I reached the upstairs hall. Duff’s door was closed but the music was coming from his room. Soft music now, plaintive music, calling me.

I went to his door, had my hand on the knob, but then couldn’t turn it. No matter what was behind me, I couldn’t make myself open the door.

He called me, softly at first, “Mother, please come in, Mother.” Then crying, “I need you, Mother, I beg you to come in.” Then, groaning as though in pain, “Oh, Mama, only you can save me! If you love me, Mama, come in and help me!”

The door opened without my touching it. The room was dark and there was an overpowering stench of corruption. But that vanished as I began to change. I was no longer Maggie Caine.

I took one step into the room. I could see a figure in a gray suit stretched out on the bed.

Then a voice behind me cried, “Maggie, don’t go in there!”

I was grabbed from behind and pulled back. But not before I saw his face.

Epilogue

Epilogue

The young priest had borrowed his pastor’s car to drive to the farm. He managed to get Maggie into the car and then took her to the motel where, with the help of the motel manager’s wife, she was put to bed. Then a local doctor came and gave her a sedative.

When the priest came the next morning she said, “Get me some more pills.”

“No, Maggie,” he said. “I can help you beat them now, because I realize what you’ve been going through. You’ve made a believer of me, Maggie.”

“What did you see?”

“I saw Duff. Now I know there’s been some kind of diabolical plot against you.”

“You saw Duff, no one else?”

“That was enough. At first I thought—forgive me—that you were responsible for his body being there. Then I realized you couldn’t possibly have opened his grave, broken the lock on the vault and lifted out the casket without help. Anyway, I called Mr. Nichols and he sent some of his men to get the body so it can be cremated.”

“He isn’t dead!”

“Maggie, he’s been dead for weeks. You must have seen the condition of the body.”

“He opened his eyes and smiled at me!”

“Maggie, Maggie . . .”

“Call your goddamn undertaker! Tell him I’ll have him prosecuted if he goes into that house!”

He went away and came back in a little while.

“The men have been out there already,” he said. “There was no body in the bedroom.”

“They’ve taken him away so they can use him again.”

“Not him, Maggie! It!”

She refused to argue. He asked some questions and she told him about going into the house with Jeff Duncan. He went away again and returned in a few minutes.