Subj: Charade: Chapter 19
Date: 12/22/01 12:33:20 AM Central Standard Time
From: Nicole

December 10, Collinwood, 12:55 AM-Parallel Time

Gwynneth couldn't sleep. When she closed her eyes, she heard vicious screams resounding inside her head. The evening's commotion had frightened her out of her lazy haze, forcing her to jump from her post at her desk and run onto the landing. Although the voices had been mildly muffled by the closed drawing room doors, she had been able to pick out to whom each voice belonged. She was shocked by the adults' behavior; how could the grown ups get away with acting like children? She was most shocked to hear her mother doing the lion's share of the yelling. Gwynneth had never thought her mother to be a fragile flower, but she never had guessed that the woman who tucked her in bed each night was filled with such rage. After such an incident, she could not help but look at her mother in a different, if not all too flattering, light.

The adults' argument had an unforseen effect: it kept Gwynneth from her sleep. She was bored, restless, and in desperate need of something to pass the time. She waited until all were asleep to sneak out of her room. She hoped that some after hour prowling would tire her enough to rest. In the back of her mind, she carried the faintest hope that she would meet up with the man. He had to roam the house at night. Wasn't that what ghosts did? Gwynneth was certain that she would see him floating across the floors like some elegant phantoms from the movies. She longed to see her ghost again; she had so many things to ask him.

Gwynneth received her wish. She noticed a glow emanating from behind the drawing room doors the moment she looked down from the landing. She carefully slid down the banister and crept toward the doors. With a slight twitch of the wrist, the doors swung open to reveal the softly illuminated room. The man sat by the fireplace. Gwynneth couldn't understand why he stared into the flames. What could he see that was invisible to her? Gwynneth had to know. She moved further into the room, careful not to make a sound as she crept toward the sofa. She slipped the moment she got behind it, landing on the floor with a thud that seemed to fill the room. She heard the man rise from his seat and begin to walk around the room. While he searched a few feet from the fireplace, Gwynneth ran back into the foyer. She hid beside the clock as she waited for the man to finish with his hunt. After a few minutes, the man emerged from the drawing room. He carefully closed the doors and made his way toward the stairs. Gwynneth watched him climb the steps and walk through the doorway at the top of the landing. She knew that she had closed that door. How could he enter without opening it? She wouldn't sit back and wait for him to tell her. Gwynneth ran up the steps in hot pursuit of her mystery man.

Gwynneth hid behind a large vase as she watched the man peak into each room. He never opened the doors to enter. Instead, he would walk through them, moving against the strong wood as if it were water. Gwynneth thought that doing something like it would hurt. Then again, could you sincerely hurt the dead? Either way, the man seemed not to mind any unknown discomfort that walking through the doors might have brought. Gwynneth noticed that he spent the most time wandering around inside her parents' room. When he emerged from that room, he seemed to be wiping tears from his eyes. He couldn't have seen anything all too horrifying in that room. Why was he so sad? He seemed to recover quickly, though, and seemed ready to take on a new task. He glanced up and down the hall and, after a moment of hesitation, turned toward a door. He hesitated once again before walking through it. Gwynneth followed him. She knew exactly where he was going: the east wing.

Gwynneth was surprised by how quietly she was able to follow him. She was even more surprised that he didn't sense her presence behind him. Weren't ghosts supposed to do things like that? Shouldn't he be able to feel the life emanating from her skin? Shouldn't he want to grab onto that life, shallow it whole, and make it a part of his frozen flesh? Apparently not. The man walked on oblivious to what went on around him. The only time he stopped walking was when he peaked inside Amy's room. He came out of her room with a large, impossibly beautiful smile plastered across his face. It seemed that the keeper of the east wing was sound asleep. He believed that no one would stall his late night prowling. He didn't consider the pint sized girl that he had met days before to be a threat.

Gwynneth stopped when the man did. He stood stark still as the doors swung open on their own. The room looked as it normally did, plush and elegant. Gwynneth crept closer to the man. He made no movements as she moved up. When she was close enough to see his face, she saw that it was calm. She looked into the room and saw no one inside. Then again, Angelique could be inside. It was just like her to hide from the interlopers who didn't know that she still lived in the house. Gwynneth wanted to know if she was available. She had more than a few questions about her mission. She tried to step into the room. The moment her foot crossed the threshold, she felt a hand descend on her shoulder and pull back into the hallway. The man stared down on her, his eyes gone cold as he shook his head at her. "Why not?" begged Gwynneth. He didn't answer.

Gwynneth wasn't in the mood to wait around for an answer. She tore away from the man and moved into the room. She turned around to see the man move to retrieve her, but he stopped directly at the threshold. He was afraid to walk into the room. His eyes pleaded for her to get out, but Gwynneth refused to budge. "Nothing's happening," she insisted quietly. "What are you so scared of? It's all fine!"

The man didn't believe her. He motioned for her to join him in the hall. His face was pained. Gwynneth could tell that he believed that something horrible would happen in that room. Why didn't he see that nothing would occur? "Nothing's happening!" she screamed. "Everything is...uh-oh."

Gwynneth could feel the air around her grow cold. The room seemed strangely hazy, as if her vision were blurring under some new strain. She looked out of the room to see the distressed look on the man's face. He continued to urge her to leave the room. Gwynneth knew that he was right. She started to leave the room, but stopped after taking one step. The room had gone ice cold and she could no longer see. She was frightened. The ghost had been right to stay away. Why hadn't he just told her that something horrible happened inside the room? She would have believed him! What was going on? Her stress soon took over her body, and, along with the cold, forced her to pass out.

When Gwynneth came to, she didn't know where she was. The room she sat in looked dilapidated and gray. She picked up her arm to see that it was covered in dust. This couldn't be Angelique's room. How had she gotten away? Had the man taken her out? If he had done that, he would have taken her to her room. At the least, he would have sat with her until she came through. Gwynneth knew that her mystery man had not retrieved her. Slowly, she rose to her feet and spun toward the door. It took all her strength to repress her gasp. Before her stood a small girl dressed for bed. The girl looked like Gwynneth. "Oh God," she whispered, "where am I?"

The girl smiled as she entered the room. She dropped a plush Tigger toy to the floor and extended her hand. "Hello," she cooed. "My name is Gwynneth Collins. I take it your name is too...or at least it's something similar." When Gwynneth failed to answer, the girl scrunched up her nose and withdrew her hand into the pockets of her pajamas. "Listen, I know who you are. I want to know why you crossed?"

"Crossed?" asked Gwynneth. "What do you mean by ‘crossed?'"

The girl smiled again and began to pace around Gwynneth, emitting tiny squeaks as she circled her carbon copy. "You're still in Collinwood, unfortunately. I have to say, I've only seen you once, and the time that I did, my friend was having a fit, so I wasn't paying the most attention to the goings on of your time. I know your mom's name is Constance and so is mine. Your father looks like a friend of mine and I think your brother shares a name with mine. His name is William, isn't it?"

"Yeah," mumbled Gwynneth. "How did you know?"

"Like I said, that's my brother's name." The girl sighed. She stopped pacing around Gwynneth. She put her hands on her shoulder's and said, "We have bunches in common, love. We need to talk if you even want to attempt to go back to your own time band. I think we have much to talk about. Now let's get out of here before this room changes on us."

Gwynneth did as she was told. The two girls stood outside the room, both of them choosing a wall to lean against as they stared the other girl down. Gwynneth couldn't get over the resemblance. She had never seen anything so uncanny in her life! She couldn't give up the chance to talk to this strange creature. "Yeah," she finally whispered, "my name's Gwynneth Blake. I don't know why I'm here."

"You're a child, you're a Collins, and you're curious. Isn't that enough," laughed her copy. "See, we have that in common! Now, tell me more about yourself, Gwynneth Blake. Tell me more."

Dark Shadows is a Dan Curtis Production.