Chapter Nineteen

nineteen

RAIN FELL IN CROOKED RIVULETS down the windows one morning. As Jemma entered the library, a cup of coffee in one hand, Inès startled her when she went to close the door behind her. She hadn't known her mother was following her. Inès handed Jemma a letter from Betty, her brows raised.

"It's a friend of mine, in Chicago."

With Jemma not knowing what more to say and Inès seemingly unwilling or unable to give any indication of what she wanted, her mother left the room.

The rain fell harder and thunder rumbled. Lightning flashed at regular intervals. The electricity had gone out, so Jemma burned candles for light so she could complete her research on séances and read Betty's letter:

Dear Jemma,

I'm a little worried about you after your last letter. Are you sure you're all right?

Also, Marvin's other woman lost that baby. When I saw him, he asked about you and he sounded like he missed you.

Have you given any thought to coming back home? You might be able to have something of the life you had before, if you're willing to let the bad stuff go.

Jemma finished the letter, ashamed of her elation over the loss of Marvin's child. But she couldn't go back to that life.

Not yet, anyway.

She had too much unfinished business here.

After dinner, Jemma announced her plan to hold a séance the following night. Fosette did exactly what Jemma expected and began to protest.

"I need information, and I can only get it this way," Jemma explained, her elbows on the table and her hands folded above her plate.

"What kind of information?" Russell asked, the only one of them still eating, on his second helping.

"Information to break the curse and free all of us."

"Well, it's certainly been a long time coming," Simone said, and lit a cigarette. "You sure you don't want to wait until the last week of February? I mean, in case it didn't work, one of us would die and you'd have one less Duchon to deal with." A bitter laugh escaped, along with a cloud of smoke.

"And the sooner I do this, the sooner I'll be out of your lives."

Jemma felt some satisfaction at the way that shut Simone up, although it didn't wipe the disgust from her face.

"We'll meet in the parlor." Briefly turning to Fosette, Jemma went on. "For this to work, it requires all of us to be there. All, Fosette."

"I don't think—" Honorine leaned forward, a warning tone in her voice.

"What, Grandmère? Even you want to leave this place, don't you? To get back to your beloved church, to visit the friends who've all but forgotten about you over the years? How will they feel when they see you on their doorstep? Do you think they'll be happy? Or maybe they'll be afraid, as afraid as they must be now, the way they avoid this place. You can't leave and no one comes, except for Father Louis. Even Charlie, who gave me a ride here when I first arrived, wouldn't come past the gates, wouldn't look back at this place." Jemma's breath was coming fast and hard, although she hadn't moved anything besides her head as she looked at each family member. "Tomorrow night. The parlor. Otherwise, I don't know exactly what's going to happen between now and March twelfth, but on my birthday one of us will definitely die."

—

THE FOLLOWING NIGHT, THE FIVE Duchon family members trailed into the parlor to join Jemma, the women's heads covered with their usual Mass veils, Fosette having given Jemma a spare. Although she was sure no one had discussed what to wear beforehand, all of them showed up in various shades of deep gray or black, including Russell and Laurence, dressed in slate-colored suits as if on their way to a funeral.

As the clock approached eleven, they assembled themselves around the circular table Dennis had brought in from the spare attic room. Small bunches of white taper candles spread a soft glow from the side tables and the center of the round table, where the family Bible rested. Shadows reached from corners and etched themselves in the hollows of the family members' faces, making Jemma wonder if this was a good idea. It wasn't too late to call it off, but with one glance at Simone and the malicious smirk twisting her lips, Jemma forged ahead. She was determined to wipe that expression off her aunt's face.

"Join hands," she commanded. At once, they created a circle, which she warned them not to break until she said it was all right to do so. To Jemma's left, Honorine's cool, papery hand held hers loosely, while Fosette's overly warm fingers gripped hers on the right. From there, it was Laurence, Simone and Russell.

"I'd like to begin with the Lord's Prayer," Jemma said.

Immediately, they all began to recite it in unison. Jemma continued alone with "For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory, forever" after everyone else had already said "Amen."

A thick silence settled over the room, with Jemma uncomfortably aware of the others' pale eyes fixed on her in the gloom. She took a deep breath and lifted her chin, gazing out over Simone's head to the back of the space, where the heavy brocade drapes were drawn.

Forget Carl and Mabel . Think about Inès and what you share with her, what she gave you.

"If there are any spirits here, I'd like you to make yourself known." The shakiness of her voice brought about another of Simone's stiff smiles.

Silence, broken only by the faint ticking of the grandfather clock in the foyer.

Jemma cleared her throat. "I invite you to make yourself known. If you're here, please give us a sign."

Silence.

As Jemma tried to think of something inviting to say, she became aware of Fosette's increasingly firm grip. She tried to stay focused, but she glanced at her cousin anyway, alarmed to see Fosette appearing paler than usual, her mouth drawn in a grimace, her eyes squeezed shut.

Was she afraid of what might answer?

Jemma took a quick look around the table. Both Russell and Honorine held their eyes closed, but Laurence's eyes moved to various places in the room, even as his head remained still. Simone, not surprisingly, stared at Jemma, barely blinking, her expression seeming to say Let's get on with this sham .

She tried again, taking a deep breath and working to keep her voice level. "If there are spirits here, we invite you to make your presence known."

Beneath their clasped hands, the table lifted up a hair and then settled back in place with a firm thunk .

Everyone's eyes opened, Fosette letting out a thin moan. Jemma gave her hand a reassuring squeeze, even as her own fingers trembled.

"What is your name, spirit?"

A quick breeze flew through the room, extinguishing all the candles in a wave, lifting the edges of the women's veils as it moved. A sharp scream came from Jemma's right, but before Fosette could make any more exclamations, the candles relighted.

Five…four…

No , Jemma told herself, her eyes shut. Don't count them away, not this time. Don't be afraid.

She opened her eyes. "Can you show yourself?" Fosette's fingers, suddenly cold, began to slip out of her grasp, but Jemma gripped her. She wouldn't let her break the circle, wouldn't allow her to run out, not when she was so close.

From the center of the table, a form began to rise.

I can do this, Jemma thought, even as she heard I can't do this at the same time.

All the things the Barkers had told her about ghosts, about her ability to see them, came swarming in as she fought to hold on to Fosette.

Don't look at 'em, Jemma.

Ain't nothing but the devil's work if you look.

Five, four, three…

The ghostly figure pulled itself up through the Bible. A man, with woolly hair cropped close to his head, dressed in a tattered shirt open to his navel and with ragged pants that didn't quite reach his ankles. His form rose almost to the ceiling before he floated back down and stood slightly behind Fosette's chair.

A sharp chill accompanied him. The rest of the family didn't seem able to see the ghost—including Russell, whom Jemma studied for several moments—but they clearly felt the coolness in the room.

"What is it?" Fosette wailed.

Jemma jerked her hand without loosening her grip. She wanted to break the circle, but something seemed to clench her fingers around her cousin's. Jemma wanted to let go, wanted to run, but she couldn't.

The spirit lifted a hand slowly, as if it were moving through water, and pointed at each of the Duchons in turn. Fright clawed its way up Jemma's throat. Was she next? He met Jemma's eyes, but placed his hands down at his sides.

"What are you looking at?" Honorine demanded, her face turned in the general direction of the ghost.

"Is something there?" Simone asked, her gaze moving to all four corners of the room. "Why is it so cold? What's there?"

Before Jemma could reply, the spirit's form wavered, and then he was gone.

Relief washed over Jemma, as the family looked at her in silence. Next to Jemma, Fosette appeared to be in a faint, her eyes half-open. She leaned slightly to one side, her head hanging at a crooked angle.

Just as Jemma's fingers began to loosen and she prepared to tell them that they'd have to try again another time, Honorine spoke up. "Miss Barker, what is your purpose, besides making the room cold?"

The question annoyed Jemma. "I didn't do that." A beat. "I want to try again."

Simone cursed under her breath.

It took several moments for Jemma to regain her focus, gazing at one of the candles on the table, the flicker of the flame hypnotizingly rapid. There was no more breeze in the room, and she didn't know if one of the spirits had caused it or not. As Fosette's lips moved quickly in what Jemma assumed was a prayer, she put forth her own.

I just need you to talk to me. Say anything that can help. I don't know if I can do this again.

Jemma tried to remember what Magdalene had told her about spirits, about talking to them.

Dennis's voice came, too: Running is easy, until it ain't. How many times have you run from something?

Too many times to count, but that's what the Barkers had taught her. Run from the spirits; run from the curse of seeing them.

It was no gift to be able to see ghosts.

Without warning, two figures appeared, one behind Russell and the other behind Honorine. Both were women, dressed in similarly ragged clothes. Jemma watched them closely, but neither appeared to be the same woman whom she'd followed out the back door months ago.

How many ghosts were in this place?

The older of the two had hair braided close to her scalp. As her form became more clear, disfigurement on one side of her face became apparent. The younger woman took on more opaqueness as well, and her face appeared melted, the flesh sagging down her cheek and chin, melding into the skin on her neck.

Ask them about the curse. Ask them!

But Jemma shut her eyes, wanting nothing more than to send them away.

Five…four…three…

No . Don't run.

Jemma opened her eyes, to see the older spirit settle her gaze on Honorine before reaching out a hand. The younger spirit took it. Their forms began to grow more transparent.

"What are your names?" Jemma asked quickly, her voice trembling.

"Who's there?" Simone shrieked.

The two women watched Jemma. The younger one opened her mouth to speak, but no sound came out.

Hear them, Jemma. Don't count them away. Don't run. Open yourself to them.

"Jane."

The voice wasn't very clear, but Jemma made out that much.

You have to speak to them. You have to ask them for help.

The thoughts were the opposite of what she'd always done, but she needed the spirits' help. She swallowed several times and licked her lips.

"Hello, Jane," Jemma managed. "Thank you for coming."

"Who's Jane?" Laurence asked.

"Are there any other spirits here? I invite you to show yourself."

The young man reappeared, right as Jane whispered, "It's dark."

"What's your name?" Jemma asked the man.

She couldn't hear him clearly the first few times he spoke, but eventually she heard "Adam."

"Adam," Jemma asked, "is it dark where you are, too?"

"And cold," he replied.

Jemma considered their words. Dark and cold. Where could they be besides in a grave?

"Are you buried here on the property? In the slave cemetery?"

"This is enou—" Honorine hissed, but Jemma snapped at her before she could finish.

"Quiet! Let me hear them speak. Or you'll never be free from this place." She lifted her eyes to Adam's face. "Can you tell me where you are?"

"Under."

"Under what?"

There was no cellar in the house. None of the homes in this region had cellars, what with the area being at sea level.

"What do you mean by ‘under'?" Jemma asked, looking at Jane, wondering if she would answer instead.

"The bones," Jane whispered. "So many bones."

Jemma opened her mouth to ask what Jane meant, but within seconds, her form grew more transparent until she disappeared. Jemma turned back to Adam, hoping and praying that he would stay put.

"Adam. What did Jane mean by ‘so many bones'?"

At first, he didn't respond, only stared at Honorine. But finally, he croaked out, "We the bones."

As Jemma opened her mouth to ask another question, he blinked out, taking the candlelight with him. Fosette screamed, halfway out of her seat, while Jemma relit the candles.

"Sit back down. This isn't over."

"What's going on, anyway?" Russell asked, leaning forward as if he was about to rise. "For all we know, you're talking to the air."

"You want to die next?" Jemma snapped.

He sat back, and beside her, Fosette did the same, her face ghastly, as if all its beauty could shine only in the light of day.

"We're this close to getting the information I need," Jemma said, resuming her seat and grabbing Fosette's and Honorine's hands. "Now, focus. Please."

Before she could do more than take a couple of breaths, a chill descended on the room. In an instant, the family members were surrounded by more than a dozen spirits, Jane and Adam among them.

"It burns yet, missy," one of the female ghosts hissed.

"So cold, so cold," another spirit moaned.

One said it burned, and another said it was cold. It made no sense.

"What burns?" Jemma asked.

"Stop this!" Honorine shouted.

"What are you afraid of?" Jemma turned her attention to her grandmother.

"Free them," the spirit said. "Set them free."

"The secret is in the blood," another ghost moaned, not looking at anyone in particular. "Free them, free the blood."

A sudden blast of heat blew through the room, but where it came from was unclear. Fosette jumped up, and struggled to free her hand from Jemma's grip.

"Stop it," she begged. "Let me go! I don't know what's going on and I don't want to know!"

"Wait—" Jemma said, although she didn't know why. She wanted this to be over, too.

"Damn your circle!" her cousin screamed. "And damn you!"

Fosette pulled herself back. In Jemma's attempt to maintain her grip, she was yanked out of her seat. Honorine had let go of her other hand, but Jemma and Fosette wrestled. Jemma was vaguely aware that Simone had stood up but made no effort to break them apart. Fosette shrieked and laughed, a horrible, piercing sound that belonged in an asylum, not in a once-grand house with a proud family still inhabiting it. Fosette ran her fingers through her carefully waved hair, dislodging the veil, the strands standing away from her scalp. Even in the dimness, the pink spots high on her cheeks were visible. Jemma didn't think she'd ever seen her look so unhinged.

"Are they here with you? Do they come when you call them?" Fosette went on, her fingers hooked, first tearing at her hair, then pulling at her dress. "What do you see?" Turning to the others, her eyes blazing, she hissed, "Do they tell you things about us? About what we did? What I did?"

"Don't say another word," Honorine whispered.

Questions swirled in Jemma's mind, but she needed to ask the one that she wanted the answer to the most. Not knowing which of the spirits, if any, had the answer, she asked of none in particular, "Who did they bury in the old slave cemetery when I was born?"

Gasps rose from a few members of the family, not surprisingly including Honorine and Simone. They knew. But the ghosts just stared back at Jemma, except for the odd one or two whose attention focused on the rest of the Duchons. She repeated the question, more loudly this time.

Adam looked at her. "Ismael."

A loud, inhuman howl sounded from the doorway, startling everyone around the table. They turned to find Agnes gripping the doorframe—when had she come in?—her mouth a wide O, her eyes wild. Her entire body was a rigid board. And then her knees slowly gave way as she slid to the floor, still howling. The family's attention was rooted on her, confusion marring their faces.

"Who's Ismael?" Jemma asked Adam. "Who is he?"

But it wasn't Adam who answered.

Instead, Simone screamed, "He was your father, damn you! Your father is buried out there on the grounds! Yes, buried the same day you were born!"

"Hush," Honorine seethed.

But her daughter wouldn't be hushed. Her eyes just as wild as those of her sister—the one who continued to howl as she sat on the floor, outside of the circle—Simone stood up, words bursting from her in a rush, as if she'd held them back for twenty-seven years and was finally able to release the floodgates. "My parents had to do it. Inès wouldn't leave that man alone. He actually thought we'd accept him just because your whore of a mother was pregnant with you. They really believed we'd welcome him into the family. And then here you came, with your brown eyes and your tan skin, looking just like him! You'd never fit in with us! Never!"

"Stop it!" Honorine yelled.

"Your mother called him when her labor pains started," Simone continued. "And he came out here to talk to my father, to tell him that he was going to marry Inès, seeking his blessing. Upstairs, my bitch of a sister was moaning and praying, along with the midwife and Maman. And then you were whelped. So much was happening that we missed it when the midwife took you out of here, but she must have known what would've happened to you if she hadn't stolen you away. Because yes, Maman and Papa were going to kill you, just like Papa killed your father, shot him and then buried that common ditch nigger outside."

"Your husband killed my father?" Jemma asked Honorine, although the answer had already been given to her. The tears were so thick in her eyes that the whole room blurred before her.

Her grandmother, still in her seat, didn't raise her eyes to Jemma. Her gaze skittered across the table in front of her, her mouth hanging slack. After a moment, she seemed to remember where she was, although she merely babbled at first. "We…we had to do it. He would never…You would never…Our legacy. She tried to ruin it. She tried to ruin us! After you were born, as Inès lay there in the bed, I told her that Raymond had sent her man away, that he'd never come back here. She cursed us. ‘I curse all the Duchon blood,' she said. ‘From this day forth, I bind the family to this house. I bind them forever.'?" Honorine met Jemma's gaze. "She actually did that. To her own blood. Not knowing that she was cursing you and Laurence, too. Or maybe she just didn't care. She thought she was going to die, I think. Because she bound herself here just as she cursed the rest of us!" Honorine began to laugh, a high cackle that was even worse than the low howl that still came from Inès.

Jemma turned to look at her mother.

"Is it true, Mama?" she asked. More gasps followed. Jemma turned back to the table, her voice soft. "Yes, I know. She's my mother and you all did this to her, cut out her tongue, made her serve you. You've tortured her and mistreated her. You turned her own son against her. She didn't tell me." A bitter laugh escaped Jemma. "Of course she didn't tell me. How could she? I found out when you left the Bible here that night when you all choked and the smoke poured out of your mouths. I found the family tree. I knew you were horrible people, but murder? Marrying your own cousins just so you could keep having high yellow children? What is wrong with you monsters?"

"Are the ghosts still there? Ask them how to break the curse, you bitch!" Simone shrieked, pulling Jemma's focus from Honorine.

The spirits hadn't moved and didn't seem agitated by anything going on among the living, despite the occasional glares they threw at the family members.

But "Free them," they said. Why on earth would they want Jemma to free the Duchons? And suddenly, Jemma didn't want any of them freed. The people she was related to were vile. She hoped the curse struck them all.

"I'm not doing any such thing," Jemma said, the level tone of her voice surprising her. She didn't have to yell; she knew each of the Duchons heard her clearly. "Because unlike you, I can leave this property. Not fucking any 'shiners, though, just getting out of this rotten house. I could have left months ago. Do you understand? I chose to stay, to help not just you but myself, too."

Jemma wanted to say more, wanted to curse them with her own spell. If her mother could do it, then surely she could do it, too.

Inès's sobs caught her attention. She didn't want her mother to die from the curse, did she? Although it was Inès who'd set everything in motion, though she'd had a justifiable—to Jemma's mind—reason for what she did. As Jemma threw her head back, letting loose with a long wail of her own, she imagined this entire cursed house crumbling down on all of their heads. The last note of her keening died down just as an urgent whispering reached her ears.

Jane knelt next to the prostrate Inès, who appeared almost catatonic. The spirit's mouth was close to Inès's ear, her lips moving rapidly.

Jemma staggered toward Inès and Jane. Dimly, she was aware that the other ghosts were gradually withdrawing into the shadows. Simone was screeching something. Russell was yelling. The sounds came to Jemma as if from behind closed doors. As Jane's form ebbed away, Jemma caught the tail end of the ghost's words: "…or you will never be free."

Jemma put a hand on Inès's shoulder and gave her a small shake.

"Mama? Can you hear me?" She sat on the floor and faced her, hip to hip. Not knowing what else to do, not caring that the rest of the family was now rushing out of the parlor, Fosette being supported by Russell, Laurence muttering something about "this voodoo bullshit," Simone being prevented from snatching at Jemma only by Honorine's iron grip.

It was just Jemma and Agnes now. Emmaline and Inès.

Jemma slipped her arms around her mother's back and pulled her close to her. Inès's head lolled, the weight dropping against her daughter's neck. Jemma rocked her back and forth in the gloom, her tears mixing with her mother's, each of them raining a river of pain onto the other as shadows danced with menacing glee around them.