Flight of the Stone Angel Read Online Free PDF Page A

I’ve been collecting rents and paying taxes on the house since Cass died – and I’m tired of it. So as soon as Mr. Butler nails down the line of inheritance, I can get rid of that chore.”
    The young woman nodded and turned back to Charles. “Are you licensed in the state of – ”
    “That’s enough, Lilith. Don’t mess with my affairs again.”
    The two women locked eyes, and in this peculiar form of wrestling, the younger woman’s gaze was beaten back – not sufficient experience in the world to outglare the old one, not yet.
    “I expect you’ll be wanting to get on with your business.” Augusta reached out to shake his hand in farewell.
    Charles said good evening to the women and walked back the way he had come, down the covered lane of oaks. A bird screamed after him, and other birds flew overhead as he crossed the open ground and entered the wide circle of trees.
    A fat black starling perched on the roof of a tomb and followed him with its eyes and the cock of its head. As he walked on through the cemetery, he heard the flap of pursuing wings and felt a rush of air as the starling lit on a marble monument level with Charles’s head. The creature pointed its sharp beak at his face. Its eyes were cold, showing no more emotion than a reptile.
    He could well believe the theory that the dinosaur had not died off, but had taken wings and lived on in the smaller form of modern birds. A memory of majesty must survive in this one, for it looked upon Charles as no threat whatever – merely a man, an upstart creature in the scheme of time on earth.
    He watched the black bird fly off toward the low-riding sun, and now he noticed that all the graves and monuments were aligned east to west. Perhaps local custom arranged the dead to face the sunrise, ancient symbol of resurrection.
    Only one tomb was facing north.
    Curious.
    He went back to the rim of the cemetery and walked around this structure to stand before a door gated with intricate designs of ironwork and flanked by narrow windows of exquisite stained glass. At first, he placed the tomb in the colonial period, for it was showing the wear of ages: corners rounding and fissures running through the walls. And then he realized that it was constructed with a soft, porous stone. Given the fine craftsmanship of the tomb, this use of shoddy material made no sense at all.
    Above the door was the bas-relief carving of a man’s face, minus the nose which had crumbled to dust. The stone eyes were gazing through a break in the trees which allowed a view of Trebec House. The first name engraved over the door was lost to erosion, and the surname was barely legible. Trebec? Yes, that was it. Well, what would Mr. Trebec think of his ruined mansion now?
    Charles walked around the tomb and headed for the path back to Henry Roth’s house. Before leaving the ring of trees, he remembered one more anomaly and turned to Cass Shelley’s monument, visible through a narrow alley of tombs. The stone angel was facing south. And what was she looking at?
    A gust of wind came ripping through the trees, tearing leaves away, and sighing off with them to the other end of the cemetery. The soft racket of thrashing branches stopped suddenly, as though the wind had closed a door behind it. The air was colder now and unnaturally still. No sound of insects, no birdcall. The stones were casting their longest shadows toward the close of day.
    He felt a light breeze on his skin, as though someone unseen had just walked by, caressing his face in passing. His involuntary shiver was delicious.
    Oh, what Cousin Max could have done with a stage like this. Cemeteries were primed for the illusionist’s art. The atmosphere alone would have done half the magician’s work for him.
    As Charles left the circle of trees and drew closer to Henry Roth’s yard, he heard the sound of an engine. His own car sat in the wide driveway, its silver metal gleaming, throwing back light from the sunset sky. There was no