The Chair

by James L. Rubart

  And more chairs made by God would show up on his doorstep.

  His laptop pinged. He got up and ambled over to his kitchen table, reached over, and tapped the space bar to wake up the screen and see who was e-mailing him at three in the morning.

  From: NicolerIIV@gmail.com

  Subject: Good fortune

  To: CorinR@artifications.com

  Translation: Another Nigerian trolling for suckers who had been living under a rock for the past ten years and might still believe a fifty-eight-year-old Chinese woman dying of cancer wanted to share her vast fortune.

  He turned, trundled back toward the couch, and picked up his book. He’d plow through another couple of chapters and then try to get back to sleep. With no dreams.

  Another ping.

  He spun on his heel. Maybe it was the Tooth Fairy this time.

  Same name.

  Different subject: One more thing.

  He slumped into the chair in front of the table and wiggled the mouse. Why not?

  He set his book down and opened the first e-mail.

  Hello Corin,

  I hope you are well, although I would guess you are going through a number of strange mental machinations at the moment.

  Do not worry; there is purpose in what you’re experiencing. It is good fortune and favor on you that has drawn you into this journey. Believe this. And keep asking. Keep seeking. Answers will come.

  Keep pressing forward, will you now?

  Your friend,

  Nicole

  Corin rubbed his jaw. It had to be her. He opened the next e-mail.

  Corin,

  One more thing: I’m sure you know this, but trust is to be earned and not given lightly with regard to everything and anyone having to do with the chair.

  Exercise caution in all you do, will you? With everyone you interact with, yes? In both the natural realm and the realm of the spirit.

  Your friend,

  Nicole

  Friend? She wasn’t his friend.

  He pulled up Google and plugged in her e-mail address to see if he could trace her e-mail address to a phone number or address.

  Corin didn’t think she’d be that careless. She seemed savvy enough to block his efforts to try to track her down. But it was worth a shot. Fifteen minutes later he gave up and typed a response back to her e-mail.

  Nicole,

  You’re right; strange things are happening and I don’t know where to go for answers.

  When can we meet?

  Can I at least call you?

  Corin

  A moment after sending the e-mail a noise from his basement startled him. It sounded like a stuck door being forced open, the latch scraping against the doorjamb.

  He stared at the door that led downstairs. A dim light came from under it. He didn’t remember leaving a light on down there. Corin set his laptop to the side and slowly rose without taking his eyes off the light under the door.

  His pulse spiked. The light along the bottom wasn’t steady. It ebbed softer and brighter with the rhythm of a slowly beating heart.

  A moment later the light vanished and didn’t come back on.

  Corin glanced furtively around his living room, then stood and eased over to the basement door. He placed his hand on the knob and listened. Nothing.

  A fly buzzed past his head as he opened the door and flicked on the light at the top of the stairs.

  He swatted at the fly and descended the fourteen steps like each one was a thin layer of ice he was scared of breaking through.

  An electrical problem? The house creaking as it settled into the fall season? Maybe. An older house like his had quirks.

  When he reached the basement he flicked on the light and glanced around the main room. Nothing was out of place. But he let his imagination roam anyway. Could it have been the chair? Throwing off some kind of supernatural glow? Mocking him, teasing him about its secrets?

  No. Knock it off. The dream and the novel had scrambled his brain.

  He looked toward the padlocked door at the back of the room where he’d put the chair yesterday. It was open a few inches. Hadn’t he shut and locked it? Corin wasn’t sure. No light came from within.

  A moment later the room grew brighter, then immediately dimmed. Corin whirled toward the source of the light.

  The incandescent lamp in the far corner of the room flickered to life, then sputtered off, then back on again. It buzzed and started through its routine of off-on, off-on again.

  Corin sighed. Of course. If you turned the knob too far the lamp would come on and off, sputtering and humming as the current to the bulb ebbed and flowed.

  He sat on the lowest stair and rubbed the back of his neck. Maybe he’d move the chair to his storage facility east of town. That way his overactive comic book mind wouldn’t create bizzaro scenarios out of nothing and play ping-pong with his emotions.

  He turned his focus to the door behind which the chair sat. Corin wandered over to it, pushed it open wider, and flicked on the light just inside the door. The chair rested in the same spot he’d left it in the day before.

  Resting? Same spot? Did he except it to jump up and dance the rumba? It was an inanimate object! He sighed. But if the Son of God had made the chair, wouldn’t it be more than a chair? It would be alive in a sense. If His hands had touched it, crafted it, maybe even blessed it, it could hold a spark of His divine power.

  He stepped farther into the room and eased up to the chair. “Are you real?” Corin pulled up a small stool, sat in front of the chair, and stared at it. At the perfect lines. The intricate patterns in the ancient wood.

  “Where have you been over the centuries? And if you are a chair formed by a Jewish carpenter, how did you end up here? Talk to me.”

  Corin laughed at himself, but soon the moment of levity vanished replaced by a sense of foreboding. If it wasn’t the chair of Christ, he should sell it for as much as he could and be done with this strange adventure. But if it was formed by the Son of God . . . he needed to know more about it, needed to know what to do next.

  An ocean of questions was forming and Corin was drowning in them. He needed someone with skills to navigate the uncharted waters he now swam. He needed a boat.

  But where could he find one?

  A name popped into his mind.

  Yes. Why hadn’t he thought of Travis days ago?

  He trudged back up the basement stairs, across the living room to his laptop. After three minutes he hit Send, slinging off an e-mail to Travis. If anyone could provide a few answers it would be him. Not religious speculation but rock-hard, scientific answers.

  Which meant tomorrow he would reluctantly do a bit of necessary surgery on the chair.

  PASTOR MARK JEFFERIES jammed his finger into his cell phone’s End button. He didn’t like hanging up on people, but when they pushed the right buttons his reaction was automatic. And having women in his church challenge his authority was the hottest button in his brain.

  He stood and paced in front of his corner windows, gazing out on the trees littered with gold and red leaves about to fall and clutter the street with their failure to stay on the tree.

  A few minutes later he picked up the phone and hit redial.

  “Hello?”

  Mark clenched the phone. “Eric, it’s Mark again. Listen, I lost my temper. It shouldn’t have happened.” He sucked in a quick breath. “But you need to keep your wife in line. It isn’t her place to challenge me.” Mark paused. “Or any man in the church.”

  “All she was doing was expressing her opinion. She wasn’t saying you were wrong, just saying how she felt.”

  “That’s fine. Everyone is entitled to his or her feelings. But it has to be done in the right context. And a woman expressing her feelings to the senior pastor of the church during a small-group gathering with almost seventy people in attendance is not the place or the time. Are we clear on that?”

  The phone went silent.

  “Are we clear on that, Eric?�
�

  “Listen, Mark. You’re a man of God and you’ve helped both of us a tremendous amount, but we’re done. Best to you.”

  Mark rubbed his forehead and with his other hand mashed his Bluetooth deeper into his left ear. “You’re leaving the church? Over this?”

  “A lot of things, but this straw probably weighs the most.”

  “What other things?”

  “Good-bye, Mark. Thanks for all you’ve done.”

  Click.

  Mark waited a moment, then yanked his Bluetooth out of his ear. People leaving the church: his second hottest button. He should have kicked them out before they could quit.

  He lurched back his windows, clenched his arms across his chest, and seethed, staring at nothing.

  A knock on his door broke him out of his daze. “What!”

  The door opened a few inches and Ben poked his head into Mark’s office. Mark motioned him in with his head.

  “Bad time?”

  “No. Perfect.” Mark didn’t speak again for over a minute. “You know, Ben. I hate it when I’m the quintessential example of Balaam’s donkey.”

  “You’ve been prophesying?”

  “No, I was referring to the species as representative of my behavior.”

  “Excuse me? I’m still not tracking.”

  “Forget it. Sit. Just in a bad mood today, which makes me do things I regret soon after. Happens to everyone, right?”

  “Everyone.”

  “Coffee?” Mark motioned toward his espresso maker, which sat on the counter that lined the wall to his left.

  “No, thank you.”

  Mark strolled toward the counter and stuck his half full vanilla latte in the microwave next to the coffee machine and punched in forty-five seconds. “Talk to me. What did you find out about this antiques store owner?”

  “He’s not stupid.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “He’s not begging for our assistance.”

  “Pity.” Mark paced in front of the microwave. “Is he a Christian?”

  “I highly doubt it.”

  “Does he believe in God?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “We need to know.” Mark drilled Ben with his eyes. “You should have asked.”

  “I’ll find out.” Ben shuffled his feet. “Sorry.”

  The microwave dinged and Mark marched back to snag his drink. “Does he know what he has?”

  “If he does he’s not letting on.”

  “Do you think the chair is genuine?” Mark settled back in his leather chair and took a sip of his coffee.

  “You mean do I think the chair sitting in an antiques store eight hundred miles away is the one you’ve been searching for most of your adult life?”

  “Yes.”

  “I don’t know. He didn’t let me see it.”

  Mark downed another slug of his coffee and wiped his mouth. “I want you to keep a watch on this guy. You know what I mean, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “What’s his name?”

  “Corin Roscoe.”

  “I want to know where Corin goes, who he hangs out with, who he talks to, everything. Understand?”

  “It’s done.” Ben cocked his head. “Do you mind me asking what you’re going to do with his chair if it does turn out to be the one?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to pry.”

  “Yes, you did.” Mark took another drink of his coffee. “But it’s okay. I admire your ambition. I’d want to know the same thing if I were in your shoes. Well done.”

  Mark opened the top right-hand drawer of his desk, pulled out a full-sized notepad, and began jotting down what he’d learned from Ben. After few moments he glanced up at Ben. “Yes? Is there something else?”

  “No, I, uh.” Ben shifted his notebook from one hand to the other. “I thought you were going to tell me why the chair was so important to you.”

  “You thought incorrectly.” Mark leaned back in his chair and glared at him.

  Ben narrowed his eyes. “If you want me to help you with this little side project, don’t you think I should know a mite more than you’re telling me?”

  “Excellent. Well done, well done.” Mark stood and clapped. “That is assertion and courage in the face of opposition. The kingdom of heaven is violent and violent men take it by force.”

  “Thank you.” Ben gave Mark a thin-lipped smile. “So are you going to tell me?”

  Part of him longed to tell someone. About the darkness inside that stabbed at him with daggers made from anger and ego that melted into mist when he tried to destroy them. The longing that welled up in him to know he was truly forgiven for his sins and accepted no matter what. The craving to be the man he pretended to be. About the hope of what the chair could do.

  But he couldn’t tell this kid. He couldn’t tell anyone.

  As soon as Ben left, Mark spun in his chair and slid back a bookcase behind which sat a safe. He spun the combination and opened the door a crack, spun to make sure the door shut completely behind Ben, then opened the safe door the rest of the way.

  He pulled out a notebook and flipped toward the middle and turned pages back and forth till he found the page he wanted. If the true chair had surfaced, then the lady had to be close by.

  He needed to meet her.

  And he needed to meet Corin Roscoe and use considerable powers of persuasion to get the guy to give him the chair. After a few minutes of contemplation, Mark smiled. He knew the perfect instrument of influence to use on Corin.

  CHAPTER 21

  The next morning before heading to the store, Corin descended into his basement and twirled the combination padlock on the door at the back of the room, his hands shaking. Why? Because of what he was about to do? Or because he felt like he was sliding into quicksand and this would only speed up his descent?

  The door squealed open and he stood at the entrance and stared at the chair.

  Move. He needed to do this. It was one of the best ways to know if he was dealing with a legend come to life or a hoax out of this Nicole woman’s fertile imagination.

  He strode up to the chair and circled it counterclockwise, hands on his hips. “I somewhat loathe to do this, but I have to find out more about you. Starting with your age.”

  He stopped, turned, and continued circling, now clockwise. “Which means I’ll need to take a small sample to send to the lab. A friend of mine will discover myriad facts about you through the process. I hope you can understand.”

  What was wrong with him? He was talking to the chair like it was alive, like it was a golden retriever he was about to do a biopsy on. It was a hunk of wood. Maybe old. Maybe beautiful. But probably nothing more than finely turned pieces of wood from centuries ago.

  Or maybe only decades ago.

  Or maybe it was the greatest archaeological find of the century.

  He stopped walking, pulled a small blade from his pocket, and knelt in front of the chair. As he touched the inner left leg—where taking a sample from would be the most hidden—the air in the room seemed to grow warm, then back to its normal temperature a moment later.

  Mind games. He wouldn’t let his brain start playing tricks on him again.

  With wood this old he needed to be careful. If the blade bit too deep, he’d end up taking off more than he wanted to. Corin ran his finger over the section he was about to cut into.

  The wood was hard; he’d have to apply more than the usual pressure to remove a piece.

  He pressed the edge of his knife into the tip of his left forefinger. Sharp. Should he sharpen it more just to make sure? No. It was an excuse to keep him from marring the chair. But he didn’t really have a choice.

  He set the blade into the wood at a twenty-degree angle. All he needed was a sliver. To his amazement the blade slipped under the surface of the wood like he was carving on a cube of butter. No resistance. After a quarter of an inch, he pulled up on the blade and watched a thin slice tumble i
nto his palm.

  He stared at the spot on the chair where he’d taken the sample and pressed the edge of his blade gently into the cut. It was rigid. He pressed harder. Where before the wood had been softer than Play-Doh, now it was like pressing into stainless steel.

  Corin fell back on his heels and focused on the chair.

  Weird was getting weirder.

  Was there a faint glow around it now, or was the light playing tricks? He got to his feet and shut off the lights to see if the glow remained.

  Nothing. Complete darkness.

  He pulled a glass vial from his pocket, slid the sliver in and capped it. After shutting and padlocking the door, climbing the stairs, and locking the door to the basement with a keyed dead bolt, he poured himself his eighth cup of black coffee and picked up his cell phone.

  “Hello?”

  “Travis, it’s Corin. Did you get my e-mail last night?”

  “I got it.”

  “I just took a sample. Can I drop it off this afternoon even though it’s Sunday?”

  “Of course.”

  Corin stared at the door to his basement. He eased over to it and checked the dead bolt again. Still locked. He laughed at himself, wandered back past his espresso maker, and grabbed his car keys off the kitchen table. “How soon can you have the results back?”

  “Soon.”

  “How soon?” Corin shut his front door and strode toward his car.

  “Do you want the full workup or just its age?”