[THEME MUSIC PLAYING]
[CRICKETS CHIRPING]
[FATHER SIGHS]
[EXCLAIMING IN ANNOYANCE]
[UTENSILS CLATTERING]
Honey, it's family hour,
there must be something on.
DAUGHTER: Oh, wow, Candied Critters!
[FATHER EXCLAIMS]
Oh, great. It's Monsters, our favorite show!
[MONSTROUS LAUGH]
[SHUSHING]
It's starting.
[MONSTROUS LAUGH]
[FATHER CHUCKLES]
[BIRDS CHIRPING]
[INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC PLAYING]
[FOOTSTEPS APPROACHING]
[WHINES]
Those rats again?
Forget it.
You'll never catch one.
Not until you go on a diet.
Get away from there!
Keep off my property!
I'll set my dog on you!
Heidi!
Some guard dog.
[GASPS]
Sorry if I startled you. I was just about to knock.
If you're a friend of Mr. Ritzen's...
Not guilty.
I've never had the pleasure of meeting Mr. Ritzen, though I intend to.
Is everything all right?
I saw a man running from the house.
That was Mr. Ritzen.
He likes to peek through windows.
Oh, I see.
Forgive me. My name is Thunston. John Thunston.
Linda McGuire.
I'm very glad to meet you.
I wrote to you about an article I'm researching.
Oh, right. About...
Local superstitions.
Do you mind if I ask you a few questions about this house?
I was just about to make some coffee. Come on in.
[SNIFFING]
LINDA: It's not my usual style at all.
I thought I was gonna be painting something pastoral, but...
Still, my agent says people like weird stuff.
You're not from around here, are you, Linda?
Is it that obvious?
No, you're right. I'm from New York.
You take milk and sugar?
Just milk, thank you.
I couldn't buy a closet there for what I pay for this place.
I've been here about six weeks.
Then you've probably heard of Crett Marrowby.
Didn't he use to live here?
I've heard Ritzen call this place "The Marrowby house."
Crett Marrowby built this house and lived here
till they hanged him for witchcraft and murder.
What?
[HEIDI GROWLS]
Heidi.
God, I hope she's all right.
She must be here.
Maybe this way.
Heidi Here, girl. Where are you?
I could swear that sound came from down here.
Maybe it wasn't her at all. Maybe it was...
a wild dog outside.
Coyote, even.
I hope you're right.
[SIGHS] I have a bad feeling.
Linda.
Was this all covered over when you moved in?
Yeah. I wanted to make this a gallery.
I got someone from town to come in and take a look.
Called himself a "damp specialist."
And he started by breaking up the old floor?
He said that's where the damp was coming from.
Next day he called in sick and never came back.
[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC PLAYING]
[BLOWS]
Take a look at these.
What does your painter's eye make of that design?
[LIGHT BULB BUZZING]
I gotta get that wiring fixed.
Well, it looks like the points of a star.
A five-pointed star.
Someone painted an ancient occult symbol
on the original stone floor covering this circle.
When your specialist ripped up the floor,
he destroyed the pentacle.
Pentacle?
You think Crett Marrowby did this?
No. These are part of The Seal of Solomon,
used to ward off evil.
My guess is it was put here to keep something away.
Or maybe...
to keep it locked up.
Like a genie in a bottle.
I'm gonna go visit the courthouse,
see what else I can dig up about Marrowby.
And I think I'll pay a call on your neighbor, Mr. Ritzen.
[BUBBLING]
[OMINOUS MUSIC PLAYING]
[KNOCKING AT DOOR]
Good afternoon, Linda.
I hope you don't mind, I've brought a visitor.
No, come on in.
Thank you.
Mr. Ritzen has kindly offered to share his knowledge of Crett Marrowby with us.
RITZEN: I said maybe I would.
See there?
Just like I told you. Witchcraft.
Easy now, Mr. Ritzen.
Ms. McGuire is a painter. A sensitive artist.
That doesn't make her a witch.
Thank you.
I don't see what you're doing here anyhow,
stirring things up, rousing 'em.
You don't belong here and you never will.
I don't have to listen to this.
I think what Mr. Ritzen is trying to tell you, Linda,
is that he's concerned about you.
You see, he knows things about this house other folks don't.
Isn't that right, Mr. Ritzen?
I know things.
And being a gentleman, naturally, he's worried about you living here alone.
That's why he's been keeping a neighborly eye on you. Right, Mr. Ritzen?
I reckon.
Mr. Ritzen...
Can I get you a drink?
I've got some bourbon over here you might like.
Well, I've tasted a lot better.
Tasted a lot worse too.
Well, now, about Crett Marrowby.
Marrowby.
Well, I heard the story from my great-grandmother when I was a boy.
She heard it from her grandfather.
Way she told it,
Marrowby killed a preacher
who was trying to run him out of town.
Preacher died of a stab right through the heart.
Then, right here,
right in this house...
right in this cellar,
they found a wax dummy of the preacher
and a needle stuck right through the heart.
Go on.
Fear of God come on Marrowby,
and he pleaded guilty.
Said if he didn't repent,
the devil would carry him straight to hell.
Stood up in court, confessed to black magic.
[BUBBLING]
Confessed to murder.
"Death," says the judge.
Walked him right out, put him on a scaffold.
That's when he gave his warning.
JOHN: Warning?
He warned not to use black magic.
He said some things I don't understand.
What things?
Strange words.
"Let familiar be," he said.
"Rouse him not," he said.
Then...
off he swung.
They buried him someplace hereabouts.
The cellar.
They say Marrowby's spirit's down there still.
[LOW GROWLING]
RITZEN: They dug him up once.
Drove a ash stake through his heart.
That don't keep the spirit from roaming.
His spirit.
That's right.
His immortal spirit.
[GROWLING]
[RITZEN SCREAMS]
[KNOCKING AT DOOR]
It's me, Thunston.
[EXHALES NERVOUSLY]
Thank God.
I was going out of my mind.
He's gone. Not a trace of him.
That creature must have taken him back to its lair.
This is the only way out.
No. I think there's another way.
That circle. I think it must be some kind of a doorway to wherever that thing lives.
It's gone now
but it will be back when it gets hungry again.
Probably at midnight.
That's the time strange things awaken.
I never thought I'd feel sorry for Mr. Ritzen.
There was nothing we could do.
Do you think...
H... Heidi...
That creature...
I'm sorry.
This is so insane. What am I gonna do?
Is there somewhere you can go?
Linda, listen to me.
Something has drawn me to this house for a purpose.
I can't explain it exactly.
All I know is that I must finish this.
Face to face.
And I will do it.
You're going after it?
Tonight.
You don't even have a weapon.
I have a weapon.
Oh, a sword.
You're going after that monster with a sword?
[SIGHS]
This is no ordinary sword.
This blade is pure silver.
[BUBBLING]
JOHN: Evil hates silver.
LINDA: It is beautiful.
What's this writing mean?
I never was any good at Latin.
[SPEAKING LATIN]
"So perish all thine enemies, O Lord."
I'd still feel a lot happier with a machine gun.
Believe me, bullets would have no effect on whatever is down there.
Linda, you should leave this house until it's over.
LINDA: This is my house now,
not Crett Marrowby's.
[TICKING]
[SIGHS]
I wish this didn't feel like the last supper.
What was that thing anyway? Marrowby's spirit?
Not if they put a stake through his heart to keep him quiet, no.
Not Marrowby.
His familiar. An attendant's spirit.
Familiar. You mean like a witch's cat?
Familiars come in all shapes and sizes,
none of them very pleasant.
They feed on their owner's blood,
anyone else's if they can get it.
When they hung Marrowby, his familiar stayed here,
hidden...
hungry...
waiting its chance.
I thought that thing looked a little physical for a spirit.
Remember what you told me about the pentacle keeping evil locked up?
Like a genie in a bottle?
I remember.
I let the genie out of the bottle, didn't I?
Don't blame yourself.
No one could have known what was under that cellar floor.
[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC PLAYING]
[BUBBLING]
[CLOCK CHIMING]
It's time.
[LOW GROWLING]
JOHN: Come out!
[GROWLS]
[SCREAMING]
Come out and face me!
[GROWLS]
[GUNSHOTS]
Here, take me!
I'm gonna get you something...
for your hand.
It's over.
I think you'll find you can open your gallery now.
I'm not sure I still want to.
You were right.
That's no ordinary sword.
It was made by St. Thunston in England
nearly a thousand years ago.
He was a silversmith
before he was a saint.
Thunston.
So perish all thine enemies,
O Lord.
[THEME MUSIC PLAYING]