§ § § -- February 12, 1999

Rogan's face filled with disbelief; Leslie found herself suddenly unable to breathe. He was really going to go through with it! She was on the thin edge of rushing H.R. and knocking him straight over the cliff. Rogan saw it and clamped his hands around her arm, frantically shaking his head at her when she threw him a look of panicked betrayal.

"Right, right, right," crowed Mephistopheles, bouncing in place as if he'd suddenly been infused with too much nervous energy and needed to expend it. "So I do, so I do. And that's fine with me…in light of this, I won't need their souls. I knew you wouldn't let me down, my old friend. I knew I could count on you."

"How did you know that?" H.R. asked, a thread of amusement in his voice. "In case you've conveniently forgotten, I've never actually turned a soul over to you before."

"What does that matter, when I'm about to receive the one soul I've coveted most in all the world for so long? H.R., my good man, you won't believe the rewards I'll shower upon you for doing this. There aren't words to express my gratitude!…" Mephistopheles continued to wax grandiloquent; meantime, H.R. turned to Rogan and Leslie and reached into the inside pocket of his suit jacket. Both watched him, Rogan puzzled, Leslie ready to attack. H.R. noticed her stance and smiled with grim humor.

"Stand down, Leslie," he suggested quietly. "I've something to give you." He withdrew two small folded slips of paper from his jacket and handed one to Rogan, the other to Leslie. "Go ahead, look at them."

"…I've got everything ready for Roarke when he arrives in—" Mephistopheles cut himself off at the sound of Leslie and Rogan unfolding the sheets H.R. had forked over. "Now wait a minute, H.R., what are you doing over there?"

"Making my decision," H.R. replied with the utmost calm. Behind his words, they all heard a bell begin to toll the midnight hour, at some great distance. Mephistopheles peered overhead as if he could see it, then eyed Leslie and Rogan with growing suspicion. No one spoke for a moment; then Leslie gasped.

"Sweet paradise…is this the…the cure?" Her voice dropped to a whisper on the last word; she barely dared hope.

Mephistopheles stiffened and his eyes went very wide. H.R. watched him with mild amusement, eyebrows raised. Rogan looked up and began to grin.

"I think we've all the ingredients we need in stock, Da," he said.

"It is the damned cure, isn't it?" Mephistopheles breathed ominously. "How could you do this to me? After all these years of amiability and cordiality—you've failed me after all! You string me along and let me believe for a few blissful days that I'd finally achieved my heart's desire, and then snatch it from me at the last moment!"

"Bah," H.R. suddenly snorted, rolling his eyes in annoyance. "You underestimated me very badly, Mephistopheles. You gave me too much time to think things over and observe what was happening around me. In the end, I couldn't turn P.Q. over to you. What sort of family does something like that?"

"DAMN YOU!" screamed Mephistopheles, body quaking, eyes literally blazing with a towering rage that would have ignited into an inferno had anyone had a match handy. "DAMN YOU, H.R., DAMN YOU!"

"Quite so," H.R. agreed tonelessly. "I've been damned for centuries, if you want the truth. I'm not my cousin, but I daresay you'll be able to expend some of the creative energy on me that you were so ready to use on P.Q." He swept one arm out in the direction of the cliff. "Well, shall we? No use waiting round."

Rogan jerked to attention. "What's this, Da? Are you offering yourself up to the devil, for the love of heaven!"

"It's only right," H.R. said, shrugging. "Mere payback for what I've done over the years. I did tell Mephistopheles here that he was getting one soul tonight. You had no idea I meant my own, did you?" His gaze shifted to Leslie, who was frozen with shock. "I know you thought I was going to calmly hand your father over to him. You're an open book, young lady. But I've always been full of surprises, and I decided to save the best one for last. Make sure you tell P.Q. every detail of what happened here. And tell him…tell him I'm sorry." He smiled slightly, then turned back to Mephistopheles and sighed. The devil was stomping around in circles, roaring incoherently, arms waving madly through the air. In response the ocean below them was churning dangerously, and in the sky overhead massive storm clouds had gathered, sparking colossal lightning bolts and setting off deafening thunderclaps. "Oh, cut the histrionics already, will you, old chap? Anyone would think you're three years old, with the temper tantrum you're throwing."

Mephistopheles leaped into action, seized H.R. by one arm and, without the slightest warning, threw him over the cliff's edge. Leslie screamed and Rogan let out a shocked howl, and the devil turned to them with a threatening sneer. "Let that be a lesson to you," he growled. "Don't…ever…cross Satan!" So saying, he followed H.R. over the cliff; all at once the sky cleared and quieted, and the ocean calmed, leaving a silence that felt like a void. Even the bell had stopped tolling.

Rogan and Leslie stood there immobilized by shock and horror, staring at the edge of the cliff where the two entities had been just moments before. After a minute, Rogan cursed sharply in Irish, savagely kicking stones over the precipice, hurling indecipherable invective into the sky while Leslie watched him with enormous eyes. It took her another minute to gather herself together enough to catch his arm and stop him. "Don't, Rogan," she said, her voice shaking badly. "It was his choice. He said all along that he knew what he was doing, and he did. His every move was deliberate and calculated."

"Maybe…but that didn't mean he had to sacrifice himself!" Rogan cried in protest.

"I know, it seems like a waste," Leslie agreed with an all-encompassing sigh, glancing skittishly at the cliff where H.R. had met his demise. "Just when we thought we'd escape unscathed…but I think there was something redeemable in your father after all. Look at the sacrifice he ultimately made for Father. Something must have gotten to him. I wish we could have known what it was."

"I as well," Rogan murmured heavily. "Well…let's get back before Julie raises an alarm, shall we, cousin?"

Leslie nodded, mulling in surprise over the word as they hiked back down the trail they'd traversed earlier. "We really are cousins, aren't we," she said suddenly, making Rogan glance smilingly back over his shoulder. "This should be interesting. I never had a cousin before."

"Then here's your chance to find out what it's like," chuckled Rogan. "By the way, Leslie, we need to run by Julie's B&B, if you happen to know a shortcut. I need to get something out of my luggage."

"I think I can find a back trail," said Leslie, and made a couple of educated guesses in the dark. Soon they reached the MacNabb homestead; while Rogan went inside, Leslie unfolded the page H.R. had given her and read the list of ingredients for the cure. Two stood out: one was a fairly common plant called boneset, of which Leslie had heard and could recognize by sight, but had never really known much about; and the other was amakarna. She gasped, just as Rogan emerged from the back door.

"Something wrong?" he asked.

"This stuff needs amakarna," she cried, "and there's none on the whole island!"

Rogan smiled. "Correction—there's a little: all in here." He displayed an ornate crystal spice bottle at her. "I brought some with me."

Leslie eyed him in disbelief. "You know something, Rogan Callaghan? You're almost worse than Father when it comes to keeping secrets. I think, since we're family, I've got a right to know. How did you know to bring that stuff?"

Rogan gestured at her to accompany him as he turned to retrace his steps down the trail that had brought them to the MacNabb house. "Let me go back to the beginning, when Paola stumbled onto Da's island. I said initially that she ranted in Italian. She did, but just toward the end when she was in her very last hours. I had one run-in with her, in which she bragged to me that she had really got Da's attention now. She was going to eliminate his cousin for him and take over his island, because she'd managed to pass the bone-eating disease on to uncle. In her mind, it was going to be her last magnificent effort to gain Da's love. Paola was always in love with Da, and Ariel made her insane with jealousy. She died the next day, and I knew I'd have to do something before Da was motivated to act. Paola had this spice jar in her belongings, and when she died I confiscated it before someone else could put it to more nefarious use. After I got here and realized how low the supply of tonic was, I planned to use some of this to make more. But now it can go into the cure. If you're willing, Leslie, I can use your help in mixing it up."

"Of course, I'd be offended if you didn't ask," Leslie said. "But to tell the truth, I don't know how much help I can be. I can't even read the labels on the bottles."

"No matter," Rogan said. "I'll find them and measure out what's needed, and you can blend them together."

"Just as well. I can't understand half the words written on this sheet—and they're in our alphabet!" She shook her head, at first in confusion and then in wonder as her gaze lit again on the apparent oddity in the list. "Imagine something as commonplace and terrestrial as boneset being part of the cure!"

"Just goes to show you you never know," Rogan observed cheerfully. "I think it's there because it can be safely ingested by both humans and our people. I seem to remember reading somewhere that Cro-Magnon peoples used it to aid in healing broken bones, making them stronger so that they would mend better."

"That makes sense. Judging from its name, I assume the disease eventually attacks the bones," Leslie said, pausing when she saw a clump of boneset growing alongside the trail. Carefully she harvested a good-sized handful.

Rogan nodded. "Yes, that's right. I don't know if boneset was actually the missing link or if it was something else; but no matter. The important thing is getting back to the main house, mixing up some of this and giving it to uncle, and then stepping back to see if it does what Da claimed it would do."