A Dusk of Demons Read Online Free PDF Page B

again, her cheeks flushed from running and wet with tears.
    â€œI’m sure they got out,” I said.
    â€œWhere are they, then?”
    We stared at the scene of desolation, and the sight brought back the story I’d been told the previous night. I had always loved the comfort of flame in a kitchen grate, the thrill of it leaping above autumn bonfires. I’d never dreamed how much I could hate it.
    Sea King neighed, and I turned to see him rear, perhaps stung by a fleck of hot ash.
    â€œThe horses!” I pointed to where the stables had been reduced to a separate smoldering heap. “Sea King was being kept in, because of his leg. Someone let them out, and if there was time for that . . .”
    â€œThen where are they?” Paddy asked, and I had no answer. It was she who said urgently, “Joe’s cottage!”
    This was the only other habitation on Old Isle. It nestled in a dip, a couple of hundred yards from the house. It was tiny, with only two rooms and a doorway under which Joe must stoop to enter. The door stood open, and there was someone in Joe’s rocking chair. With light from only one small window, it took a moment to recognize the figure: The forelock identified Andy.
    â€œWhere’s Mother,” Paddy demanded, “and Antonia?”
    He rocked, with hunched shoulders. “Gone.” His voice was slurred. “The house burned to cinders, and all in it. Every last thing . . .”
    Shaking him, Paddy dislodged a bottle which rolled across the floor. It sounded empty. He wenton rocking and rambling, “It was the Demons, come in judgment. Out of the sky they came, in a flaming chariot. We ran out, and I hid my face from the sight of it. Then there was the sound of a hundred thunderclaps rolled into one, and the house was turned to a fiery furnace. And after that, with a roar and a whoosht, they’d gone.”
    Paddy gripped his shoulders. “Where are they?”
    â€œHow would I know where they went, or any man? On the wings of the wind, to the moon and maybe beyond. To think I dared mock them, with tales to frighten children—”
    He winced as her fingers dug in. “I’m talking of Mother and Antonia. What happened to them?”
    â€œTaken. Both taken.”
    I whispered: “By the Demons?”
    Andy shook his head. “No, they’d been and gone.”
    â€œThen how?” She shook him violently. “Who took them?”
    â€œThe Sheriff’s men. He must have seen the fire and sent them over. It was they who took them away.”
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    Fresh air was welcome after the brandy fumes. I assumed we would head back to the dinghy, and said, “We can get across before the tide turns. It won’t be easy otherwise, with the wind from the southeast.”
    She said, “I don’t know . . .”
    â€œBut it is.” I touched finger to tongue and raised it. “Almost due southeast.”
    â€œAbout going to Sheriff’s.”
    â€œYou heard what happened. The Demons burned the house, but the Sheriff’s men took Mother and Antonia. He’s drunk, but not so drunk as to have made it up.”
    â€œI don’t know. We ought to talk to Joe.”
    â€œHe won’t be back till after dark, if the mackerel are running well.”
    â€œAnd there are things that need doing—the animals to see to.”
    She was heading away from the jetty. I followed, arguing.
    â€œI think we ought to go right away. We don’t know why they’ve been taken to Sheriff’s.”
    â€œWe know they’re all right.”
    â€œDo we?” I was irritated by her obstinacy. “Do you care?”
    She whirled on me. “Who are you to talk about caring? It’s my mother, and my sister. No kin to you, just as you’re nothing to anyone. Not even to him, till after he was dead. He may have left you the island, but he wanted nothing