"No, Harley. The man in this house is not your father. He's your grandfather," I told him. "The newspaper article makes that perfectly clear."
He stared without speaking. Then he looked away for a moment as if he hoped that when he looked back at me. I'd be gone and all this was just his dream.
"You've got to be mistaken." he said finally. "You just didn't read it right. Maybe it was a cousin or someone with a similar name or..."
"I did read it right. Harley, and there are pictures down there, too, pictures of your grandfather and your grandmother and your father when he was a little boy. There's a picture I believe is your father on the wall as well. Don't you see? It explains why he's so old now."
"No." Harley said, shaking his head vigorously. "you're wrong. Summer. You've got to be wrong. He talked about my mother. He knew all about her."
"Whatever he knew. he knew from listening to your father talk about her.'
"Why would he do this? It doesn't make any sense. Summer," he insisted.
"I don't know his reasons. Maybe he's ashamed of it all Maybe what happened left him so empty inside, he grabbed onto the opportunity to have you. Maybe Suze told him some mystical reason and performed some voodoo ritual. Who knows? The thing is it's all so strange and I didn't want to leave you without you knowing,"
"I still can't believe it," he said shaking his head, but not as vigorously.
"Perhaps he means to tell you the truth someday. but I didn't want to take the chance of his never telling you. I couldn't leave here like that. I'd be thinking about it all the time, worrying about vou."
He glared angrily into the darkness. Then he threw off his blanket.
"I want you to show me this stuff right now," he said. "I'm sure it's a mistake. I'm sure."
"All right," I said. "I will."
He got up, found his pants and slipped them on. He didn't put on his shoes and socks, however, or a shirt.
"Let's go," he said. "and very quietly. I don't want us waking them up if we can help it."
"I don't want us waking them up either," I said, but not because I would feel bad about disturbing their rest.
We left his room and moved very quietly down the hallway to the stairs. At the top, we stood and listened to be sure they were asleep. The house seemed very quiet, but a house like this was never completely quiet. Its shutters tapped in the wind. Its ceilings and floors creaked and the pipes moaned in the walls. Things scurried about in the shadows.
A thick candle burned on a table in the kitchen and the glow of that threw shadows over the walls, shadows that moved and trembled with the flickering flame. I felt every muscle in my body tighten. When I looked at Harley. I saw how anger had filled his eyes and tightened his jaw. I knew that for now most of that anger was directed toward me. With all his heart, he wanted me to be wrong. Seeing such fury in his eyes made me almost wish I had left without telling him.
"I'm better off without the crutch," I told him. "Ill use the banister and just limp."
He nodded and we started down. The steps became little tattletales moaning and groaning under our careful footsteps. After one in particular sounded as if it might give way completely, we both paused to listen and see if we had been heard.
Harley nodded and we continued to the bottom of the stairs and then down the hallway to the basement door. He looked at me and then he opened it and I showed him the light switch. He flicked it and the light, as poor as it was, made us squint for a moment.
"It's all right there in those cartons at the bottom." I said softly.
He started down and I followed. He stopped to look at the picture on the wall.
"I think that really is your father." I said. He glanced at me and back at the picture. "I don't see much difference."
"Okay, Harley." He would see what he wanted to. I thought, until he was forced to see the truth. "Look in the second carton on the right. I left it all on top," I said.
He went to it and squatted. I joined him, making myself as comfortable as I could under the circumstances and watched as he read the news clipping. His eyebrows lifted and fell with the revelations. Then he shook his head.
"I don't understand this," he muttered. "Why pretend to be my father?"
"Like I said, maybe he's ashamed of it all. Maybe he thought he could do something nice. Maybe..."
We heard the door above slam closed and both looked up the stairway.
"What was that?" he asked.
He stood up and helped me to my feet. We heard a loud scraping noise and a bang against the wall and the door.
"What's going on?"
He hurried ahead of me up the stairs and tried the door. It didn't budge an inch.
"It's locked or blocked." he reported as I came up behind him.
"Bang on it. Maybe Suze found it open and just closed it." I said.
He nodded and pounded on the door.
"Hey," he called. "We're down here. Open the door. Hey!"
We waited and listened. There were some footsteps in the hallway and then. silence.
Harley tried the door again, pushing with all his strength. "It feels like that cabinet was slid in front of it," he said,
"She must have done it. She's crazy. Harley, really weird. She thinks she has her dead son's soul in a jug!"
He nodded and started to shout louder. He stopped and we listened: again, we heard nothing.
"He couldn't sleep through all this." Harley remarked angrily. He pounded the door with his closed fist. It was a thick door, like all of them in the house. His thumping seemed easily absorbed and smothered.
"Why isn't he waking up and coming to let us out?" Harley cried. He pounded and pounded.
"Harley," I said, now growing more terrified. "What are they doing to us?"
He looked at me a moment, his own face filling with shock and fear. Then he shook his head.
"I don't know. This is crazy. You're right," he said.
He continued to pound and pound until his hands were red. I sat on a step and waited.
"Why would they do this?" Harley muttered. "Why?" he shouted at the door.
I looked up at him. He not only looked betrayed and frightened. He looked terribly guilty when he turned his eyes to me.
"What did I get you into?" he asked, shaking his head.
"It's my fault. Harley. I should have told you about all this earlier."
"Why didn't you?" he asked, suddenly realizing and wondering. too.
"You were so happy here. Everything was going the way you wanted. I felt horrible even thinking about it, and then I told myself I would tell you everything before I left. but I got so sick from that food and whatever else she put in mine that I missed a chance to do so earlier.
"I was also hoping you might go back with me and I could tell you everything once we had left. I'm sorry," I said. "This is my fault, my fault."
"No, no, don't blame yourself. That's silly. They have no right to lock us in here. And what for? Why? Why?" he screamed at the door.
Then he looked at me and we stared at each other, both of us feeling that cold overwhelming fear that came with the question lingering above us like a storm cloud. The answer could be mare horrible than we could even imagine, and yet we had to know, we had to ask.
Why?
It was madness, all of it, the impersonation, the holy room, being locked down here.
And we were trapped in it.
"He probably thinks hers teaching us some kind of a lesson," Harley decided.
He sat beside me on the next to bottom step. I nodded, willing to accept anything that was short of the horrors running through my mind.
"I had such a good time with him today," he continued, shaking his head with a soft, dazed smile on his lips. 'When he showed me stuff, he was so patient and interested, and when I did it right, he looked so proud and happy.
"Roy's shown me stuff too, and he looks satisfied when I do it right, but this was different. It was important to him. It was like something of him had
found a place in me. I felt very good about it, too." he said, turning to me. "I felt a good family feeling."
"He's probably a very confused man. Harley. What his son did must have had a very big effect on him and then there's that Suze. Who knows what strange ideas she's been putting in his head? Before. when I went up to sleep, she stopped to ask me who had sent me?"
"Who had sent you?"
"Yes. like it was part of some evil conspiracy. like I had come from the devil. maybe to steal her dead son's soul out of that jug. Who knows?"
I gazed about the small room.
"We've got to get out of here. That's all I do know," I said. Harley nodded and stood up.
"This is too small to be the entire basement for a house like this." he said. "It was probably built to be some sort of storage area."
He started to inspect the walls and paused on the far right.
"This part was built relatively recently."
He gazed around and then returned to the cartons, taking everything out of every one of them, finally holding up a pair of scissors. He looked at me, quickly becoming concerned.
"You're very tired, aren't you?"
"Yes," I had to admit. "I got sick from the dinner before, and it's left me feeling weak."
"You've got to rest," he said.
He found a few empty potato sacks and then formed a makeshift pillow with all the newspapers. He spread out one of the sacks.
"Lie down here for a while," he suggested. It's not very comfortable, but you can get a little rest while I try to figure out a way to get us out of here. Summer."
"Maybe they'll let us out in the morning," I said. "They've got to. We could die down here if they don't. They wouldn't let that happen, would they?"
"Don't make yourself sick with worry. Just rest. I got us into this situation. I'm goin' a to get us out of it." he vowed.
"I'm all right."
"Please, rest. Summer," he begged.
I rose and went to the makeshift bed. I sprawled on my good side and lowered my head to his improvised pillow. Then he drew another one of the potato sacks over me to serve as a blanket.
"You all right?"
"Yes," I said and closed my eyes.
Was this a dream? Would I wake up any moment and laugh about it?
I felt Harley's lips on my cheek and opened my eyes with surprise.
"Thanks for worrying so much about me and caring so much about my happiness that you kept all this to yourself. Summer. It's nice to know someone is that concerned about me and my happiness . "
"Then you're not mad at me?"
"Are you kidding? I can't imagine ever being mad at you. Well, maybe for a split second," he admitted.
I smiled and he kissed me again, this time on the lips. Even at this horrible time, I could stare into his face and see he really did love me.
"Sleep." he whispered kissing my eyes. I kept them closed, and he returned to the walls to find a way out of the trap I had put us in. It was all my fault, whether he wanted to say it or not.
The combination of the pain from my ankle, my having an upset stomach and the terror I felt after our being locked in this basement room was enough to make me sleep, despite my great effort to stay awake for Harley. I guess I passed out more than just slept. All I know was I closed my eyes and when I opened them again. Harley, exhausted himself, was seated on the floor across from me, his back to the wall, some of the wood pulled away, exposing what looked like an opening.
I glanced at my watch. Because there were no windows in this room. there was no way to tell if it was morning. My watch told me it was just a little past six AM. The sun should be up. I thought. Maybe they would wake soon, realize what they had done, and open that door.
I licked my lips. They felt so dry. Being down here in this cool, damp room made my muscles ache, too, especially after having fallen asleep in so awkward a position and on so hard a surface. I moaned with the effort to sit up. Harley was so still, his lips barely trembling with each regular breath. I rose to my feet and gazed up the stairway.
There was something at the top, something that hadn't been there before.
I went up the stairs and looked at what was a new carton. Opening the top. I gazed dawn to see two bottles of water and some of Suze's homemade bread rolls, cheeses, and some sticks of what looked like beef jerky. Included with it all was a sheet of paper. I read what was written.
I know you're angry right now I'm angry, too. You shouldn't have gone snooping about. Suze has read the signs and told me Fletcher's bad spirit had awoken in you and might take control. I don't believe everything she says, of course, but she been right most of the time.
Suze says you've got to stay down there until the evil spirit is out of you, It won't be long She working on it.
I don't know why you couldn't have let things be. We were doing so tired,
Perhaps Suze is right and it not your fault. You can't help what's happened any more than I could help it.
I guess you know who I am now, so I might as well just write it.
Grandpa
This really is madness. I thought, pure madness. They want to keep us down here until his voodoo lady thinks it's all right for us to come up?
"Summer?"
Harley stirred, wiped his eyes and stood up.
"What's happening? Did they unlock the door? Are they letting us out?"
"No. It's worse," I said. "They shoved some food in here in a carton and your grandfather has written you a letter. At least he admits who he really is," I said.
Harley came up the stairs, looked into the carton and then took the letter and read it, smirking and shaking his head.
"Evil spirit is out of us?"
He lunged at the door, pushing against it with his shoulder and then pounding on it.
"Grandpa! Get this door open now! You hear me!" We waited and listened, but heard nothing.
"Do you think it's safe to drink this water?" I asked. "I'm very, very thirsty,"
Harley studied it and shook his head. "I don't know."
"Maybe I should wait a little longer," I said.
"There's something behind that wall. I think there was once a door there and it has been covered. It might be another way out of here."
He hurried back down the stairs and started pulling at the wood, prying what he could with the scissors and ripping some away with his bare hands. He worked frantically, madly, frightening me with his wild efforts.
"Take it easy. Harley." I said. "You'll hurt yourself."
He ignored me or didn't hear me. He was in a frenzy by now, kicking and pulling on the wood with the side of his foot, tearing off only a few inches at a time sometimes, but gnawing away at it like some underground creature. I stepped up beside him and put my hand on his shoulder, which finally brought him to a pause. The sweat was running down his temples and his face and neck were crimson, flushed. His right palm was bleeding.
"You have hurt yourself and you'll exhaust yourself quickly. Harley. You hardly slept and you haven't eaten or drunk anything either."
"I've got to let us out of here," he moaned, his eves glassy with tears of anger and frustration. "You've got to go home. We both have to go home." he said.
"We will. Harley. We will." I said softly.
He calmed some more and looked at the opening he had torn. "Can you see anything in there?" I asked.
"No. It's very dark. Obviously no windows on that side either. Still, there might be another door or a door that goes directly outside. Many of these old houses had doors on the basements and stairways up with a metal door over them. I'll work slower." he promised and went at it more methodically.
While he worked. I searched the small room for something else that might be of some use as a tool. Just under the stairs. I saw a thick piece of wood and pulled it out a yard-long two-by- four.
"Harley?"
He turned and smiled.
"Yeah, that's good. Good work," he said, and took it from me. He used it to pry away
more of the wall, and soon he had torn enough for him to slip through.
"Be careful." I said as he started. "Don't scratch yourself or step on anything sharp."
He didn't have a shirt on or any shoes or socks.
"Okay, okay," he said, anxious, and worked himself through the opening onto the other side.
He was so quiet for a while. I became very nervous. "Harley?"
"It's all right," he said. "This is very strange. I'm looking for some kind of light, but it looks like I'm in an old living room or something. Wait."
There was a flicker and then some light.
"Electricity works," he cried.
I poked my head through the opening and gazed around. It did look like an old living room. There was a thick-cushioned light brown sofa and a matching settee across from it with a table in between. Beside the sofa was a pole lamp with a flowery shade, and on the far right of the settee was the small lamp Harley had lit.
"It s more than just a living room,' Harley called back from behind another wall, "There's a kitchenette back here and a bathroom, too.
"The water runs!" he cried."Ill let it run a while and we can drink this without worrying."
I decided to slip through the opening, too, and did so. I tried to keep off my bad ankle as I hopped to the sofa. It was very dusty. Our movement stirred up the layers of dust on the concrete floor, making the air even more murk,,... There was a very musty odor. Water had seeped in around the foundation from time to time, staining the walls and the floor.
Someone had once tried to turn this into some kind of a retreat. I thought. There were some weak attempts to give the room warmth. Although there were no windows, a curtain had been hung to make it seem as if there was a window. Half of the curtain drooped. It was once white and blue, but now looked gray and very dirty. Here and there were framed prints of rustic scenes: farmhouses, woods and fields. There was a clock lodged in what was a hand-carved Swiss house with figures of milkmaids and farmers on a small platform in front. The little door looked like it opened on the hour. I touched the chimes and to my surprise, they began swinging steadily back and forth, the clock beginning to tick as if it had never stopped.
On the table next to the sofa were the remnants of someone's efforts to knit what looked like a dark blue sweater. There was a bag of wool, more knitting needles and some more completed knitting beside it. On the wall behind the settee. I saw a table upon which was an old phonograph and a pile of what looked like antiques to me... the large. 33 rpm records I had seen in our house, records once collected by my great-grandparents.