by Hamill, Ike
Jack reached down and tried to halt the medium pace of the panel, but its speed was unchanged by his effort. He withdrew his hand and the panel finished its travel.
Stephen yelled at the panel—“Tell us when a minute is up.”
A muffled reply came from below: “Okay.”
They waited in silence. Stephen pointed his light over towards the open door on the far wall. Joining with his light, Jack looked at the door as well. The hallway beyond the door seemed to swallow their lights—the floor, ceiling, and walls were all flat black.
Their eyes were glued to the black rectangle and they both flinched when Ben’s voice floated up from below—“One minute!”
“Hmmm,” said Stephen. A second later the panel began to open again.
“Let’s get out of here,” said Jack.
**********
Jack’s dad cooked on the grill. The boys gorged—after returning from the hotel they had worked up an appetite planning and assembling all the tools and materials they thought they would need. For the first time, they had left the stepladder in the woods near the hotel. Jack decided that it was risky to constantly move it in and out of the garage. But, for now, all the preparation was forgotten and the boys focused on dinner.
“This is great, mom,” said Jack.
“Tell your dad, he did the cooking,” she replied.
“Thanks, Dad.”
“What did you do today?” his dad asked. “You certainly have an appetite.”
“Nothing much,” Jack responded. “We played outside, and then messed around up in my room.”
“Did you talk to your mom?” Jack’s mom asked Stephen.
“Yes,” he began, “she said I should ask if it’s okay that I stay ‘til the end of the month.”
“Oh, of course, that’s fine,” Jack’s mom replied.
“And Ben, are you moving in for good?” she asked.
“If that’s okay,” smiled Ben.
“Hey Dad,” said Jack, “I heard a riddle today.”
“Difficulty?” his dad asked.
“I don’t know,” said Jack. “I thought easy, but I don’t know the answer. It’s definitely not a brain-buster.” Jack and his dad had always enjoyed solving puzzles and riddles together. Jack was good at the math and logic problems, and his dad excelled at the language and historic references. When they wanted a good challenge, they would turn to Jack’s “Book of Brain-Busters.”
“What would you consider the key line of the riddle?” his dad asked him.
“It was ‘Level heads have patience while their hands part and meet again,’ I think,” recited Jack.
“How old?”
“Um, not sure. Maybe fifteen or twenty years.” Jack didn’t want to reveal too much information.
“Well, patience suggests a time-reference, and it’s modern, so I would suspect that the hands are on clock. Could be minute-hand against the hour, or second-hand against either.” his dad replied.
“Oh, so it could mean have patience for a minute?” asked Stephen, joining the conversation.
“Or an hour,” said Jack.
“A bit more than an hour, actually,” corrected his dad. “If a minute hand travels around, it doesn’t catch the hour hand for sixty-five minutes.”
“Oh, right,” said Jack.
Stephen looked up at the clock on the wall and studied it until he figured out the extra five minutes.
“Not very hard for someone my age,” said Jack’s dad. “But you boys have probably never had a watch with hands.”
“Well, no, but we had to learn to tell time anyway,” protested Jack.
“No offense intended, sir,” Jack’s dad joked.
**********
“It’s closed again,” announced Stephen. He was the first up the ladder and into the “Bishop’s room.” The boys had carefully agreed on names for all the locations they had seen during their discussions the night before. Now it was Sunday morning and they each carried a backpack with lunch and water.
“What, the door on the right?” asked Ben—he was heading up the ladder.
“Yeah, it must be spring-loaded, or motorized or something,” Stephen conjectured.
Picking his way, Ben stepped off the ladder onto the harlequin floor. Jack was right behind.
“It’s not surprising,” said Jack. “Everything else here resets.”
“Kinda like us,” said Ben. “We just do the same thing every day.”
“Wait a second,” said Jack, inflamed, “you convinced me that we had to keep going on this.”
“Me?” asked Ben. “I went to talk to you about it and you had already decided to keep going because you liked figuring out the clues in that letter.”
Ben turned away from his friends and started studying the wall with his light. A crack extended from the ceiling to about halfway down the wall; it was covered in black paint. By leaning over Ben was able to reach the crack and he picked away some of the paint, leaving a small white spot of gypsum exposed.
“What are you saying?” asked Jack. “You don’t even want to be here?”
“It’s not...” began Ben. “It’s not how I pictured spending my summer is all.”
“Don’t you even want to see what’s down that hall?” asked Stephen. He pointed his light at the door on the right at the end of the room.
“I don’t know,” Ben answered. “I guess so.”
“Look,” said Jack, “we have all day. Let’s just keep going a little while, have lunch, and then we’ll figure out what to do.”
“This place is creepy though,” said Ben. “How can you want to have lunch in here? I keep expecting to run across rats or dead bodies.”
“It’s just dark,” said Stephen. “We haven’t even seen anything unusual.”
“You don’t think that painting down below is unusual?” asked Ben. “I wouldn’t be surprised if some murderer painted that.”
“The guy’s gone though,” protested Jack. “The place is empty.”
“How do we really know that?” asked Ben.
Stephen and Jack looked at each other. For a moment they ignored Ben. They sized each other up to see if Ben’s idea had any resonance. Jack was the first to speak—“We’ll just see what’s past the door.”
Defeated, Ben agreed by moving across the tiles towards the door. Stephen led the way.
“Careful this time,” said Ben.
The door stood closed at the edge of Stephen’s reach. Leaning forward, he gingerly turned the handle and let the door force itself open. Jack circled to the left to get another angle on the doorway. When it banged open, Stephen moved towards the door. Once again, they saw a long, dark hallway. Its walls were painted the same black as the Bishop’s room. The floor was solid black.
Stephen stepped on each white tile on his way to the threshold. “Guess it doesn’t matter where I step,” he said as he passed a foot through the doorway and willed his body to follow. He brought his other foot across, turned around to face Jack and Ben, and then pointed his flashlight up. “I think we caught a break.”
“What is it?” asked Jack.
Stephen was facing him and looking up above the door-jam from the hallway side. “I don’t know,” said Stephen. “Something bolted to the wall up there. Looks like it could be bad news for people coming through the door, but it didn’t do anything to me.”
“Oh wait.” Stephen traced his flashlight down the right-hand side of the door. “There’s a wire that looks like it goes to the floor here. You guys should come through just like I did.”
Jack crept up to the door and waited for Stephen to get out of his way. He mimicked Stephen’s one-leg-at-a-time style of crossing into the hall without incident.
“Maybe one of us should stay behind,” said Ben. When he saw that Jack and Stephen were about to protest, he quickly rescinded—“Just kidding.” Ben stepped through and joined his friends.
“Okay,” said Stephen, getting ready to head down the hall, “I’ll look down. You
guys look left and right.” He pointed at Jack to look left and Ben to look right.
“What about up?” said Jack.
“Both of you look up,” Stephen responded.
It didn’t take long for Stephen to sound the alarm. About ten feet down the hallway, he put up his arms to physically stop Jack and Ben from proceeding. “Check it out.” Stephen trained his flashlight on the floor a couple of feet ahead of himself.
Barely visible in Stephen’s beam of light, a thin wire was stretched across the hall. Ben got down on his knees and got close to the wire. He found impossibly small holes in the walls between which the wire was strung.
“I bet it sets off something awful,” said Stephen. “What does the letter say about it?”
Jack didn’t have to consult the paper to quote the letter. “Nothing—it ends with a thing about a hasty man and our job.”
“Okay,” said Stephen. “Keep going then?”
“We should be looking for another letter,” said Ben, looking up and around. “We’re going to need more clues.”
“I think we know what to look for,” said Stephen. “He didn’t get us with this.” Stephen stepped over the wire and continued down the hall.
A few more feet later they found a turn in the hallway.
When they came to the end of the hall, and could see around the bend, they were greeted with a dead-end. After it turned, the hall went only a few feet.
"Which side of the building is this?" asked Jack. He moved his light all around, the ceiling, floor, and walls were all black and offered no clues. The wall in front looked the same as the ones on either side.
"Well, we came in the back, went to ground floor, the ladder was on the right and then we doubled back." Stephen thought through the steps that had gotten them to their current location. "I think we must be on the north end of the hotel."
"So, looking at the hotel from the back, this would be the left side?" asked Jack.
"Yeah, the corner of the building should be there." Stephen pointed to the left end of the corridor.
"No way,” said Ben. "We took the right-hand door, and plus, the chute we came down when we first entered. There's got to be at least ten feet to the corner; assuming we've got far enough to make it to the corner."
"Yeah," admitted Stephen, "you're right, I guess."
"So that means that there's space this direction." Jack looked at the wall opposite the dead-end.
"Right," said Ben, "you probably would get to it through one of the other doors that we didn't try from the Bishop's room."
"I thought we all said that those doors were no good?" asked Stephen.
"If you believe that model,” said Ben. "But maybe there's just a dead-end that way too."
"Hey—turn off your lights for a second,” said Jack.
"What for?" asked Ben.
"Just do it," answered Jack.
Stephen and Jack turned off their lights and waited for Ben to follow suit.
"You guys have really gone nuts,” said Ben. He turned his light off. "What did you expect to see? Dancing dingle berries?"
"Just wait,” said Jack.
They waited in silence and dark. At first they heard nothing, then Ben's breathing became noticeable.
"This is dumb,” said Ben. He started to fumble with his light.
"Just hold on a little bit,” said Jack.
A distant noise made Stephen gasp. Goose bumps jumped up on Ben's neck and arms. Jack tensed with excitement.
"Here it comes,” said Jack.
At last Ben was able to identify the noise they were hearing. It was the door at the end of the hall closing under the power of an electric motor. The buzzing and churning reminded him of a garage door opener, but much quieter. It finally clicked home and stopped.
"Great, so now we have to figure out how to get that back open,” said Ben.
"Oh, I get it, where's the light?" asked Stephen.
"Right,” said Jack. "The model showed a light coming from under the door, so maybe there's supposed to be light back here."
As if on cue, a crack of light appeared in front of Jack. He was facing the left side of the hall they had initially traversed. The crack expanded as a portion of the wall drew back to expose a hidden way. Momentarily blinded, the boys could see nothing but bright shapes ahead. In the lead, Jack raised his arm to shield his eyes.
"Wow,” said Stephen, awed. "What's in there?"
"I can't see yet,” said Jack.
When his eyes had adjusted more, Jack saw an extremely well-lit room, painted white. Poking his head in, he could see that the room had no windows and stretched off to his left. The walls and ceiling had no adornment. The floor was the same nondescript tile, but in this room it was all white. It was blinding—the bright lights reflected off all the white surfaces.
"Look up,” said Ben.
Jack—still leaning his head through the secret doorway—twisted his neck to look above the opening in the wall. He saw nothing but more white surfaces.
"So, did that open because we turned off our lights?" asked Ben.
"I think so,” said Jack. "I think that you have to be in the dark before it lights up."
"How did you ever guess that?" asked Ben.
"It makes sense, if you think about it,” said Stephen. "The model showed us there was supposed to be light coming from under the door. But the door was open and we had lights."
"That actually makes no sense at all,” said Ben.
"Do you think it's safe to go in?" asked Jack. He braced himself against the wall and leaned farther. "It goes on for quite a bit that way." Jack pointed with his chin.
"Look for wires,” said Stephen.
Jack crouched and put the side of his face near the floor. "I don't see anything."
"Could be pressure sensitive,” said Ben. "Like the Bishop's room."
"I'll try just one foot,” said Jack. He pushed back. When he had recovered his balance he gingerly advanced one foot. Jack touched a toe to the floor, ready to pull it back at the sign of any trouble. Nothing happened, so he put more weight on the foot.
"I'll go in,” said Stephen.
"It's my turn,” said Ben. He was resigned, not excited.
Jack stood aside and let Ben pass. He poked his head in, looked side-to-side and then Ben entered the room. "I call this the White Room."
"Very original,” said Jack.
"I guess this is the Black Hall then?" asked Stephen.
"No," began Jack, "we should call it the Tripwire Hallway, so we don't forget."
"Good point," said Stephen. "Too bad we can't mark it with something. Later, I guess."
"Are you guys coming?" asked Ben. He had moved into the center of the White Room. Ben was still training his flashlight in the direction he was walking.
Jack and Stephen entered behind him.
"No windows, no outlets, no switches,” said Ben. "Just these lights." He pointed to the ceiling—it was a drop-ceiling but instead of acoustic tiles, the entire ceiling was composed of the diffuse plastic panels covering fluorescent lights. "I wonder if these lights were on before the door opened."
"What's that buzzing?" asked Jack.
"Probably just from the lights,” said Stephen.
“I don’t think so,” said Ben. “I think it’s coming from down here.” Ben was walking to the far end of the room and pointing with his unnecessary flashlight.
When Jack and Stephen reached Ben he was hunched over with his ear near the wall at about stomach height. “There’s a thing here,” said Ben, touching one finger to the wall. Jack looked closer and saw a rectangle cut into the drywall. While Jack and Stephen looked on, Ben poked at a corner of the rectangle and the piece of drywall came loose. Once a corner was protruding, Ben was able to pull it away. The resulting hole was nearly ten inches tall and five inches wide.
Inside the hole, was a life-size diagram of a handprint. “Put your hand on it,” said Stephen. “I bet it opens something.”
“No,
don’t,” said Jack.
“Yeah, not about to,” said Ben. “Looks like it grabs your hand. These plexiglass parts probably close together and clamp around your wrist.”
“I think you’re right,” said Jack. “Maybe we can press it with something else.”
Ben still had the flashlight in his hand, so he centered it on the palm-print and pressed it firmly.
“Nothing,” said Ben.
“You probably have to touch the whole thing,” said Jack.
“Or maybe it only reacts to skin,” offered Stephen. “My dad used to have a stereo like that.”
“Really,” said Ben. It sounded more like an accusation than a question.
“Seriously,” said Stephen. He made his hand narrow, squeezing together his fingers, and pushed against the center of the palm-print. The diagram was recessed behind the plexiglass a couple of inches, and when his fingers touched the switch a loud buzzer sounded. Instantly, the two halves of plexiglass snapped together. They encircled his fingers, but didn’t trap his stretched hand.
“See?” Stephen said.
Nobody answered as they listened to yet another distant, rumbling sound.
“That’s coming from the hall,” said Jack. He started off in that direction and Ben and Stephen followed him. When Stephen’s hand released the switch the sound stopped and the plexiglass reset.
“I think you have to keep holding it,” said Jack.
“Okay,” said Stephen, “but you have to tell me what you find.”
Jack and Ben went to the doorway through which they had entered the white room and Stephen manned the palm-panel.
“Ready?” asked Stephen.
“Go,” said Ben.
Stephen pressed the panel again and this time his hand wasn’t exactly centered. “Ow!” he exclaimed as the collapsing plastic pinched his hand.
“You okay?” asked Ben.
“Yeah,” said Stephen.
“Hey,” said Jack, “it’s another ladder.” He and Ben were looking through the doorway to where they had found the dead-end in the tripwire hall. The rumbling sound was a ladder descending through a disguised hole in the ceiling.
“Who would go to all this trouble?” asked Ben. “What is this place?”
