Diary Entry June 12, 1926
I no longer like it here.
I know that’s a horribly ungrateful thing to say, especially after Mrs. Semple has been so kind to me.
But it’s true. I don’t like what’s been happening on New Avalon.
Because Katrina’s strange disappearance isn’t the worst of it.
More frightening things occurred today, and I fear what’s yet to come.
It began this morning, when I awoke to find everything once again out of place. My shoes, this diary, even my dress, which had been moved from the back of one chair to another. What’s worse is that I found yet more writing in my diary.
GO AWAY DAISY
Although it had been written in the same childish scrawl as before, this time I have no idea who could have done it. Katrina, the person I’d thought was responsible, is now gone. And when I told Jonquil and Mrs. Minafer about it, they suggested that it was me who did it.
“Do you sleepwalk?” Mrs. Minafer asked.
“If she’s asleep when she’s doing it, how would she know?” Jonquil quite reasonably said.
I thrust out my hand so that Mrs. Minafer could grasp it. “Maybe your Gift will tell me if I am.”
Mrs. Minafer took my hand only a second before quickly letting go, clearly disturbed.
“What did you sense?” I said, alarmed.
“Nothing,” she replied. “Your hand was cold, that’s all.”
It felt like a lie, which surprised me. The last person I’d suspect of lying is pious Mrs. Minafer. Perhaps she was the one responsible and didn’t want to admit it, although I can’t see why she would do such a thing.
I intended to tell Mrs. Semple about it this afternoon, but she was quick to pull me aside and say, “You’re concerned about Katrina, aren’t you?”
“Yes,” I admitted, despite the fact that we didn’t get along. But now that she was gone without explanation, I worried that something terrible had happened to her. “Where do you think she went?”
“I don’t know, my dear. Perhaps we’ll never know. But I do think she’s gone for good, don’t you?”
“What if she’s dead?” I asked, finally speaking aloud the fear that had hummed in my thoughts since discovering she was missing.
Mrs. Semple leveled her gaze at me, full of sympathy and understanding. “I can think of only one way to find out,” she said.
I knew exactly what she meant. She was suggesting another séance.
That is how, once darkness settled over the island, we wound up back at the table in Mrs. Semple’s candlelit parlor. She’d once again arranged the lettered tiles around the table’s edge, an upturned glass sitting in the center.
“Now,” she said with an energetic exhalation, “let’s see what we can learn this evening.”
I didn’t share her enthusiasm. Having a séance was the last thing I wanted to do, for several reasons. First, if we did hear from Katrina, it meant that she truly was dead. A horrible prospect. So horrible that, seated at the table across from Mrs. Semple, I wondered if it was better not to know.
Even worse was the thought that Azra might once again contact us. I didn’t for a second think they were done with us yet. Not after my nightmare that might not have been a nightmare at all. Holding a séance seemed to me an unnecessary tempting of fate.
Jonquil and Mrs. Minafer, seated on either side of me, felt the same way. “This is a bad idea,” Mrs. Minafer said, noticeably fretting.
“I don’t like it one bit,” Jonquil concurred.
Yet all of us placed our fingers on the glass and waited. Under Mrs. Semple’s watchful eye, we didn’t feel like we had a choice.
“Is there anyone present who’d like to speak to us?” she said.
The gloom hovering above the table seemed to come alive with electricity. It was a light buzzing that I felt first in my bones, then in my head, making me slightly dizzy. I barely noticed when, beneath my fingers, the glass began to move, inching its way to the YES tile.
“Good evening, friend,” Mrs. Semple said. “Please identify yourself.”
“Katrina, is that you?” I said, changing my mind about not wanting to know her fate. I suddenly, desperately did.
The glass lurched to the other side of the table, stopping at the tile marked NO.
At first, I felt only relief. No, it didn’t necessarily mean Katrina was still alive, but it certainly wasn’t the confirmation of her death I had been dreading.
But my relief soon faded to fear when the glass began to move among the letters, spelling out two words.
HELLO DAISY
I let out a gasp of shock, because I knew who we had contacted—and who has been writing in my diary.
Azra.
Being forced to communicate with them again made me even more dizzy.
My vision blurred, the letters on the table moving in and out of focus.
It felt like I was about to faint, which I think I did.
I’m not certain because it seemed to take place in a blink.
My eyes snapped open, and I saw the others looking at me with curiosity.
“What happened?” I asked.
“You were asleep,” Jonquil said.
“It was a trance,” Mrs. Semple clarified. “You fell into it almost immediately.”
While that alone was enough to leave me unsettled, it got worse when I said, “How long did it last?”
“Thirteen minutes,” Mrs. Semple replied.
Fear coursed through me then. Thirteen whole minutes had passed, and I remembered none of it!
“Was there any word from Katrina?”
“No,” Mrs. Semple said. “We only communicated with Azra.”
Next to her, Mrs. Minafer flinched at the name. I could scarcely blame her, even though Azra hadn’t greeted her by name. Only me. At least that I knew of.
“What did they say?” I asked, fearful of the answer.
Mrs. Semple hesitated, looking not at me but at the letters arranged around the table. “That you will be seeing them again soon.”
“And that when you do,” Jonquil added ominously, “another one of us will be gone.”