Sleepy Hollow: Bridge of Bones Read online

  He switched napkins.

  Okay. They had a son. Abraham, who everybody called Brom. That’s the Brom from the Legend. The jock, the trickster. In Irving’s story he pretended to be the Horseman, chased away silly little Ichabod, his rival, and married the wealthy heiress Katrina Van Tassel.

  But I’ve seen the Horseman with my own eyes.

  Jason glanced at the menu propped at his elbow: The Horseman with his hand held high, carrying a tray with burgers and a shake. The Horseman he’d seen on Halloween was no cartoon. That Horseman was a thing of crematorium ash, of grave-clothes and withered grass, riding a horse of autumn leaves and snail shells and pieces of skull. Jason’s hand rose to the tender stripe of skin on his neck. The hatchet cut.

  “You okay, Honey?” Jennifer the waitress appeared at his elbow. She had dyed her hair since he’d first met her. A pink stripe ran through the grey now as if she had stuck her head in a cotton candy machine.

  “Yeah. I’m—I’m full.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “That bad, huh?”

  Jason glanced at his plate, still piled with food. “Just not hungry. Do you have… more napkins?”

  She looked at his scribbled collection. “Here, take my order pad. I’ve got plenty. Coffee?”

  “Sure. Thanks.”

  Jason opened the order pad and went back to work, not glancing up when Jennifer returned to pour.

  The Horseman is real, and it serves the Van Brunts. Agathe possessed something they called the Horseman’s Treasure. What is it?

  Jason frowned. Had Eliza’s first instinct been right?

  “I say it’s his head.” That had been her guess on the night of the Proposal. Hadewych had laughed at that idea, insisting the Horseman’s Treasure was some jewel or bauble. That only increased Jason’s suspicion. What if Eliza had been right all along? What if Agathe did have the Horseman’s head and had… bewitched it somehow?

  He started a new page and marked it UNKNOWN

  Is the H. T. the H.H.’s head?

  Jason put a big question mark next to that one. He bit the end of his pen and pressed on.

  Agathe used the Horseman to drive off Ichabod. So her son could marry into the Van Tassel wealth. In later years, after she died… (how did she die? Hadewych said her body was never found. What happened?) …Brom’s son Dylan wanted the thing very badly, but to end the evil bullshit Brom locked it away in the Van Brunt tomb, in the coffin of my ancestor Absalom. That’s where Hadewych found it. And now he can command the Horseman too.

  Where has H.V.B. hidden H.T.?

  Jason circled that one and starred it.

  Bells chimed as the door opened. Jason glanced up. Fireman Mike had come in. Jennifer greeted him with a kiss on the cheek. “What are you doing here at Thanksgiving, Hot Stuff? No girlfriend to cook for you?”

  Mike smiled bashfully, taking off his scarf and coat. He was blond, fair-skinned and quick to blush. “Not yet.”

  Jennifer hit his rear with a menu. “I can change that, you know.”

  Mike slipped into a booth. “Best offer I’ve had in months.”

  “Oh shut up,” she said. “I’m old enough to be your… auntie.”

  Mike raised a hand and nodded to Jason. “Hey, Ichabod!”

  Jason returned the greeting. He sipped his now-cold coffee and stared at Fireman Mike. He thought of Debbie Flight and felt a stab of pain. He’d wondered many times if he’d done the right thing, giving Mike his pin back—the only evidence that could have, well, pinned the murder on him. But Mike wasn’t to blame for what had happened. He wasn’t the real murderer. He didn’t even remember being possessed by Agathe and killing Debbie, did he?

  Maybe he dreams of black water and blood and doesn’t know why.

  “You know, I saw the Headless Horseman once,” said Jennifer, refreshing Jason’s cup. She glanced about, deciding something. She set the pot down on a nearby table and slid into Jason’s booth with some difficulty, sucking her belly in. Jason collected his notes and shoved them into his backpack. “I’ve seen him,” she whispered. “Just like you.”

  “When?”

  “Oh, ten years ago.”

  Jason glanced around, to see if the cooks or busboys were watching, to see if she was playing a prank.

  “Where?” he asked, trying to sound casual.

  “East of here. Sam and I used to live out on Saw Mill River road. I worked at my daddy’s Applebee’s franchise, you know? It’s still there. Daddy sold it though. It was around Halloween time and I was coming off shift—it had been a night, believe me. Parties of like twenty. We sang to the little brats, ‘Happy happy birthday from all of us at Applebee’s—’”

  “The Horseman?”

  “Right.” She produced cigarettes. “Do you mind?” Jason shook his head. “Thanks. Don’t tell the smoke police.” Jason slid the saucer from beneath his coffee mug to serve as an ashtray.

  “Don’t listen to her, Ichabod,” laughed Fireman Mike. “She’s pulling your leg.”

  “I am not. Read your menu.”

  Mike raised his menu, holding up the Horseman logo. Jason stared at it over Jennifer’s shoulder as she spoke.

  “It was about midnight, probably. I counted my tips. And those little bastards stiff you, by the by. So I wasn’t in a good mood. I was waiting for Sam to pick me up. I was smoking in the parking lot, trying not to catch my hair on fire. And I heard this thunder. Coming down the Pocantico Hills, from the direction of the Hollow. Rumble, rumble, rumble… But it was clear out. And the sound got closer and closer. We had a full moon that night. Hanging over the top of the ridge. And I saw him come up the other side. This black shape on a horse. Fast as the devil late for church. He was down the hill before I knew it—coming right at me—and he jumped Saw Mill River. Ka-boom. And when he reached the parking lot I saw.” She drew one finger across her neck. “Nothing. No head. And it wasn’t any real horse, either. Too damn fast. He was in a hurry. Didn’t even see me. Whoosh. My apron blew up. The dumpster started rolling. Car alarms. Blew out my damn cigarette. He shot across the field. Beeline due east. Never saw anything like it. So—” She patted Jason’s hand. “I know you’re getting laughed at. But not by me.” She stubbed her cigarette in the saucer. “Some of us believe you. I thought you ought to know that. There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio. That’s from Hamlet.”

  “Can I order now?” called Mike, grinning and waving his Horseman.

  “Mike saw a ghost too,” said Jennifer, rising. “Didn’t you, Mike? You saw the White Lady of Raven Rock. Back in October.”

  “I can’t say what I saw.” Mike shrugged. “It was just… a figure at the crossroads, just standing there. Up in the woods. Not far from Raven’s Rock. And she was white, so… maybe. More blue, really. I don’t know. Maybe Debbie came to visit me on her way to heaven. It was the night she died, you know. It was dark. I really don’t know what I saw.”

  Jason felt sick. Agathe. You saw Agathe. He prayed that Fireman Mike never figured out what he’d done. Poor guy. He seemed really decent.

  Jason returned to his notes, with increased determination. He flipped a page, wrote ANSWERS? and realized… he didn’t have any.

  Another customer came in, setting bells to chime. The musical equivalent of gooseflesh.

  “Whoop!” said Jennifer. “No rest for the wicked!”

  When Artie woke again, he was dangling in midair. The woods were pitch black. The only lights were… fireflies, fireflies everywhere, like dancing stars. He struggled and cried out, his yellow sneakers trying to find the ground.

  “Shh…” said a voice. “It will all be over soon.”

  Panic rose. He felt invisible hands on his legs, on his arms, invisible fingers around his neck, reaching up the back of his shirt. He heard the sound of water running below, high and agitated, as if through a stony brook.

  The crescent moon swung out of the sky, falling into the water. Blood rushed into his cheeks. He realized he had been flipped upside down. He yelle
d and groped, flecking his own face with spit, helpless to drive away whatever was attacking him.

  He felt a sharp pain between his shoulder blades and air flew out of his lungs. A spray of blood hit his cheeks, hot and clinging. His hands found a sharp branch protruding from his body. It had speared him through his back and out through his chest.

  He tried to say “help” but had no air to form the word.

  Blood poured up his body. No. It poured down. It only felt as if it were rising, climbing his neck, covering his face, gathering in his scalp. He reached for the ribbon of blood that fell from his crown into the trickle of moonlight below. The ribbon slipped through his fingers. It thinned, choked, became a tiny rivulet. His tanks were empty. Not even fumes. His engine began to sputter. The flow became a drip. A maddening drip like the drip drip drip of his kitchen faucet. The drip his landlady hadn’t fixed. The drip that kept him up at night.

  This drip would not be keeping him up. He would sleep very well this night. Very well indeed.

  The fireflies slipped into shadow. A figure appeared—blue as gaslight, bony and toothless. A crone from a fairytale. “Thank you, my friends,” she whispered. “I am thankful for this good harvest.” She neared, scrutinized him with manic intensity, and turned away, muttering to herself in a singsong rhythm as she, too, vanished into the trees:

  “A man may toil from sun to sun, but a woman’s work is never done.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  “Oracle of the Bones”

  Jason stopped in the doorway, aghast.

  Zef and Hadewych must have been watching football. A clutter of chips, soda cans and popcorn covered the davenport. A beer had tipped over onto Eliza’s coffee table, puddling the glass. A pair of sweat socks swam in the puddle—somebody’s half-assed attempt at mopping up the spill. There was a new flat screen TV in the living room too. Top of the line. The cardboard box was leaning on the fireplace.

  He found the dining room table loaded with platters and bowls and plates, all caked with food. Hadewych had unboxed Eliza’s family silver, her best china, her candlesticks, her place mats and her centerpiece. He’d unboxed the prized stemware. The glasses were Dalmatian-spotted with fingerprints. A linen napkin lay half-drowned in the gravy bowl. A deli-bought pumpkin pie sat near, portions scooped out with a silver soup ladle. Something hissed at Jason from the floor. He’d trod on a whipped cream can.

  He stomped to the kitchen. A turkey carcass sat on the counter, spreading tinfoil wings. The bird had been hacked to pieces by an incompetent surgeon and awaited proper burial. The gas burners were spattered, the curtains were stained, and potato peelings clung to the skin of the sink like leeches. The counters brimmed with cans and jars and bags and bottles, with coffee cups and coffee grounds and spilled flour and the remains of a runny cherry cheesecake.

  “Hadewych!” Jason spat. “You jackass!”

  “Shh!” Hadewych sat in the breakfast room, his bare feet propped on a chair. “We have company,” he said. His finger circled the rim of a slender yellow wine glass.

  Jason recognized the glass. Eliza’s great-grandmother had bought the twelve-piece set from Macy’s Herald Square around the time of the Titanic disaster. Only six had survived the four-alarm house fire of Christmas Eve nineteen-thirty. Aunt Nano had passed them on to Laura Merrick sometime after World War Two. They’d come to Eliza in the fifties and she’d kept them safe through the Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon and Ford administrations. She had broken yet another glass on the day of the Challenger disaster, leaving five. She’d lost four more a decade later when moving men had dropped a box at the threshold of the Augusta house. She’d prized this last glass—called it her “survivor-glass”—and had never, ever, used it.

  It wobbled under the drunken touch of Hadewych Van Brunt.

  “How dare you,” said Jason.

  “How dare I what?”

  “This is not your house. These are not your things.”

  “It’s a special occasion. I wanted to make Thanksgiving nice for you.”

  “Nice? You’ve wrecked the place.”

  “Oh, I have not. Come talk.” Hadewych pushed a chair out with his foot.

  “No. I’ve got to feed Charley.” Jason set to work clearing a length of counter-space.

  “Zef will clean up. Come. Sit down. Where were you anyway? You missed my announcement.”

  “What announcement?”

  “Sit and I’ll tell you,” said Hadewych. He produced something grey and V-shaped from the tabletop. “I saved us the wishbone.”

  “You’re drunk.”

  “I am. But I’ve been hurting.” Hadewych put a hand to his heart. “Hurting terribly.”

  “Good,” Jason muttered, running water.

  “Everybody’s got a conscience, you know. I have been a real bastard. I admit it.”

  Jason whirled. “You admit you killed Eliza?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  Jason shook his head. “You’re a liar.” He swept the potato peelings out of the sink with his palm.

  “Don’t be hateful. I want to see you happy. I admit that I am somewhat responsible for your unhappiness. Liza would never have moved here if Valerie and I hadn’t pushed for it. Come. Talk to me.”

  Jason flipped on the garbage disposal, cutting off the conversation. Hadewych waited. Jason removed the beaters from the mixer and rinsed them. He noticed an open drawer and saw the butcher knife inside. He imagined seizing it, plunging it into Hadewych’s chest, carving him up. But—

  —I’m not that kind of person.

  He turned off the disposal and joined Hadewych.

  “What do you want to say to me? If you want to make a full confession, let’s talk. Let me get a recorder and we can talk all night. Let’s go talk to the police.”

  “I didn’t kill your grandmother.” He said it simply, looking Jason straight in the eye.

  “Don’t you feel any guilt?”

  “Let’s dispense with this fantasy. Once and for all. Did you see me do it?”

  “No. You used the Horseman. Don’t smirk. I’ve seen him.”

  “That’s a delusion, Jason. She fell down those stairs. Right outside that door. She was eighty years old, with arthritis, and the stairs were wet. Isn’t that a likelier explanation?”

  Jason stared at the back door. “No,” he said, but his voice was uncertain.

  “People do fall down stairs. Don’t they? Honestly, couldn’t she have?”

  Jason gave a tiny nod. In fairness, she could have.

  “It was an accident. No one’s to blame. You had every right to be out having fun, so don’t blame yourself either.”

  “I don’t.”

  “Good. That’s good. Listen to me. I swear to you, on the life of my son, that I did not hurt that sweet woman. Am I a bastard? Yes. Have I treated you badly? Yes. Do I enjoy having some money to play with? Sure. I have struggled with poverty my entire life. But I’m no monster.” He shook his head. “Is that why you won’t sleep under the same roof with us? All right. Bring the dog in. Move back into your room. You’ve proved your point. Three nights is enough.”

  “No.”

  “It looks bad.”

  “I like the RV. So does Charley.”

  “People will think I forced you out there.”

  “You did.”

  “I made one decision you didn’t like. That’s what a guardian does. Someone has to be the adult. Let me do my duty. Let me do what I can to make your life better.” Hadewych’s voice had an almost hypnotic quality. That Van Brunt salesmanship.

  “How?”

  “First things first. We need to get your reputation back.”

  Jason nodded. “Yeah. I got kicked out of my history class this week.”

  “Did they say why?”

  “The teacher is on the board of the Historical Society. Can we smooth that over? Donate money and fix the church?”

  Hadewych looked thoughtful. He smiled. “We can do better than that. The town ne
eds to know what a decent young man you are. And… I’ve had an idea. Let me run it by you. Kate’s father is running for the United States Senate in Massachusetts. It isn’t going well. His opponent in the primaries is a local fellow, while Paul’s a carpet-bagger from New York State.”

  Jason shrugged. “Why should I care?”

  “Usher’s powerful. He can do a lot for you. Make all this community service nonsense go away, get you into a good school. Get your life back on track. So when he comes home for the holidays—you are going to throw him a fund-raiser.”

  “A fund-raiser.”

  “On New Year’s Eve.”

  “You mean you are. With my money.”

  “The estate will be providing the venue and the food. But that’s all.”

  “That’s all. Are you kidding me?”

  “What’s wrong? It’s a legitimate expense. It’s for you.”

  Jason shot to his feet, shaking his head. “This isn’t for me. This is for Zef.”

  “Of course it isn’t.”

  “Zef is Usher’s little protégé. They play tennis and shit. This isn’t to get me into a good school. You want to use my money to butter up Zef’s… meal ticket.”

  “Shut your mouth.”

  “Is this why Usher spoke up for you at my guardianship hearing? So you’d help his campaign?”

  “He’s an old friend.”

  “Right. Because you’re so loveable.”

  “Sit down.” Hadewych sighed. “You don’t know when someone’s trying to help you. This is an excellent opportunity. Kate was very enthusiastic.”

  “Kate?”

  “She’d tell you herself but she’s in Zef’s room.”

  “Kate’s here? Now?”

  “Of course. It’s Thanksgiving. I had to invite Zef’s girlfriend. Especially with her father away.”

  “What are they doing in Zef’s room?”

  “Well,” said Hadewych, leering, “they can’t stay virgins forever, can they?”

  Jason spun. “You think they’re—” He couldn’t say the words.