disheveled, blood-soaked glory.
The front door opened a fraction of an inch and half of a woman’s face appeared.
“Yes?” she said.
“Hey, uh, my name’s Charlie, uh, Charles Berger. And this is Kristin. We, uh, we’re expected. I have a letter from Mrs. Elmwood-Ravensburg. It’s more like an invitation, really.”
The woman at the door looked us over, her mouth turning to a frown.
“Let me see it,” she said.
I handed her the crumpled, blood-stained letter.
“Just a moment,” she said, and quickly shut the door.
A few minutes went by.
“We should go,” said Kristin.
I didn’t say anything, but I smiled weakly. Her eyes shot daggers at me.
“Charles Berger?” said a stern, but quavering voice.
“Yes,” I said.
The door opened again. An old woman was there, sitting in a wheelchair. Her hair was completely white, and pulled back into a bun. Her wrinkled, gnarled hands rested in her lap.
“Prove it,” she said.
“Excuse me?”
“I said, prove it.”
“Well, uh, I gave her a letter. It was from you. You wrote it to me.”
The old woman gave her servant a look.
“That all you got?” she said.
‘You—you are Victoria Elmwood-Ravensburg, right?”
“Who wants to know?” she said.
My brain locked up and I couldn’t figure out if this lady was messing with me or if maybe she really was crazy.
“I have a letter,” I said.
“Letters can be intercepted. Forged. Fabricated and unscrambled. Agents are everywhere, trying to discredit me, destroy my reputation and hasten my demise. I will not be bamboozled by the Ragamuffins of the Enemy. You claim to be Charles Berger? Prove it!”
I didn’t know what to do. My tongue felt like to was glued to the top of my mouth and the gears in my head struggled to turn, to think of something, anything.
Then I remembered what was in my pocket.
I pulled out the little black bag and held it up for her to see.
“How’s this?” I said.
She looked at it for a moment, her eyes narrowing.
“That will do,” she said. “Come inside.”
The old woman’s servant wheeled her out of sight.
“This way, please,” she called from the darkness.
We stepped into a mansion. Everything inside looked old-fashioned. Big furniture, painted portraits on the walls, bronze urns, floral wall-paper. I felt like I had stepped back in time. The whole place smelled like Lemon Pledge.
“Come in, come in, sit down,” she said.
We followed the sound of her voice into some kind of parlor, full of fancy bookshelves and chairs. There was a little teapot with cups and saucers laid out on a small table.
“Thank you, Consuela, you may go now.”
The dark-haired woman lingered for a moment, unsure.
“I will be in the other room, if you need me,” she said.
Mrs. Elmwood-Ravensburg nodded and Consuela left.
“What happened to your clothes?” she asked.
“We, uh, we had some trouble,” I said.
“And what about you, hm?” she said to Kristin. “You got a name? Quit lurking in that doorway and come over here so I can get a better look at you.”
Kristin reluctantly shuffled over and sat in one of the cushy chairs.
“And you are?” asked Mrs. Elmwood-Ravensburg.
“Kristin.”
The old woman looked her over, her eyes squinting, the wrinkles in her face multiplying a million times over.
“Mrs. Elmwood-Ravensburg—”
&n
bsp; “Please, call me Victoria.”
“Okay, uh, Victoria, what exactly is this thing?” I said, holding up the little black bag again.
“That’s a conjure bag,” she said.
“What does it do?”
“That depends. Some people wear them to bring good luck. Or romance. Fidelity…or fertility.”
“Oh,” I said.
I stared down at the little black bag and felt a wave of dizziness sweep over me.
“This belonged to my mother,” I said.
“I know.”
“Did she get it from you?”
Victoria shook her head, no.
“Whose blood is that on you, young man?”
“Just a friend’s,” I said.
“What kind of trouble did you say you were in again?”
“Spider Lady trouble,” I said. “She’s your sister, right? Elvira?”
“Clever boy,” said Victoria. “Have you seen her lately?”
“Yeah, we, uh...we met her,” I said.
The old woman said nothing.
“I saw her a few times, when she was the Spider Lady. And then, uh, we went into her stone tower with some friends a little over a week ago, and they...anyway, she was dead, but she’s not really, I think she’s haunting my friend somehow.”
The old woman looked at us. She rubbed her hands together, but said nothing.
“It’s true,” Kristin said. “Somehow...she’s inside me, in my head, trying to get me to do things, to hurt people...”
“We’re not making this up,” I said.
“How far gone was she?” asked Victoria.
“Gone what?” I asked.
“You called her the Spider Lady, correct? Well, what was she, when you saw her last? A spider? A lady? Some awful combination of the two?”
“Uh, she had spider legs coming out of her, but, I didn’t really look to close.”
“She was cursed. By an African shaman.”
“Yeah, I kind of guessed.”
“We tried for years to break the spell,” said the old woman. “But nothing worked. The magic was too strong. Elvira grew frustrated, bitter, angry. And the books she was reading didn’t help. Dark magic. She became impossible to be around. We had a falling out. I haven’t spoken to her in a long, long time.”
I glanced over at Kristin. She was slowly spinning her teacup around in circles.
“But now it seems Elvira did find a way to break the curse,” said the old woman. “And a pretty neat trick it is. Cheat the curse, and cheat death, too. At least, for the time being. But a new question arises. Was it her body the shaman had cursed? Or was it her soul? You see the difference, I hope? Who’s to say the curse won’t begin to affect this body, your friend Kristin here?”
“I don’t understand,” I said. “What way? What trick? How is the curse going to affect Kristin, too?”
“That book your holding, Der Hexenhammer? Did you know it was bound in human skin?”
I looked down at the book and quickly dropped it on the table.
Victoria took the heavy tome and briskly flipped through it until she found what she was looking for.
“Look!” she said, her bony finger jabbing one of the pages.
She pointed to a woodblock illustration of three figures, dressed in medieval-looking clothes . First, an old woman, sitting with her eyes closed, talon-like hands resting in her lap; then, another form floating above her, wispy, but resembling the old woman. Her spirit, I realized; it was attacking the third figure, a young woman, seeping into her mouth, nose and ears. The expression on the young woman’s face was one of sheer terror.
Scribbled in the margin were several esoteric symbols, equations and foreign words which I couldn’t decipher, and one written in all capitals that I could: TRANSPOSITION.
I held my breath. Kristin gasped.
That was how she did it.
My mind flashed back to that night in the Stone Tower. The grey dust when her body collapsed, all of that dust in the air, going into Kristin’s nose, her mouth.
The Spider Lady wasn’t just messing with Kristin’s thoughts and dreams. She was inside her body, too!
And it was clear that she was taking over.
Kristin stood up and bolted for the door. I ran after her, trying to grab her arms.
“Wait!”
“Get off!”
I tackled her to the ground, pinning her arms.
“Why are you doing this?”
“Just let me go, Charlie!”
Victoria wheeled herself into the front hall. Consuela came running out of the kitchen, drying her hands on a towel.
“It’s not Kristin who’s running, Mr. Berger, it’s her. Elvira.”
I looked at Kristin, her eyes full of venom.
“Elvira?” I asked.
“You will all die!” said Kristin. “You will die, the girl, the Mexican bitch, and you, sister, I will kill you all!”
She started to speak in some other language, odd frightening words, over and over.
“Stop her!” said the old woman.
I shoved my fingers into her mouth. She bit them, hard, and I howled.
But at least she couldn’t talk anymore.
“Fight her, girl!” said the old woman. “Take control of your mind!”
Kristin beat her fists against the floor, squirming and twitching. Then she growled and threw her head back, banging it hard on the ground.
She went limp, tears pouring out of her eyes. I stood up, glancing at my bloody hand. Kristin got to her feet and ran up the staircase to the second floor. Somewhere, a door slammed.
I looked at Consuela. She looked at Mrs. Elmwood-Ravensburg.
“I’m calling the police,” said Consuela.
“No,” said the old woman. “Go to her, hurry.”
I quickly ran upstairs, poking my head into the many rooms, when I heard Kristin sobbing behind a closed door. I tried the handle. The door was locked.
“Kristin?”
“Go away!”
“It’s okay, Kris,” I said
“Why is this happening to me?”
“I don’t know.”
“I’m going crazy! I can’t even control my own body anymore!”
“Yes, you can,” I said. “Come on, open the door.”
“I wish none of this ever happened!”
“Open the door, Kristin.”
I heard the sound of cabinets banging, drawers being quickly opened and slammed shut.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
I put my ear to the door. I heard her rummaging around, then nothing. She must have found what she was looking for.
“Open the damn door!” I said.
“Goodbye, Charlie.”
And then I heard her gag, heard something metallic clang to the floor.
“Consuela!” I screamed. “Victoria! Help!”
Consuela came charging up the stairs.
“It’s locked,” I said, gesturing toward the door.
She jiggled the knob, nothing. Then she ran off. I took a step back and kicked the door as hard as I could, once, twice, but it wouldn’t budge.
Consuela returned holding the key. Moments later the door popped open.
Kristin was on the floor, blood spurting out of her throat. On the tiles nearby was a pair of bloody scissors.
Consuela screamed.
I grabbed a hand towel and pressed it to Kristin’s neck. Her eyes were closed, her face pale.
“Oh, God!” I said. “Kristin! Kristin!”
Her eyes popped open and she grinned, her teeth covered with blood.
“You don’t have to be so melodramatic,” she said.
Consuela ran out of the bathroom, her hand over her mouth.
The hand towel was turning warm and red.
“It’s all right, Charlie,” said Kristin. “She won’t let me die.”