by Jim Grimsley
Burke follows him the next moment, with a look of reckless bravery; but he is still only the second one to enter, he has been diminished by Roy. Randy clambers over. Because he is thick-waisted, to get inside takes effort, and he breathes heavily; though maybe this is as much from fear as from exertion. Nathan slides over the windowsill, careful of the glass. His heart is pounding. They are inside the house.
The room they have entered is small and oddly shaped. From inside one can hardly tell the fallen tree is there. The place would be pitch dark except for the flash-light, which Roy washes over the floor. Randy takes a step and the floorboards groan but hold steady. The boys walk carefully.
They go through a door and then down a hallway, and suddenly they are steeped in moonlight. They are standing at the top of the gallery overlooking a grand staircase. From a skylight overhead, partially broken, wind rattles through empty panes. Moonlight falls strong from there, and the vaulted space floods with light. The lower floor is dark.
Beyond the sound of the wind, is there something else? A thread of music suggests itself to Nathan, who follows the melody in his head. As if someone with a clear voice is singing softly in a distant room. He misses the words, but the sound is very pure.
Roy keeps the flashlight at his side, in spite of the darkness. They pick their way forward carefully. The floor is solid all the way to the top of the stairs, and the stairs seem solid too, but there is the hole in the skylight and a pool of water beneath it. One can see the water from the gallery, a patch of reflection in the deep darkness. The four of them stand at the top of the stairs looking at each other.
“We should explore up here first.” Randy’s tone makes it clear that he is reluctant to descend into that well of darkness.
“But after that, we have to go down there.” Burke squares his shoulders.
The rooms on the second floor are small and plain, like the rooms in any farmhouse Nathan has ever seen. The floors have held up, though the boards sag in a few places and groan in many. The rooms have a desolate feeling, containing little beyond scraps of furniture, the chimney from an old gas lantern, a tin plate with a bit of candle. In one room, beside an unshuttered window, they find a nearly whole chair, casting its long moon shadow across dust and cobwebs. It has a delicate look, like something that might once have faced a woman’s vanity table, with slender, curved legs and one thin, spidery arm. Beneath the cake of dust that shields the cushion is a dark stain. Roy uses the flashlight here for the first time, and they see the startling pink of the cushion, the patina of dust. The dark stain’s resemblance to old blood is unnerving; even Burke, buffeted by his bravura, seems wary at the sight. “I wonder why they left this,” he says. “They took everything else.”
“That’s blood, ain’t it?” Randy asks.
“It looks like it might be.” Roy’s answer is bland.
“Maybe this is the room where the slave cut the master’s head off,” Nathan suggests, and they all look at him.
“Jesus.”
“Or maybe not.” Nathan looks around. “There would be a lot more blood than just this.”
That is enough for the others. They head out of the room, all but Nathan. He goes on standing there. He finds a place in the wallpaper, another stain like a bloody hand outlined in a pane of moonlight thrown from the window. “There’s another stain,” he says. “Maybe this is the right room, after all.”
Nor is he teasing them, entirely. He is seeing the room a different way. His hands glide along the back of the chair, and when he realizes where he is again, he is counting strands of spider web on the fireplace mantel.
Then without another thought he carries the chair to the fireplace and sets it at an angle to one side. He lifts it by the remaining arm. He studies the chair from behind, as if judging its placement. Then he backs away.
They stay perfectly still and take deep breaths.
“Why did you do that?” Roy asks.
Nathan blinks. The question strikes him as odd. “I think it looks better there.”
“He’s fucking with us.” Burke stands with his fists clenched.
“I’m not fucking with anybody.”
Roy laughs and then Randy follows his lead. His body tense, Burke glares at Nathan.
“Let’s go.” Roy leads them out of the room.
The rest of the rooms they visit are bare, and they find no other evidence of occupation, neither ghostly nor otherwise; except, near the door of one room, Nathan discovers a doll’s foot made of thick porcelain and covered with dust. He cleans it, white and pink, on the tail of his shirt. Nathan turns the foot around and around in his hand. Then, without asking anybody, he replaces the porcelain foot in the dust, in the same position as before, but clean and shining.
They find narrow stairways leading to the attic, these at the back of the house, open to access; and they find service stairways leading down, also at the back of the house; but the entrances are boarded off beyond a couple of steps. They enter many rooms full of dirt and dust, spider webs and leaves, branches and dead birds, bits of broken glass.
Nathan still hears the music, the tiny sound like singing at the back of all the other sounds, the creaking floors and the house settling, the wind through broken windows. He can tell the others are listening like he is and he wonders, he is suspicious that they are hearing other songs. Maybe they are even getting the words too.
When they have explored the upper level, they return to the grand central corridor, the skylight and descending stairs. They have turned off the flashlight again and are walking in the ambient light; the moon has risen higher, and the whole space is bathed in milk.
Below they can see the outlines of a large entry hall at the end of the long curved stair. Vague outlines of door-ways and rooms beyond are visible, as if they are being invited. They descend without discussion. Nathan follows Roy, claiming that place for himself. He knots Roy’s tee shirt in his hand, as if for luck or protection. They step carefully down the speaking stairs where the darkness absorbs them gradually. Soon Nathan can see the outlines of the room, larger than any he has ever entered, larger even than the sanctuary at church or the auditorium at school. A layer of dirt and leaves carpets the floor, which slants toward the pool of water. Water drips into the pool from above, a periodic sound that echoes. “That floor is about gone,” Roy says.
But to the left rises a tall, broad archway, the pale beams of the arch outlined in moonlight. The room beyond is dark, but engulfs sound like a large space. It is the sound of their footfalls, their breathing and coughing, that it swallows, along with the dripping water. These sounds multiply as if a voice is coursing through Nathan’s head, a tiny singing, sometimes clear and sometimes too soft to distinguish. They walk into the room.
Nathan’s immediate impression is that he knows the place, even though the shutters are closed, even though the moonlight flickers feebly. The outlines of the room are clear to him. The ceilings are high, a room of generous proportions. Four windows open on one wall and three on another. A fireplace at one end has lost a good deal of tile and brick, bits of which litter the floor beneath, along with animal turds and dry leaves. There are branches, bits of china, fabric of an indeterminate type, piled in one corner. Rags of draperies hang from a window, singed as if burned; but there are no other signs of fire. The remains of wallpaper peel away from the walls, and the wainscoting warps in a place where the windowpane is missing; even the shutters cannot keep out a heavy rain. Some of this he sees in splashes of the flashlight, but the rest is simply there. In what he knows, without asking why.
Beyond this room is another, not as large, and lined with bookshelves. The shelves are bare save for a city of spiders that has settled on the shelving. Ivy has burst through a window and creeps along the walls.
“What’s that smell?” Randy asks Roy.
“Sulfur.”
“How do you know?” Burke demands.
“I know what sulfur smells like.”
“The Devil is
supposed to smell like sulfur,” Nathan says.
“Oh that’s really funny.” Randy sounds more nervous than ever.
Scowling, Burke tips his bottle one last time, almost hidden in the darkness; and this time when he finishes, none is left.
“Where do we go now?”
“Randy, do you have to talk so much?”
“I ain’t talking to you, I’m talking to Roy. I just want to know.”
But in some way they all share Burke’s feeling, that no one should speak. Light from the broken window where ivy grows laces the floor. The ivy leaves are dark like blood on the walls, a deeper shadow. The boys stand there. The room echoes.
They move forward uneasily. Through another archway they step into a room so dark they cannot see the vaguest outline. Either there are no windows or the shutters are airtight. The air is motionless. Roy picks a path carefully, and Nathan follows. Burke is behind him, breathing onto the back of his neck. Randy is last and noisiest, breathing heavily.
They are all increasingly aware of a want for quiet. As if something in the room, or in the rooms beyond, is listening.
A prickle up Nathan’s spine. The distant singing has ceased.
It is hard to say which is more complete, the silence or the darkness. They remain motionless somewhere in space, in a room no contour of which is visible.
“Why don’t you use the flashlight?” Randy asks.
“Because I don’t want to,” Roy whispers, “keep quiet.”
Somewhere in the heart of the house. They are close enough to one another that they share warmth and the feeling of safety in numbers. The intuition that someone is listening becomes palpable, and Nathan finally senses a direction, a particular place in the darkness. Nathan touches Roy’s arm and points.
They can barely see each other. But Roy reads the touch as a message and they head where Nathan points.
They sense the approach of the wall and then, arms out, Roy touches the jamb of a wide doorway.
Nathan can feel the door frame, the space beyond, as black as the one they are leaving.
Randy lets out a deep breath, as good as a plea for the flashlight, but he dares not ask.
The sound of their breathing fills the room, and Nathan wonders whether the sound of other breath might underlie their own. Someone could be standing in the center of that spacious darkness, someone attentive and silent like them. Listening.
Roy edges forward. The others follow.
The air is stale. Burke follows close behind Nathan. His body radiates heat.
Roy freezes.
There is a figure ahead. They can see the outline of a shadow, a broad-shouldered man standing perfectly still. Nathan cannot determine whether or not he has his head. The figure is visible even in the darkness of the room, and they are very close to it. Then it slowly raises its arms.
Someone grips Nathan’s shoulder, hard.
Roy presses back against Nathan, raising the flashlight.
The figure turns and flees. A silent gliding motion carries it toward further darkness.
The boys remain where they are, hardly breathing.
“Shit,” Randy whispers. The single word echoes. They hold their breath. They stand perfectly still, listening.
“Did you see that?” Roy asks Nathan.
Nathan whispers, “Yes,” since no one can see him nod his head.
“What was it?”
“I don’t know.”
“That thing didn’t make any noise when it moved,” Randy says.
“Shut up,” Burke says.
“The fuck I will. It’s still out there.”
“Shut up.” Roy switches on the flashlight without warning. Splashing the yellowish circle methodically, he reveals that they are in a large room with the windows boarded from the inside. The room is as tall as two floors of the house, and the beams of the ceiling cast looping shadows. Leaves and dirt litter the floor. Bare of furnishings, pitch dark, the room shrinks the flashlight beam. Nothing else. No figure of a man, nothing.
At last Roy finds the door again and trains the flash-light on it.
Once they reach it, he cleans cobwebs from the frame with a stick. Spiders are moving along the strands of web. Roy turns off the flashlight, and they wait for a moment while their eyes adjust to the dark.
Again, the sense of someone listening is immediate. Nathan can almost find the direction in the darkness, the place where the shadowed figure has returned out there in the black expanse they have crossed. He searches, but his eyes are still learning to read shadow, he sees nothing in the murk.
“He’s there.” Nathan’s voice hardly carries at all.
“Where? Do you see him?” Roy searches the darkness too.
No, he sees only shadow within shadow. But the one who is listening is there. As if he knows who they are. As if he has known they were coming, as if he was waiting for a sign. No one moves. The silence has filled everything, every space in them.
“Nathan’s full of shit,” Burke whispers, “there’s nothing out there.”
“Be quiet.”
“I mean it,” shoving Nathan forward a little, into the dark space again, “he’s trying to scare us. The little sonofa-bitch. Use the flashlight.”
“No. We already used it.” Roy barely controls anger in his voice.
“Give it to me then, if you’re a coward.”
Roy and Burke are suddenly squared against each other in the darkness, blowing, and they lock together. They are fighting over the flashlight quicker than they could have chosen, it is as if the moment has been waiting for them to find it. They strain back and forth, shoving each other in concentrated silence, convulsive, sudden motions, testing each other’s strength. Burke strains to take the flashlight but Roy fiercely grips it. They are grunting, swearing, but the sounds are plush and quiet.
Then, suddenly, a resounding thump from the darkness beyond, followed by the sound of footsteps running toward them. A thrill races up Nathan’s spine. Burke tears the flashlight free of Roy’s hand. Randy makes a noise and runs, and Burke releases Roy and runs, and then they are all running. Into the darkness.
Nathan is hardly aware that Roy has taken his arm, that Roy is guiding him.
They pass through a doorway, then down a passageway through which moonlight falls in slatted patterns onto dusty floorboards. They are alone now, Roy and he, they have lost the others. Roy stops and pulls Nathan to a halt as well. Breathless, they face each other. He can make out Roy’s grin in the shadow that is his face. Roy is listening.
For a moment they hear distant voices, maybe Burke and Randy. Afterward, silence falls again.
“That sure scared the shit out of me,” Roy whispers, panting. “Did you really see something?”
Nathan shrugs. Roy rests a hand on Nathan’s shoulder, laughing quietly. He is still listening, too.
“My uncle told me he saw a ghost here one time. The one in the book. I didn’t believe him.”
“You think that’s what he saw?”
Roy shrugs. “Who knows? But if it’s a ghost, I bet it’s that old man. If somebody cut my head off, I would want it back.”
“I think it’s more ghosts than that.”
“How do you know?”
“I don’t. But it feels like it. It feels like there’s all kind of ghosts.”
This makes Roy think again. “Are you trying to scare me now?”
“No.” Nathan steps away from him. They are in a black room again, and no moonlight seeps through any shuttered windows here. The room feels small. They withdraw from the doorway to a farther wall, where they know each other by touch, by voice. “But this place does feel like there’s people in it. Don’t you think so?”
Roy is frowning. “I don’t know.”
“Did you ever come to a place and feel like you’d been there before?”
The frown deepens. “No.” Silence. “Did you? Do you feel like you been here before?”
“Not quite.” Whispered so quietly Nathan c
an hardly hear the words himself. “It’s more like I’ll never leave.”
Then a sound, a footfall. Nearby.
Roy, by his stillness, makes clear that he hears too. “What is it?”
“I thought I heard somebody.”
“It’s probably the guys.”
Then comes the sound again. A step, another. Another. Too heavy for Randy or Burke. The sound approaches from the corridor beyond.
He draws Roy into the deepest part of shadow. The doorway is a lighter outline of gray against the strangling black of the wall.
Silence. Nathan holds his breath.
A figure in the door. A vaguer shadow. Someone stands there with his legs spread apart. He is sturdy, square-shouldered, like Nathan’s Dad when he was younger, like Preacher John Roberts. Like Roy. He is familiar. He makes no sound. He is another blankness of the house, a ghost who could be anyone, living or dead.
The moment broadens in some way, and divides. The sensation is explicit. There are two of Nathan, moving in different directions, and time is no longer a line but a knot, a maze, through which he must pick his way. The figure both remains in the doorway and walks away from it, and Nathan follows in each direction. The figure moves away, and Nathan follows, into the dark corridor, up the stairs, through walls, through ceilings and roofs, upward into air, into heaven and night sky.
But the figure also remains in the doorway and in the haze moves vaguely, like something out of a dream, so that it might be Dad taking off his clothes there or it might be the preacher opening the Bible behind the pulpit on Sunday morning.
And Dad’s hand on Nathan’s thigh.
The unsteady voice in Nathan’s ear whispering, Do you remember what we did when you were a little boy?
While overhead the voice of the preacher sails like a wind of itself, Do you remember what the Lord said unto Abraham?
In the voice of an angel
The Lord said unto Abraham, Lay not thine hand upon the boy, neither do thou anything unto him: for now I know that thou fearest God.
Then Roy lays his hand on Nathan’s shoulder and says, “What do you see? What’s wrong?”
