Kelley Armstrong - Omens

The taxi had barely gone thirty miles past Chicago before it turned off the highway. I expected the town to be right there, but it was at least another twenty-minute drive until we passed the sign welcoming us to Cainsville. Actually, “welcoming” might be an exaggeration. The sign was so small I had to squint to see it. It didn’t even say Welcome. Just Cainsville, Pop. 1,600, as if state law decreed there be one or they would have left the population sign off altogether.

It looked welcoming enough, though. Classic mid- to late-nineteenth-century architecture—heavy on brick and stone and flourishes. A pretty town, in better shape than most. The main street—called Main Street, naturally—was heavily Renaissance Revival, red brick with the occasional yellow brick facade thrown in for variety. Arched windows topped by simple keystones. Elaborate cornices of tin or painted wood. Trees lined the road, and there were flowering pots and raised beds everywhere.

Almost every shop on Main Street was occupied, and from the looks of the signs—J. Brown and Sons Grocers, the Corner Diner, Loomis Bros. Fine Fashions—they’d been there for decades. That was a huge accomplishment these days, where many town cores were filled with For Rent signs, dollar stores, and pawnshops.

A flicker of movement near a roof caught my eye and I looked up to see a bluebird alighting on the long nose of a gargoyle. A spring bluebird. That was a good sign.

As the cab paused at the crosswalk, I took a better look at the gargoyle. It was a real one, the mouth opening in a spout for water draining off the roof. It was far from the only gargoyle, too. Now that I looked, I saw them everywhere—on rooftops, on gateposts, over doorways.

“A town filled with gargoyles,” I said. “Must be well protected.”

The cabbie looked up and muttered something in a language I didn’t recognize. Then, as the light changed, he said, “This is Cainsville. I let you out here.”

“I have an address,” I said. “Five Rowan Street.”

“I do not know where that is.” He pulled to the side. “You get out here.”

“No, I have an address.” I put the window down and called to a young woman pushing a stroller. “Excuse me, do you know where I’d find Rowan Street?”

She gave me directions, friendly as could be. Even warned us that there was no parking on the east side of the road.

Rowan adjoined Main Street, making it an easy drive. The cabbie turned onto it but didn’t park. He barely stopped. Just took my fare and left me on the side of the road. I didn’t tip him, either. A first for me, and I thought I’d feel guilty. I didn’t. Instead, I was happy for the excuse to keep the money.

An elderly couple tut-tutted as the cabbie sped off, then gave me smiles and good mornings, which I returned before they carried on.

I stood on the curb for a moment, waiting for that sensory overload after the cocooning quiet of the car. It didn’t come. I smelled lilacs and freshly mown grass. I heard the wind and the distant ding-ding of a bicycle bell. But that was it.

I relaxed and looked around. The apartment building was across the road. When I saw it, I had to double-check the address. The building was gorgeous. Three stories of Renaissance Revival beauty. Smooth, yellow-gray stone walls forming a rectangle. A recessed, arched front entrance topped by a triangular gable. Red-clay tiled hipped roof. Deep eaves with huge, decorative brackets. Balconies under every window, most too narrow to use.

On closer inspection, I could see the signs that the building had not been kept in the shape befitting such a grand old dame. Disrepair is harder to spot with a place like this—the stonework will survive anything short of a bomb blast. No factories in the area meant the stone had stayed reasonably clean. But there were little signs—the crumbling edge of a window rail, the slight sag in the roof—that it was only good bone structure that left her looking so fine in her old age. Even the plain ivory curtains in the windows seemed as if they hadn’t been replaced in decades.

Speaking of curtains … as I walked down Rowan I noticed another pretty place, this one a fraction of the size. A dollhouse of a two-story Victorian, narrow and shallow, its height making it seem bigger than it was. Weathered boards cried out for a fresh coat of paint. Ivy covered every surface. The yard was well kept, though. Exceedingly well kept, with a golf-course-perfect lawn and gardens so lush they seemed to have time-warped into midsummer. It was jarring, that juxtaposition. Like something out of a fairy tale, the perfect yard enticing the unwary into the witch’s abode.

The witch herself seemed to be in residence, peering out from that open curtain. Below her, in the first-floor window, a sign read “Tarot, palmistry, and astrology. By appt. only.” A fortune teller? Seriously? I squinted to get a better look at the woman. The curtain fell.

As I crossed the road, I noticed the apartment building had gargoyles, too. Under the eaves and tucked into the corners of the fake window balconies, stone gargoyles standing watch. I marveled at them, then climbed the steps and reached for the doorknob. There, above my head, was yet another Gothic touch, this one far more subtle and definitely unintended. A massive spiderweb, dew-dappled and glistening in the morning sun. The spider was there, too, big and black, waiting in the middle of its web.

If you wish to live and thrive,

Let the spider stay alive.

That was a new one. Just what I needed. More superstitious crap filling my brain.

I shook my head and pulled open the door.

Rose ducked back behind the gauzy curtain as the girl squinted her way. The red hair had thrown her, but only for a moment. She’d known the girl was coming. The cards never lied. So Rose had been watching. Now she was here.

Eden Larsen. Olivia Taylor-Jones. As for what her arrival in Cainsville portended … The cards were, as usual, long on declarations and short on interpretations.

The girl had stopped on the stoop of Grace’s building. She was staring up into the corner of the front doorway.

What was she gaping at? Whatever it was, it held her attention for at least a minute before she opened the door and walked through.

Rose picked up her binoculars from the table and peered out. She looked where the girl had been staring. Nothing. She adjusted the lenses and looked again. It didn’t help. She was looking right at the spot.

There was nothing there.

The front door opened into a vestibule with stairs going up and a perpendicular hall for the apartments. No locked door to pass through. No panels of buzzers to alert the residents to company. Not even names on the mailbox slots.

The hall was paneled plaster with a wooden floor. My knowledge of architecture was confined to the external, so I didn’t know how historically accurate this was. It looked right, though. It was definitely nicer than any of the apartments I’d visited so far. Yes, the floorboards were worn, unvarnished paths showing the main routes, and the walls could use fresh paint. But it had a comfortable, lived-in look. Benign neglect.

I looked down the main hallway. Two doors on each side, four apartments on each floor. Twelve overall, then. Small, but it certainly didn’t feel full. The long corridor was dimly lit and cool, like a cave. Smelled a lot better than any cave I’d explored. I picked up teasing traces of sandalwood. The sounds were as muted as the smells. Hushed. Not so much a cave, then, as a church after hours, dark and cool and peaceful.

I knocked on 1D, the number on the note. It took three tries for the landlord to answer, and when she did, the look she gave me said I should have taken the hint after the first two.