She heard Mitch speak; and tried to focus on him. But it was difficult to see him up there at the top of the stairs; the shadows were dense and they seemed almost to be concealing him from her. She tried to move her arm; to raise herself up a little way, and get a better look at him. As she did so he spoke again.

"Who are you?" he said.

There was distress in his voice; a little panic even. She saw him jab his knife at the darkness, as though to keep it at bay. But it wouldn't be driven off. It seemed to come at him, alive and eager. He stabbed again, and again. Then he took a backward step, loosing a panicked cry as he did so.

"Jesus!" he yelled. "What the fuck is this?" With one last, agonizing effort of will Rachel pressed her aching arms into service, and lifted her upper body off the floor. Her head spun, and a wave of nausea rose up in her, but she forgot both in the next moment, as her eyes made sense of what was happening at the top of the stairs. There were three, perhaps four, human forms up there with Mitchell; they moved with gentility, but they pressed against him nevertheless, backing him against the wall. He still continued to jab at them, in the desperate hope of keeping them away from him, but it was dear that they weren't susceptible to harm. They were spirits of some kind; their sinuous forms expressed from the simple convenience of light and dark. One of them, as it closed on Mitchell, looked down the stairs, and Rachel caught a glimpse of its face. Not it; she. It was a woman-they were all women-her expression faintly amused by the business she was about. Her features were not perfect by any means; she was like a portrait that the painter had only sketched, leaving the rendering of detail until later. But Rachel knew the face, nevertheless. Knew it not because they'd met, but because this woman had lent the essentials of her features to the generations that had followed her. The sweep of the brow, the curve of the cheekbones, the strength of the jaw, all of these were echoed in the Geary line, as was her penetrating stare. And if she was, as Rachel guessed, one of the women who'd been with Galilee in this house, then so too were the others. All Geary women, who'd passed sweet, loving times beneath this roof, and who in death had returned here, to leave some part of their spirits where they'd been most happy.

The spinning in Rachel's head retreated somewhat, and as it did so she was able to make better sense of the other forms that moved around Mitchell. Her suspicions were confirmed. One of this number was Cadmus's first wife Kitty, whose picture had hung in the dining room at the mansion. A resplendent woman, with the bearing of an undisputed matriarch, she was here unleashed from her corsets and her formality; her body sensual despite the simple stuff with which it was expressed; as though she'd come back here in the form of the hedonist she'd been under this roof. A woman of pleasure for a few, blissful days, secure in Galilee's arms; loved, even.

That was what these women had come here to find-what she, Rachel, had come here to find, though she hadn't known it at the time-love. Something more than wifely duty; something more than compromise and concealment. A taste of an emotion that struck deep into their being; and offered them a glimpse of what their souls needed to stay bright. No wonder they'd found their way back here; and no wonder they now made themselves visible. They wanted to keep the man who'd offered them that glimpse from harm.

How much of this did Mitchell understand? Very little, Rachel suspected, but there were signs that he was being told. She could hear whisperings coining from the top of the flight-gentle, playful sounds-and the women were pressing themselves upon him as they spoke, their faces inches from his. He'd given up attempting to keep them at bay with his knife; instead he raised his hands to his face and tried to blot them out.

"Leave me alone!" Rachel heard him sobbing. "Leave me the fuck alone!"

But they had no intention of letting him go. They continued to press their attentions upon him, while he cowered in their midst, as though he'd walked into a swarm of bees and having no way to outrun it could only stand there and be stung and stung and stung-

Rachel, meanwhile, had reached for the curve of the banister at the bottom of the stairs, and was doing her best to haul herself to her feet. She was by no means certain she trusted her legs to bear her up, but she knew that while Mitchell's gaze was averted she had a chance to arm herself. She might not get another. But as she was about to rise she caught sight of another figure up there on the landing. It was Galilee. He'd risen, naked, from his dreams, and was making his pained way to the top of the stairs.

Mitchell had also seen him. He dropped his knife hand from his face and flailed at the spirits around him, loosing as he did so a venomous yell. Then he raised the knife again and pushed up through the veil of his tormentors to get to his enemy.

From her position at the bottom of the stairs Rachel could not clearly see what happened next. Mitchell's body blocked Galilee from view, and an instant later the women in their turn covered Mitchell, closing around him like a cloud. There was a still moment, when the darkness at the top of the flight showed her nothing. Then Mitchell appeared out of the murk, pitched backward with such force that his feet were off the ground. He missed the top stair, but struck the second, twisting as he did so. Rachel heard a shout escape him, then a series of smaller cries as he somersaulted down the flight. At the last moment she pulled herself out of his path, and he landed face down on the very spot where she'd been lying seconds before. Almost instantly he raised himself up off the floor, as though he were doing a push-up, and she drew away from him, certain he was going to renew his assault. But as he lifted his body she saw that blood was pouring out of him, slapping on the ground. The knife-that little knife of his-was sticking out of his chest. Her eyes went up to his face. The mask of his features had cracked; he was no longer implacable. Tears of pain sprang from his eyes, his mouth was drawn down to make a pitiful shape. He looked toward her, his wet eyes wide.

"Oh, baby…" he said. "I'm hurting."

It was the last thing he said. His trembling arms gave way beneath him and he sank down, driving the knife all the way into his flesh; burying it. His gaze was still turned up toward her as the life went out of him.

She stared at him, dry-eyed. There would be tears later, but not now; now there was only relief that this was ended; that they were finally done with one another.

She looked up to the top of the stairs. Galilee was standing there, holding onto the banister for support. He was looking down at Mitch's body with such a forlorn expression on his face-such a look of loss-that it might have been the corpse of someone he'd loved lying there at the bottom of the stairs.

"I didn't…" he began to say. But he didn't have the will to finish the thought.

"It doesn't matter," she said.

He sank down, still staring at the body. Behind him, the Geary women stood like a melancholy chorus.

Only one of them broke rank, and moving past Galilee began to descend the stairs. It wasn't until she was halfway down, and had halted, that Rachel realized who it was. It was Margie; or rather some echo of the woman she'd called by that name. Her features were no more finished than those of the other women-perhaps a little less in fact-but there was no mistaking the raised, quizzical brow, nor the sly smile that now came on to her face.

More than a smile; laughter. It wasn't quite the raucous din that had erupted from her in the high times, but it was still recognizably Margie. Who else would have found the sight of Mitchell Geary, sprawled face down in his own blood, funny? The prince was dead, and Margie's spirit stood on the stairs and toasted the sight with long loud peals of laughter.