The Waiting: A Supernatural Thriller(47)

“Apparently she passed her gift on to you,” Evan said, motioning to the walls.

Cecil shook her head, slowly, deliberately. “I received but a fraction of what she possessed. If you could’ve seen her work, if you could’ve seen that painting in the room before—”

She stopped, her small face crinkling with lines.

“What happened there?”

His initial excitement at opening up a channel for answers wasn’t as strong. Something dulled it, clouded over it like the weather outside cloaked the sky.

“To understand what happened, you must first understand what Abel Kluge was.”

“What was he?”

“A madman, and a cruel one at that. If he hadn’t needed a maid that could also cook when my mother came calling, he would have turned her away, battered and bruised, no matter. He was not unfamiliar with women looking like that anyway, since he sometimes administered beatings to his wife as well as the rest of the staff.”

Evan waited, not knowing what to say, and decided not to say anything, in hopes that Cecil would keep talking.

“You see, Mr. Tormer, work was scarce in the early 1900s, and an employer that paid steadily was even more of a rarity. The staff at Kluge House got room and board, pay, and Abel’s knuckles if he became displeased with any of them.” Her eyes trailed to the window and grew distant. “I have no doubt my mother would have died there had she not met my father.”

“He worked there too, I’m assuming?”

Cecil turned back toward him and dipped her chin once. “Yes, he was the groundskeeper and the head butler. He and my mother fell in love shortly after she arrived there, and they began to make plans to leave the awful place as soon as they could afford to, but the money didn’t ever seem to add up and they were forced to stay.”

Cecil finished her coffee and scooted forward to the edge of her chair, pensive, staring into his eyes. Evan could see the old woman was working something out inside her head.

“I suppose that woman was the final piece of the bizarre puzzle assembled in that home,” Cecil said quietly.

“Allison Kaufman,” Evan said.

Cecil half smiled, without humor, and he decided it was a terrible thing on her tired features.

“I see you’ve been somewhat successful in your research, or deductions.”

“It was the only thing that fit,” Evan said. “Two people die and one disappears on the same day in a small town? Not likely.”

Cecil shook her head, like a pendulum. “Not likely at all. If Abel Kluge was a madman, Allison was his equal. She was orphaned young and grew up in a small church south of Mill River. No matter how strict the nuns were back then, they were no replacement for parents. She turned to mischief at an early age—stealing, drinking, even prostitution before she met Abel. From what I know, she showed up at the gates one day, long, brown hair most of the way down her back, eyes conniving. Something about her must have flipped a switch in him, for she was immediately given a room, and was his mistress within days.”

“Right in front of his wife?” Evan asked, taken aback.

Cecil gave him the half smile again. “Oh yes. By then, Larissa wasn’t much more than a husk of her former self. He’d hollowed her out with beatings and mistreatments for so long, I’m not sure she even realized what was going on.”

Cecil sat back in her chair, her spine still rigid, as if the telling of the history wouldn’t let her relax.

“But Allison, on the other hand, put up with nothing from him. In a matter of months, most of the staff answered to her as the lady of the house. My mother told me some nights the staff was unable to sleep, for the sounds of their carrying-on in the upstairs bedroom would filter down through the house, sounds of sex, pain, hissing, screaming. I shudder to imagine what really went on in those rooms.”

Cecil paused, pursing her lips while her eyes found the painting over Evan’s shoulder.

“My mother and father lived in constant fear of them, for Allison only heightened the violence and mistreatments that went on there. In fact, it appeared that her cruelty rivaled Abel’s in many ways. My mother said that more than once a servant was randomly called to her room, strapped down, and then whipped within an inch of his or her life, as Abel and Allison took turns behind the leather strap.”

“God, why?” Evan said, feeling a lurch of revulsion in his stomach.

“Because they were able to, Mr. Tormer. I assume it made them feel powerful, as we crush a spider that crawls onto our pillow. They were merely full of hate and needed someone to unleash it on. But fate, it seems, is the great equalizer. Nothing in this world goes unnoticed, no deed, good or bad, remains unbalanced. Less than a year after coming to Kluge House, Allison became sick. It was soon clear she had the consumption.”

“Tuberculosis.”

“Yes. It was still a very prominent disease in those days, taking bloody bites out of the population whenever it could. No one knows how Allison caught it or why no one else became infected, but it sealed all three of their fates.”

Evan’s heart picked up speed. A picture formed in his mind, the room that he and Selena had stood in rearranging itself into a scene he could almost touch.

“He built the clock for her, didn’t he?” Evan asked, knowing he was right.

“Yes. My mother told me he was completely devastated by her prognosis, which deteriorated each week, so he started to work in the basement of the house. He spent hours upon hours down there, and the staff was forbidden to enter, to see what he slaved over day and night. When he wasn’t working, he was at Allison’s bedside, watching her, or contacting every doctor within six counties to come and see her condition. But there was nothing anyone could do.”