The Secret Hour

by Luanne Rice

  Now, excited, reaching overhead, she tried to crack the door.

  The door wouldn't budge. Kate's fingers were bloodied, pricked with splinters, as she started to bang. She couldn't hear that voice anymore, that whistling, ghostly voice. And that nonhearing actually gave her hope—because if the voice had just been her imagination, wouldn't she still be imagining it from down here? But what if she couldn't climb out or get into the lighthouse?

  And then she remembered: Maggie's knife.

  Fumbling in her pocket, she took it out. Hand trembling with cold and tension, she dropped the knife into the water, heard it clank and skid, then had to feel around, locate it with freezing fingers.

  “Oh, God,” she cried, fitting the blade into the space between the door and the stone wall. “Please, please work . . .”

  The rusty latch popped.

  Heaving with all her might, Kate scraped the door open inch by inch. She hauled and scrambled her way up the stone wall, pulled herself through the opening. Scraping her side on the rough edges, she climbed forward and stopped, catching her breath, waiting for her eyes to get used this new dark

  There seemed to be no light whatsoever. She knelt on all fours, feeling in all directions. The space was narrow; by reaching from side to side, inching forward slowly, she realized she was in a tunnel, about six feet wide. A smell of damp mustiness choked her and grew stronger the farther she crawled from the well's entrance.

  Her heart was pounding. She knew she was in the lighthouse, and she prayed—passionately—that Willa was in here too. She had to find her sister, but she had no idea where she was. In fact, she had lost her own bearings and wasn't sure whether she was moving toward or away from where she'd thought she'd heard Willa's voice.

  The darkness was total. Advancing on blind faith, she walked smack into another stone wall. She had come to the end of the tunnel. Now, still feeling her way, she realized that a set of rickety wrought-iron stairs stood to the right. Grabbing the handrail, she started up, and her foot smashed through the first rung as if it were lace.

  Her jeans torn and shin bleeding, she ignored her leg and felt the stair rungs ahead of her, assessing their strength. These stairs were so old and unused; perhaps this basement had been long forgotten. In any case, the wrought iron's filigree had rusted through, become as fragile as paper. Knowing that the stairs' sides—where the connection would be strongest, the metal thickest—were her best bet, she began to move upward on all fours, staying toward the right, trying to balance her weight forward and backward.

  Twenty steps up, she came to another door. Like the first it was locked, and like the other, she used Maggie's knife on the rusty hinge. This one, too, broke open. When Kate edged the big wooden door open, she found herself standing in a small anteroom. Light came in here: the bright occulting flash from the beacon. She checked her watch: eight-twenty. Barely fifteen minutes had passed since she'd heard Willa's voice on the wind.

  And when Kate walked forward, opening the next, unlocked door, she stood right the middle of the large, open lighthouse. The column of windows rose on the left; a circular metal stairway wound like a helix up the cylindrical center. More glass from the broken window lay on the floor. Standing with her head thrown back, she could see all the way up to the Fresnel lens, to the beacon.

  There was no sign of Willa.

  Kate looked around, frantic. She had been almost sure—she'd heard her sister's voice. Just like that time on Chincoteague, carried by the wind, over dunes and trees and water. Kate, alone of everyone on the island, had heard her sister's voice then, and she would have sworn she'd heard it tonight, through the storm-smashed window.

  She had just known, deep inside, that her sister had to be right here, inside the lighthouse. Could she have been imagining it? Could she be longing for her sister so terribly that she had conjured up her voice?

  But Willa had been nearby . . . Kate had her gold airplane to prove she had been here at some point.

  Perhaps the strong wind had fooled Kate into thinking Willa's voice came from inside here—maybe she was somewhere else, close by the lighthouse, in a shed or barn that Kate had missed. Flying to the door, Kate began to shout.

  “Willa? Willa, where are you?”

  The cry came from the sky, filled with pure joy and disbelief.

  “Katy?”

  “Oh, honey, oh, Willa,” Kate cried, a sob ripping out of her chest.

  “You came, oh, you came! Here, Katy,” came Willa's voice, still muffled but much clearer than before, drifting down from above. “I'm right here!”

  “Where, Willa?”

  “Up above,” Willa said, her voice cracking with hysteria. “And hurry, Katy—before he gets back!”

  Kate tipped her head back, looking. There was only one possible place: the lens. Running toward the narrow, sweeping stairs, Kate took them in long strides. Her leg was cut and bleeding, but she didn't even notice. The metal rungs clanged under her feet, and her heart was in her throat. The air was freezing cold, smelling of salt and rust.

  When she'd gone six stories, she peered up the last two stories to see the round walkway circling the lens, but not Willa. She frowned—she should be able to spot her sister by now. The beacon's light flashed so brightly up above, scraping her eyes, and she had to shield them to see.

  “Willa—where are you?” she asked now.

  “Right here, Katy,” her sister said, her voice so close.

  Slowing down, her legs burning from the steep climb, Kate began to smell fresh wood. When she looked down, she saw clumps of old, wet sawdust on the stairs. And when she looked up . . . there, camouflaged against the narrow and shadowed section of the tower just below the lens, just one story above, was a wooden box.

  Bolted into the lighthouse's impenetrable brick wall, bracketed to the walkway above and the staircase circling around, was a small structure the size of a garden shed. Painted white to blend in . . . As Kate approached from the stairs, she could see no possible way to enter.

  “Willa,” she said, touching the box. “Where's the entrance?”

  “Are you here?” Willa asked, her voice breaking into a sob, knocking from inside. “Oh, Katy, get me out! Hurry, he's coming! There's no time . . .”

  “Get you out how?” Kate said, touching the box, banging on the sides, trying to find the way. “Where's the door?”

  “On top,” Willa said. “From inside the light . . .”

  Kate didn't waste a second. She ran up the last flight and a half, onto the walkway that encircled the lighthouse lens. It was a magnificent Fresnel crystal, brilliant and sparkling as it refracted light tossed by the beacon, splitting the beam into rainbows and throwing them out to sea. Kate hardly saw. Tearing around the mechanism, she came to a break in the metal walkway and looked down.

  There was the trapdoor.

  Cut into the top of the box, it had two metal hinges and one hasp held by a padlock. Hand around Maggie's knife, she could see that this was a different story from the locks she'd broken earlier: Both of them had been ancient, probably two hundred years old, rusted through. These hinges were new, solid, stainless steel.

  Even so, she set to work with Maggie's pocketknife, digging into the wood. If that window hadn't been broken, no one would ever have heard Willa: Up close, she could see the brick and cast iron of the tower walls.

  “Hold on, Willa,” she said. “I'll be in there in just a minute. . . .”

  “Hurry, Kate!”

  The lock was unyielding. Once the knife slipped, gouging her hand; she shook it off. Willa was breathing hard—Kate could hear it through the wood, and the labored sound struck more fear into her.

  “This isn't working,” Kate said, giving up on the knife. If only she hadn't left her cell phone in her car, if only she could call John and get help. But she couldn't, so looking all around, she tried to see something that would work better than a small knife.

  “Don't leave me!” Willa howled as Kate scrambled across the walkway towa
rd the light itself.

  “I won't—never,” Kate promised.

  The lighthouse lens was partially enclosed by a metal cage. The upper half was open, but the bottom half was fabricated from the same old iron as the stairs in the secret passageway. The light blinding her with each flash, Kate took hold of one of the half-round metal rungs. Woven almost like a basket, it had rusted to thinness in the middle, while holding strong at the bolted ends.

  Cracking one rung in the middle, Kate pulled with all her might. She worked it back and forth, wearing it down at the bolt, pumping and pulling till an eighteen-inch length snapped off in her hands. Now, holding the rod, rushing back to the box, Kate wedged one thin end under the hasp.

  It was a perfect pry bar, and as Kate put all her strength behind it, working it back and forth, she felt superhuman strength building inside her. Her sister was inside, and Kate was going to get her OUT. Gasping, screeching with exertion, she gave everything, and the lock and wooden door broke in one smashing blow.

  Willa was crying, pushing from inside. Kate fumbled the lock, pulling it off the door, hinges and all, laying it beside her.

  Yellow eyes in a dark space, an owl in a roost hole, a fox in a hollow lair. Shivering, she was dressed in rags. Oh, God: a prisoner in a cell.

  At the sight of her sister, Kate's chest heaved and broke. The sob cracked in her ears as she looked down, as her eyes locked with Willa's. The questions came, but Kate ignored them. She reached down, inside the darkness, feeling Willa grasp at her arms, too weak to hold on. Kate did it all. Finding strength she didn't even know she had, tears pouring down her cheeks, she clasped her arms around her sister's thin upper body and pulled.

  “I have you,” Kate said. “Let's both hold on tight.”

  “Don't let go,” Willa begged.

  “No,” Kate said, her voice hoarse with the knowledge that she had her sister in her arms.

  Kate knew in that moment that she had never seen anything so beautiful, in her entire life, as her sister Willa, and she did what she'd promised: She held on tight, she didn't let go. Outside the lighthouse, the wind whistled, decreasing from its earlier roar, and waves smashed the beach. The sounds were loud enough to muffle, slightly, the sobs coming from both sisters as Kate led Willa to the relative safety of the walkway.

  “Can you make it down?” Kate asked, supporting Willa, feeling her thin arm around her neck, feeling her body heave with each breath, as if it caused wracking pain.

  “My legs,” Willa cried. “I haven't moved them in so long . . .”

  Looking down, Kate could see Willa's legs, thin and spindly like a newborn colt's after so much time in the box. Choking with emotion, Kate took off her coat—wet from her fall into the well—and put it around her shoulders. Kneeling beside her, she began to massage Willa's legs and ankles. Willa cried out, cringing at each stroke.

  “I can't make it down,” Willa said.

  “Yes,” Kate said, rubbing steadily, trying to focus. Her mind was buzzing with what Willa had said before, “Hurry, he's coming . . .” She didn't know who or where or when, but she felt her sister's terror, and she knew it was real. “You can,” Kate said.

  “I want to, but I can't,” Willa said, weak with frustration.

  “I'll carry you,” Kate said. “I did when you were little, and I'll do it now.”

  Both sisters looked down—eight stories on a winding, narrow staircase. Willa shook her head, letting out a sob. “You can't.”

  Kate didn't even reply. She just tucked the coat around her sister's body. The smells from the box were bad, but Kate had changed this baby's diapers. This was nothing.

  Being careful, she stowed Maggie's knife in the front pocket of her jeans. Then, shoving the metal bar down the back of her pants, like a sword, she crouched beside her sister.

  “Wrap your arms around my neck if you can,” Kate said, lifting Willa against her chest.

  Willa tried, but her arms were too weak and trembling. Kate knew it didn't matter. She had her sister in her arms, and she wasn't going to falter. She took the first step down, then the second. Her legs were powerful, her arms filled with energy. The electricity of love filled her, passing from her heart to Willa's and back again, forming a circuit that made her stronger with every step. She thought of Amelia, of John, Teddy, and Maggie, taking strength from all of them.

  One story, two stories. She hurried down the steps, sure of foot, positive they were going to make it. Her mind raced, planning what to do next. She had her trusty pry bar. If the lighthouse door opened easily from the inside, Kate would take Willa out, put her in the Judge's car, drive her to the hospital.

  If it didn't, she'd take her out through the secret passageway, into the well. Kate would find a way to climb out—she'd scale the walls if necessary.

  “What time is it?” Willa asked, her voice weak and shaky.

  “I can't see my watch,” Kate said. “But about eight-forty-five, I think. Don't worry, we're almost down . . .”

  “He comes at nine,” Willa said, frantic. “He calls it his time, it's the secret hour . . .”

  “The what?” Kate asked, her chest heaving with exertion.

  “When he won't be missed; when no one will see him coming out here . . .”

  Kate's feet moved faster. Willa shifted in her arms, crying out with pain. The unbalance nearly toppled them both. Steadying herself against the thin black rail, Kate happened to look up, toward the box.

  She couldn't even see it from here. The cell was completely hidden in shadow and light, blending into the guts of the lens and light, camouflaged from sight. Her heart kicked over, knowing that it existed, that whether she could see it or not, danger was there.

  “He built it,” Willa said, following Kate's gaze, as if she could read her mind. “He built it to keep me in. . . .”

  “What did . . .” Kate began, but she trailed off. There would be time to learn everything later. Right now, the clock was ticking, and she had to get Willa out.

  Outside, she heard the waves breaking closer. The sound was deafening, as if the storm tide had risen way up the bluff, as if it was nearly dead-high. The association with Merrill caused a jolt of terror to shoot through her blood.

  “Almost there,” Kate said, carrying her sister down one more flight.

  Just one and a half to go. Her arms were beginning to tingle, as if her body knew it was almost time to put Willa down. Her muscles ached and burned under the weight, and her lips felt numb, all the blood going to her arms and legs.

  “I never thought I'd be rescued,” Willa said, her voice breaking. “I thought I'd die in there.”

  “Never,” Kate promised. “I'm getting you out of here.”

  Reaching the bottom flight, she bent over, to put her sister down. Wanting just to investigate, to try the door, Kate was nearly bowled over by Willa's clawing grip.

  “Don't let me go!” she begged.

  “Just for ten seconds,” Kate said. “While I find our way out . . .”

  Collapsing on the stairs, Willa was too weak to argue. Kate ran to the door, trying it. Three locks, including two deadbolts, ran up and down. None had a latch; keys were required to open each lock—from either inside or out—and the door itself was thick and new.

  Removing the metal bar from the waistband of her pants, she wielded it with a flourish, giving Willa a huge smile.

  “You make a good pirate,” Willa croaked, smiling back.

  “I'll get us out of here yet,” Kate said, trying to fit the rod's flat end between the door and the jamb.

  Just then, as if by magic, one lock turned. Then the second—the noise rasping in her ears, metal on metal—being opened from outside. As she realized what was happening, that Willa's captor had returned, that it was nine o'clock and he was right on time, she turned toward her sister.

  Willa was a ghost.

  Pure white, all life gone from her eyes, she cowered on the wrought-iron stairs, clutching the railing and staring at the door. Kate wan
ted to grab her, hide her in the well, but it was too late. She heard the key in the last lock.

  Putting her finger to her lips, to warn Willa not to make a sound, Kate knew the signal was useless. Her sister was frozen, waiting for him to come inside, afraid of what he'd do when he found her and Kate.

  The door cracked open, letting in waves of cold, fresh air. Kate breathed deeply, feeling a new sharpness in her brain, standing behind the door. Her gaze was on Willa, and she saw her sister close her eyes in defeat.

  The man stepped inside. He was six feet tall, lanky and athletic, with brown hair, less than two feet away from Kate. As he caught sight of Willa, he stood with one hand on the doorknob, shaking with rage.

  “How did YOU get down here?” he yelled. Kate could almost imagine him running through his precautions, the fact that Willa couldn't possibly have gotten down here on her own. His shoulders seemed to expand as if inflated, and as he wheeled to look behind the door, Kate screamed and swung the rusty iron bar with everything she had.

  Right in the face, right between the eyes, she connected with bone and tissue and blood—lots of blood. The man bellowed and staggered back, hands on his eyes, his blood and hands obliterating his face and identity, losing his balance and falling toward Willa when Kate struck again.

  “You hurt my sister,” she screamed, swinging the bar. “You took her and hurt her, and I'll KILL you for it!”

  The metal rod connected again, then once more, and finally Willa's captor collapsed in a heap at Willa's feet like a slain dragon. Willa scuttled, crablike, away from him, and Kate stepped forward.

  Her heart was pumping. Was he dead? She didn't know, and she almost didn't care. She knew one thing: She wasn't going to let him stand up and hurt Willa again. So she prodded him—first with her weapon, then with her foot. When he didn't move, she moved closer to peer into his face.