Page 46 of The Premonition at Withers Farm
Maribeth had not left the study yet, and Perliett had retired without interrupting her. Now she rolled onto her side and reached for the photograph displayed on her nightstand.
“PaPa,” she whispered. At twenty-four now, it had been six years since he had passed away. Perliett could never forget the morning she’d waltzed into his study, ready to take on the world with him, only to find him slumped over his desk. Dr. Wasziak had not established his practice yet, and so it had been the now-retired Dr. Hempshaw who had hurriedto the Van Hilton home only to pronounce Perliett’s father dead. They’d already known that was his state, yet hearing the doctor declare it was still heartbreaking. Perliett had held some irrational hope that the doctor could revive him. That PaPa was not fully dead, and that they could urge his heart into beating again.
Perliett held the photograph tilted toward the window so the nearly full moon could shine its light over her father’s face. His gray beard, his neatly combed gray hair. His beloved lined face with his right eye slightly slanted downward. It was the day that had changed her forever and in so many ways.
God had become more distant, since He had chosen not to answer her pleas for her father’s life.
Mother had become devoted to her study of the spirits in hopes of connecting with PaPa and remaining tied to him in the afterlife.
Perliett had devoured tome after tome of old medicine books, remedies, ancient potions, and natural solutions so that she could help others not experience the grief she now bore every day.
Six years. She had hid her grief well. Behind a sharp wit, a sure intelligence, and a forthcoming smile.
Perliett stroked her thumb across the image of her father.
Six years, and nothing. She was older. Unmarried. George consistently challenged her and seemed intent on proving her methods not only impractical but unhealthy. Her mother had yet to conjure PaPa from the other side, and it left Perliett with no communication from him. Nothing to offer her guidance.
Here, a true spinster who lived with her mother, lay Perliett Van Hilton. Abandoned by death and by spirits. She might argue that at times she felt abandoned by her mother, who seemed to prefer ghosts over the living. Abandoned by...
Perliett sighed and rested PaPa’s photograph back on her nightstand.
She knew the argument would be that God had not abandoned her. But that was because people believed that God never told an untruth, His Scriptures were holy, and His promise of eternal faithfulness usurped the physical world. That God crafted an eternal one filled with some sort of hopeful dream should one choose to accept the grace He offered. Of course, one could discount the opposing option of hellfire and brimstone if one went their own way, and that hardly seemed in line with an all-loving, gracious God.
The truth was, she was lost. Perliett swiped at a lone tear that trailed down her cheek toward her pillowcase. She was grappling with questions that offered no satisfactory answers. She could argue that the churchgoers in town—excluding those like her who abided it as their Christian duty merely because of tradition—were short on tolerance of her. But then, if she was being honest, she was short on tolerance of their intolerance. So, didn’t that mean she also was intolerant? Was humankind merely a bucket of souls, pointing fingers at one another instead of at themselves and refusing to reconcile that they were innately not good to begin with?
PaPa had told her once,“Perliett, all of mankind groans because we are trapped here without the fullness of the purity of God. Until we meet Him face-to-face, we are paltry excuses by ourselves. We should be humbler, we as mankind. We are nowhere near as magnanimous as we believe ourselves to be.”
PaPa had not been a theologian. He had not been a vocal man of faith either. He’d been a quiet man. Leading a quiet life. A quiet owner of a lucrative enough business to leave her and Maribeth in good financial stead. But therein lay the root of the problem. He had left them. To go where? To heaven? To hell? To an in-between place? Did he hover in the corners of their home like an angel watching over them,or did he plead with them from the shadows of the walls, a ghost begging for release?
In her dreams, she heard him. Chuckling. The low timbre of ominous laughter rolling in his throat. Mocking her. Boasting of his ability to take her. To brutalize her. To hold her beneath his will and bend her until she broke. Until she begged for mercy. Until she pleaded for grace and the chance to continue living. All before he plunged his blade into her, twisting her insides around the razor-like sharpness, laughing as her lifeblood drained from her and corn silk brushed her face as she—
With a gasp, Perliett shot straight up in her bed. Hadn’t she just been pondering God and man and all that lay between them? She glanced at her nightstand. PaPa’s photograph stared back at her, but for a moment she would have vowed she saw him shake his head, ever so slightly, in a warning to stay still.
Never obedient, Perliett flung the covers off her sweaty body, swinging her legs over the side of her bed. It was complete darkness now, the moon having taken a respite behind a thick cloud covering. Thunder rumbled in the far distance, mimicking the growly chuckle that echoed in her mind.
“You will not have me,” she whispered into the darkness. Not sure why she whispered it, Perliett rose and reached for her wrap. Slipping her arms into it, she tied the ribbon at her neck. Detective Poll and George had weaseled their way into her subconscious, making her afraid Eunice’s killer had somehow drawn designs on her, merely because of what? They were both brunette? They both had blue eyes? They both were ... beautiful?
Perliett padded across the floor in defiance of her fear and of the warnings given to her. She was perfectly safe in her bedroom. In this house. There was no one here. No one lurking in the corner, chuckling in a taunt.
The window was open, and Perliett pushed aside the flimsy curtains. She leaned out the window, eyeing the familiar dark shapes of their yard. The weeping willow tree and its dancing branches that, even in the night, floated like fairies and brushed the earth. The large boulder that sat at the end of their drive. A wooden barrel filled with flowers that in the darkness had lost their color.
No. There was no one there.
Only her dreams flitting about, weaving in and out of the willow tree. A chuckle that reverberated only in her mind but threatened another night without solid sleep.
She pulled her body back inside, closing the window for good measure. No sooner had she straightened the curtains than aclinkagainst the window made Perliett startle. She remained rooted, staring at the window through the curtains as if whatever apparition had administered its bell-like knock against the glass would become visible.
Anotherclink.
This time, she saw the distinct shadow of stone bouncing off the window.
A stone.
Inspired by a throw from a human arm.
For a brief second, terror paralyzed Perliett. The Cornfield Ripper was outside her window! He had found her! He had thrown a stone at her window to get her attention?
Rolling her eyes at her exaggerated imagination, Perliett pushed back the curtains and reopened the window.
