Phantom: A Love Story.

He shushed her. "All you heard was the wind blowing down the trellis."

"There was no wind!"

"There might have been."

"And I suppose the wind made that horrible mask?" She turned to the wall and refused to look at him. He put a hand on her back, surprised as always by how strong and muscular her seemingly small frame really was.

"It looks like some farmer's scarecrow," said Phillip. "Probably nothing. Might have been lying out there for days without us noticing."

"Someone was out there," said Penelope. Her voice was flat. "Someone wearing that mask. It was probably one of your precious house niggers. They're probably planning to kill us all in our sleep. All because you fired the staff and brought a bunch of god damned niggers to sleep in our —"

"That's enough," said Phillip. He stood, stiff, and marched to the door, slamming it behind him. Penelope did not look at him even as he left, but he heard her sobbing as soon as the door was closed. He looked at the mask, with its ugly black paint face, crumpled in his hands. He looked at the door of his own room, then back at Penelope's, caught between the two for a moment, unsure where to go, or what to do. Although he tried to dismiss it in front of Penelope, the racket from the slaves worried him too. Whatever they were doing, it was new. He went to his bed and tried to turn the sound out but the drums were beating, beating, beating, all through the night. They beat like the rhythm of his heart.

***

Amelia woke to piano music. From somewhere in the house, somewhere nearby, came the strains of a song she did not recognize (some sonata or another, she thought). It took a moment for her to wake up entirely, another to realize that she was hearing music, and a third to realize that she shouldn't be.

She stood (her back and shoulders groaned; she'd been on the couch all night). It was the grey-blue time just before dawn, and long shadows from the windows slithered across the floor. Amelia stood in the hallway, looking one way and then the other, trying to pinpoint the direction of the melody. It sounded like it was coming from the storage room? She followed it. Still sluggish from sleep, it did not occur to her to be frightened. At most she felt impersonal curiosity.

She came to an old, warped door, one that lead to what she remembered as a room crammed with (ruined) antique furniture, draped in sheets. Yes, the music was definitely coming from in there. She put her ear to the door; what was that tune? She should know it, she was sure, but she could not place it in her memory. Without really thinking about what she was doing she pushed on the door, and it stuck for a second before popping out of the frame. Draped sheets fluttered in the draft. Amelia was surprised by how dark it was inside. Someone had painted over the windows long ago, and the wiring was no longer functional.

As she fumbled for a light switch that she knew would do nothing, she realized that the music had stopped, and only then did it occur to her what it might mean that there had been music in the first place. Swallowing the sudden tightness in her throat, she opened her mouth to call out but then thought better of it. She got a flashlight from the kitchen and shone it around. The room was empty except for dusty old furniture, and cobwebs, and the smell of things long unused.

She found the piano against the back wall: ancient, falling apart, its frame warped on every side. She looked closely; there were marks on the keys, marks in the decades of dust, as if from playing fingers. She tapped a key; no note sounded. She tried another and heard nothing. She wouldn't be surprised to find all the strings were rotted. Whatever she'd heard, it wasn't this. But she saw the fingerprints in the dust, and the spot on the bench where it looked for all the world like someone had just sat, and she shivered.

Amelia ate breakfast in an automatic fashion, thinking about the music, and the dream of the previous night. Had it been a dream, really? Odd to have a dream that was not about her. It had been a dream of this house though, a dream of the very room she slept in, in fact, the room as it might have appeared just after it was built. "Phillip," she said out loud, between sips of coffee, and "Penelope," drawing the vowels out. Who were they?

She dumped the rest of her coffee down the sink. The sound of it gurgling around the drain made her think about her father, and that awful gurgling, rattling noise in his lungs as he tried to speak to her in the last moments; "Devereux. Devereux."

Her reverie was interrupted by a knock at the front door. She found Ms. Price on the porch, smiling like the Cheshire cat with a basket full of baked goods thrust out in front of her.

"Welcome to the neighborhood!" she said.

Amelia affected a smile. "Well, how thoughtful," she said. "But I thought we had our welcome yesterday?"

"Oh, that was just me being a busybody," said Ms. Price, winking. "This is from everyone. They thought we ought to welcome you properly, and I volunteered to bring it on over, since we had such a nice chat." She leaned in, as if to get as much of her body through the doorway as possible. And I bet you volunteered to get a look at the interior of the house too, thought Amelia, opening the door wider and letting her pass.

They sat in what Amelia thought of as the living room (but what Philip and Penelope would probably have called the parlor). Other than the wall of unpacked boxes, the only things visible were Amelia's old sofa and the ancient stone (not brick, but whole stones) fireplace. Ms. Price looked the room over as if she were planning on moving in herself (which Amelia supposed she very well might be), leaning as far as she could to peer down hallways and up staircases visible through open doors. They talked about nothing at all before Amelia finally came to what was her mind.

"Ms. Price," she said, "what was the name of that family who built this house?"

"You mean the Devereuxs?"

"That's right, but do you remember any of their first names? Or anything about them?"

Ms. Price was very quiet for a moment, pretending to think hard, although Amelia was sure she knew the entire family tree from top to bottom. "It's hard to say," said Ms. Price. "I learned the whole story so many years ago. Mainly ghost stories, you know. They're supposed to haunt the house now. But evidently it was already haunted even when they lived here. Haunted since the day it was built, if that makes any sense?"

"But their names, Ms. Price," said Amelia. "You don't remember anything?"

Ms. Price made an ambiguous gesture. "I'm sure I have a book somewhere —"

Amelia put her hand on Ms. Price's arm. "Could you lend it to me, just for a day or two? I'm very interested in finding out the house's story, now that you've whetted my curiosity. I mean, it's important that I understand its historic value, isn't it?"

Ms. Price couldn't very well argue with that. The book she brought looked like a high school text book, filled with lengthy treatises on county figures from the 19th century. The section on the Devereuxs was marked, and the pages were particularly worn. Amelia went to the bedroom (where she involuntarily looked toward the French doors, imagining the red velvet curtains affixed to them, as they were in Penelope's bedroom) and sat down to read:

"Archibald Devereux, the son of a tanner who made a fortune in cotton, built Devereux Manor in 1840 as a gift to his wife, who died just a week before they completed construction. That left Archibald alone to raise their son, Andrew, and their daughter —"

Amelia paused, and then read the name out loud. "Penelope." Her fingers shook a little as she turned the page.

"Penelope Devereux married Phillip Rich, a concert pianist and protégé of her father, in 1851. Phillip took the Devereux name rather than confer 'Rich' on Penelope, supposedly as a token of respect for her father but perhaps really because local gossip held that the Rich family line was the product of miscegenation. When Archibald Devereux died a year later, he surprised everyone by leaving the house and most of the estate to Philip rather than to his own son and daughter."

Amelia's lips moved, outlining the last words in the chapter: "Phillip, Penelope, and most of the slaves and house staff died when a fire broke out in the slave's quarters in the late hours of June 16th, 1852." That was all. No cause of the conflagration was recorded. Amelia knew, in the pit of her stomach, that if she turned the page she would find a photograph of the Devereuxs. So it came as small surprise when she saw Phillip and Penelope staring up at her/ Their faces were bleached and expressionless, as they so often were in pictures from those days, but still recognizable as the couple from her dream.

She closed the book and tapped the binding with one finger, lost in thought. It was possible, of course, that she had heard of the Devereuxs in the past, maybe even seen pictures of them, and not remembered. Those old recollections, jarred to the surface by her habitation in the house and her conversation with Ms. Price, could have manifested in her dreams. Yes, that made sense, more or less, and it explained everything. Everything but the music this morning, and why worry about a little thing like that?

But Amelia could not help thinking about one of the last things Ms. Price had said (or at least, one of the last things Amelia had paid attention to): "It was already haunted even when they lived here. Haunted since the day it was built." And she remembered Ms. Price's mention of "the Phantom", and the figure lurking at Penelope's window, and the almost-forgotten recollection of a man at the same window as Amelia drifted off to sleep in the very same room.

Haunted since the day it was built.

From somewhere in the house, distinctly, Amelia heard the sound of a piano note.

***

Phillip stared into the fire, prodding the smoldering logs with the tip of a wrought iron poker. "You have no idea what it's been like around here," he said. "We're living in a kind of hell. Penelope is at her wit's end. She refuses to even leave her room. Strange, since that was where it all started, at least for us, but you know how she is."

"She's not the only one, from what I hear tell," said Andrew. "The slaves are in an uproar. I've never seen them so agitated, not even when father died." He was dressed in his best white silk suit and somehow managed to appear as if he were reclining while standing.

Phillip looked lean and tired, his flesh gone sallow, his clothes a little rumpled. He stared at the mantle, where the painting of Archibald Devereux and the twin busts of Janus stared back at him. "It's no wonder if they are," said Phillip. "Whoever the man is, he's a perfect terror to them. They complained of him first, you see, and I didn't pay attention. But who would believe that some specter was lurking around, peering in their windows and accosting their children while they slept?

"That's what all this damn drumming is about," he continued. "They think it keeps him away. Superstitious nonsense, of course, but I don't blame them. If I thought it would work, I'd be out there banging a cowhide right along with them." He made a particularly violent jab at a log and then set the poker aside.

"But you think he's real?" said Andrew.

"I know he's real. Penelope has seen him. And the damage he's doing is certainly real enough." Phillip stared into the fire without flinching. "That's why I asked you to come here. This is your house too, Andrew." Andrew put up a hand to protest, but Philip waved him down. "You grew up here, and you helped your father put the estate in order. Whatever's going on, you have a stake in it too."

"I'll do anything I can for you," said Andrew.

"Not for me," said Phillip, turning. "For Penelope. We have one more guest coming, and then —"

They stopped when they realized that someone was standing in the door, a broad, red-faced man with gray whiskers, dressed in a crisp army uniform and leaning on a cane. Behind him, a slave stood, looking awkward, obviously wanting to prevent the newcomer from barging into the room but not daring to say so. "Phillip," said the man in the uniform. He limped as he came in. "I hope you don't mind that I let myself in. I helped build this damn house, I wasn't about to sit around waiting to be shown through it by some ignorant darkie."

Phillip smiled without humor. "Captain Sidney. Thank you for coming." He nodded to the slave, who departed with obvious relief, shooting an unreadable look at the captain's back as he went. The captain nodded to Phillip but declined a handshake. He broke into a grin when he saw Andrew, though, pumping his hand several times while sitting down in the room's most comfortable chair.

"M'boy, how good to see you again."

"Of course," was all Andrew could think to say. He sat, rather tentatively, in a second chair while Phillip remained standing. They all three let the silence stretch on for a moment and then as one, they looked at the portrait, as if deferring to the dead man's authority before beginning.

"Well Phillip," said the captain, "I would guess, judging from all that racket outside, that the local gossips have got it right for a change. They say you have a kind of...ghost, on the premises?" He allowed himself the tiniest sneer.

"Not a ghost," said Phillip, still smiling in an unfriendly way. "A man. A man intent on ruining me, and my business, and my marriage."

The captain turned his cane over and over in his hand. "Is it true that your slaves are calling this man 'le Fantome'?" Phillip nodded, and the captain grunted. "And that he menaces the grounds in some ridiculous cape and mask?" Another nod. "Hmm. And what exactly has he been doing?"

"He's been doing all he can to drive me mad," said Phillip. He moved from the fireplace to the window, pulling open the curtains and looking into the pitch black outside. "This 'Phantom', as they insist on calling him, accosts my slaves, destroys my property, leaves threatening messages for me and my wife, and steals whatever isn't nailed down. This week he killed the horses, all of them, every horse in the stable! The slaves say they saw him making his escape, but no one saw how he got in. Worst of all, he torments Penelope. Every night for three weeks she says she's seen him at her window, peering in, sometimes even trying to enter."

"Why haven't you just shot him and been done with it?" said the captain.

"I've never seen him," said Phillip. The drums beat louder and faster outside. "If not for Penelope, I might not even believe he exists."

"Why haven't you notified the police?" said Andrew.

"Those frauds and grifters?" said the captain, snorting. "No, for this kind of problem you need the help of real men. That's why — I say Phillip, I wouldn't object to a cigar." Phillip opened the humidor to both Andrew and the captain, but took none for himself. "Penelope writes and tells me that she thinks this is all the slaves' doing," the captain continued.

"I'm sure she does," said Phillip. "She's suspected them from the start. Do you know what she did? She almost killed Jeremiah. Beat him half to death."

Andrew choked. "But he was just here? Is he all right?"

Phillip nodded, but appeared grave. "As he can be. She nearly whipped the hide right off of him. You know how strong she is when she loses her temper."

"But surely she couldn't think that Jeremiah is the Phantom?" said Andrew, shaking his head. "He's the gentlest creature on the face of the earth. Why, father brought him up by hand!"

"Try telling that to Penelope," said Phillip. "She's sure that if Jeremiah isn't the Phantom then he's protecting whoever is. Somehow she thinks this is all happening because I've let Jeremiah and some of the others tend to the house."

"And she's quite right," said the captain, interrupting. He settled further back in his chair. "All this sounds like a bunch of nigger witchcraft to me. Just listen to them out there! Andrew, have you heard about the mask this Phantom fellow wears? Tell me that doesn't sound like nigger devilry?"

"Well I don't see how —" said Andrew.

"When you let niggers live under your roof they get uppity," continued the captain. "Breeding uppity niggers will be the death of us all. Andrew, you're old enough to remember the Marshalls? If you'd kept the old indentured Irish servants instead of letting your pet Sambos into the house, Phillip, none of this would have happened. I'll grant you, an Irishman isn't much more than a white nigger, but at least they don't invite the devil under your roof."

Phillip's smile grew wider and more brittle as the captain talked. Andrew jumped in. "Do you have any idea what this person wants?" he said. "A reason he's doing all of this, whoever he is?"

"As a matter of fact, I do," said Phillip, producing something from his pocket. "Do you see this? It's a threatening letter I received the other day, purportedly from the Phantom."

The captain snatched the letter out of Phillip's hand and began to read it. Philip went on as if nothing had happened.

"It says that until I vacate Devereux Manor things will get worse. Notice that it singles me out, specifically; only I am to leave. The Phantom means for Penelope to stay."

Andrew shuddered. "Good God, what a horrible thought, to be left alone in this house with that monster prowling about!"

"Terrible," muttered the captain, reading the letter to himself again. "What do you think it means?"

"What does it mean?" said Phillip. "It means that I know who the Phantom is."

Andrew sat forward in his chair. "You do?"

"Of course!" Phillip spread his arms. "Doesn't it seem a strange request that I and I alone go? Doesn't that right there tell us who's behind all this?"

Andrew looked confused. The captain made an impatient gesture. "If you think you know something, just spit it out."

Phillip stood directly in front of the captain's chair. "It's a little funny that you should say that, captain. Because we both know who the Phantom is. Because he's you."

Phillip was not smiling anymore. Andrew's jaw dropped. The captain, baffled, dropped his cigar and had to catch it before it burned a hole in his coat. When he'd composed himself, he harrumphed as loudly as he could and said, "Me? What's in your head, boy?"

"Don't play stupid, Captain Sidney," said Phillip. "I brought you here because your game is up. You gave yourself away with the letter." He snatched the paper from the captain's hand and threw it into the fire. "I should go, but Penelope should stay, hmm? I find that interesting, in light of the fact that no one pursued Penelope's hand more aggressively than you did."

The captain shrugged. "What of it? Archibald was my best friend, his daughter grew into a fine young woman, and when the time came I asked for her hand. Archibald preferred you, and he convinced Penelope to go along with his preference. I've never held any ill will over it. I wish you both the best of happiness."

"Do you?" said Phillip. His voice was ice cold.

"Phillip, honestly, I don't think the captain would do something like this," said Andrew, half standing.

"He's counting on your good opinion, Andrew," said Phillip. "That's the captain for you, everyone has a good word to say about him. It's the perfect cover, isn't it?"

"Now see here," said the captain, his face turning purple, "maybe you haven't noticed, but I very nearly lost this leg to Santa Anna." He thumped his cane against his knee. "How do you think I could manage to be out all night prowling around your grounds and peeking into your wife's window with a hobble like this?"

Phillip glared. "I don't know. I don't know how you're doing it, but I'm sure you're the one doing it, and I've brought you here to ask you, man to man, if you have any honor at all, to put a stop to this nonsense."