P. Parrish - An Unquiet Grave

A small crack in Seraphin’s smile.

“Rodney DeFoe told me everything,” Louis said. “And Claudia’s mother told me she signed adoption papers. You took her baby and sold it. That’s how you got the idea for all this.”

Seraphin rose slowly, walking a slow, deliberate circle. “You’ve taken this one tragic incident and made it into this preposterous black market baby conspiracy.”

“So I’m right,” Louis said.

“Right?” she asked.

“About the babies.”

“You seem to need me to confirm something you already know.”

“Just tell me, damn it. Am I right?”

Seraphin hesitated. “Did you read that book by Dr. Laing I gave you? He identified a state called ontological insecurity. It means lacking a sense of selfhood and personal identity.”

“I know who I am,” Louis said.

She studied him for a moment. “But your experience in the tunnel may have altered that. Dr. Laing said that when people are in a threatening situation from which there is no physical escape they can dissociate-their mental self splits from their body and what they experience is like a dream.”

“I read part of that damn book,” Louis said. “He also said being threatened can make your thinking extra sharp.”

Another small smile, as cold as the air. “Then you have nothing to worry about.”

She was still putting it back on him. Making him believe he already had the answers to his questions. But he didn’t.

“Where is Claudia DeFoe?” he asked.

She stared at him. It was a cool, long look that he could read nothing into. For several seconds, neither spoke. Then a sound behind Louis made Seraphin’s eyes swing up.

“Yes, Oliver?”

“The snow is getting worse. We have to get going, Doctor, or we won’t make it out of here,” he said.

“Right,” she said. “Take those bags and finish loading the car. I will be along shortly.”

Oliver picked up the two duffels sitting by the desk and left.

Seraphin looked back at Louis. “I’m afraid our time is up, Mr. Kincaid.”

She turned off the nearest lamp, then went to her desk and picked up her briefcase.

Louis stood up. “Where is Claudia DeFoe?”

Seraphin was at the doors leading to the deck. She gave them a hard tug to make sure they were locked. She turned to him.

“Dead,” she said. She switched off the floodlight. The backyard went black. She looked at him.

Louis didn’t move.

“You’re not going to leave until you hear this, are you?” she asked.

“No.”

“Claudia committed suicide,” Seraphin said. “She got out one night and just walked into the lake.”

“How do you know it was suicide?”

Seraphin paused, seeing the look on Louis’s face. “She left a note for Rodney,” she said. “I have it in my office in Ann Arbor. I’ll show it to you.”

“Why didn’t you just tell the family the truth?”

“You know their history. It would have been cruel. And there would have been other. . repercussions.”

Louis sat back in the chair. He understood what she was saying. And he wanted to believe her about the way Claudia died. But. .

“What happened to her remains?” he asked.

Seraphin sighed, taking a moment to answer. “She was cremated by mistake. You can find her remains in the columbarium. There are small numbers imprinted on the tops of the cans. It was done as a precaution in case the labels were lost. Look for number 926. There is a file somewhere in E Building that holds the cremation log. You’ll find her name there.”

She held up her hands as if she wanted to say something else, but then she just dropped them to her sides. “I probably should have told you all this a long time ago, but I was hoping to spare everyone,” she said softly. “I’m so sorry.”

He was quiet. Unmoving. In the reflected light from the desk lamp, Seraphin’s face looked suddenly old and deflated. The hardness that always seemed to be there was gone.

Louis picked up his coat off the chair.

“Good-bye, Mr. Kincaid,” she said.

He left the den. Out in the foyer, he paused to put on his coat. There were still three large suitcases sitting next to the open front door and a trail of wet footprints leading outside.

Leaving the door ajar, Louis stepped out into the snow. The Volvo was parked to the left of the entrance. There were two suitcases sitting back near the closed trunk. Louis turned up his collar and started back down the hill.

The snow was up to his calves and he walked slowly, his mind locked now on Claudia and her baby. He had his truth now. Claudia was dead. He had his truth now about the baby-from Eloise DeFoe and now Seraphin. But that was all that seemed real. Everything else that had happened at Hidden Lake might as well be a damn dream for all the chance he had of proving it.

And Ives. .

Where the hell was he?

Seraphin was afraid of Ives. She was smart to be leaving.

Louis stopped.

The suitcases sitting by the Volvo. Something weird about that. They were covered with snow, like they’d been sitting there a long time. And the trunk was closed. Why would Oliver leave them in the snow to get ruined?

Forget it, Kincaid. Go home. Get some sleep.

But something felt wrong. Shit, just go back and check.

Louis turned and trudged back up the hill. In the glare of the floodlights, he could see that the front door was closed now, but the suitcases were still sitting by the truck untouched, a heavy layer of snow on top now. Where the hell was Oliver?

Louis went to the back of the Volvo. The snow was tamped down, but the impression was half filled with a fresh cover. Louis stood, looking into the trees, his ears attuned to any sound. But there was only the soft hiss of the falling snow.

He walked to the driver’s door, jerked it open and found the latch to pop the trunk. He went back and threw the truck open.

Oliver lay facedown across the suitcases. There was a huge jagged hole ripped in his neck. The blood had soaked through his collar and onto the suitcases below.

Louis drew back, scanning the nearby trees.

Shit . Ives was here.

His eyes shot to the closed front door. Ives was inside.

Louis pulled up Oliver’s jacket, searching the body for a gun. Nothing. He needed a weapon. . something. Rolling the body onto its side, Louis pulled out a suitcase, tossing it to the snow, looking for something he could use. There was a large black kit and he tore it open.

A tire iron. He grabbed it and ran to the front door.

He pushed against the door. It was locked. He bumped against it with his shoulder, but the door didn’t give. He pounded on it with the tire iron.

“Dr. Seraphin!” he shouted.

He heard nothing from inside.

The windows. There were two, one on each side of the doors, but their wood shutters were closed and pad-locked.

He stepped back to the door, his eyes on the brass door handle. He’d break it off. He started slamming at the handle with the tire iron, smashing it with vicious swings. The wood splintered and the brass started to bend and finally pulled loose from the door. But the lock wouldn’t give.

“Dr. Seraphin!” he yelled again.

He changed angles, jamming the tire iron into the crevice between the lock and the jamb, trying to snap the lock off. The door start to rattle, but still something was holding the lock in place.

He stepped back and kicked at it with the flat of his foot. It shuddered but didn’t open, and he kicked it again, and a third time, and finally on the forth, it popped open, slamming back against the wall.

“Dr. Seraphin!”

The house was dark. The living room, the hall, all the lights were off and still he heard no voices. No screams. And he wondered if he was too late. The den. She would still have been in the den.