Broken Angels

83

Jessica hugged the wall, her weapon held out in front of her. She was in a short hallway between the kitchen and living room of the farmhouse. Adrenaline raced through her system.

She had cleared the kitchen in short order. The room had a single wooden table, two chairs. Stained floral wallpaper over white chair rails. The cabinets were empty. There was an old cast-iron stove, probably idle for years. A thick layer of dust covered everything. It was like being in a museum that time had forgotten.

As she moved down the hall toward the front room, Jessica listened for any indication of another human presence. All she heard was the thud of her own pulse in her ears. She wished she had worn a Kevlar vest, wished she had backup. She had neither. Someone had deliberately trapped her in the basement. She had to assume that Nicci was hurt, or being held against her will.

Jessica sidled up to the corner, silently counted to three, then peered into the front room.

The ceiling was more than ten feet, and there was a large stone fireplace against the far wall. The floors were old plank. The walls, long given over to mold, had at one time been painted with a calcimine wash. There was a single medallion-back sofa in the center of the room, a sun- bleached green velvet, Victorian in style. Next to it sat a round tabouret table. On it was a leather book. This room was not dusty. This room was still being used.

Drawing closer, she saw a slight depression at the right side of the sofa, the end near the table. Whoever came here sat at that end, perhaps reading the book. Jessica glanced up. There were no ceiling fixtures, either electrical or candled.

Jessica scanned the corners of the space; sweat lacing her back despite the cold. She made her way over to the fireplace, put a hand to the stone. Cold. But in the grate were remnants of a partially burned newspaper. She fished out a corner, looked at it. It was dated three days earlier. Someone had been here recently.

Off the living room was a small bedroom. She peeked inside. There was a double-bed frame with a mattress, sheets and blanket pulled taut. A small table for a nightstand; on it was an antique man's comb and a delicate woman's hairbrush. She looked beneath the bed, then edged over to the closet, took a deep breath, and threw open the door.

Inside were two items. A man's dark suit, and a long cream-colored dress, both looking to be from another time. They hung on red velvet hangers.

Jessica holstered her weapon, stepped back into the living room, tried the front door. Locked. She could see scrapings along the keyhole, bright metal amid the rusted iron. A key was needed. She could also see why she had been unable to see through the windows from the outside. They were covered with old butcher paper. A closer look showed her that the windows were secured with dozens of rusted screws. They had not been opened in years.

Jessica crossed the plank floor to the couch, her footsteps creaking in the wide-open space. She picked up the book on the end table. Her breath caught.

The Stories of Hans Christian Andersen.

Time slowed, stopped.

It was all related. All of it.

Annemarie and Charlotte. Walt Brigham. The river killings-Lisette Simon, Kristina Jakos, Tara Grendel. There was one person responsible for it all, and she was in his house.

Jessica opened the book. Each story had an illustration, and each illustration was rendered in the same style as the painting found on the victims' bodies, the moon paintings of semen and blood.

Throughout the book were news articles, bookmarking various stories. One of the articles was dated a year earlier, the story of two men found dead in a barn in Mohrsville, Pennsylvania. The police said they had been drowned, then tied into burlap bags. The illustration was of a man holding a large boy and a small boy in his outstretched hands.

The next article was from eight months ago, the account of an elderly woman who had been strangled and found stuffed into an oak barrel on her property in Shoemakersville. The illustration was of a kindly woman holding cakes and pies and cookies. The words Aunt Millie were scrawled across the illustration in an innocent hand.

The next pages were articles about missing people-men, women, children-each accompanied by a delicate drawing, each depicting the stories of Hans Christian Andersen. "Little Claus and Big Claus." "Auntie Toothache." "The Flying Trunk." "The Snow Queen."

At the back of the book was a Daily News article about the murder of Detective Walter Brigham. Next to it was an illustration of a tin soldier.

Jessica felt the nausea rise. She held a death book, an anthology of murder.

Also inserted in the book's pages was a faded color brochure that showed a pair of happy-looking children in a small, brightly colored boat. The pamphlet looked to be from the 1940s. In front of the children was a large display set into a hillside. It was a twenty-foot tall book. In the center of the display was a young woman dressed as the Little Mermaid. At the top of the page, in cheerful red letters, it read:

Welcome to StoryBook River: A World of Enchantment!

At the very end of the book, Jessica found a short news article. It was dated fourteen years earlier. Odense, Pennsylvania (AP)-After nearly six decades, a small theme park in southeast Pennsylvania will close for good when its summer season ends. The family that owns StoryBook River says it does not plan to redevelop the property. Proprietor Elise Damgaard says her husband Frederik, who immigrated to the United States from Denmark as a young man, opened StoryBook River as a park for children. The park itself was patterned after the Danish city of Odense, birthplace of Hans Christian Andersen, whose stories and fables were the basis for many of the attractions.

Beneath the article was the clipped headline from an obituary:

ELISE M. DAMGAARD, RAN AMUSEMENT PARK.

Jessica looked around for something with which she could break the windows. She picked up the end table. It had a marble top, some heft. Before she could cross the room she heard paper rustling. No. Something softer. She felt a breeze, making the cold air even colder for a second. Then she saw it: the small brown bird landed on the couch next to her. She had no doubt in her mind. It was a nightingale.

"You are my Ice Maiden."

It was a man's voice, a voice she knew, but could not immediately place. Before Jessica could turn and draw her weapon, the man yanked the table from her grasp. He swung it at her head, slamming it into her temple with a force that brought with it a universe of stars.

The next thing Jessica knew she was on the living room's wet, cold floor. She felt icy water against her face. It was melting snow. A man's hiking boots stood inches from her face. She rolled onto her side, the light fading. Her attacker grabbed her by the feet and pulled her across the floor.

Seconds later, before she fell unconscious, the man began to sing.

"Here are maidens, young and fair…"