The Quill Pen

by Michelle Isenhoff

  With a shudder, he recalled the old sea dog’s words. If he didn’t act soon, he feared they would all die.

  3

  _______

  Micah shoved a chunk of cold chicken into his mouth, his mind still fuzzy with sleep. Somewhere in the house his father was ranting about freight charges. His fury reverberated through the walls. “That’s the last time I use Grayson’s line, you can be sure, if I have to pay the difference.”

  A door slammed and Gerald threw himself into a kitchen chair. When his grumbling died down, Micah ventured a question. “Pa, where am I working today?”

  His father had just taken a sip from a porcelain cup. “Blech! What is this concoction? Turpentine and tar? What are you trying to do, Lusa, poison me?”

  “Nay, Mr. Randall.” The broad-hipped cook calmly retrieved the cup, as unfazed as a bear being scolded by a chipmunk. “The new girl tried her hand at making coffee this morning. She’ll learn.”

  “See that she does.” The man shook open a newspaper and scanned the headlines. Halfway down the page, his eyes locked onto a story.

  “Pa, whose attic am I cleaning this morning?”

  His father grunted, reaching absently for his coffee and tapping the table with impatient fingertips. “Hurry up, Lusa,” he demanded. “Bring me some new.”

  The cook moved with ponderous, measured steps, as if she had energy for only so many and must carefully ration it. Dumping the contents out the back door, she wiped the cup on her apron and refilled it from a silver teapot. This she placed before the stewing man.

  The newspaper came down and Gerald sucked in a swallow. “Tea!” he roared, spluttering indignantly. “Tea is for women and children!”

  “Tea is all I have. If you wait fifteen minutes, I can brew you a fresh pot of coffee.”

  “Time is money, Lusa. I haven’t got fifteen minutes.”

  The girl, the same sad-eyed maid who served dinner the evening before, approached the table with hands gripped together so tightly they appeared dead. “I’m sorry, Mr. Randall. I’ll get it right tomorrow.”

  “I should hope so. How hard is it to make coffee?” He stood abruptly, gulping a last mouthful from his cup with a wretched expression. “Anna!” he bellowed and pushed out of the kitchen. “Where did you file that Johnson invoice?”

  Lusa followed behind him. “Mrs. Randall already left for a missionary society breakfast—”

  When they were gone, Micah shrugged at the girl apologetically. She was young, only a year ahead of him in school.

  “Don’t take it personally, Nancy. He learned his social graces from a barracuda.”

  Gerald popped his head back in the door. “We leave in two minutes, Micah. I need to deliver a stove to Buddy Lincoln before the store opens. I’ll drop you off.”

  Micah tried one more time. “Pa, you haven’t told me—”

  But the door swished closed. Micah sighed. It didn’t really matter. The inside of one building was much like the inside of another.

  Out on the porch, the sun felt warm on Micah’s back. A heavy cast-iron woodstove had already been loaded into the wagon, and one of the horses from the livery waited to haul it away. Gerald pushed through the screen door behind him. “Get in.”

  Micah scrambled to obey.

  The birds gossiped to one another as the wagon rolled down Main Street. Micah always liked mornings. They felt clean and fresh and loaded with possibility. After turning onto Water, he could smell the smoky residue of cook fires wafting from the cottages of the fishermen, their boats now long departed for the day. Not until they bypassed Buddy’s shop on the far edge of town did Micah feel the first prickle of alarm. “Um, Pa, who exactly did you hire me out to?”

  But already he could see the gingerbread railing through the tops of the trees.

  Gerald drove the horse through the rusty gate and pulled up before Mrs. Parsons’ door. “I told you last night, the Parsons widow. Unstop your ears.”

  His father had not told him. He would have remembered that.

  Micah turned to face the scene he had last envisioned in a nightmare. The house—what some might call a mansion—displayed the grandeur of an era long past. It was blocky and symmetrical, almost austere, softened only by the ivy that grew rampant along its brick walls. Micah wondered vaguely how many generations of ghosts walked its hallways at night.

  “Pa, I really don’t think—” he began, but his father cut him off.

  “I expect you at the store the moment you finish up, you hear? No dawdling on the beach this afternoon.”

  “I won’t. But I—”

  “You need capital to run a business, and you can’t accumulate it dangling your—”

  “Yes, sir,” Micah broke in. “I know.”

  “Well then,” his father frowned, “I’ll see you in the stockroom by four o’clock.”

  A tremor began behind Micah’s knees as he watched his father drive away. Slowly, deliberately, he turned and faced the widow’s walk.

  The railing wasn’t really white, he saw, but a dull, weathered gray. The walls looked dingy. Even the light that fell on the old house seemed murky, strangled somehow, though the sun shone in a cloudless sky.

  Micah’s mind replayed the stories his schoolmates whispered on stormy nights, the ones he had shivered over every Hallow’s Eve. Could the garden really hold the bones of devilish old pirates? Were missing children, in fact, locked in the basement, calling out eternally with their hollow, feeble voices? Was he to be the mansion’s next victim?

  Standing alone in the lane looking up at that balcony, nothing ever felt more possible.

  The old lady answered Micah’s first knock, a scowl creasing her wrinkled face. “It’s high time you stopped yammering in the street. We’ve got a lot of work to do,” she scolded, pulling him in by the arm and muttering something about lazy boys. Her grip felt strong as a lobster’s pinch.

  Slightly dazed, Micah followed the tiny woman as she led him through rooms full of elegant, worn furnishings and up three flights of stairs. He hardly had time to look around before they arrived at a stout wooden door.

  Of course he had seen the widow many times before—it was impossible not to in a village this size—but he had always managed to avoid personal contact. Now, as she produced a key and struggled with the rusty lock, he took the opportunity to study her.

  She stood shorter than him, but straight as a mast, with neat silver hair and a map of wrinkles. The heavy black gown she wore looked severe and out-of-date, as though from a funeral half a century past. Her mouth puckered with grim determination, and her hands, though steady as they worked the iron key, were veined and withered. She reminded Micah of old apples down cellar, wrinkled and shrunken after a winter of storage.

  And sour as vinegar.

  The lock popped open and the woman slipped the key back into her pocket. Behind the door lay a narrow room that stretched the full length of the house. Heavy curtains lined the entire left wall, holding daylight at bay, and cobwebs flung themselves across the entrance to deter unwanted intruders. Micah stepped inside gingerly, peeking into corners. It looked exactly as he imagined a witch’s attic might.

  Mrs. Parsons encompassed the entire room with a sweep of her arm. “I want this space tidy,” she snapped. “I am not going to die with a house full of castoffs for some stranger to rummage through.”

  “Are you ill?” he blurted.

  The woman glared at him. “No.”

  He clamped his teeth shut.

  The widow pulled back one of the curtains and illuminated the attic. Micah’s heart sank. The room would take a week to clean.

  She set him to work without preamble. “Move this table against the wall.”

  He gave one more hesitant look around the room then tugged at it, banging the table against a wooden crate.

  “Carefully, you big oaf! That was my mother’s favorite piece. Now pull off those dust covers so I can see what they’re
hiding. Easy! Are you trying to provoke my wheezing spells? Don’t shake them so.”

  “Sorry, ma’am.” He handled the linens like spun gold.

  “That’s better. Now, drag this box of papers next to the light, and while I’m sorting through it, you go down and dig a fire pit on the beach. There’s a shovel in the garden shed. When you get back I’ll have a pile for you to burn.”

  Micah grimaced. A day with Mrs. Parsons, he was beginning to realize, promised to be as much fun as one spent with his father.

  And so it was. The morning filled itself with heaving, lifting, hustling, and climbing. Lots of climbing. Up steps and down, arms loaded with debris. Silently, he cursed his father. There’d best be a mountain of capital at the end of this venture!

  Returning from a seventh trash run, the widow awaited Micah at the top of the stairs. “What took so long, boy?” she barked. “Did you pause for a swim?”

  Micah bit back a retort. His legs burned and his ears rang with the thunder of his own pulse. The frightening, fanciful notions he’d arrived with now seemed pleasant and remote, a childish daydream from long ago. He’d found no tools of torture, seen no phantoms, heard no voices or rattle of chains. But not one of the old stories had prepared him for the most truly terrifying resident of the Parsons mansion—Mrs. Parsons!

  “Help me lug this beast next to the window,” she demanded, indicating an old sea chest partially draped with cloth.

  She snapped open the locks. Inside nestled an assortment of books and clothing. She lifted out two faded landscape paintings and tossed them on the trash heap. The clothing went on a stack to be donated to the church. Then she lifted out a large, golden feather.

  The fluffy plume caught Micah’s eye. It shimmered with a metallic glow, as though it gave off a light of its own. Never in all his ramblings had he seen anything like it. What kind of bird, he wondered, had it come from?

  Wrinkling her nose in distaste, the widow dropped the feather back into the chest and cut short his view. “I’ll sort through these later,” she declared and slammed down the lid. “You haul that old ottoman down to burn and I’ll make us some sandwiches.”

  Micah’s stomach voiced its hearty approval.

  The breeze off the harbor felt cool against Micah’s skin. He threw the footrest into the smoldering pit and watched the flames bite into the torn upholstery. The stench drove him to the veranda just as Mrs. Parsons arrived with a tray of food.

  Slouching into one of two folding chairs, he scooped up half a sandwich and bit into it eagerly, relishing the nourishment sliding into his belly. Within moments, he felt his body begin to revive.

  Then Mrs. Parsons sat across from him, pinning him to his seat with keen, gray eyes. “How old are you, boy?”

  “Thirteen, ma’am.”

  “Thirteen years old,” she repeated, looking him up and down. He grew red under her scrutiny and shuffled himself more upright. “Are you aware that I despise boys?”

  The bread went dry in his mouth. After a fit of coughing, he managed to mutter, “No, ma’am.”

  “Speak up, child. I can’t abide mumbling.”

  He swallowed hard and repeated louder, “No, ma’am.”

  “Boys are greedy, ill-behaved, and wayward.” Her eyes bored into his, and he looked away, feeling a sudden kinship with the seaweed scum that washed ashore after a hard storm.

  “The ones that manage to keep themselves out of mischief long enough to survive simply turn into overgrown rogues. Why, look at your own father. He’d steal the letters off a gravestone and sell them at a profit if he could.”

  She leaned in, her eyes never leaving his face. “I’ll wager the apple didn’t fall far from the tree. It never does. I wouldn’t have hired you at all if I could manage the job alone.”

  The woman was as a loveable as a sea urchin. After this job was finished, he’d never have to speak to her again. So why did he care what she thought?

  He knew why. Lifting his chin, he looked her straight in the eye. “Ma’am, I am nothing like my father.”

  She raised one eyebrow and settled back in her chair. “We’ll see.”

  After polishing off three sandwiches, Micah sat for a spell, trying hard to ignore the old lady, and stared at the ocean. In the cove, it lay as smooth as his mother’s fine china, the waves barely lapping the sand. But just beyond the harbor, he knew it swelled with waves that could suck a man down as easily as they could escort him to freedom. What would it be like, he wondered, to venture out on them?

  “That room isn’t going to clean itself.”

  Taking his cue, Micah heaved himself upright and eased his way to the attic while Widow Parsons cleaned up the meal. Lacking instructions, he scanned the piles of outdated furnishings, the boxes of crumbling letters, the obsolete gadgets and relics. Just how long had the room been collecting old junk anyway?

  He picked up a china doll, absently running his finger along a crack that scarred its face. Some child must have loved it, or the toy would have been discarded rather than hoarded in the attic all these years. He wondered briefly what little girl had treasured it. Where was that child now? What story lay behind the cracked porcelain?

  He set the doll down and, with growing interest, picked up a man’s hat similar to one he’d seen in a history book. He tried to imagine who might have worn it. And to where? A daughter’s wedding? A neighbor’s funeral? Was the gentleman who wore it now resting in the churchyard?

  He scanned the attic anew, his imagination coming alive as it did when he walked through the old village. He spotted a woman’s fur coat, a baby pram, a wicker dog bed, and a grandfather clock with its heartbeat long stilled.

  There were scores of stories buried in the clutter. Did the widow even know half of them? How did one sort through a century of family history? What does one do with the possessions of those who have passed on?

  Micah gave an involuntary shiver. Everything in the attic belonged to the dead, he realized. He placed the hat reverently atop a table and took a step backwards.

  He had discovered his ghosts.

  His roaming eye fell on the sea chest. Remembering the golden feather, he overcame his sudden squeamishness, picked his way across the room, and turned the trunk toward the light. The wood’s finish, he noticed, was discolored—nearly eaten away—and a row of scratches lined the front like tally marks. He traced a finger across the scarred surface before opening the latch and lifting out the feather.

  It was actually a quill pen, he saw, the tip carved to a pointed nib, the plume fluffy and elegant. “How peculiar,” he murmured.

  “Nosing around in my absence?”

  Micah dropped the pen, his face burning with shame. “I’m sorry, ma’am.” He struggled to explain. “I saw you hold this up earlier, and, well, I couldn’t place it. I know all of the birds hereabouts, and not one of them produces feathers like this.”

  She pursed her lips. “Who said it’s from these parts?”

  “Where’s it from?” He picked the pen up eagerly.

  She scowled. “How should I know? I’ve never seen it before in my life. Could be an extinct species, long as it’s set in that trunk.”

  Micah ran his finger along the golden fibers, watching the light reflect back in tiny, colorful sparkles. The bird that had produced it must have been a spectacular sight.

  “Burn it.”

  He blinked, his eyes growing wide and owlish.

  “Foul thing. No telling what kinds of diseases it harbors.” She turned with finality and began issuing new orders. “I want that chair put with the others.”

  With a sigh of dismay, Micah dropped the pen on the burn pile and turned to follow the widow’s bidding.

  4

  _______

  That afternoon, Micah’s glasses slipped down the sweat on the bridge of his nose, and his muscles shook with the fatigue of heavy use. He judged four hours had passed since his meager lunch, each one growing hotter than
the last. It was with welcome relief that he escaped into the sweet ocean breeze carrying yet another load of refuse.

  Micah stirred the fire, feeding it old documents, yellowed newspapers, and the two landscape paintings from that morning. He’d finally gotten all the way down to the bottom of the trash pile.

  His fingers drew the quill pen out of the tangled heap and dangled it regretfully over the blaze. The filaments reflected the sunlight in a prism of colors. His hand froze. He couldn’t make his fingers let go.

  He sneaked a peek up at the window. Empty. Seizing the opportunity, he stashed the quill pen under his shirt, but the nib scraped painfully across his belly. With a yelp, he pulled it out, running his finger speculatively across the tip. It was hard as iron and left an inky mark of deep, dark red.

  Lifting his shirt, he peered at the scratch on his stomach. It looked like a wound. Like dry, crusted blood. He stared at the tip again. The tube was clean, but a repeat test on his finger left another mark.

  How did it write without being dipped in ink?

  Micah pulled off his glasses and wiped his sleeve across his eyes. Snatching a scrap of paper from the fire, he scrawled across the back of it and a thin, perfectly smooth line of ink appeared. He tried a sentence, jotting down the one thought his tired body was screaming. “I want to go home!” It set down as nicely as if he were using his father’s fine, steel-tipped pen.

  He stared at the quill with wonder. There was no way he could burn it now! With another glance at the window, he laid the feather carefully against his stomach and tugged down the fabric of his shirt.

  Back in the attic, Micah found Widow Parsons slumped in an old velvet chair. She shook her head in disgust. “The heat’s finally gotten to me, I’m afraid. All of a sudden I’m as spent as a sailor on shore leave.”

  The fire had gone from her eyes, and her shoulders slumped like a sack of flour on the shelf of his father’s store. At his appraisal, she summoned one last ounce of defiance. “Well, shoot, at eighty-two, I reckon I’m entitled to a bit of weakness.”