"Oh, my God," Caroline cried.

"Looks like he's been dead for years," Jack said.

"Dead?" a voice behind them said. "Resin."

Jack and Caroline turned. Keating Flowers came through the cracked glass door from the room with the reflecting pool. He was dressed just like the resin-work figure and was almost as bony.

"Since I live in such Gothic surroundings," Keating said, "I figure I might as well use the setting to good advantage."

"You have an odd sense of humor, sir," Jack said.

"I can afford to," Keating said.

Jack studied the sculpture and said, "Nice work."

"I studied at the Arts Students League," Keating said. "A long time ago." Keating tilted his head as he studied Jack's bruised face. He asked, "Do you mind if I take a picture?"

Before Jack could respond, Keating took a compact digital camera from his pocket and snapped. Twice.

Jack blinked in the flashes.

"Quite a ruin," Keating said about Jack's face, slipping the camera back into his pocket. "I can use the picture for one of my fright masks."

Jack scooped a spiderweb away from the sculpture's face.

"I know a cheap cleaning woman," he said.

"Jack," Caroline said, putting a restraining hand on his arm.

"Light dusting," Jack said. "Vacuuming. I don't think she does windows."

"Pity," Keating said. "I'd like to let more light in."

"I think you need something more than light," Jack said.

"Light's a good start," Keating said. "Speaking of starts, I'm sorry if my scarecrow gave you one."

"The dead don't scare me," Jack said. "It's the living I find frightening."

"Do I frighten you," Keating asked, "Mr.-?"

"Jack Slidell." Jack held out his hand, which Keating ignored. "And," Jack dropped his hand, "I'm not related to any Slidells you'd know."

"No doubt." Keating turned to Caroline. "My dear?"

"Caroline Wonder." Having seen Keating snub Jack, Caroline did not hold out her hand. But Keating took it and raised it to his dry, cracked lips.

"Charmed," Keating said.

Jack said, "I'm sure you know her family."

"Your friend seems to feel that I'm not being a kind host," Keating said, "a presumption, considering you're both housebreakers."

"The door was unlocked," Jack said.

"Oh," Keating said, "you're standing on the letter of the law."

"The law's not a bad place to perch," Jack said.

"Commonwealth law." Keating was dismissive. "I prefer the law of hospitality. Which I extend to invited guests."

"Why do I think you're reluctant to call the cops?" Jack asked.

"Jack," Caroline said, "we did trespass."

"Forgive me my trespasses-" Jack started.

"As I forgive those," Keating said, "I guess that means you two-who trespass against me."

"We're looking for your son," Caroline said.

"You're welcome to play hide-and-seek with him in this old white elephant," Keating said. "We don't run into each other much in here."

"Family's all anyone's really got," Jack quoted Bix.

"Family is what we have to free ourselves from," Keating said. "I'm a good example of what happens when you don't. Robert, too."

"History's prisoners?" Jack asked.

"From an early age," Keating said, "a family like mine instills in you a powerful Stockholm Syndrome."

"You've got the key," Jack said. "Why don't you let yourself out?"

Keating turned to Caroline and said, "Your rude friend's people must have short memories."

"If you mean," Jack said, "we don't practice ancestor worship, you're right."

"You can't worship what you don't know," Keating said.

"Funny," Jack said, "from Robert's description I assumed you'd be a gentleman."

"I don't feel the least uneasy in your company," Keating said. "A gentleman," he explained, "is comfortable in any company."

"I thought," Jack said, "a gentleman makes any company he's in comfortable."

Keating nodded and turned his back on Jack and Caroline.

"I'll leave you to your pleasure," he said.

After Keating had left the room, Jack nodded toward the resin work. "I think I prefer his scarecrow's company."

"You didn't have to be provocative," Caroline said.

Jack shrugged. "I've got status anxiety."

CHAPTER THIRTEEN.

1.

"You want to play hide-and-seek with Keating in here?" Jack asked.

"I could use some air," Caroline said. "We can call Robert at his new job tomorrow."

They walked onto a terrace. The fading light came with a breeze and the beginning of a chill. A shadow like a shutter slid across the lake. The air was heavy; the storm was working its way up the coast.

Caroline shivered. Jack took off his sports coat and draped it around Caroline's shoulders. She protested, but, when Jack held it around her, she didn't shrug off his coat-or his arm.

They descended broken stone steps leading to a long arbor, dense with grapevines, heavy with grape clusters. The arbor smelled of wine. The dying sun's horizontal light flickered stroboscopically through the green leaves, casting a netlike shadow on them.

"Do you feel like Adam and Eve being driven out of Paradise?" Caroline asked.

"Some Paradise," Jack said.

"I don't know," Caroline said. "I always figured Paradise would be a little threadbare by now."

"And Robert's creepy dad is God?" Jack asked.

"Well," Caroline said, as they came upon another sculpture, of a ghastly woman, "he's creating a race of resin."

The resin woman was dressed in what looked like a diaphanous skirt, high-collar blouse, and wide-brimmed sun hat trimmed with plastic flowers and spattered with bird droppings. The top half of the face from the bridge of the nose to the lifelike, but dirty, forehead was lovely. Almond eyes seductively half closed. The bottom half of the face, the mouth and the chin, revealed beneath shreds of skinlike resin a grinning skull.

"Jack!" Robert's voice hailed them. "Caroline!"

Robert appeared, backlit, at the far end of the arbor, near where they had parked.

"Dad said he saw you wandering around," Robert said. "I thought, if I came around by your car, I'd head you off at the pass."

Robert was in gray slacks, a white business shirt, and a beige V-neck sweater vest. His carried his suit jacket slung over a shoulder, hooked on a finger.

"Creepy place you got here," Jack said.

Approaching, Robert waggled his head.

"Too much Poe, too early," he said about his father. "You should see the old wine cellar. He's got one of his sculptures half bricked up inside. My Montresor, he calls it."

"Hallowe'en must have been a gas," Jack said.

"Is he crazy?" Caroline asked.

"You know how much he gets for his sculptures?" Robert said. "Enough to keep this place the way it was when my grandfather was alive. If he wanted to. Collectors come and see his works in this setting, they pull out their checkbooks and start writing zeros."

"I can write zeros in my checkbook, too," Jack said. "Just can't put any numbers in front of them."

"I was delayed in town," Robert said, "new job and all. So tea'll be a little late today. Daddy likes it at five-thirty."

"I don't think I'm up for playing more games with your father, Robert," Caroline said.

"I'll give you something in the kitchen," Robert said. "The kitchen's right out of House & Garden."

"No ghouls?" Caroline asked.

"Or cobwebs," Robert said. "The freak show is all downstairs. In front. The rest of the house, the part we live in, is normal. Well, not exactly normal, but not designed for effect. At least, not on purpose."

"Robert," Jack said, "two nights ago, was your father at the Dutch Village Motel?"

"You'll have to ask him," Robert said. "No, I'm sorry. That came out wrong."

"You didn't like the question?" Caroline asked.

"I don't think you had to ask it," Robert said, looking at Jack. "We were watching TV. I'd TiVo'd The Kid From Brooklyn. My dad's a Danny Kaye fan. And I know that makes both of our alibis dependent on each other-except for the pizza boy."

"You have pizza delivered here?" Caroline asked.

"I give big tips," Robert said. "That's my vice. Frank's vices, if he hadn't given in to them, he'd be alive today."

"We know about Jean," Jack said.

"My sister," Robert said, "half sister, shouldn't have been in the room with Frank. Ever since Jean was a child, she's gotten into scrapes. That's what Daddy used to say. Jean's in another scrape. But whatever trouble she was in, Daddy always got her out."

"Does Daddy know she's dead?" Jack asked.

"He knows she's dead," Robert said. "Neither of us is wearing crepe. We did that years ago."

"When she started drugs and hooking?" Caroline asked.

"When she started shaking us down for money," Robert said. "Which we would've given her anyway. Gave her. We paid her mother. After she died, we paid Gaynor. For her food, clothing, school. And blackmail. So they wouldn't reveal her connection to our family. Oh, did he forget to mention that?"