A/N - I apologize for another long wait with this chapter...these middle chapters aren't coming as fast as I would like them to, which I probably should have known. This one and the next one is the turning point of the story. The latter chapters of this story are very well planned out and have been for a while, so things will run smoother (faster) after I get through this middle section. Hope my readers are still out there! Please review!

Note - I've did a little bit of blending on the pre-1795 and 1795 plot points/contradictions. For an example that will come into play soon, Josette's death on Widows' Hill played out the way that Barnabas described it to Carolyn and Victoria.

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Chapter 18: The Lovers

Carolyn took a small sip of the tea that her mother had brought her. The scalding liquid slid down her throat and made her feel a bit warmer.

She had felt cold since the séance, like she would never be warm again.

Her mother sat beside her, watching her with concern. Her uncle was pouring himself a rather generous amount of brandy. Josette had excused herself after Carolyn assured her - three times - that she was fine and that there was no need for her to worry.

However, Carolyn was sure that Josette was still awake, and worrying, in her room.

And probably not only about her.

Carolyn had very little knowledge of what exactly happened at the party once Roger had started the séance, it was almost a complete blank for her. She could barely remember her mother putting her arm around her waist and walking with her to Roger's car. Both her mother and Josette had been very somber during the ride back to Collinwood. Only Roger seemed to have been unaffected by what had occurred. That would have been inexplicable to anyone else given the fact that the séance had been Roger's idea in the first place, but not to Carolyn. He was just the type who would wave the whole thing off.

"How are you feeling?"

She gave her mother a tired, forced smile so that, hopefully, someone would stop worrying.

"I'm fine, but my heart's still racing."

"Of course it is, Kitten." Roger grinned widely at her. "It's from all the excitement you've had this evening."

Her mother gave Roger a reproachful look. "Excitement? I would hardly use that word to describe it. Disturbing would be far more appropriate."

Roger was about to protest, but Carolyn cut into on the conversation before he had the chance, knowing how he and her mother could argue until the night had passed and the day began, "I can't deny that a part of me was scared once I realized what happened, but it's not fear that I feel now….it's anger. This terrible anger. But I know it's not really my anger."

Roger tilted his head. "What do you mean, Kitten?"

"I think this anger that I'm feeling was left behind by the person who spoke through me," she explained.

"We did seem to contact a rather grumpy ghost," he acknowledged dryly.

"Seem? Uncle Roger, you heard her speak. Can't you tell me what I - what she said?"

"I'm afraid neither of us can answer that question, darling," her mother told her. "She spoke in French, and very quickly. We were so shocked that even if she hadn't, I'm not sure we would have understood her. We could hardly keep up with what was happening."

"We did understand one word though," Roger added. "She said Barnabas's name."

Carolyn felt herself grow pale. "Barnabas?"

Roger nodded. "I daresay that if Barnabas wasn't afraid of a séance before, he most certainly is now."

"Roger, don't talk that way," Elizabeth said in a scolding tone, the kind she'd used with Carolyn countless times over the years. "I felt so sorry for him. He wanted so badly to give us an enjoyable evening."

"And he did. It was certainly a night to remember. And I seem to recall you having doubts about attending the party, Liz."

"I had doubts about wearing these costumes and the reliance on the past, not his desire to have the family spend some time together. And there is nothing enjoyable about watching other people suffer! Barnabas was so unhappy when we left, Josette couldn't get to her room fast enough, and poor Carolyn's obviously not feeling well after the ordeal you put her through."

"Mother, I'm all right," Carolyn protested, but as expected, she went unheard by both of them.

"You're taking it too seriously," Roger insisted. "I may believe in it, but that doesn't mean I take it seriously. Though I do admit to being incredibly surprised when she said Barnabas's name. I assume she was talking about the first Barnabas….. I wonder who she was. I think we can rule out Naomi, so that leaves us with Millicent Collins and Josette Collins. It could have been Millicent. Carolyn did dress as Millicent for the party. But since the woman spoke to us in French it could just as easily have been Josette. And it was our Josette that felt the hand on her shoulder- "

Carolyn interrupted him, "It wasn't either of them."

She was sure of that, though she didn't exactly know why. She was not the history buff that her cousin was. Though she knew quite a bit more about Josette Collins than she'd known previously and was positive it had not been Josette, she knew next to nothing of Millicent Collins. The woman could have been Millicent. But Millicent wouldn't have spoken in French….

"Who else could it have been, Kitten?"

Her mother didn't give her a chance to reply. "Do we have to know? I think it would be best forgotten."

Carolyn strongly disagreed. She didn't want to simply forget it and pretend it never happened. She wanted to know who the woman had been, why she had been so angry, and what Barnabas Collins had to do with it. Maybe if she hadn't been the one that the woman had used she wouldn't have cared so much, but the lingering effects of the séance made it impossible for her to sweep it under the rug and never think of it again.

"I don't believe there was any mention of another woman in the Old House during those early years except for Abigail Collins," Roger continued, oblivious or ignoring of his sister's opinion that the séance should be forgotten. "Of course there were a few servants that were obviously not important enough to be included in the family history."

"I'm not sure that the family history is as accurate as everyone thinks it is," Carolyn said. She replayed the séance in her head and added to it the marriage of Jeremiah and Josette Collins. "Uncle Roger, do you remember when we were talking about Josette Collins and what made her throw herself from Widows' Hill?"

"Yes, I remember thinking it was odd that Jeremiah was the one chasing her."

"Mother, you know more about the family history than we do." Carolyn turned to her. "When did Jeremiah die?"

She was asking a question that she already knew the answer to. She suspected that her mother, however, would provide her with a different one.

"Well, from the accounts I've read he lived well past Josette's suicide."

"He didn't." Carolyn shook her head and ignored the headache that she felt coming on. "He died in the same year she did. I saw his grave in Eagle Hill when I walked through it with Josette. Don't you think it's a little odd that what's written in the family history seems so contradicting? Barnabas said that Josette was being chased by her lover the night she killed herself. Why would he refer to Jeremiah as her lover when he was her husband? 'Lover' almost implies a scandal of some sort, and he didn't mention Jeremiah by name at all."

"A different version of the tale could have been handed down to him in England," Roger replied. "It's just as he mentioned - there are so many legends about Collinwood and the Old House… There's really no way of knowing for sure what's truth and what's fiction." He gave her a wry grin. "One thing is certain, our family seems to have a long standing tradition of hiding skeletons in our respective closets."

Carolyn knew that Roger's explanation was a reasonable one, but she couldn't get past what Barnabas had told her friend.

Barnabas said that Josette du Pres came to Collinsport to marry his ancestor, not Jeremiah. If that's true, the two of them must have shared something, something that couldn't have been banished so easily after she married Jeremiah….

Then something clicked in Carolyn's mind. Something that brought back in full force the heavy foreboding that had coursed through her on her walk through the cemetery this afternoon. David's attachment to Josette Collins, his declaration that Sarah was a ghost, and finally, her cousin's love for the past and interest in Josette Collins.

A suspicion was beginning to form. A suspicion that terrified her more than anything, even though it was not yet clear enough for her to grasp it and see it for what it truly was.

For what it truly meant.

That suspicion was only heightened by the thought in her head, the assumption that she felt she could safely make based on the few pieces of a puzzle not yet completed. She still couldn't see what image the puzzle would show her. But this suspicion, this piece of that puzzle, seemed important somehow, as if it held the clue to all that was occupying her thoughts.

Barnabas Collins was the lover.

The one who had pursued Josette Collins to the edge of the cliff.

---

Without moving from his place on the bottom of the stairs, Willie let out a breath that he hadn't known he'd been holding.

Time had passed by while he had been standing there, so still that he could hear his pounding heart as it thundered in his chest. He felt like he had been standing there for years, so long that the bottom of his shoes had grown roots and planted themselves on the second to last step. He was gripping the banister hard enough that his knuckles were white and his skin was stretched taut over the bone.

The family had left, and Josette had left with them - something for which he was extremely grateful. But the look on her face as she did….

Willie had made himself scarce during Barnabas's party, knowing that Barnabas wouldn't want him intruding. He'd spent most of the night upstairs fixing something in his room, trying to keep himself from wondering was happening downstairs. He would stop working occasionally to listen. He hadn't been able to hear much of anything except muffled voices that he couldn't make out. Finally, he'd given up and went back to his task -

Then came the wild laughter, so clear that it had sounded as if the woman laughing was in a room near his in the servant's quarters. After dropping the hammer that had been in his hand, he'd raced into the hall, searching for the source of the sound.

That was when he had seen the transparent figure, standing - no, glowing - at the end of the hall: a woman, dressed in an old gown that was ragged and worn. She'd had blonde hair and the biggest blue eyes Willie had ever seen in his life; eyes that could have drive any man to the point of delirious distraction.

She had turned to him and smiled, and knives of terror had pierced through him as she did, carving up his insides and rendering him helpless under their sharp blades.

There had been something evil in that woman's smile.

Willie knew what evil was. He'd found it that night in the mausoleum after carelessly breaking the rusted chains that had sealed an ancient, hidden coffin. But something about the blonde haired woman had made him doubt how much he knew about evil for the first time since a dead man had wrapped his hand around his throat and sunk his fangs into his wrist.

Willie had started running then, and was halfway down the stairs when he'd seen the little girl next to one of the pillars in the drawing room.

Sarah, Barnabas's sister.

Yet another ghost.

Willie had glanced into the drawing room just in time to see Carolyn throw her head back, scream, then collapse. The others had been seated around her at the large table, and Barnabas and Josette had been holding hands with their backs to him.

Willie had looked at Sarah again, just in time to see her vanish before his overworked eyes. He hadn't moved since.

Mrs. Stoddard had helped Carolyn out of the house, and Roger followed with Josette. He had watched Barnabas advise Josette to leave with the family and then retreat into the drawing room without even noticing Willie on the stairs.

Willie wondered how much more he could take. How much more he would have to take.

He slowly loosened his grip on the banister. His hands were sticky with sweat, so much so that they almost stuck to the wood as he lifted them away from it. He couldn't decide if he should go see what Barnabas was doing or flee back upstairs, shut the door to his room, and play ignorant later if Barnabas brought up whatever it was that had happened tonight.

I can't. I'll just keep seein' that woman if I do that. I gotta find out what happened. I gotta know! I'll never be able to sleep in this house again unless I know!

He put one foot in front of the other, and eventually, he reached the drawing room. Barnabas was standing in its center, staring up at the high ceiling, his face contorted with rage.

For a minute, Willie thought that he might go on a rampage and tear the entire house apart. He almost wished that Barnabas would, then maybe the ghosts would go away and take the horrors that haunted this house with them.

And if luck was on Willie's side for once, take Barnabas with them as well.

Willie had seen Barnabas angry plenty of times, but there was something different about what Willie was witnessing now. Willie had never seen him like this - not when he had found out about Willie making the phone call to Victoria on the night he'd first tried to take Maggie; not when he'd woken up and found Jason opening the lid of his coffin; not even when he'd learned that Willie had attempted to warn Josette away from Collinsport.

"ANGELIQUE!"

Barnabas's roar tore through the empty drawing room like a gunshot, and Willie almost ducked to the ground like he did the time when he and Jason had "accidentally" gotten themselves in the middle of a shootout on the California coast.

"Is the memory of you that I've carried with me for over one hundred and seventy years not enough? Must you continue to torment me? You will not take Josette from me again! I will not allow you to ruin what I finally have an opportunity to regain. Go back to Hell where you belong and leave us alone!"

Willie imagined he could feel the very foundation of the house shake with the wrathful force of Barnabas's voice. Like a scared mouse, he crept further into the room just in time to see Barnabas fall into his chair and bring one hand up to cover his eyes. It was almost as if he had become exhausted by his anger and no longer had the strength to remain standing.

Willie stopped moving a few feet away from Barnabas's chair, not about to get any closer. When Barnabas was in a mood such as the one he was currently in, Willie knew to keep his distance.

"B-Barnabas?" When he received no response, he bravely, foolishly, forged ahead, "Barnabas, who…who's Angelique?"

Willie already had some kind of idea, and that idea was made up of blonde hair, blue eyes, and a sadistic smile.

Without turning his head or lowering his hand, Barnabas answered him in a hoarse snarl filled with pure loathing, "My wife."

"Wife?"

The word slipped out before Willie could stop it, and his mind reeled from Barnabas's revelation. Wife. Barnabas had been married. He'd had wife named Angelique. He tried to fit that in with some of the other things he knew about Barnabas's past, like his obsessive love for Josette and his hatred of Jeremiah. It just didn't fit.

All this pinin' over Josette and he was married to another woman! A pretty woman. Yeah, pretty…but scary.

Really damn scary.

Angelique. Didn't that mean 'angelic' or something?

She hadn't seemed at all angelic to Willie when she'd appeared to him upstairs.

"It was she who forged my existence," Barnabas said coldly, while Willie just gaped at him. "She turned me into what I am now."

Willie reached for one of the smaller chairs and pulled it to him, his curiosity piqued. He'd always believed that Barnabas had chosen to be…different, and considered himself above normal men. Better than them. Willie would never have guessed that this life, if one could even call it that, wasn't something Barnabas had wanted for himself.

He sat down in the chair and kept quiet. He was afraid that Barnabas would stop talking if he said anything. In spite of himself, he wanted to hear Barnabas's story. He wanted to hear how someone could come to be what Barnabas was. Sure, he'd heard stories growing up, the kind that kids would tell before bed to scare each other, but that was all make believe. And this? This was real.

Very, very real.

But if Barnabas had any reservations over sharing his story with Willie, they apparently weren't strong enough for him to stay silent. As he began to speak again, the tone of his voice changed and became far less chilly, probably forgetting who it was that he was recounting his life to, and needing to tell the tale to someone.

"My father was an aloof man. Distant and unaffectionate to my mother, to Sarah….to me. Wealth, status and the respect that came with it mattered more to him than family. It mattered more to him than love. Sarah was too young to understand why our mother always seemed sad, or why she always had a drink in her hand. Mother tried to make up for our father's lack of attention when she was in need of it herself. Father felt I was too much like Mother, and that she had 'coddled' me as a child. I wanted to please him, but I could not be the man he wanted me to be. I could not so unemotional…so cold! I was his only son, the heir to his fortune, and a disappointment to him. This room saw many disagreements between the two of us. None ever ended in my favor."

Willie titled his head to the side, looking at Barnabas and trying to picture him the way he'd described himself. He couldn't envision Barnabas being intimidated by anyone, not even by his old man.

"I met Angelique on the French island of Martinique. She was a servant to the Countess du Pres," Barnabas continued. "Angelique was….like no other woman I had ever known, but then, I was rather naive in anything that did not involve shipyards and my family's wealth. I became intrigued by her, drawn to the passion that she laid bare for me to witness in all of its reckless abandon. She pursued me with no reservations, no thought to propriety. She was beautiful but it was not her beauty that brought me to her bed. It was my desire for a taste of that passion… It did not matter that it was hers, it would not have mattered whose it was. That I could drink it in, that was all that mattered. And drink it in I did. I thirsted for it because I had never allowed myself to have it. My father frowned on such a feeling. He even frowned on love."

Willie could envision that. All too well, in fact. A repressed young man goes to a tropical island and gets blindsided by a beautiful girl who offers herself up to him. What man could resist?

"But you didn't love her." It was a reasonable assumption on Willie's part.

He thought back on the women he had used to make himself feel better. All the times he'd lost himself in them because he wanted to forget for a little while that he was poor and that he would never amount to anything if he didn't scam his way to money. Jason had been just the friend, and the opportunity, that Willie had been looking for.

God, what if one of 'em had turned me into-

He put that out of his mind before it could go any further. He had bags under his eyes from the lack of sleep he'd been getting. He didn't need to add something else to the list of things that kept him awake when he was lying on his back in the stiff, broken down bed in his room.

"I…felt for her." Barnabas's reluctance in admitting just that much was palpable. "I never intended our union to be anything more than a moment in time. A moment I would always remember that poured over me as rain, but was not meant to last. Rain always ends, and yet…..it always returns." He gave a small, bitter sounding laugh that made the hair stand up on the back of Willie's neck. "Rain. An appropriate analogy.

"I was sent to Martinique by my father. The du Pres family had amassed a fortune in sugar cane, and my father was always interested in those he could profit from. I was formally introduced to Josette the day of my arrival at the family's plantation. She was the opposite of Angelique, not only in looks but in manner as well. She had an enchanting innocence and a grace that few women truly possess. I did not entertain the prospect of a union between the two of us. Not in the beginning. I did not think she would consider me, nor did I believe Andre du Pres would find me suitable. Many men presented themselves to her and her father. I kept a respectful distance, though my eyes strayed to her whenever she was within my sight. I could never help myself. Her smile and her laughter, both so genuine and unassuming….a vision and sound that were foreign to me. I became riveted by her. One night I was restless, unable to sleep, so I went for a walk along the shore. I saw Josette. When she noticed me she panicked and begged me not to tell her aunt that she was outside alone. I assured her that I would not, and that it would certainly be the end of me if the Countess discovered us together, even in such an innocent predicament. Impulsively, feeling that fate itself had offered me an opportunity to interact with her away from the watchful eye of others, I convinced her to accompany me on my walk."

Barnabas smiled. Willie knew that in his mind, he wasn't in the Old House, but on Martinique with Josette, reliving one of his happier memories.

"By the time we crept silently back into her family's home and wished each other good night I knew that I was falling in love with her. I spent the remainder of my stay in Martinique agonizing over it. I recognized that what I had shared with Angelique had been about escaping my father and his expectations of me rather than giving into what I truly wanted. What was passion without love? I….I should have been firm with Angelique, but I did not know how to explain myself to her. I had not intentionally set out to hurt her. I found myself unable to tell her of my love for Josette. I thought that she would forget me, that she was not in love with me and that she would find someone who could give her his heart. I had given mine to Josette."

"I left Martinique wondering if I would ever see Josette again. We began to write to each other once I returned to Collinsport. Even though I thought nothing would ever come of our contact I kept every letter I received from her in a drawer in my desk, and when I was upset or angry I would take them out and read them. I withheld my feelings for her in those early letters, fully expecting to read one day that she was promised to a wealthy man from Martinique that had impressed her father with his knowledge of sugar cane. That letter never came. Instead, her letters grew more affectionate towards me, and I could easily imagine her smiling as she described the events of her day to me, as well as sense her honest interest in mine. I forced myself to overcome my fear of her rejection. What astonishment I felt when I read that she returned my feelings! With her father's permission, we became betrothed. My father was ecstatic, not because I was happy, but because of Andre du Pres's profitable plantation. I did not care. Josette was all that mattered to me, and I waited eagerly for her arrival.

"The Countess and her servant arrived before Josette and her father. It was in utter shock that I opened the door to see Angelique standing beyond it. She came to my room that very night, hoping to resume our relationship in spite of my impending marriage to Josette. She was willing to be my mistress. I refused her. I told her that I loved Josette," Barnabas paused, and Willie watched his mouth twist into an ugly smirk. "But Angelique would not allow me to have happiness with Josette."

"How did she… I mean, I don't understand how she could've -" Willie struggled for the right way to phrase his question.

But Barnabas was well aware of what he wanted to know, and he responded flatly, "Angelique was a witch."

"A…a witch?" Willie rubbed the back of his neck with one hand. "How's that possible, Barnabas? Witches can't exist…they're just in stories."

Barnabas leveled a withering glare at him, and Willie was struck by how inane he must have sounded.

"She wrought damnation upon my family before I discovered what she was. It was too late then to undo the damage that she had done. No one suspected her. She was nothing more than a mere servant girl to both families. It was easier to cast the blame on Sarah's governess, a stranger to all who had arrived only days before the odd occurrences began. Now as I look back I cannot believe how foolish I was to have not seen it; to have not seen her wickedness, her obsessive and jealous nature.

"She cast a spell upon Josette and Jeremiah and made them fall in love. The night that Josette was to marry me, she ran off with him into the village and became his wife. I will never forget how I felt when I walked into this room upon their return and was told by my father that they were married. All my father could worry about was the scandal while they destroyed every dream I'd ever had of happiness. Jeremiah was more of a brother than an uncle to me, and Josette…. They humiliated me. Deceived me. Betrayed me. I thought Josette had never loved me and Jeremiah had secretly hated me. How else could they have done what they did to me? I challenged Jeremiah to a duel."

Guess I don't have to ask who survived…

Willie cringed. If he had never gone to the mausoleum, never found the secret room, he would have thought that this was all just some crazy story. A really good piece of horror fiction, something that he and Jason might have had a laugh over while they shared a drink in some port. The idea that one woman could ruin so many people's lives would have been impossible to him if his own life hadn't been demolished by the man that was sitting only a short distance away from him.

Barnabas folded his hands in his lap and leaned back in his chair with an air of calm that Willie knew better than to take at face value.

"I had never participated in a duel before, nor witnessed one. But my pain was too great to wish Jeremiah and Josette well and walk away. My father tried to forbid it. Even though the consequences frightened me, I was determined to go through with it. It was the first time I had ever truly defied my father. Jeremiah never offered a protest. He went along with it willingly. I think perhaps he wanted to die for marrying Josette. That night we met in the woods and I shot him. I turned Josette into a widow. Jeremiah - my uncle, my brother - was the first man I ever killed. Josette ran to his side and accused me of killing the only man she ever loved."

There was something tangy in Willie's mouth, a sharp flavor on his tongue that he didn't like. It only took a second for him to place it. He'd bitten his lower lip and drawn blood. Feeling sick at the taste, he wiped his lip with his shirt sleeve and tried to ignore the way the blood stained the cuff and how the taste still lingered on his tongue.

"When Sarah became ill, it was Angelique that helped make her well again. I was so grateful to her in that moment for saving my sister, and she wanted so much to marry me, I gave in. I would always love Josette, and told her that if she would accept that, then I would marry her. I had cared for Angelique on Martinique, and she promised to be a good wife. I believed her." The bitterness in Barnabas's voice was unmistakable, and Willie thought he could hear a tiny trace of self-loathing behind it. "My father disinherited me and said that I was no longer his son, but my mother gave us this house to live in. Mere days after our marriage, I discovered the truth. I discovered that Phyllis Wick, the governess, was not responsible for the horrors that had befallen my family. She was not the witch. The witch was my wife."

Willie frowned, and a hollow feeling entered the pit of his stomach.

"So many nights I had spent in anguish over Jeremiah and Josette's love for one another, and that love had never existed. Jeremiah had not willingly stolen my fiancée, and Josette had not deceived me. Angelique had forced them together, and she had created Sarah's illness so that she could be the one to cure her…. Everything had been orchestrated so that she could manipulate me into marrying her. Any affection I'd had for her vanished in an instant. I vowed to be the one to put an end to her trickery. I planned to poison her, and when that did not yield the result I wanted, I attempted to stab her in our bed while she slept. However, she knew that her secret had been exposed to me and stopped me with her threats. She threatened Josette. She threatened my family. She turned me into a prisoner in my own house."

Barnabas laughed then, and it was a hollow, empty laugh.

"This house had suddenly become my coffin, and she the chains that bound me inside of it. Foreshadowing in its finest form. There was no end to her malice. Desperate and frightened, I shot her with a pistol. But still she lived…."

"Damn," Willie whispered. He knew was what coming….

"She was bleeding on the floor and I stood over her, scarcely aware of what was happening. I heard her voice, I heard her words….Those words will be with me until the end of time, and time is endless. "I put a curse on you, Barnabas Collins!" she cried wretchedly to me, "You will never be able to love, for anyone who loves you will die. That is my curse, and you shall live with it through all eternity!" After she lost consciousness, a bat appeared; its wings fluttering as it flew to me, and its eyes glittering as it gazed into mine. I could not escape it. While I screamed in terror its fangs tore open my flesh. I remember very little after that, except Josette at my bedside. In my delirium, I promised to return to her. She promised to wait for me." Barnabas swept his hand over his eyes and turned away from Willie. "Her face was the last face I saw as a living man."

"Angelique….did….did ya kill her?"

"Yes, Willie, I killed her. At dusk on the day that my father had my coffin placed in the secret room, I opened my eyes and found her above me with a stake and hammer in her hands. The very sight of her sent such hatred spiraling through me that I never noticed the hunger that had already begun to burn through me. She claimed that she loved me still. I trapped her against the coffin and put my hands around her throat. She loved me….so she would die. She would be the first victim of her own curse. I watched her struggle for breath as I strangled her. There was only the slightest satisfaction for me as she became lifeless in my grasp - she was gone but she had taken me down into the darkness, leaving me with nothing but the night and the longing for a life I would never live."

Goosebumps had formed on Willie's arms and he roughly ran his hands up and down them in an effort to make them go away. Barnabas was staring into the flames without blinking, without moving. He was utterly still, and the house seemed to sense it because it became as still as Barnabas.

As still as death.

"But…she came back, didn't she? That laughter was hers," Willie said, breaking that stillness, his statement causing Barnabas to rise from his chair. He could see Barnabas's agitation in his movements.

"Yes," Barnabas acknowledged. "It was the séance. I had never considered that she could cross the barrier between life and death through the séance or I would not have allowed Roger to conduct it. She used Carolyn to repeat her curse to me. She knows that Josette is alive again and that I can be with her, and Angelique will do everything in her power to keep me from welcoming Josette into my existence." Barnabas stood near the window, a grim expression on his face. "That is why I sent Josette away. How I hated to send her away! But I feared what Angelique would have done had I asked her to remain. Josette is not safe here as long as Angelique's presence defiles this house."

Willie looked up at Barnabas as a memory of the shredded lining in the coffin in the basement wafted through his mind and presented him with a sudden insight.

"Barnabas, she must've been responsible for what happened to ya a couple of nights ago when you couldn't get outta your coffin! That….that was when Josette was here

and I….I walked her back to Collinwood…."

Willie cringed as he remembered how angry Barnabas had been over his pathetic attempt to keep Josette from him.

The bruises had just started fading.

Barnabas's eyes widened and he gripped the back of his chair tightly. "Of course! Angelique was responsible… Why did I not think of it? Even I am not safe here."

Willie held his tongue between his teeth, forced to make a decision. He knew that Sarah had stopped Angelique somehow. He'd seen it with his own eyes. There was a chance that Angelique hadn't been able to come back at all, at least not fully. He might not have known about ghosts or how they worked, but he'd seen Sarah standing there facing Carolyn, and heard Carolyn scream right before Sarah disappeared.

But, if Willie told Barnabas that, he would bring Josette to the Old House.

If I let Barnabas think Angelique's still floatin' around here somewhere, he'll be too afraid to bring Josette here. Sure, he could go see her at Collinwood, but he couldn't hurt her there….he couldn't make her into what he is while she's there…too many people around.

But Barnabas said she recognized him…if she did….if she is Josette du Pres…if she is…. Nah, she'll be terrified of him, just like she was when she jumped from Widows' Hill. She won't willingly come here if she remembers. She won't willingly come to him….

And if Barnabas finds out about Sarah bein' here tonight, confrontin' Angelique, and that I didn't tell him about it, he'll kill me. No, he'll do worse than kill me… I can't stop what's gonna happen to Josette, anyway. I wish I could…but I can't! I'm as helpless now as I was when Barnabas brought Maggie here! It's useless. I couldn't save Maggie's life, and I got even less of a chance to save Josette's. He'll never let her go. He was willin' to kill Maggie, but he'll never kill her. She'll suffer for eternity….

I gotta tell him. He'll find out sooner or later, anyway….

"I don't think ya need to worry about Angelique," Willie stuttered, wishing that he had more courage, hating that he didn't.

Barnabas approached him with a glare of confusion. "Explain yourself, Willie."

"I…I saw Sarah tonight, Barnabas." Seeing Barnabas tense, he explained hastily, "I was up in my room and I heard that laughter. I came down the stairs to see what was happenin', and she was standin' over there by that pillar." Willie nodded his head towards it. "Barnabas, I think….I think she stopped Angelique."

"Sarah." The expression on Barnabas's face turned to one of wonder. "Could Sarah have sent Angelique away? Could Sarah have protected me from her? Perhaps she understands now that it's Angelique who is responsible for what I am. Perhaps she will finally let me see her..."

"What if she didn't?" Willie countered, thinking that it couldn't hurt to make Barnabas more cautious. "I mean, what if Sarah didn't get rid of Angelique? I saw her and it looked like she did somethin', but I can't be sure! Barnabas, what are ya gonna do if I'm wrong?"

Barnabas's silence was an answer in itself.

Hadn't Willie hoped every day since he'd stumbled across the secret room in the mausoleum that someone would come along and be able to destroy Barnabas?

Usually the person in the scenarios that he made up in his head was Sheriff Patterson. Sometimes though, as much as Willie hated it because he never wanted to owe him a damn thing, it was Burke Devlin. He knew Burke would destroy Barnabas without a second's hesitation if he discovered the truth. A girl that Barnabas attacked would be able to describe him, the police would get suspicious, and Patterson or Devlin would show up at the house during the afternoon and demand to be taken to the basement and shown Barnabas's coffin. Once they got over the initial shock of seeing him laying helpless in the coffin, they would take the stake and drive it through Barnabas's heart. Barnabas's eyes would fly open, he would scream, then that would be the end. Willie would be free, at least in some way, even if he was led out of the Old House and thrown into a police car.

A witch ain't exactly what I had in mind.

He wouldn't have cared before. He would have welcomed her with open arms if he thought she was going to get rid of Barnabas. He wouldn't have cared if the devil himself rose up from Hell and swallowed Barnabas whole. He especially felt that way whenever he was recovering from a brutal beating, or after he'd heard someone mention Maggie's name in town.

But now….now that he knew Barnabas's past, now that he knew about Angelique…. He didn't know how he felt. He didn't know how he was supposed to feel.

All he knew was that he didn't want that….woman….witch….whatever she was, hanging around the Old House. Nothing good could come from that.

Nothing good at all.

---

It was late.

Far too late for Josette to be awake and still dressed in the gown she had worn to the costume party. She had not even removed her shoes or freed her hair from its elaborate upsweep.

The family had gone to bed. She'd listened as their footsteps could be heard in the hall outside of her bedroom and waited until they were asleep before she had embarked on a journey from her room to the downstairs drawing room. She now sat at the piano with her fingers resting lightly on the keys, imagining that she knew how to play it.

She was beginning to become more comfortable at Collinwood. She knew, however, that that was not necessarily a good thing. She could not stay at Collinwood forever. Some day the family would surely tire of taking care of her, and then she would be on her own. But the thought of leaving and attempting to enter the world beyond the estate only added to the anxiety that was already tormenting her.

How would she ever forget what happened at the Old House tonight?

"Angelique," she whispered to the empty room. "The woman's name was Angelique."

I knew her. I had to. She was in one of my dreams. Hers was the face I glimpsed while talking to Carolyn - the gold hair and blue eyes. Her laughter… I've heard it before. Long ago….. How long ago?"

Josette absently traced the piano keys with her fingertips.

Too long for it to have been possible… I mustn't allow myself to think such silly things. Roger said that the séance was to contact a spirit of the first Collins family. They lived in the Old House over a century ago! Angelique had to have lived then, how else would we have been able to contact her?

But if that were true, I would not remember her. I would not see her face in my dreams. I would not be so frightened of her laughter.

Angelique must be the key….the key to unlocking my memories.

And I was not the only one who recognized her….

Barnabas had recognized Angelique. There was no disputing that fact. His reaction was one of a man who had come face to face with an enemy, and the hatred he'd had for her had overwhelmed and confused Josette.

If Barnabas knew her, and I remember her…. That must be the connection between us. That must be why I feel so drawn to him. But what reason would he have for pretending that we are strangers? Perhaps we knew her at different times in our lives…perhaps we are strangers.

Then why do I have such strong feelings for him? Why does he affect me so?

And he shows interest in me. He invited me to his party when it made very little sense for him to do so. Even when we first met here in the drawing room…he was so attentive.

Resolutely, Josette rose from the piano seat and walked into the foyer. She glanced at the portrait of the eighteenth century Barnabas and gathered herself.

She would go to the Old House.

She would go to Barnabas.

And she would demand answers.

She ignored the little voice inside of her head that warned her not to, that she should not simply run out into the night unaccompanied to a man whom she'd only known for days. As long as she returned before morning, she reasoned with it, no one would know that she had gone. They could not worry if they were not aware of her excursion.

She took a deep breath, opened the paneled wooden doors of Collinwood, and cried out in surprise.

Barnabas Collins was standing before her in the night's shroud.

Like her, he was still in his costume, only now he wore a heavy black cloak that concealed much of it from her view. She was too stunned to speak, and he was as silent as she. She felt herself grow warm as he stared at her, his gaze sweeping over her form. The smallest of smiles touched his lips and he held out his hand.

"Come with me, Josette," he commanded softly, his voice the piano melody she had wished to create in the drawing room.

He drew her forward with his eyes. She gave him her hand, and he led her into the darkness.

She never noticed Carolyn above her on the landing, watching her as she followed Barnabas from the mansion.