The Chosen

Vera shook her head. “Donna, even if it’s true, no one will remember it. It happened too long ago.”

“Someone must remember it.” Donna held up the book in her lap. The Complete Compendium of Haunted American Mansions, the title read in silly, dripping letters. “This book just came out a few weeks ago. And there’s a whole chapter on Wroxton Hall.”

“Wait a minute,” Dan B. testily jumped in. “What’s the big deal? Some people got murdered in an insane asylum—so what?”

“They were tortured to death,” Donna said. “By the staff. And a lot of the local residents say they’ve seen ghosts walking around in the building at night.”

“Ghosts?” Lee said. “You mean the place is haunted?”

“Aw, relax,” Dan B. chuckled. “There’s no ghosts.

It’s just your mom with a sheet over her head, looking for some free peter.”

Vera rolled her eyes. What am I going to do with these three nuts? she wondered.

««—»»

“You’ve got to be kidding me, Vera,” Dan B. complained. “How much longer?”

“We’re almost there. It’s right up the ridge.” At least she thought it was. The access road wound upward; cracks spiderwebbed the old asphalt. Skeletal branches seemed to reach out, trying to touch them. The tall forest blocked out the light.

They’d passed through Waynesville twenty minutes ago, a sleepy, rustic little town. It looked poor, rundown. A simple turn off, the route brought them into the face of the northern ridge. A haphazard sign signalled them: wroxton hall in hand-painted blue letters, and an arrow. Get a new sign, Vera thought, nearly groaning. And all this brush would need to be cut back, and the access road would have to be patched, and…

That was all Feldspar’s problem. Again, she wondered about these “restorations”; The Inn would have to be more than merely impressive in order to attract patrons through this mess. Surely, Feldspar knew this.

“This can’t be right.” Dan B. whipped his head toward Lee. “If you’d get your hand out of your pants and watch the map, then maybe we’d know where we were going.”

“Relax, Dumbo,” Lee came back. “This is the right road. It says right here on the map, Wroxton Estates.”

The moving truck rumbled behind them up the incline. Farther up, Vera felt some relief. A contractor’s sign, RANDOLPH CARTER EXCAVATORS, INC., had been posted. They were fixing the road and cutting back the overgrowth. Soon, construction vehicles came into view, refuse trucks, chipping machines, tree-trimming crews. At last, the winding, dark road opened into crisp winter daylight.

“Jesus Christ,” Dan B. muttered.

Lee’s face flattened in astonishment. “I don’t believe what I’m seeing.”

The car slowed around a vast, paved court. Vera and Donna gazed over the men’s shoulders. Center of the court was a huge, heated fountain; Sappho in white marble poured twin gushes of water from her elegant hands. Great hedges had been trimmed to the meticulousness of sculpture. And just beyond loomed the immense edifice of Wroxton Hall.

“Somebody pinch me so I wake up,” Donna said in wide-eyed wonder.

“Jesus Christ,” Dan B. repeated.

Lee’s rowdy voice hushed in awe. “This place is gonna kick…butt.”