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  Reaching the mausoleum, the blackness moved down the narrow lane toward them. Maria tried to think of a spell she might use to protect them against the approaching darkness, but no such spells came to mind. Crystals and incantations seemed foolish child’s play against the thing that now moved through the Tolomato Cemetery, seeking out those who had summoned it. Against such an evil she would be no match, no matter how many magical words she could recite.

  The women watched in horror as the thing they had accidentally summoned changed shapes, transforming from a rolling cloud of blackness to a monster that resembled a maddening cross between an octopus and a giant spider, to the dark figure of a man with tentacle arms, and back again to a shapeless mass of darkness. This was no helpful spirit, coming to serve them as a guide. It was a thing of pure evil, conjured from the very bowels of hell.

  Knowing that the three of them were outmatched, and in great danger, Maria could think of only one thing to say to her students, “Run!”

  Turning on her heels, Maria sprinted for the front of the cemetery. The other women did not need to be told twice, for they too ran for their lives. Louise moved like a comical stick figure, all elbows and knees, a grimace of fear pulling at the corners of her mouth. Her sister, Jane, held her skirt with both hands as she pumped her short, thick legs high in the air. The plump woman spoke as she ran, a single word repeated over and over again, keeping time with the heavy sounds of her footfalls, “Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh....”

  They neared the front gate, and Maria was struck with the sudden maddening thought that the double gates would swing shut in their faces before they could escape the confines of the cemetery. She had seen the chain magically split in half and fall to the ground, had watched in awe as the metal gates swung open by themselves. Surely, if the thing pursuing them could unlock and open the gates to invite them in, then it could easily close the gates to keep them from getting out.

  But the gates did not close as they reached the front of the cemetery. The metal bars did not spring shut to block their exit. Louise reached the gates first, not even bothering to look back as she fled from the Tolomato. She ran out into the street, stumbled and nearly fell, but kept her footing as she turned left, racing for the nearby parking lot. Maria did not call after her; Louise knew where the spare key for the Nissan was kept, and was no doubt hurrying to start the car.

  Surprisingly, Jane reached the gates second, a full ten feet ahead of Maria. The fear of things far worse than death had empowered the short, portly woman, enabling her body to perform a feat that would have been nearly impossible any other time. She glanced backward as she reached the gates, and the look of terror on her face told Maria that they were still being chased by the thing they had summoned.

  Maria was confident they would be safe once they got out of the cemetery; at least she hoped they would be safe. She was praying the evil spirit had it limitations, and could not venture beyond the cemetery walls. Ghosts rarely left the places they haunted, confined by rules mortals did not understand.

  She was almost to the front gates, just a few feet away from possible safety, when she tripped over something laying in the darkness and went sprawling. She didn’t have to see the item to know that it was her leather shoulder bag, the bag she had set just inside the front gates for safekeeping when they entered the cemetery.

  With a startled cry, and a painful jolt, Maria Sanchez hit the ground. Crawling, nearly mad with fear, she tried to get back to her feet and continue running. She almost made it, but an ebony tentacle grabbed her around the legs and snatched her back inside the cemetery, dragging her toward a thing of darkness.

  She screamed in terror, a high-pitched cry that was cut short. A fatal silence followed, interrupted briefly by the distant sound of a car engine revving, and the squeal of tires as a small white sedan sped out of the parking lot.

  Chapter 2

  Detective Jack Colvin wasn’t out looking for bad guys when he turned off of U.S. 1, following King Street to the old section of St. Augustine. Nor was he investigating clues to a recent crime. Instead, he was enjoying a well-earned day off, hoping to spend the morning hours sketching a few landscapes before the tourists flooded the area.

  Jack sketched for his own enjoyment, simple pencil drawings, or pen and inks, of the city’s historic homes and buildings. In the past ten years he must have done close to a thousand drawings; they adorned the walls of his two-bedroom home, and took up space in the closets and various desk drawers.

  Since he was never able to completely separate himself from his work, he often used the time that he sketched to think about the details of a particular case. Sitting under a shade tree, pad and pencil in hand, he sometimes came to conclusions he would never have considered while confined to his stuffy office at the police station.

  Not that he was working on any cases at the moment. Things had been rather quiet in the old city, and his casebook was clear. Still, he enjoyed his artist sessions, because it gave him a chance to be alone with his inner thoughts. Being a thirty-six-year-old bachelor, with no special lady in his life, he had been having a lot of inner thoughts. The little voice inside his head was telling him that maybe it was time to find someone to share his life, settle down, perhaps even start a family.

  Parking his car on Granada Street, he put a dollar’s worth of quarters into the meter, and then walked slowly north past the Lightner Museum and Flagler College. The elaborately ornate buildings that housed the museum and the college had once been luxury hotels for the superrich. Built by railroad tycoon Henry Flagler in the late 1800s, they had been designed to lure the wealthy from the north, turning the city of St. Augustine into the Newport of the south.

  Sadly, old Henry’s plans had failed, for the Rockefellers and Vanderbilts had set their sights further south, seeking even warmer weather and finding it in the tropical retreats of Miami and Key West. The buildings remained as a reminder of what could have been, glistening towers of red and white stone that spoke of faded glory and a forgotten era. Some say that the ghost of Henry Flagler still walks the halls of Flagler College, others say that it is the ghost of his insane second wife, Ida Alice, that haunts the building and grounds

  After passing the college, Jack walked a block east to what could probably be considered the heart of the old section. St. George Street wasn’t a strip mall, but it came damn close to being one. Lined with gift shops, souvenir stands, clothing stores, and restaurants, the pedestrian-only thoroughfare was where most of the visiting tourists bid farewell to their hard-earned money. Many of the buildings along the street were indeed quite old, but St. George did not possess the quiet charm that existed in other sections of the historic city.

  It was still early, so most of the gifts shops along St. George had not yet opened for business. The tourists were also still relatively few in number, outnumbered by the locals, who were grabbing quick cups of coffee, and morning newspapers, before heading off to work. The peace and quiet wouldn’t last long, however, because it was Saturday and the narrow avenue would soon be filled with throngs of people shopping for bargain souvenirs.

  There used to be a lot of artists and street musicians set up along the street, but the city had passed a law forbidding public performance of any kind on St. George. Jack didn’t have to worry about violating the local law in his artistic pursuits, because he would never dream of setting up to showcase, or sell, any of his drawings. Not that he was afraid of being arrested--he just didn’t think any of his sketches were good enough to sell. Nor did he like people looking over his shoulder while he worked.

  The detective stopped walking when he reached the old City Gate at the north end of St. George Street, thinking about his choices for possible sketches. In front of him was the Huguenot Cemetery and the visitor information center, while in the distance stood the Castillo De San Marcos, the massive gray stone fortress that stood watch over the harbor.

  The Castillo had been built by the Spanish in the 1600s, and was constructed enti
rely of coquina, a native shell rock mined on Anatasia Island. Over the years, the military structure had seen its fair share of violence and suffering. It had stood strong against invasions of blood thirsty pirates and heathen English, offering a safe haven for the soldiers and citizens of St. Augustine.

  In later years, under American rule, the fortress was renamed Fort Marion and served as a military prison to house members of various Indian tribes, victims of a westward expansion that had stolen their land. Entire families had been imprisoned at the fort, suffering from sickness, malnutrition, and the relentless heat and humidity. On the harbor side, a bullet-ridden wall still marked the spot where the firing squads of three different nations had executed helpless prisoners. The holes stood as a silent testimony to the bloody history of St. Augustine.

  He thought about doing a quick sketch of the Castillo, but decided against it. He had already done quite a few sketches of the old fort, from several different angles, and really wasn’t in the mood to do another one. Besides, he found the fortress depressing, and the last thing in the world he wanted to think about on his day off was imprisonment.

  Walking west along Orange Street, he made his way slowly toward another one of the city’s interesting buildings. Like many of the structures in the historic district, the Old Drugstore appeared to be in danger of falling down. The rustic two-story wooden building sat on the corner of Orange and Cordova, its sagging frame of weathered pine standing out in sharp contrast to the newer buildings surrounding it. Jack could almost hear the termites and carpenter ants chewing as he stood gazing at the old building, wondering how many more years it would be before it crumbled into dust.

  For some strange reason he had never done a drawing of the Old Drugstore, even though he knew it would make an interesting sketch. He thought about opening his pad and taking a seat on a bench across the street from the drugstore, but shook his head and changed his mind. He just wasn’t in the mood to sketch another historic building. He wanted something different to draw, something that would give him a challenge and release the creative juices. He wanted to be quietly melancholy, before the hot Florida sun had a chance to chase away the grayness of the day.

  Luckily, he didn’t have far to walk to find the ideal place to be moody. Just past the Old Drugstore, on Cordova Street, was the Tolomato Cemetery, and he could think of no better place to conjure somber thoughts and feelings than at a graveyard. Older cemeteries were even better for inspiring the artist within him, because there was a feeling to them that was nearly impossible to describe. They were special places, calling out to the creative, and to those with open minds, promising to share dark secrets with anyone who dared to linger beneath the shade of their towering oak trees.

  Jack decided to sketch the cemetery from across the street, sitting on an elevated ridge of ground that was part of the original earthen works that once encircled the Spanish settlement. He had just stepped off the sidewalk to cross the street, when he noticed that the front gates of the Tolomato stood open. He had never seen the gates open before, and wondered if a grounds crew was working inside the cemetery. If so, then maybe they wouldn’t mind if he walked around for a few minutes. He would love to get a closer look at some of the burial sites, maybe even do a few quick sketches.

  There were no sounds of power mowers, or hedge trimmers, coming from within the tiny confines of the cemetery, so maybe it wasn’t a grounds crew that had opened the gates. Nor did he see a city truck, or any other vehicles, parked in the area.

  If it wasn’t a grounds crew, then maybe the front gates had been opened by a member of the Historical Society. The St. Augustine Historical Society had considerable power within the old city, and were responsible for maintaining a number of historic sites. They were also responsible for the publication of papers and books about the town, as well as raising funds to restore many of the older homes to their original condition.

  Jack thought it might be a member of the Historical Society who had opened the front gates, but then he spotted the broken chain on the sidewalk. The only person who would do such a thing would be someone who did not have permission to enter the cemetery: a vandal or trespasser in search of mischief, or a tourist in search of an illegal souvenir.

  Whoever cut the chain to enter the cemetery must have been in quite a hurry when they departed, for they had left the gates standing wide open. He wondered if it had been a couple of college kids out for thrills: some idiot trying to prove his bravery to his drunken buddies, or trying very hard to impress a girl. Maybe a young couple had broken into the graveyard, but they had gotten scared and ran away. The Tolomato Cemetery was spooky as hell at night, especially to those who believed the local legends about its ghosts.

  “So much for a peaceful morning of sketching,” he said, frowning. Even though he was off duty, he still carried his badge. He was also armed, a 9mm Glock tucked securely into the shoulder holster concealed beneath his jacket.

  Just inside the front gates, he spotted a leather shoulder bag on the ground, apparently dropped by whoever had broken into the cemetery. He suspected the bag might contain a hacksaw, or burglar tools, and was surprised to discover its contents consisted of three white candles, three plumb-sized quartz crystals, a butane lighter, and several tied bundles of dried herbs. He sniffed one of the bundles, decided it was made of cedar and sage, and dropped it back into the bag.

  A cedar and sage smudge stick, the kind sold in New Age shops. New Agers. Wanna-be witches. College girls with purple hair and body piercings. The hippies of the new millennium. He had had a few run-ins with such people in the past, arresting them on possession of illegal drugs, or putting a stop to ceremonies that always seemed to take place on private property. Such things weren’t really a problem in St. Augustine, because New Agers were few in number. Usually, it was just a couple of college kids trying to invoke a higher spirit to help them with their term papers, or using a ceremony as an excuse to get stoned and naked.

  Setting the bag aside, he made his way slowly toward the rear of the property. He was pleased to see that none of the headstones had been toppled, nor had any of the graves been disturbed. There wasn’t even any graffiti painted on the side of the mausoleum, which had once happened several years earlier.

  Walking slowly back toward the front gates, he discovered a silver ring on the ground, just a few feet away from the main path. The ring was large and ornate, with two carved snakes circling an oval blue stone. It was obviously quite valuable, and he wondered what it was doing in the graveyard. Maybe the person who had cut the chain, and opened the front gates, had also been the same person to lose the ring.

  “Serves them right.”

  He started to pick up the ring, but then decided not to touch it until after he had finished looking around. The ring might turn out to be evidence in a crime, so it wouldn’t do to go handling it. It was bad enough he had picked up the leather bag. Pulling a half-full pack of Winston cigarettes from his jacket pocket, he set the pack beside the ring to mark its location. It would be easier to find the bright red cigarette pack, than it would be to try to locate the silver ring again.

  He had just set the cigarettes next to the ring when he spotted something on the ground about thirty feet off to his right. At first he thought it was a discarded plastic trash bag, or maybe one of the larger black bags used for leaves and lawn clippings. But as he walked over to the object, he discovered that the tattered material was cloth and not plastic.

  The shredded fabric was thick and heavy, black in color and probably wool, much too heavy to be the remains of a scarf or shirt. Attached to one of the pieces was a large plastic button, the type commonly found on women’s dresses. The remains of the dress lay near one of the ancient gravestones, its frayed edges flapping in the morning breeze.

  Beyond the dress were a few thinner pieces of shredded material that might have once been a pair of dark blue panties. And there was a pair of women’s shoes beyond that.

  Alarm bells sounded inside the
detective’s head when he spotted several dull brown stains on the tattered dress that might be blood. Contrary to what was depicted on television cop shows, bloodstains were not always bright red, and often ranged in color from reddish-brown to black, and could even appear green, blue, or grayish white, depending on the actions of sunlight, heat, wind, and weather.

  “Son of a bitch.”

  The situation had just gone from a simple case of breaking and entering, to a potential crime scene. Squatting down beside the dress, Jack pulled a white handkerchief from his back pocket and gently touched it against one of the brown stains. The blood was still wet, which ruled out the notion that the dress might have been taken from one of the graves.

  Not that he had ever suspected the dress came from a grave. Its styling was rather modern, something that might be found on a rack at Sears, or JC Penny’s, and there hadn’t been a burial in the Tolomato for over a hundred years.

  Pulling a pencil from his jacket pocket, he carefully lifted the tattered fabric off the ground. Beneath the dress was a scattering of small pieces of bone, and several human molars. There were also what looked to be pieces of skin, varying in size from a few centimeters to an inch or two in length. The bones were still wet with blood, as were the molars, due in part to the dampness of the surrounding grass and being covered by the fabric, and the pieces of skin were soft and pliable to the touch.

  No doubt about it, he was definitely looking at a crime scene. Someone had dumped human remains on the grounds of the Tolomato, remains that might have come from a homicide victim. The bones, teeth, and skin were still fresh, and had probably been removed from the victim’s body within the past six hours. Unhooking his cell phone from his belt, he called the station to report his findings and request additional help.