And how, Grayson wondered as he rode Astor to the physician’s house on Claymore Street just off the Royal Mile, was he to change Mary’s mind—rather, her spirit’s mind—about Cibalto Terduck?
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Sunday evening
Grayson was tired, his head pounded, and he felt frustrated and stupid. Mary wouldn’t come to him, no matter how hard he concentrated. By the time he returned to Abbotsford Crescent, he knew he wasn’t seeing something important, but he couldn’t figure out what it was. So many pieces to this puzzle, so many unanswered questions, so many inconsistencies, and now Cibalto believed Grayson was the one to find Mary’s descendants to save him from Mary’s curse. And yet the curse made no sense. Grayson’s head continued to hurt.
Miranda was alone. George and Lise Marie had taken the children to see acrobats performing with a traveling theater group on the Royal Mile. She took one look at Grayson, took his hand, and led him to the sofa in the sitting room. She brought him a cup of tea, blistering hot with a dollop of honey. He drank it slowly and finally looked at her, closely. Miranda looked like a woman on the edge. He forgot his headache, instantly alarmed. “Where is everyone? Why are you here alone? What happened while I was gone?”
“Drink your tea.”
He took another sip, waited.
“You go first.”
And so Grayson told her about finding Mrs. Brush on the floor in the kitchen, struck down by someone or something she hadn’t seen, and Cibalto surrounded by his destroyed library furniture. “He claims it was Mary’s doing, to terrify him, to let him know he is going to die. I fetched a physician for Mrs. Brush and came home. Your turn.”
“To see you again, alive and well—I was worried about you, Grayson, so I stayed home while George and Lise Marie took the children to a theater.” She sucked in a deep breath. “I’ll spit it out. Ever since you met Cibalto Terduck, it seems everything has flown out of control. You and George have told me about the Red Witch at Ravenstone and how the two of you faced her down. Don’t you see? You had a plan; you knew it was a succubus and you trapped it. But here? You have no idea what’s going on. Scary things keep happening, like Pip disappearing at the castle, Pip seeing the old man at the bookstore who sold him that strange book, and now this—something attacked Mr. Terduck and Mrs. Brush. Tell me, do you understand yet what is happening here?”
He looked into her beloved face, picked up her white hand, and laid it on his leg, his hand over hers. “I’m sorry, Miranda, but I’m as confused—no,bewilderedis a better word—as you are. I don’t know what to do. I seem to be pulled in one direction, then another. And then this violence and destruction today. I know it all centers on Mary, but tearing apart every stick of furniture in Cibalto’s library? Do you know, it simply doesn’t feel like Mary.” He sighed. “I can’t figure it out.”
Miranda tapped her fingertips on his leg. “Take another drink of tea. Let’s look at this logically, place all the pieces in order—what happened first, then second, and so on.”
Before Grayson could open his mouth, the front door opened and they heard three excited children talking, each young voice drowning out another. They burst into the drawing room, George and Lise Marie on their heels, looking very pleased with themselves and laughing.
Pip shouted, “Papa, we watched the puppet show! Mr. Punch squawked like a chicken!”
P.C. said, “I wish Judy had knocked his head off.”
Brady said, “Punch never hit her hard, P.C.”
Pip said, “Uncle George told us how Punch and Judy came from Italy way back before any of us were born.”
“That’s right,” Lise Marie said, “a very, very far way back, Pip, back even before the Great was born.”
Brady said, “Goodness, Lise Marie, that’s nearly back to the ark.”
And on and on it went until Young Agnes came into the room with Meg, Pip’s nanny, behind her, to announce dinner. Grayson realized his headache was gone. He rose and picked up Pip, kissed him soundly, and handed him over to Meg. Pip said with great dignity, “Meg, I am a big boy, so do not try to carry me. You will hurt your back.”
Meg wanted to tell him she’d carried him around since he was a day old, but she said, “You’re right, Master Pip, you are a big boy now.” She leaned down, kissed his nose.
The adults listened to the children’s excited voices fading as Meg led them up the stairs to the nursery and their own dinner.
George said, “I wondered about the violence since Punch is always walloping Judy—”
“But, George, the way Punch squeaked when he talked,” Lise Marie said. “I laughed until my sides ached. Trust me. The children knew it was all a jest.”
As they went to the dining room, George said, “Everyone even laughed when the marionette strings got tangled, including the children.”
Lise Marie said, “Punch even squawked while his lines were being untangled, a nice touch.”
Young Agnes’s dinner was splendid, the stuffed pork prepared perfectly. Miranda tucked the turnips, orneeps, under the rest of her vegetables, grinned when everyone looked at her. Young Agnes had made a tasty sponge cake covered with candied plums. Grayson didn’t mention what happened at Cibalto’s house.
That night, Grayson lay on his back in his bed and called to Mary, but she wasn’t there. When he finally slept, he dreamed of red mist covering a bright white moon, then veiling it, like an eclipse, but then a flash of white cut through the red, and it dissolved, leaving the moon bright white again, but Grayson knew the red mist hovered and if it covered the moon again, there would be death, probably Cibalto’s. He saw himself as a puppet, unseen hands above him tangling the strings and making him turn in circles, flail about, stumble and fall. He felt those unseen hands jerking his own hands up to strike out, again and again, at the white—
“Grayson! You yelled. Are you all right?”
It was George, Lise Marie and Miranda behind him, and he was shaking Grayson awake. Still Grayson didn’t come back until he heard Pip yell, “Papa!”
