by Dan Poblocki
Her skull began to throb. What exactly did she think she was doing? Shouldn’t she at least climb back down and tell someone about what she’d found?
But a voice in her head (possibly not even her own) answered her. The hour is late. What will anyone care? There’s a storm raging and when it’s over, they still have a wedding to prepare.
She slowed her breathing and squinted into the darkness. She’d already made up her mind that the girl hadn’t been real, that the island was somehow showing her a story like in a movie. If she eased back toward the ladder, would the movie stop playing? What if this was her only chance to find out what was going on in here? What if the answers she and Eli were looking for were right ahead, down this dark hallway?
“Hello?” she whispered. The echo of her voice led her forward. Crawling on her hands and knees, Josie tried to focus her light on the next few feet of wooden floor, but as she moved, her cell phone wavered, alternately illuminating the brick on one side and then the slanting roof on the other. After what felt like a long while, she reached the end of the brick wall, beyond which appeared a wide space with a low ceiling that stretched from the rear of the house all the way to the front.
From the safety of the tunnel, she examined this new room. In the opposite wall, a series of small rectangular windows near the floor reflected her light back at her. A bowlegged chair sat beside the nearest window, its blue velvet upholstery tattered at the seams and moth-eaten everywhere else. Directly across from it stood a compact wooden bookcase, upon one shelf of which lay a pile of thin hardcover books. Beside these sparse volumes were several delicate-looking china dolls, dressed in frilly and dust-encrusted dresses that looked like miniature costumes from the old film Gone with the Wind. A black steamer trunk sat on the floor, between the bookcase and the chair, a large, circular brass clasp embedded into its lid.
Taking it all in, Josie exhaled slowly. This had obviously been a child’s hideaway. Maybe it belonged to the girl who’d led her here. But the space looked like it had been untouched for decades.
Shoving that aside, Josie wondered what she was meant to do now. She stared at the black trunk for a moment and a sticky feeling settled on her skin before seeping slowly into her bloodstream. “No,” she whispered, with a strong suspicion of what she’d find if she opened the lid. “No, no, no. I didn’t want this.” But what had she thought she’d discover up here? A new friend? A playmate?
A sour taste filled her mouth. Her feet felt cemented to the floor. She wished Lisa were here. They’d clasp each other’s hands and walk fearlessly together into (or out of) this strange attic. Maybe it would be best to bring someone else along before she ventured farther into the room. Josie sighed, realizing that she’d have to make do with Eli. She couldn’t imagine what he would do when he saw this place. Probably flip out. Shout something like I knew it! But what other choice did she have?
Josie was about to turn back toward the ladder, when lightning flashed and a figure appeared, kneeling before the trunk. The flare faded, but the figure lingered, bright like the blur of sunlight that burns your retina after you glance at the sky. It was the girl in the muddy peach-colored dress.
A FEW MINUTES AFTER the wedding planner’s outburst, Eli found himself standing in the doorway of her room, watching the commotion of two families trying to sort out what to do.
Margo sat on the bed, dressed in a green plaid flannel nightgown, sobbing into her hands. Gregory knelt at her side, trying to get her to repeat the story. Eli’s mother sat beside Margo, rubbing her back, and his father was bent over on the far side of the bed, examining the shattered remains of the lamp. In the bathroom across the hall, Vivian ran a cool stream of water over a facecloth that she would bring to Margo in a moment. Beatrice had earlier run up from downstairs to see about the commotion and was just now returning with a pitcher of drinking water. At the opposite end of the hallway, Aimee finally emerged from her room with Bruno in tow.
But where is Josie? Eli wondered. Hadn’t she heard the screaming?
“What happened?” Aimee asked, her voice shaking. “What’s going on?”
Eli stepped aside, allowing Beatrice and the others to pass into Margo’s quarters. “Someone tried to kill the wedding planner,” Eli said flatly.
He felt a sense of both wonder and dread, as well as growing satisfaction that his fears about the house were being revealed for the others to see. Of course, he’d wished Margo no harm, and he prickled with guilt when he realized that his mouth had twisted into a smirk. He raised his hand as if to wipe it away.
Aimee’s eyes grew in disbelief. “Mom?” she called out suddenly, as if Aimee were the one in need of assistance. Cynthia left Margo’s side, slipped across the room, and gathered her daughter in her arms. “Who would do such a thing?” Aimee whimpered into Cynthia’s shoulder.
As Gregory recounted Margo’s tale for the new arrivals, Eli leaned into the hallway, still curious about Josie. Maybe she was a heavy sleeper. Maybe she was listening to music through her headphones. Or maybe she just didn’t care.
He was about to head toward her bedroom to see if light was visible from underneath her door, when a separate thought occurred to him. Someone else from the house hadn’t come to check on Margo.
He glanced back toward the hubbub and counted heads. His mom and dad. Gregory and Margo. Bruno and Aimee. Vivian Sandoval stepped past him holding the cold compress. He counted himself and the absent Josie. Beatrice Gagnon stood by the window, pouring water into paper cups. That left just one person.
“Where is Mr. Gagnon?” Eli asked. Everyone stopped what they were doing and glanced up at him. After a second, they all looked back at one another, as if to confirm that the caretaker was, in fact, not among them. In that moment, Eli realized that his simple question had become an accusation.
WHEN JOSIE GASPED, the girl gave no indication that she knew of or cared about Josie’s presence. She simply reached forward and raised the brass clasp on the trunk’s lid. Josie watched, her hand firmly pressed to her mouth, as the girl lifted the lid and reached inside. Then, the girl sat back on her heels, holding something in her lap. Josie couldn’t see what it was. She leaned farther into the room, trying to catch a glimpse.
The girl stiffened and whipped her head over her shoulder. Her eyes were wide with worry. She stared at the tunnel entry where Josie crouched. Was the girl looking at Josie or was she imagining that someone else was coming through the pitch-blackness behind her? Josie flashed her light into the dark, toward the hidden ladder. Nothing was there but dust swirling in the stale air and the continuous sound of the rain against the roof. She held her breath, trembling. Turning back toward the room, Josie stared at the girl and then whispered, “Can you see me?”
The figure blinked away, disappearing with a soft rasp, which may have been a gust of wind rushing through the eaves of the roof, or it may have been Josie’s own ragged breath.
Wow, Josie thought. Just … Wow.
Though it had lasted only a moment, the vision of the girl opening the trunk filled her with a new courage. It had been like an instruction. Yes. Do this. She crawled into the room and stood, watching out for the wooden rafters that were inches above her head as well as the cobwebs that hung like delicate snares all around her. The floor creaked with every step. Josie moved purposefully, worried that the girl might appear with the next lightning burst. Once she reached the black trunk, she knelt. She wasn’t sure what she’d find inside the box, but she knew that she’d never survive opening it without the comfort of the flashlight. She balanced her phone on top of her collarbone and then leaned her head to the left to grip it with the edge of her jaw. This kept the light steady.
The clasp opened easily. Josie grasped the top of the trunk. She lifted the lid, pushing it upward until it reached the point where it remained open on its own. She was still for several seconds, almost expecting something to jump out at her from the musty-smelling space.
The inside of the box appeared to be em
pty — a simple construction of dark wood. Josie grabbed the phone away from her clavicle and then shone the light directly at the crate’s bottom. What the heck? Of every possible option, somehow she hadn’t considered that the steamer trunk would simply be empty. She sighed and sat back, disappointed.
After a moment, she reached up to shut the lid, and as she did, she glanced once more into the trunk. Without the bold light shining directly onto the bottom, Josie noticed that the dark wood was not completely level. In fact, lying directly in the center was a small squarish object.
A book! Since its cover was the same dark brown as the wood beneath, it had been almost completely camouflaged. Josie quickly reached inside and pulled it out. Its cover was made of cracked leather, and the edges of the pages were slightly wrinkled, as if having survived decades of dampness.
Seconds later, Josie discovered herself sitting in the bowlegged chair across from the bookcase. The lid of the trunk was closed, but she didn’t remember touching it again. That wasn’t important, she knew. The book she’d found was on her lap, the cover open, black pen marks staring up from the front page. She’d read the words there several times, wishing again that she wasn’t alone up here.
The Diary of Dory M. Sauvage
Dory Sauvage. Dory. Was that the girl’s name?
Why hadn’t Eli been the one to discover this place? Was it simply Josie’s luck to have been assigned the room with the secret passage in the closet? She felt her cheeks burn. She’d cut off Eli, kept him from joining her in this quest, because she’d been scared. She knew she needed to find him immediately and show him her treasure. It belonged partially to him. At this point, who cared what his response would be?
But first, she’d peek inside, just to see what the book was all about.
She flipped through several pages, reading dates from the early 1940s.
She perused several passages: “I cannot believe they didn’t invite me!” “I haven’t told anyone other than my roommate …” “… any light in the darkness can be revealing.”
Interesting. According to the writings, once upon a time, this girl, Dory Sauvage, had lived on this island with her family. Apparently, Dory had been a little bit older than Josie. She wondered, would they have been friends if their lives had overlapped? If Dory was a ghost, could they be friends now?
As Josie sat idly in the chair — Dory’s chair — an idea struck her so intensely that chills raced across her skin. If Dory’s tale was important, the final passage should be the key as to why. Maybe Dory had written down what was on her mind on the night she’d placed the journal into the black trunk for the last time.
There was only one way to find out. Josie flipped to the back of the book and found the spot where the final entry began. She shone her flashlight at the page and read the date. Sunday, September 6, 1942. The first sentence was big and bold, written with a heavy hand that pressed the ink deeply into the paper.
IF YOU’RE READING THIS, I’M PROBABLY DEAD.
IN THE BEDROOM at the end of the hall, the guests continued tending to Margo. Eli’s question about Charlie’s absence still hung unanswered among them. Standing in the doorway, Eli glanced at their faces, trying to read the secrets hidden inside.
Just then, the house shook, and from downstairs there came a massive crashing sound. Glass splintering. Bricks tumbling. The ruckus was so thunderous, it seemed as though the earth itself might have suddenly split in two. The lights flickered and then went out.
From close by, several screams erupted. Eli lost his bearings and stumbled against the doorframe. He heard a great whooshing resonance from below, as wind and rain whipped through the labyrinth of the house’s hallways, ecstatic at long last to have gained entry to the grand mansion on the hill.
IN THE ATTIC, another lightning flash filled the space, this one so bright that the world seemed to explode. A great booming sound erupted from somewhere nearby. Dust was shaken from the ceiling and rained down all around the room. Surprised, Josie slammed the cover of the journal shut and nearly threw it across the room.
Stupid storm! Leave us alone!
After a few seconds, she listened as the rain continued to spatter against the roof. Something must have crashed outside. Had a tree fallen nearby? Or had it been merely thunder?
She listened for further commotion, but none came. The white noise of the rain drowned out everything else. Not a big deal, she thought. But the book in her hands was a big deal. She opened it again.
IF YOU’RE READING THIS, I’M PROBABLY DEAD.
There was more to this passage, much more, but Josie understood that it wouldn’t make much sense without the knowledge of everything that had come before.
She checked the battery on her phone. It had already diminished by half, but maybe it would be enough to keep her illuminated. Josie flipped to the front of the journal, settled into the rotting chair, and began to read.
ELI FOUND HIMSELF slumped on the floor, lying on his side. He didn’t know how he’d come to be on the ground. But as a couple of dark figures dashed from Margo’s room and tripped over his leg, he figured that, in the commotion, he may have been pushed.
“What’s going on?” Aimee cried out.
“Everyone stay put!” Bruno shouted.
“Everybody move!” Beatrice called.
Lightning flashed through the window at the end of the hall, and for a moment, Eli could see that some of the group was heading toward the stairwell. Someone grasped him under his arms and lifted him to his feet. Eli glanced over his shoulder and made out Gregory’s face smiling down at him. “Let’s all stick together,” Gregory said, turning to help Margo step over the threshold. He waved them both forward.
At the bottom of the stairs, Eli felt a brisk, moist wind rushing toward him from the rear of the house. A roar echoed all around him. Barefoot and practically blind, he bounded quickly across the cold marble floor, wishing to stay close to the dark figures ahead who were moving into the current. Moments later, Eli heard voices in the solarium.
“Oh my goodness!”
“Stay back!”
“Stop pushing!”
That’s when Eli saw it. One of the ancient pines that had stood for so long on the cliff across the yard had fallen onto the house, crushing the enormous glass cage that, until minutes ago, had been the gathering place where the group had spent a good portion of that day.
“No!” Aimee shouted out when she saw the disaster. “This cannot be happening! Not now. Not now!”
Eli was stunned. The sky beyond the new hole in the house continued to flash white and red and green, with thunder quickly following. Rain spilled inside. Prickly green branches wavered in the wind like the fur of a felled beast. The wide tree trunk lay across the yard, a massive half circle of roots and earth lifted up from the edge of the cliff. Anyone sitting here five minutes earlier would have been flattened.
A spot of light appeared from behind the group, shining onto the debris that lay before them, and a voice called out. “Come away from there.” Eli turned to find Charlie Gagnon in the kitchen across the hall, standing behind the wooden island in the center of the room, waving a flashlight, gesturing everyone toward what he believed to be safety.
CHARLIE LED THE GROUP into the small sitting room that was part of his and Beatrice’s cloistered apartment and then closed the door against the wind and rain that continued to invade the house.
Nothing anyone was saying made much sense. Words. Words. Fragments of sentences. Filled with worry. Eli was sure that they were all in shock. Brains weren’t performing optimally — his own included. Seconds ticked away, like in a dream where events and places and faces shift quickly.
Margo seemed to have forgotten about the terror she’d experienced upstairs, because she was already poised over the two-way radio, searching again for a signal. Or maybe she was simply desperate to escape from this place, from the people in this room, and the radio was her best hope.
Charlie handed out several more fl
ashlights that he’d had stored in his bedroom closet. Otis and Bruno and Gregory helped examine everyone else, looking for nicks, scratches, or bruises, but the group seemed to be okay. All except for one …
“Charlie,” Eli called out from his corner of the room. “Your forehead is bleeding.”
Charlie glanced into a small rectangular mirror that was hanging on the wall next to the radio. He raised one hand and examined himself. His face was lit from below, casting crinkled shadows onto his sagging skin. There was clearly a stream of red running from a gash just at the edge of his hairline. “Shoot,” he said. Beatrice came up behind him and gasped. “That looks serious.”
“Just after we’d gotten into bed, I heard a strange noise. I came out here to check on it. I was standing in the doorway to the solarium when the tree fell. Some glass must have got me good.”
“I’ll find a bandage.” Beatrice rushed into the bathroom. The sound of water running from a faucet echoed into the parlor.
As Gregory explained what had happened upstairs to Margo, Charlie continued to stare into the mirror, a quizzical expression on his face. He looked like he didn’t recognize himself. He dabbed at his wound. His fingers turned a tacky red.
“Why don’t you sit down?” Otis said, taking Charlie by the shoulder and leading him to the chair by the cupola window.
Eli’s esophagus gurgled. Did no one else see what had happened here? Someone had attacked Margo while she was sleeping, and she’d fought back. A broken lamp lay on the floor upstairs. The one adult who hadn’t rushed to her aid was the same person who happened to have a head wound.
