The Witching Hour

Michael Curry hides in his house in San Francisco where his aunt, Vivian, takes care of him. He drinks to cope with the psychic power that came after he drowned in Ocean Beach and was resuscitated by Rowan Mayfair. Touching objects causes him to have visions, so he wears gloves. He believes that he was brought back to accomplish a mission, but he can’t remember what he saw when he died. Micheal’s obsession with this otherworldly mission causes him to lose his friends and his business—a construction company he named Great Expectations (after his favorite novel) that renovates old houses. The press learns of his psychic power and people continually demand he use it on various objects.

The narrator describes Michael’s life before he drowned. He grew up in the Irish neighborhood of New Orleans and enjoyed taking walks in the Garden District. He saw a man, who his mother didn’t see, in the garden of the Mayfair house. Michael was a good student and visited the public library often. Books taught him how to play chess, which he played with his father. He also researched music, opera, painting, mythology, and architecture. In addition to his studies, he was an excellent football player, and he loved listening to the stories his family would tell about the witches in the Garden District. They attended many Catholic processions.

After his father died in a fire, Michael and his mother moved to San Francisco. She took him to see classic movies—he loved movies about houses—and plays, and to art museums, like the De Young. Due to her alcohol addiction, she fell while intoxicated and died as a result. Michael went to San Francisco State University and majored in history. Returning to his obsession with houses, he worked for a carpenter and eventually received his contractor’s license. He then had a successful business restoring old Victorian houses. At 35 years old, he became a millionaire.

Michael had serious relationships with women named Elizabeth and Judith. The relationship with Elizabeth ultimately failed because she lived in New York City and Michael didn’t want to move there. The relationship with Judith ended after she got an abortion that he didn’t want her to get. Afterward, he became obsessed with fetuses. At the age of 48, Michael drowned, but someone rescued him; he becomes determined to find out who it was and fixates on a mission he can’t remember. Aaron Lightner visits, but Michael won’t see him. He wants to go back to New Orleans.

Father Mattingly thinks back on visiting the Mayfair house over the years and talking with Carl, Nancy, and Millie. When she was little, Deidre got into trouble at school. Other children at her school said the devil retrieved objects, like flowers, for Deirdre and her friends. When Mattingly takes her home, he is impressed with the expensive furnishings. Carl tells him that the Mayfairs came to New Orleans from a plantation in Saint-Domingue and they would keep Deirdre at home, as the nuns requested.

Sister Bridget Marie tells Mattingly that the Mayfairs are cursed. Mattingly is from St. Louis and unfamiliar with them. She confides in him about Stella’s connection to the devil and how her late mother, Antha, committed suicide. A month later, Deirdre goes to confession and tells Mattingly about the devil retrieving objects for her. Her family calls him “the man” (85) and warns her to not talk to him. Mattingly wants to talk to her family, but she asks him not to and runs out of the church.

Over time, he overhears Sister Bridget Marie talking about Stella Mayfair, who was killed by her brother Lionel, as well as other Mayfairs, such as Mary Beth. Deirdre is expelled from other schools as the years pass. Mattingly visits Carl, Nancy, Millie, and Belle. However, they don’t discuss the Mayfairs that Sister Brigit Marie told him about. Mattingly learns that Deirdre got pregnant, and her fiancé died in a car crash. Parishioners discuss the Mayfair witches and their money. A man named Dave tells Mattingly that the woman who sees the man is the one who inherits the house.

Later, Mattingly hears that Deirdre gave up her baby for adoption with the help of Father Lafferty. After Lafferty dies, Mattingly moves to New York and other locations. When he visits New Orleans in 1976, he sees Deirdre sitting comatose on the porch wearing an emerald necklace. Millie and Nancy tell him electroshock therapy rendered her generally unable to move. In the next few years, Millie and Nancy die. Mattingly comes into town for Nancy’s funeral and runs into Aaron outside of the Mayfair house.

Mattingly and Aaron have lunch together. Aaron tells him about older generations of Mayfairs, including Marie Claudette, Katherine, and Mary Beth. After getting drunk, Mattingly tells Aaron about the man getting flowers for Deirdre and realizes that Aaron can read his mind as he thinks about her confession. The conversation shifts to what Sister Bridget Marie told Mattingly about the Mayfairs. After they part ways, Mattingly returns to St. Louis.

When Mattingly hears that Deirdre is dying, he decides to visit her one last time at the Mayfair house. Mattingly sees her on the porch and notices a man who talks to her and kisses her cheek.

After a long day in the operating room, Rowan Mayfair doesn’t want to go home. She thinks about the boat she lives on, the Sweet Christine. Her adoptive parents, Ellie and Graham, died in the past year and left her their house and boat. After Ellie’s funeral, Rowan slept with her boss, Dr. Larkin. She generally has sex with cops and firemen and had sex with Graham so he wouldn’t leave Ellie when she was dying. Eventually, she used her psychic powers to kill him. In addition to being able to kill someone by thinking about their death, Rowan has a “diagnostic sense” (108) which allows her to know which patients will live or die.

Rowan walks through the ICU and visits her patients. Michael Curry’s doctor, Morris, tried to contact Rowan while she was in surgery. She thinks back on rescuing Michael four months earlier on her boat. Her psychic sense told her he would live as she got him out of the water. Rowan performed CPR until Michael regained consciousness and the Coast Guard arrived. During the rescue, she asked to remain anonymous; later, when she saw the press about Michael’s psychic power and visions of life after death, she wrote him a letter. It gets lost among the many letters he receives asking him to use his power.

For the next few weeks, Rowan frequently thinks about Michael and his forgotten purpose, as well as the time when Dr. Lemle asked her to join the Keplinger Institute. Tempted but also horrified by his work on fetuses, Rowan turned down his job offer. She also thinks about the people she killed with her psychic power. In addition to Graham, Rowan killed another child when they were six years old. Eight years later, she killed her rapist. She wonders if Michael will see these deaths if he touches her hands; she wants to confess to him. One day, when she met Aaron at her adoptive parents’ graves, he offered to tell her about the Mayfairs. Despite her curiosity, she thought about her promise to Ellie to never go to New Orleans and rejected his offer.

When Rowan gets to her office in the hospital, Dr. Morris calls. He tells her how Michael wants to use his psychic power and touch her boat to try and remember his purpose. She agrees to pick him up in an hour.

The narrative jumps back in time to when Deidre was a teenager. She and Rita Mae Lonigan meet and became friends at St. Rose de Lima’s boarding school when they are 16. Deirdre shows Rita the “Mayfair emerald necklace” (142) and tells Rita that she cares for her. Rita overhears Deirdre and Lasher talking in the nun’s garden. After other people see Lasher and Deirdre’s romantic moments, Deirdre is expelled. Rita marries Jerry Lonigan, who runs a funeral home with his father. He tells her that Deirdre is pregnant, and that the aunts are making her give up the baby for adoption.

Rita visits the Mayfair house, where Deirdre gives her a card with a number to call. Carl tries and fails to take it from Rita, but she smudges it in the process, obscuring the number. Rita can only read the words “The Talamasca” (150) and the name “Aaron Lightner.” She tries to track him down but is unsuccessful. After giving up her baby, Deirdre is in and out of mental institutions. At one point, Rita sees her at Mass and apologizes for not calling Aaron. Jerry’s family takes care of the funeral services for Belle and Millie. He shows Rita the Mayfair tomb, pointing out the names Mary Beth and Stella, and explains that all the women have to keep the name Mayfair to inherit the family house and money.

In 1976, Rita visits the comatose Deirdre, who is still wearing the emerald, on the porch. Jerry’s father passes away, and he has to handle Nancy’s funeral without him. He hates the Mayfairs and other old families. At Nancy’s funeral, Rita meets Aaron, but she doesn’t realize that he is the person she was looking for until she gets home and looks at his card. Rita memorizes the number before Jerry takes the card. When he is drunk, he tells Rita about taking care of Antha’s corpse, including cleaning up the emerald. Jerry also tells Rita about Lionel murdering Stella, then dying in a mental institution. Each time a Mayfair dies, the funeral home has to clean the necklace. Rita thinks it is cursed, and Jerry thinks the house is cursed, too. She meets Aaron, who tells her about Antha’s father and boyfriend dying in car crashes. Aaron asks her to contact him if Rowan comes to New Orleans; he promises to convey the message that Deirdre didn’t want to give up Rowan. After 12 years pass, Rita hears that Deirdre is dying and calls Aaron. She wants Rowan to know that her mother was loved by Lasher, and Deirdre loved Rowan.

Michael tries to sober up, with the help of his aunt Viv before Rowan arrives. He plans to go to New Orleans after he sees and touches her boat. When Rowan arrives at his house, he is immediately attracted to her. As he gets in her car, they see Aaron down the street. Michael asks her to stop so he can buy alcohol, and she does. Rowan tells him he said a word that began with the letter L when he came to on her boat. He takes off a glove, touches Rowan’s hand, and has a vision of Graham’s death, but Michael doesn’t believe she killed him. She asks him to touch the place where Graham died and tells him she wants to have sex with him.

They go through the house and onto the boat. Rowan shows him where he came to on the deck, and he touches the boards. Michael has a vision of Rowan’s life and her perspective of rescuing him. He doesn’t learn anything about his purpose; frustrated, he talks to her about this. She invites him to stay and they have sex, though Michael does not take off his gloves. Afterward, he talks about going to New Orleans, and she tells him that she promised Ellie to never go to there. Rowan even signed a document to that effect. She tells him about her diagnostic sense and confesses to killing two people in addition to Graham. Michael still doesn’t believe her. She tells him about the offer to work with fetuses, and he tells her about the girlfriend who aborted his child. They have sex a second time and talk about their lives, neurosurgery, New Orleans, their psychic powers, legacy, and houses.

In the morning, Rowan makes breakfast. Michael hasn’t been drinking but feels obligated to go to New Orleans to figure out his purpose. He tells her about his visions, which include a jewel, and how he thinks they are connected to the Mayfair house (he doesn’t yet know it belongs to her family). Rowan tells him more about her promise to Ellie not to go to New Orleans. She also wonders if the visions are coming from a good place, or if they are manipulating him. He wants to touch the house and wants Rowan to come with him. She cries, and he tells her she’ll be welcome to join him if she changes her mind. They exchange numbers for the hotel and hospital. He confesses that he is falling in love with her, and she admits she is falling for him.

Michael takes a cab to the airport and realizes he didn’t use protection any of the times he had sex with Rowan. Aaron is also on the plane to New Orleans. Michael sees him and starts drinking again while he rereads David Copperfield.

When he arrives in New Orleans, Michael takes a cab to a liquor store and reminisces about the city with the driver as they go through the Garden District. Michael gets out in front of the Mayfair house at sunset, drops his beer bottle, and starts to climb the fence. The cab driver tries to stop him. Michael sees a man in the garden—the same man he saw as a child. Aaron arrives at the house and takes Michael to his hotel.

Rowan sits on her boat and thinks about Michael. He is older than her other romantic partners, and she assumes, correctly, that he is drunk. When she gets in the shower, she realizes she didn’t use protection like she usually does because she doesn’t want to have kids. After her shower, she sleeps with Michael’s shirt. When she wakes up, she goes to the hospital and operates.

She gets home late, and at three o’clock in the morning, she wakes up with the feeling that someone is in the house. After getting her .38-caliber pistol, she walks around, and at 3:05 am, she sees a man outside on the deck. She points her gun at him through the glass, and he vanishes. When she touches the glass where he touched it, she notices it’s warm. Rowan calls Michael’s hotel, but she can’t get ahold of him. She thinks she might be seeing someone from his visions, or a ghost. As she falls back asleep next to her gun, she thinks about getting someone to cover for her at the hospital so she can go to New Orleans.

Michael wakes up in his hotel room and tries to remember how he got there. There are cans of beer in an ice bucket, and he starts to drink. After he gets dressed, he sees Aaron. Aaron introduces himself, and Michael realizes Aaron is reading his mind. When Michael mentions this, Aaron offers to teach him how to shield his mind. Then, Aaron tells him about the Talamasca, which has been investigating the paranormal “since the eleventh century” (234). There are motherhouses in Amsterdam, London, and Rome. When Michael touches Aaron’s card, he realizes that Aaron feels guilty that the Talamasca stole from the Knights Templar. Michael wrote a paper on them and agrees with Aaron’s view of them.

Aaron tells Michael that the house he was at belongs to Rowan’s family and asks if she sent him to New Orleans. Michael says she saved his life and let him touch her boat so he could try to remember his purpose. He talks about seeing the house and the man in the garden when he was a child, and tells Aaron he remembers a doorway, a jewel, and a two-digit number from his visions. He assures Aaron that Rowan doesn’t know about the house, but Michael wants to call her and tell her. Aaron asks him to wait until he’s shared what he knows about the Mayfairs. Michael starts to remember more about his vision—that the number is 13.

Aaron shows Michael a large file on the Mayfairs and asks him to come to Oak Haven, a little over an hour away, to read it. Michael wants to show it to Rowan, and Aaron agrees that he should. When they talk about the man again, Michael crosses himself. Aaron is afraid of Rowan because of her ability to kill with her mind. Michael reluctantly agrees to leave his hotel and leave a message for Rowan there. When he does, the hotel staff tell him that Rowan called while he was out.

Aaron orders a fancy car to drive them to the Talamasca’s property. On the way, he tells Michael about the Talamasca’s research on witches and about the history of the Talamasca. Aaron confesses that he came to San Francisco to ask Michael to join the Talamasca. Michael is interested but feels like the purpose he was given when he drowned is more important.

Rowan wakes up and doubts that she saw the ghostly man. Carlotta Mayfair calls; she doesn’t know that Ellie and Graham died but informs Rowan that her mother died at 5:15 that morning. Rowan wants to come to the funeral. Carl tells her that her mother is at Lonigan and Sons Funeral Home, and that Rowan can have the house. She calls Jerry, and he promises to keep the coffin open until she arrives. He tells her that her mother’s name is Deirdre, and she was 48. Jerry asks if Rita can notify other people about the death, and Rowan agrees that it’s a good idea. She asks that Rita tell the Mayfairs about Ellie’s death. After she gets off the phone, Rowan cries. She realizes that the ghost she saw appeared at the exact time of her mother’s death. Then, she calls her boss about getting someone to fill in for her while she goes to New Orleans.

On the drive, Michael becomes interested in the Talamasca. He would accept Aaron’s offer if he didn’t feel obligated to seek out his purpose from the visions. Michael is sober and plans to remain so while reading the file. He loves the Talamascan “retreat house” (263). Aaron convinces Michael to eat before reading the file. Over lunch, they talk about Rowan and her powers. Aaron leaves the file with Michael. However, he returns almost immediately to tell Michael that Deirdre died, and Rowan is coming to New Orleans. Aaron is upset he couldn’t help Deirdre and leaves the room. Michael begins to read the file.

Rowan packs and calls the hotel. She leaves a message for Michael and reserves a room. During their conversation, Rowan realizes the Mayfair house is the one Michael told her that he saw in his childhood. Rowan locks up the house and boat. She briefly considers sinking it, but she decides not to destroy the thing that led her to Michael. Rowan longs to see him.