Beware the Night by Ralph Sarchie

Author:Ralph Sarchie
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: St. Martin's Press

Chapter Nine

Dabblers in the Damned

TWO OF MY investigations took place in the same neighborhood in Queens, and involved people who literally had neighbors from Hell—of both human and inhuman varieties. This middle-class area, which was within walking distance of the apartment my family and I lived in at the time, is home to hard-working people of many ethnic backgrounds, predominately Italian, Irish, German, Jewish, and Hispanic. The tree-lined streets have a mix of small apartment buildings and two- or three-family homes.

In the first case, a family of four was plunged into life-threatening danger after they rented the basement apartment in their home to the wrong people. The new tenants looked respectable enough: The husband and wife were gray-haired financial planners in their fifties, who lived with their grown children. But, as Nina and Marco Salvatore soon discovered, this well-dressed family, who frequently entertained groups of equally well-dressed guests, had an unsuspected dark side: They turned out to be practicing Satanists.

The father of this family also had a cocaine problem—and a disturbing habit. While hopped up on his favorite substance, this middle-aged man liked to head over to an Episcopal chapel down the street. He wasn’t there to repent of his sins. Instead, he often stood outside and shouted profanities, invoking Satan’s name. Cops were called about this several times. Each time they told him to shut up and go home, which he obediently did. This strange behavior isn’t typical of serious Satanists, since they usually avoid drawing attention to themselves. But then again, embracing evil isn’t exactly normal behavior to begin with.

Shouting blasphemies outside a church wasn’t this couple’s only offense. They actually attempted to draw the Salvatores’ fourteen-year-old son, Andrew, into their coven, much to the horror of Nina and Marco, who were devout Catholics. Even that, however, wasn’t nearly as upsetting as what happened after the boy emphatically rejected the Satanists’ overtures and Nina told them that if they ever bothered her son again, she’d have them arrested.

Soon after, the Salvatores were afflicted by a horrifying ordeal. The wife was friendly with one of my students, Rose, and called her. “There’s something evil in my house,” Nina said. “We’re all really scared. Do you think the people you’re working with can help us?”

Nina explained that time and time again, she and her family would get the flesh-crawling sensation that somebody was creeping up behind them on the stairs in their home, yet when they’d whirl around, no one was there. The unseen intruder would often give them an unexpected shove, causing several near-accidents. Although the pushing occurred mainly on the stairs leading up to the second floor, it was felt throughout the house. Even the Salvatores’ cats were affected by this, as animals so often are when the demonic is present; they began to avoid certain areas of the home, no matter how much they were coaxed to enter them.

By the sound of it, this was a classic case of demonic infestation that was growing more dangerous by the minute.

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