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Once Simon and Lady Denby have gone, Grandmama has Emily draw me a hot bath. When I sink into the deep tub, water sluices along the sides and comes to settle in tiny waves beneath my chin. Lovely. I close my eyes and let my arms float upon the surface of the water.
The sharp pain comes swiftly, nearly pulling me under. My body goes rigid, out of my control. Water rushes into my mouth till I'm coughing and sputtering. Panic has me gripping the side of the bathtub, desperate to get out. I hear the dreaded whisper, like a swarm of insects.
"Come with us. . . ."
The pain subsides, and now my body is light as a snowflake, as if I were in a dream. I do not want to open my eyes. I do not want to see them. But they may have answers to my questions, so I turn my head slowly. There they are, ghoulish and haunting, with their ragged white dresses and dark circles beneath soulless eyes. "What do you want?" I ask. I'm still coughing up water.
"Follow us," they say, and they slip through the closed door as if it were nothing.
Hurriedly, I reach for my dressing gown and open the door, searching for sign of them. They hover just outside my bedroom, casting a false light at the end of the darkened hall. They motion for me to follow as they slip into my room.
I'm shaking and wet, but I follow them, working up the courage to speak. "Who are you? Can you tell me anything about the Temple?"
They do not answer. Instead, they float to the cupboard and wait.
"My cupboard? There's nothing in there. Just my clothing and shoes."
They shake their pale heads. "The answers you seek are here."
In my cupboard? They're as mad as Nell Hawkins. Carefully as I can, I step around them and begin pushing aside dresses and coats, tearing through hatboxes and shoes, looking for what it is I'm supposed to find, though what that is I can't begin to imagine. Finally, I explode in frustration.
"I told you, there's nothing here!"
It's the horrible sound of those pointed boots scraping my floors that has me scrambling backward. Oh, God, I've done it now, made them angry. They advance, arms out, coming for me. I can move no farther; I'm trapped by the bed.
"No, please," I whisper, curling into a ball, shutting my eyes tight.
Those fingers of ice are on my shoulders and here it comes, a vision of such fury I can scarcely breathe, let alone think of crying for help. A field of green leading from the old stone ruins to the cliffs by the sea. In their white dresses, the girls run and laugh. One snatches the hair ribbon from another.
"Will she give us the power today?" the girl with the ribbon asks."And will we at last see the realms that are so beautiful?"
"I hope so, for I should like to play with magic," another says. The girl whose hair has fallen free of her ribbon calls, "Eleanor, did she promise that it would be today?"
"Yes," the girl answers in a tight, high voice. "She will come soon. We shall enter the realms and have it all, everything we've ever wished for."
"And she thinks this time you can take us in?"
"She says so."
"Oh, Nell, that is wonderful!"
Eleanor. Nell, The name pushes the air from my lungs. For the first time, I see her, walking toward the others. She is heavier, and her hair is curled and shining, the face untroubled, but I recognize her instantly: It is Nell Hawkins, before she was touched by madness.
There is the coarse sound of insect wings near my ear. "Watch. . . ."
It is like being pulled by a fast train, everything moving so quickly past the windows of my eyes. The girls on the rocks. The woman in green, face hidden. The hand taking Nell's. The sea rising like the terror in their eyes.
It stops. I'm panting on my floor. They point to the cupboard. What could it possibly be? I've been through it all, and there's nothing ... My mother's red diary peeks out from a pocket of a coat. I reach for it.
"This?" I ask, but they are already fading into a mist that disappears completely. The room comes back to itself. The vision has ended. I've no idea what they could mean. I've been through this diary again and again, looking for clues, and there is nothing. I turn each page till I reach the place where I've saved my mother's creased newspaper clippings. When I read the first line this time, I do not find it to be a melodramatic story badly told. No, this time it chills me through and through.
A trio of girls in Wales went out walking and were never heard from again. . . .
I read on, feeling my blood run fast as I do. Young ladies who were the angels of Saint Victoria's School for Girls . . . fair, shining daughters of the Crown . . . loved by all. . . walked gaily to the cliffs by the sea, never knowing the tragic fate that awaited them . . . lone survivor. . . went mad as a hatter. . . bears some resemblance to the story of a bonnie lass from the MacKenzie School for Girls . . . Scotland . . . the tragic dagger of suicide . . . claimed to see visions, frightening the other girls . . . fell to her death . . . other disquieting tales . . . Miss Farrow's Academy for Girls . . , Royal College of Bath. . , .
The names of these schools are familiar. I know them. Where have I heard them before? And then it comes to me with a cold, hard chill: Miss McCleethy. I saw them on the list she kept inside her case beneath the bed. She'd marked through them all. Only Spence remained.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
