Odnośniki
- Indeks
- Frederick Marshall Brown [Ravaging Myths 01] Ravaging Myths (pdf)(1)
- Anita Philmar [Black Dragon 03] Black Dragon's Heart (pdf)
- Donita K Paul [DragonKeeper Chronicles 04] DragonFire (pdf)
- Beverly Connor [Diane Fallon Forensic Investigation 07] Dust To Dust (pdf)
- Charles R Cross Room Full of Mirrors A Biography of Jimi Hendrix (pdf)
- Bailey Bradford [Love in Xxchange 04] What Matters Most [TEB MM] (pdf)
- Alan Burt Akers [Dray Prescot 14] Krozar of Kregen (pdf)
- Bailey Bradford [Southwestern Shifters 03] Reckless [TEB MM] (pdf)
- Janrae Frank Lycan Blood 03 If Truth Dies [pdf]
- Diana Castilleja [Aiza Clan 02] A Trust Earned (pdf)
- zanotowane.pl
- doc.pisz.pl
- pdf.pisz.pl
- anapro.xlx.pl
Most competently. His manner softened. He stopped walking
and turned to face her. Vodun isn t necessarily evil, Claire. It s an old
set of beliefs and an honorable one. Goes all the way back to Africa. It
came to the West Indies with the slave trade. He shoved his hands
into his pockets and began to walk again. Vodun exists side by side
with Christianity. In fact, most of the folk you d see at a vodun rite on
Saturday night will be at mass on Sunday morning. And you know
what they do with their new drums? They dress them up in white and
baptize them!
Philippe was talking with a sort of grim desperation, skirting the
horrible reality of Bertrand s body lying in the stable with the face a
mass of bloody scratches. Not that vodun doesn t have its dark side,
he was saying. But so does Christianity. Think of the Inquisition, the
Crusades, the pogroms . . . the deviltry that s been done in the poor
name of Christ! And then we look down our noses at vodun for a few
He stopped in midsentence, suddenly pale. Good Lord! he
murmured.
114
Drums of Darkness
He spun around as if he d been shot and bolted back toward the sta-
ble. Simone! he shouted. Dumbfounded, Claire raced after him.
Simone was still crouching in the straw beside Bertrand s body. Her
hands were raised high above her head and in them she gripped a
long hunting knife.
Simone! Philippe gasped, hurling himself through the doorway.
Don t do it, Simone!
She swung her face toward them. Her black cheeks were streaming
with tears. Stay back. M sieu Philippe! I got to do it! Got to set his
soul free, or they ll steal it!
Simone! Philippe edged toward her.
Stay back, M sieu Philippe! The knife quivered in her upraised
hands. She was a leopardess, a crouching, wild-eyed animal. So
intense was her ferocity that even Philippe dared not approach her.
Claire caught his sleeve. He pushed her back behind him. Get out
of here, Claire! he muttered.
Simone stretched her arms to their full height, steadied the quiver-
ing knife. Then with a sob she plunged the weight of her arms and
body downward, thrusting the knife hilt-deep into Bertrand s chest.
Claire gasped, choking on her own horror. Philippe swung her
around and pressed her face into his shoulder. She felt the jerking of
his chest muscles as he breathed.
After a few seconds he let her go. The handle of the knife pro-
truded through Bertrand s shirt. There was no blood. Simone was
sitting back on her heels, eyes streaming, a triumphant, faraway look
on her face.
As they moved closer, they could hear her whispering, crooning.
Go home now . . . Go home, my Bertrand . . .
It was evening. The police had come and gone. Claire sat in one of
the big chairs in the library with Marie-Thérèse on her lap, leafing
through a picture book.
The police had found nothing. Since the yard was all grass and cob-
blestone, there d been no tracks. They d left soon after they came, their
manner indicating in language stronger than words that the murder of
a black, hunchbacked stablehand was hardly worth their time.
Strange, Claire thought, they had done her an unknowing favor. To
make sure that no one in the house fled the country, they had confis-
115
Elizabeth Lane
cated all of their passports. No matter how badly he might want to,
Philippe would not be sending her back to France on the next boat.
Simone had been busy all day with funeral preparations. Claire had
watched her trek back and forth from the house to the gate and into the
jungle beyond, carrying an assortment of mysterious bags and bundles,
as well as a pick and shovel. Finally, just at dusk, Claire had seen her go
out the gate with the puny Bertrand cradled in her arms like a baby.
Lizette, bug-eyed and still shaken, had told her about the vodun
funeral ceremony. Bertrand would be dressed all in black, sewn into
clothing from which the buttons had been removed. His head would
be shaved, his nails cut, and the hair and clippings put into the coffin
to keep them from being used for evil magic. His jaw would be bound
shut to keep the precious drops of moisture from escaping his mouth.
Because witchcraft was so strongly suspect in his death, some addi-
tional precautions would be taken. Simone s stabbing of the corpse
was meant to liberate the soul that the use of black magic had trapped
inside the body. For greater protection, a small wooden cross carved
from a single piece of pine would be placed in the casket, along with
bunches of a plant called hoholi. The evil one who comes to take the
body must count the hoholi seeds first, Lizette had explained. The
hoholi, it has so many seeds that the bad one can never finish counting
them before morning, and by then it s too late. Lizette had leaned
close and clutched Claire s arm. But if Simone killed him, she will
only pretend to do those things. Then his body will be her servant, her
zombi, until the time when Bertrand would have died if she had not
killed him, Mam selle.
Claire had dismissed her after that, and refused to listen to any
more. Her own heart was heavy. Not so much because she had known
Bertrand well enough to be deeply grieved by his death, but because
he had become so vital to her as her most important link in proving
Paul s innocence. Now he was out of reach forever. He would never be
able to tell her what he knew. Claire shivered. She had reason to
believe that the secrets he d held from her had provided someone with
a reason to kill him.
Marie-Thérèse had been bewildered by the day s events. Bertrand,
Claire learned, had been her friend. Before Claire had come, the little
girl had often gone to visit him in the stable where he would carve
whistles and little animals for her out of bamboo, play his harmonica
116
Drums of Darkness
for her, or let her feed the horses. She had not yet realized that he was
gone, but the strained atmosphere had upset her. Her three-year-old
mind understood that something was wrong.
Philippe, his face drawn, had taken Claire aside after breakfast.
Help me tell her, he d pleaded.
So they d taken Marie-Thérèse into the garden and sat down on the
stone bench with her between them. In spite of Philippe s initial hesi-
tation, he d taken on the burden of telling her himself that her friend
was dead. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]