August’s face grows livid as he slaps the cup from her hands. It clatters to the floor, spilling a puddle of dirty water.

Constance opens her mouth in defiance, but she withers at the look on her brother’s face and the coldness in his voice when he says, “Nothing will save her.”

I do not stay to watch her clean up the mess.

Constance is not the only one who has ever felt the swamp’s strange allure. What is it about things that horrify us that simultaneously attracts us? Like moths drawn to their own demise by candlelight, unable to look away from the burning beauty even as we draw closer, so close our flesh melts and sloughs off. The swamp, shrouded in heavy mists and the odors of decay that conceal lurking predators and invisible quicksand, should warn all to stay away. This is a bad place, the swamp communicates to us. Do not enter. So what is that voice underneath the warning, entreating us to see it for ourselves? What is this siren song of the swamp? Why is it that we fancy ghost stories that raise the hair on the backs of our necks?

I walk down the old wooden staircase, through a house that looks much as it did in Frances’s time. One reason we haven’t changed things much over the years—no remodeling, an adherence to old furniture positioned in just the right places—is so that we do not become disoriented when suddenly a room decides to rearrange itself into its past formation, to show us a memory it has dredged up. The house is sufficiently disorienting as it is. Rooms inside rooms like nesting dolls; an intersection of two identical hallways, confounding the unwary traveler who neglected to bring his compass. All thanks to Mad Catherine, of course, my great-great-great-great something or other, who built this mausolean monstrosity.

The house is a nonsensical place, but if you keep to the main areas, you might never understand how strange it is; it is only when you explore further into the recesses that you begin to realize, with a sense of mounting dread, that the house just goes on and on, intending to confuse and disorient, and as you try to find your way out, confused and disoriented yourself, you cannot help but wonder if you are merely going in deeper, toward the heart of the house, wherever that may be, where, one can only assume, the Minotaur lives.

I find myself heading into the kitchen, thinking I might rummage through the cabinets for something to eat, when I spot another ghost. It is a boy of eight or nine, sitting at the kitchen table. I do not recognize him. The moon in the window silhouettes the boy’s frame in pale light. His back is to me, and at first all I see is dark unruly hair, his head bent down to examine some treasure.

What is it? I creep around until I can make it out. Upon the table lies a crippled blackbird shifting its broken wings feebly. Detached feathers make a soft bed around it. I wonder what has happened to the poor creature and how the boy ministering to it plans to help. His hands hover over the ailing bird, as if he is unsure of what to do.