Chapter 5 - The Bell Committee
Emma did not want to follow Adrian Holloway anywhere.
Then the wall opened wider.
A child's face pressed out of the darkness as if the plaster were thin cloth. The face had no eyes. Water poured from its open mouth.
Noah screamed.
Holloway unlocked a side door with the brass key.
"Now!"
Emma grabbed Noah and ran.
Lucas followed.
They emerged behind the school into a parking lot where rain had begun to fall from a perfectly clear sky.
It fell only over the school.
Each drop was cold enough to sting.
Holloway led them to a black town maintenance van.
"Get in."
Lucas laughed once, breathless. "That's not happening."
A shape moved behind the school windows.
The towering figure from the well bent beneath the roofline, visible for one impossible second through three classrooms at once.
Noah whispered, "Please."
They got in.
Holloway drove.
Emma sat in the rear with Noah pressed against her. Lucas sat opposite them, watching the mayor through the metal divider.
"Start talking," Emma said.
Holloway gripped the wheel.
"In 1886, St. Michael's church had a cellar school. Thirteen children were down there during a flash flood. The sexton locked the outer door because he thought the water would pass. It didn't."
Emma looked at Noah.
"Thirteen?"
"Twelve died. One escaped through a coal tunnel."
"Who?"
Holloway did not answer.
Lucas leaned forward. "And this became what? A ghost story?"
"It became a pattern. Every forty years, the water returns. 1906. 1946. 1986. Tonight."
"Forty years doesn't fit 1906," Lucas said immediately.
Holloway glanced at him in the mirror.
"You're right. Because people lie when they're afraid. The first records were altered. The real dates were 1886, 1926, 1966."
Emma's stomach tightened. "Then why Emily in 1986?"
The mayor said nothing.
"Why Emily?"
"Because they thought the interval was twenty years. They were wrong."
Lucas stared. "So your families sacrificed a kid on the wrong year?"
Holloway's face hardened.
"The Bell Committee believed one life could prevent a flood that would kill hundreds."
"Believed?"
"The old instructions said the twelfth child must be 'named to the bell.'"
Noah looked at the black 12 on his wrist.
Emma's vision narrowed.
"You were going to kill him."
"I was going to complete a ritual that has kept this town standing for generations."
"Emily says there was no deal."
Holloway slammed the brake.
The van stopped in the middle of Church Street.
He turned around.
"You saw her?"
Emma held up the pumpkin lantern.
The blue flame illuminated his face.
"She saw me first."
Holloway looked suddenly older.
"Then Thomas was right."
"My grandfather?"
"He spent the last twenty years of his life trying to prove Emily could still speak."
Emma took the photograph from her jacket and held it through the divider.
"He wrote, 'We chose the wrong child.'"
Holloway stared at it.
"That photograph was supposed to be burned."
"Why?"
"Because Thomas took it after he tried to stop them."
The van rolled forward again.
"My father chaired the committee. Thomas Vale was a deputy. He found Emily locked beneath the church and freed her. She ran toward the square. They caught her at the well."
Emma could barely breathe.
"Did my grandfather kill her?"
"No."
"Then who did?"
Holloway's hands shook on the steering wheel.
"My father."
The van went silent except for the wipers scraping dry glass.
Holloway continued in a flat voice.
"Thomas attacked him. There was a struggle. Emily fell into the well. At least, that's what they told the police."
"And the body?"
"Never recovered."
"Because?"
"Because the well has another chamber below it. Older than the town."
Lucas leaned closer. "What's in it?"
The mayor looked at the church tower ahead.
"The thing you saw."
The van passed the elementary playground. Water had covered the basketball court to Emma's ankles even though the rest of the street was dry. The swings moved without wind. Every time the van crossed an intersection, the blue glow from the square seemed to pulse through the storm drains ahead of them.
Lucas pressed his face to the small rear window. "If the town really expected this, why hold the biggest festival ever? Why invite thousands of people?"
Holloway's silence lasted too long.
Emma leaned forward. "Answer him."
"Numbers," Holloway said. "The committee believed a large crowd would dilute the effect. More noise. More movement. More possible names."
Lucas stared at him. "You used tourists as cover."
"I tried to cancel the festival in July. My mother overruled me. The council voted six to one."
Emma almost laughed. "You're the mayor."
"In Ravenwood, that title has never meant what people think it means."
He turned onto Church Street. Barricades had already been placed at both ends. They were not police barricades. Old iron crowd-control gates from the festival had been dragged into position to keep people away from St. Michael's.
Noah pointed through the windshield. "Those men were at my school."
Three orange-jacketed volunteers stood at the church steps, each wearing a black sash beneath the reflective fabric.
Holloway saw Emma watching them. "The public committee organizes parades and booth permits. The real committee has twelve seats. Some families inherit them. Some are recruited."
"And what happens if someone says no?" Emma asked.
Holloway parked. "Ask your grandfather."
St. Michael's doors were open.
Inside, emergency candles burned blue.
Five people waited in the nave wearing black festival sashes.
The Bell Committee.
Sheriff Nora Vale stood among them.
Emma's heart stopped.
Her mother held a revolver at her side.
Holloway parked.
Nora met Emma's eyes through the windshield.
"Mom?"
As the van rolled to a stop, Emma saw a handwritten sign taped inside a bakery window across the street: WE REMEMBER EMILY. The ink had faded years ago. Holloway looked away from it. Ravenwood had never completely forgotten; it had only been trained to keep memory separate from accusation. Emma decided that separation ended tonight.
Nora raised the gun.
Not at Holloway.
May you like
At Emma.
"Give me the lantern," she said.
