Tom called telling me he would be later than expected. He had some things to take care of that couldn't be delayed. I didn't mind waiting a little longer, as I didn't expect for anything extraordinary to happen. Santana's threats seemed to be void and baseless to me.
But I was wrong.
I missed Gabrielle and wanted to know how she was doing. As I was deciding whether to go or not to go to check up on her, I heard voices outside. I looked out of the window and saw a small gathering of people. Among them was Gabrielle's father. All were acting agitated.
I rushed to the door to find out what was going on. As soon as the people noticed me, they grew aggressive and verbally abusive. They were hurling insults at me. I was extremely confused and couldn't make out what they were accusing me of. But I soon found out the driving force behind the vicious crowd.
Her evil smile appeared behind their backs. Her lips were redder than before, red as blood on an animal's maul.
Santana stepped forward and screamed above the tumult:
"What have you done to Gabrielle's body? I know you're hiding her here somewhere!"
I can't really tell what I expected to hear from her, but I wasn't prepared for that question. I looked at her in disbelief and said I didn't know what she was talking about. But the damage was already done.
My reaction came a little too late, a little too hesitant, a little too obvious.
The discontent increased and the violent crowd pushed me back into my house. Some men drove me into a corner, while others searched all the rooms, guided by Santana. They didn't find anything that could prove Santana's outrageous accusations, and I saw the hesitation on their countenances.
However, she was right when she said that I underestimated her.
"He is lying! I wouldn't ask all of you to go with me to this cursed place if I didn't have any proof. You don't know what we're talking about, caretaker? And what's this then?"
She produced from behind her back a piece of white fabric. She slowly unfolded it, showing a dirty white dress.
Gabrielle's burial dress.
I felt my heart sink into my feet.
"Remember this, darling? That's the dress Gabrielle was buried in!" Santana exclaimed in her best distressed voice, addressing herself to her husband.
"You son of a bitch! What have you done to her?!"
Gabrielle's father dashed forward. The bystanders weren't in time to hold him back. I felt his steel fist striking my jaw, causing a burst inside only I could hear. They dragged him away, barely able to hold him with four men.
Santana continued to escalate the situation.
"We have to report this to the police. We should go to her grave and dig the coffin out. If she's not inside, we have proof he stole her body."
The people eagerly followed her. Nobody paid any attention to me and my objections. They hauled me hard-handedly to Gabrielle's grave. I regretted that I didn't insist on seeing Tom sooner. The events were taking a turn for the worst.
Santana attracted everyone's attention to the split tombstone, concluding it was I who damaged it as I was digging out the coffin. Three men started to remove the earth from her grave. I tried to release myself, tried to draw the father's attention to me and explain what happened. But he seemed to be blinded and deafened by the rage imposed on him by his wife.
They soon got to the coffin and uncovered the lid. The coffin was empty. All eyes turned on me. There was only one person who didn't care, one person who wasn't surprised not to find Gabrielle inside.
Santana searched through the velvet folds, trying to find something that was more valuable to her than a human life or the sad remembrance of it.
"Listen to me! Your wife tried to kill your daughter, but she didn't succeed! Your daughter was alive when you buried her. Your wife sent people to dig her out and steal the necklace, but Gabrielle woke up. I saved her. Gabrielle is alive!"
"Don't pronounce the name of my daughter, you pervert! Where is her body?!"
The man went up in his sorrow quite believable. I don't think he really understood or even heard what I was trying to say to him. He wanted to strike me another time, but they stopped him. Someone led him away.
"I've told them about the things you did on her grave the other day when I visited her. You're sick! You're disgusting! You know what, boys? Throw him in that coffin while we're waiting for the cops to come. That will teach him!"
The boys didn't have to be told twice. I kicked and screamed as hard as I could, but Santana's mastery of manipulation and hypnosis was on another level. The men were like soulless creatures who would do anything their mistress demanded from them.
They pushed me into Gabrielle's coffin, locking the lid from the outside. I heard the digging of the shovels and earth covering the wooden case.
Screaming for help was pointless. Besides, I didn't want to give Santana the pleasure of hearing my pleas. They hadn't dug me in completely, because at some point I heard them leaving.
And then I heard that bitch.
Despite the muffled sound, I could distinguish her voice loud and clear, as if she was lying beside me and whispering in my ear.
"I know Gabrielle is alive, sexton. And I know where you're hiding her. How was she? A hot little thing, huh?"
My loud, desperate scream filled the entire small, suffocating space in which I was captured. Sooner or later, somebody would find me. But until then so many awful things could happen to my Gabrielle, and those agonising thoughts drove me insane.
I hit my fists to blood trying to break the wooden lid, but all in vain. I felt like an animal trapped inside a cage, with no way out. Somehow, Santana managed to deprive me of the deadly silence under the ground. All the noises from above reached me tenfold; birds chirping, footsteps on the asphalt, even the graveyard wind intensified its howling.
After an hour Tom came to my rescue. I heard him cursing and praying at the same time for me to be still alive. He was so relieved when he threw open the lid and found me on the bottom of the coffin. He helped me to get out and told me that someone informed him of what had happened to me.
Tom was angry with me after I told him about Gabrielle. Things like that had to be reported straight away, he said.
We jumped in his car and drove to my apartment. He wanted to bring me to the hospital first, but I refused. I didn't feel any physical pain, maybe because of the shock, maybe because the mental sufferings I endured were far worse.
I flew up three stairs at a time to my floor, but that pointless rushing wouldn't change anything about what I already knew had happened.
Someone had forced the lock to my apartment. There were signs of a struggle inside. My baby tried to fight them off, but she was too small and too weak to oppose the aggressors. I can't really explain how, but I felt she was still alive. I felt the tailflower still blooming in my chest.
Tom walked in. He stood behind me, informing me of the measures he had taken to find Santana. He left the door open. The numbing humidity of the stairwell reached my neck. That sensation felt curiously familiar to me and suddenly I knew where they had taken my Gabrielle to.