The Blackstone Chronicles - By John Saul Page 0,29

them. When Clara Wagner informed him in a stern voice that he “must come for dinner one night,” he had no idea how to respond. He knew Germaine from the library, of course, but had never been inside the Wagners’ house, and certainly had no desire to go there now.

“Thank you,” he managed to say, then turned quickly to Oliver Metcalf and Harvey Connally.

“Watch out for that one,” Connally warned dryly, watching Germaine push her mother away. “As far as she’s concerned, you’ve become fair game.”

“Jesus, Uncle Harvey!” Oliver Metcalf protested. “I’m sure Mrs. Wagner didn’t mean anything like—”

“Of course she did,” the old man cut in. “And don’t tell me I’m saying something inappropriate, Oliver. I’m eighty-three years old, and I shall say what I please.” But as he turned back to Bill McGuire, his tone softened. “It’s a terrible thing you’re going through, Bill, and there’s nothing any of us can say that’s going to make it easier. But if there’s anything I can do, you tell me, understand?”

Bill nodded. “Thanks, Mr. Connally,” he said. “I just keep wondering if maybe—” The words died on his lips as he felt Megan slip her hand into his.

“Don’t think that way,” Harvey Connally advised. “Things happen, and there’s no explaining them, and no changing them. All any of us can do is play the hand we’re dealt, the best way we can.”

Ten minutes later, when the little cemetery was empty save for the three of them, Harvey Connally’s words still echoed in Bill McGuire’s mind.

Play the hand we’re dealt, the best way we can.

Gazing one last time at his wife’s coffin, Bill McGuire finally turned away from the grave and started out of the cemetery.

Mrs. Goodrich, leaning slightly forward, dropped a single rose onto the coffin, then reached down to take Megan’s hand.

But Megan lingered for a moment, and though she still faced the coffin, her eyes were fixed on the doll.

The doll gazed back at her.

Now they truly belonged to each other, and no one would ever take the doll away from her again.

Late that night, as Blackstone slept, the dark figure moved once more through the silent corridors of the abandoned Asylum, at last coming again to the room in which the secret trove of treasures was stored.

Glittering eyes flicked from one souvenir to another, and finally came to rest on a single sparkling object.

A hand, smoothly gloved, reached out and picked up a locket, holding it high so it glimmered silver in the moonlight.

It would make a perfect gift.

And the dark figure already knew who its recipient would be.

To be continued …

PART 2

TWIST OF FATE:

THE LOCKET

Prelude

The full moon stood high in the night sky above Blackstone, bathing the stones of the old Asylum atop North Hill in a silvery glow, even penetrating the thick layers of grime that covered its windows so that its dusty rooms were suffused with a dim light. Though the dark figure who moved silently through these rooms needed no light to guide him, the luminescence allowed him to pause now and then to savor the memories this place held for him: vivid memories. Images as sharp and clear as if the events they depicted had occurred only yesterday. He was their keeper, even if those same memories had faded from the minds of the very few in Blackstone who might have shared them.

And this room, with its shelves filled with mementos, was his sanctuary, his museum, to which he had added something new.

It was an ancient ledger, which he’d come upon in one of the basement storerooms. Covered in faded red leather, it was like the ones used in years gone by, in which were recorded all the minutiae of the Asylum’s busy life. Taking the book to the shelf-lined, square room, he stroked its cover with all the sensual gentleness with which a man might stroke the skin of a beautiful woman. Hoping it might jog delicious memories even his brilliant mind might have mislaid, he finally opened its cover, only to feel a pang of bitter disappointment: despite its age, its yellowed leaves proved blank. Then disappointment gave way to a tingling excitement. There would be a new use for the book, an important use.

An album!

An album containing accounts of the madness unleashed upon the town that had spurned him.

Now, hunched over the album in the dim moonlight, he opened its cover and read once more the familiar words of the two articles he had painstakingly clipped and carefully pasted