“You won’t believe it,” he said as he dipped the ladle into the kettle once again, this time offering it to Angel. “It’s not even hot.”

Though Angel could see the steam rising from the ladle, she still held it to her lips and took a careful sip. Seth was right — it was cool! Tipping the ladle further, she drained it quickly, and felt the coolness spread through her. Houdini had now approached and sat by her feet. Dipping the ladle once more into the kettle, Angel held it close to the floor, right under the cat’s nose. Not even bothering to sniff it first, Houdini lapped thirstily, sucking up the liquid until the ladle was empty.

Ten minutes later, with the kettle empty, the ladle put back on its peg above the counter, and the book returned to the niche behind the loose stone in the wall of the fireplace, they closed the cabin and climbed the stone berm.

When they got to the top, Angel turned around and looked down at the stone they used to mark the spot where they’d buried Houdini. “Let’s try something,” she said to Seth as she recalled the strange words of the recipe’s second verse. Focusing on the stone, she tried to visualize it rising into the air until it was level with the cabin’s roof.

For several long seconds nothing happened. Then, as she and Seth watched, the stone slowly rose from the ground, seemed to float in the air for a moment, and dropped back to the earth.

Chapter 35

EITHER ONE OF THEM SPOKE AS THEY FOLLOWED Houdini back along the trail to Black Creek Road, but as they emerged from the woods and stepped onto the solid asphalt of the roadway, Seth finally voiced the question that had been in his mind ever since they’d turned away from the cabin and started home: “You think it really happened?”

Angel shrugged. “We both saw it, didn’t we?”

“But how?” Seth pressed. “I mean—”

“I don’t know!” Angel broke in. “But I know what we both saw, so it must have happened.”

“But—”

“All I did was what the book said to do.”

Sensing that Angel had no more idea than he did about the rock rising into the air, Seth lapsed back into silence until they came to the last bend in Black Creek Road before Angel’s house would become visible — which meant they would be just as visible from the house. “What if your dad sees me?” he asked, stopping before the house came into view.

“Then I guess he’ll be mad at me,” Angel sighed. “But if Mom’s there, it’ll be all right.”

“What if she’s not there?”

Angel shrugged as if it wouldn’t make much difference, but she knew that if her mother wasn’t there, and her father had started drinking—She’ll be there, she told herself. And Dad won’t be drinking.

But a few minutes later, when they saw the house, she knew she was wrong about at least one thing — the car wasn’t in sight, which told her that at least one of her parents had gone somewhere. And if it was her father who was home, and if he’d been drinking…

She felt Houdini pressing up against her leg, and bent down to scratch him behind the ears. “You’ll take care of me, won’t you?” she asked, trying to make her words lighter than her mood.

“M-Maybe we should go get a Coke at the drugstore, or something,” Seth suggested. But as Angel glanced around at the gathering darkness, she shook her head.

“I better go in.” Yet she made no move to start across the lawn toward the house. Seth waited for her to speak again, and at last she did. “A-Are you scared?” Angel asked, her stammer betraying her feelings.

Seth nodded. “I — Well, I didn’t really think any of it would — I mean—” His eyes dropped to Houdini, who was looking up at them as if he understood every word they were saying. “I guess I still thought maybe he wasn’t really dead, and must have dug his way out of the hole even though we couldn’t see how. But when…” His voice faded away, but he didn’t have to finish for Angel to know what he was talking about.

“Maybe we shouldn’t go back there,” she said. “Maybe we should just pretend like we never found the book or the cabin at all.”

“But we didn’t find it,” Seth said. “Houdini led us to it, and—”

“Angel!” The single word rang out like a shot, and Seth and Angel whirled around to see her father standing on the front porch of the old house, a bottle of beer clutched in his upraised fist. “You get in here, you hear me?”

Angel glanced at Seth, her face paling. “I’ve got to go,” she said. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Seth held up a hand as if to stop her, but her father was already off the porch and starting across the lawn toward them.

“Didn’t I tell you to stay away from my daughter?” Marty snarled.

“We weren’t doing anything wrong,” Angel began, stepping in front of Seth, as if to block her father.

“You get in the house,” Marty said, shoving her aside. “I’ll get to you when I’m done with him!” But Seth was already gone, running down Black Creek Road toward town. “Coward!” Marty bellowed. Draining the last of the beer in a single long swallow, he flung the bottle after Seth, then turned back to the house as it shattered on the pavement thirty feet short of where he’d been aiming.

Retreating back into the house, he slammed the door behind him. There was no sign of Angel in the living room, so Marty continued on into the kitchen, pulled another beer out of the refrigerator, knocked the cap off on the edge of the counter, then sucked half of it down his throat before mounting the stairs. When he got to the top, he paused for a moment, glowering at the closed door to his daughter’s room.

His daughter, who didn’t seem to give a damn about what he told her.

Well, now was as good a time as any to teach her a lesson.

He started toward her door, lost his balance, but caught himself before he fell. Twisting the doorknob, he flung the door open without knocking.

Angel was on the bed, huddled up against the headboard, her knees drawn up to her chest.

In her arms she held a cat.

The same black cat with the white blaze on its chest that had attacked him yesterday.

“Get that thing outta here,” he said, his voice rasping, his fingers clenching the beer bottle.

The cat bared its teeth, hissing at him.

Draining the beer, Marty flipped the bottle around so he was holding it by the neck, then smashed it against the floor. As razor-sharp shards of brown glass shot across the floor, he straightened up again. Now he held the broken neck of the bottle in his right hand. Three jagged points, one much longer than the other two, were pointing at the cat.

The cat, and Angel too.

“Wanta try it again, cat?” Marty whispered, moving closer to the bed, jabbing at the cat with the broken bottle.

Angel’s eyes widened as she stared at the broken beer bottle and the fury in her father’s eyes. “Daddy, don’t,” she pleaded. “I–I’ll put him outside.”

“I don’t want him outside,” Marty replied, moving closer. “I want him dead! Should’ve killed him last time…”

Angel felt every muscle in Houdini’s body grow tense as he prepared to launch himself at her father. For a moment she felt paralyzed, but then her mind focused, and again she remembered the rock that had suddenly lifted off the ground and flown through the air.

And in her mind, she visualized not a stone, but her father, and not the top of the bluff, but the bottom of the stairs.

As if grasped by some immense unseen force, Marty Sullivan was suddenly propelled backward out of the room, his head crashing against the top of the doorway as he passed through. A moment later Angel heard him

Вы читаете Black Creek Crossing
Добавить отзыв
ВСЕ ОТЗЫВЫ О КНИГЕ В ИЗБРАННОЕ

0

Вы можете отметить интересные вам фрагменты текста, которые будут доступны по уникальной ссылке в адресной строке браузера.

Отметить Добавить цитату