by George Esler
sofa like that. “Really? I find that hard to believe.”
He shrugged. “My dad hates anything even remotely religious. He says it’s all just a bunch of ancient superstition. He particularly hates the Bible. Although I can’t figure out why he would hate one faith so much more than the others.”
“You’re right. That is strange. Come to think of it, I guess a lot of people are harder on the Bible than they are other religious writings.”
He nodded. “Yeah. Maybe that’s what I like about it. If it gets under his skin like it does, there must be something to it.”
“Yeah well, good luck with that. Listen, I have some things I want to ask you about.”
A suspicious look passed across his face, as if he thought I was getting ready to set him up for something. “Yes?”
“The orphans. I want to know about them.”
He pursed his lips. “I don’t know how much they would want me to tell you.”
“Is one of them a little blonde-haired girl in a blue dress named Elaine?”
I could tell from the look that passed over his face that I was right on the money. It was an expression of remorse, like he was feeling deep pangs over something either done or undone. He glanced down at his holy book, drummed his fingers across the leather surface of it, and just sort of stared off as he tried to collect himself.
“So, she’s revealed herself to you?” Trevor said at last.
“You could say that.”
“That’s good. They don’t reveal themselves to just anybody. Maybe you have a chance, then.”
“A chance of what?”
“Of them accepting you. When they don’t accept somebody… Well, you saw what happened to Seth.”
“Are you implying that the orphans caused Seth to fall out of that window? Elaine said he jumped.”
“He may have jumped, but I doubt he did it voluntarily. More likely, they drove him to it.”
“So these orphans are evil?”
He frowned. “Evil is the wrong word. More like vengeful. And remorseless.”
“Oh.”
After a deep breath, he placed his palms firmly on his knees, gathered himself, and went into it. “This place used to be an orphanage,” he said. “Up until about forty years ago. Then everything changed. The estate was under the care of my grandfather, Lionel Drury. He was the headmaster of the orphanage and he received grants from the government for his work here. He lived here, along with some of the staff and of course, the kids.”
“What happened forty years ago?”
He met my eyes, and I could see a single tear beginning to trickle down one of his cheeks. “They died. The orphans.”
“All of them?”
“All of them. It was Halloween night 1976, and they all died.”
“How? I mean, a bunch of kids don’t just all spontaneously die? Was there some kind of accident?”
He shook his head. “I don’t think it was an accident. But I don’t know exactly what happened. All I do know is that after they died, grandfather decided not to re-open it as an orphanage, and he just converted it into a private estate. The grant money stopped coming, but he was already wealthy. The Drury family comes from wealth. I don’t think he was ever in it for the money.”
“What was he in it for, then?”
“I don’t know.”
“Do you see them? The orphans?”
There was a long pause, in which I presume he was trying to decide how much he trusted me. Finally, he looked down at his hands, clammy with perspiration. When he moved them off his legs they left behind a faint residue of palm sweat.
“Yes, I see them. Not all the time, but often enough. There are nine of them. They mainly just do what they’re told. They follow the leader. Up until now, I was the only one that the leader liked. That’s why they let me go into the nursery. If anybody else goes in there, they get very angry.”
I thought that over for a long moment. I could remember Helen telling me, on the day that I startled her by almost walking in on her while she was cleaning one of the upstairs bedrooms, that I was never to allow Trevor to take me into the nursery. Was that what she meant? How much had she known? I wished I could ask her.
“What’s so special about the nursery?” I said.
“That’s where they died. And it was also my nursery when I was a baby.”
Some of the pieces were beginning to settle into place for me, but for every so-called answer, I had about twenty new questions. The part that really made me doubt my sanity was the fact that, despite myself, I was just accepting everything he was telling me. I mean, we were sitting here talking about the ghosts of orphans that died forty years ago, and what they liked and didn’t like, and all that kind of stuff, and I was just accepting it! But I knew I wasn’t nuts. Elaine was real. I had seen her, talked to her, and interacted with her. I had watched her jump down off of the bed and disappear into the wall. What’s more, I had known ever since my first night at Drury Manor that there were very strange things going on here. When I thought about all of the peculiar experiences I had here, even after only being here such a short span of time, there was just no denying that something was going on at the old estate.
“Trevor, what do you and your father know about me?” I blurted. It was a question I had wanted to know ever since I arrived. That night when Esau had tried to trick me into thinking that Trevor was a ghost, he mentioned that he wanted to see if it was true. Obviously he knew something. “I mean, clearly my Uncle Milton has told you something about me.”
Trevor seemed apprehensive at that, his entire body going rigid, like this was some kind of verbal territory that he did not want to enter. “He told us some things.”
“Like?”
“I shouldn’t say it.”
“Spill it.”
“He mentioned that you have unusual visions.”
“That’s one way of putting it.”
“And he said that the accident was your fault, that you almost killed--.”
Esau burst into the room.
“There you two are! I’ve been looking everywhere! Jacob needs…”
Trevor tried to hide the Bible again, but he was not smooth enough. It had been sitting beside him on the sofa, forgotten during the span of our conversation. As he tried to subtly shove it under himself again, Esau’s eyes detected the movement. He scowled.
“And what might we be trying to hide?” He strolled across the room, reached under his son, and pulled out the book. He frowned down at it. “Is this some kind of a joke? What have I told you about this evil book?”
“It’s not evil, dad, it’s--.”
“Are you suggesting that I do not know what I am talking about?” Trevor fell silent and could not meet his father’s sweltering gape. “You know the rules, boy. This filth is not allowed in this house! I never want to see you with another one of these again. Are we clear?”
“Yes sir,” he mumbled.
I just tried to keep my eyes down and stay out of it.
“Now go see Jacob out back,” he said. “He needs some help. In the meantime, I think this book will make excellent kindling for my fire.” He spun and left the room.
Trevor and I went to see Jacob. We did not speak with each other again that day.
5
The rabbit skittered across the grass and back toward the tall stand of trees. It cast a final compulsory look back at me before bounding the last couple of steps into the underbrush and disappearing from sight. I could hear the sounds of its progress for several more seconds until even that was gone.
I stood there, watching after the furry little critter, clenching and unclenching my fists in time with the beating of my heart. The rock I tossed at the creature rested nearby. Even though I missed the mark, it had been enough to send the animal running for cover.
I don’t usually throw rocks at animals. I guess I was feeling a bit jaded today.
It had been two days since my last conversation with Trevor. Esau was going out of his w
ay to keep us apart, giving us chores to do that kept us perpetually in different parts of the estate. Even if I could have spoken to him, I don’t know that I would have pursued our earlier conversation. It was too weird, and as the days continued to trickle by, my mind kept playing games with me, insisting that there were rational explanations for all of the things that I had seen and heard.
Things kept breaking around the house. That was hard to ignore, but I did my best. More busts had fallen, doors would randomly slam in the night, a glass on the dining room table shattered at breakfast for no apparent reason, and the footsteps up and down the hall were keeping me awake at night. Once I even awoke to see what appeared to be the vague outline of a person near my door, but in the gloom it was hard to make out. Then it was gone, and I went back to sleep. The only times we were all together were at meals, but the mood was so solemn and everybody so glum that conversation just didn’t happen.
I faced the line of trees and cursed Uncle Milton, for the umpteenth time, for sending me here. I wanted to go home. My real home. But those days were over. If I went to that house now, it would be some other family that would greet me at the door, and they wouldn’t even know who I was. My parents were six feet under the earth in a cemetery far from here, and the pain of that loss was still fresh enough to cause me waves of agony whenever the thought crossed my mind.
So I tried not to think of them. Except, of course, for the photograph of my mom, which I looked at every chance I got. Like some sort of good luck charm, it alone could ease some of that pain.
“Henry.”
The voice wafted across the open
