by Tom Pawlik
Miriam returned and they spent the rest of the afternoon together. Her strength and stamina were clearly heightened by the perilium’s effect as she long outlasted George on the treadmill. Then they sat in the outdoor hot tub and played a game of cribbage before dinner.
Vale had invited the other residents again for dinner—raw meat and all. This time Amanda provided George with a cut of meat that was cooked. George did his best to appear amiable, though deep down he had just wanted to spend the evening alone with his wife. His young, vivacious wife.
It seemed the group all came together a few evenings each week. They gathered around the big dining table as though they were at a medieval feast. And Vale sat at the head, directing conversations and moderating debates, always having the final word.
George wondered what it would be like to live within such a small community. Seeing the same few faces year in and year out. Some for more than a century. From the conversations, George gathered more details on how each one had arrived in Beckon. In most cases, their stories were not so different from his own: wealthy souls, stricken with some disease and willing to pay a fortune for the chance to cheat death.
Vale had practically built the town himself after discovering the cave in 1878. At first George wondered why he would build a town in the first place. Why draw people to the very place you’re trying to keep hidden from the public?
But then it struck him: it was obvious that Vale needed some type of human community just for his own survival and sanity. Or ego. Though still, it seemed an odd way to keep a secret.
George surmised that eventually Vale’s fortune would have begun to wane and he would’ve needed additional funds to maintain his way of life. He was a businessman at heart. So he had found a way to use the perilium to his advantage and began his search for others whose circumstances he could exploit, then convinced them to join him. Or perhaps lured them here would be the better description.
George learned that Malcolm and Loraine Browne had arrived in 1893, followed shortly afterward by Frank Carson, who’d once been a colonel in the Union army. And then in 1897 came Dwight Henderson, who had been a physician at the time. Henderson was tight-lipped about the precise circumstances that had brought him to Beckon, but George got the feeling he might have been trying to save someone. Someone close to him.
He also discovered that Max and Fiona Dunham were low-level British royalty who had arrived from England in 1914 just as the First World War was breaking out in Europe. Fiona had suffered from some sort of aggressive cancer.
George already knew that Amanda had arrived in 1923 and the Huxleys in 1972, but there seemed to be a big stretch of time between them, and he wondered if there had been others that he didn’t know about. Others who perhaps didn’t wish to remain under the rule of Thomas Vale. Not for all the perilium in the world.
George noticed that Henry Mulch was not present. When he asked, Vale simply said that Mulch was busy with a job he’d asked him to do.
He made it a special point to look for any hint of dissatisfaction among the group, but the general mood was light and jovial.
The gathering began to disperse shortly after ten o’clock, so George and Miriam excused themselves and retired for the evening. George wanted to get to bed early. He had plans for a morning excursion to locate the cave under the lodge. It was a risky maneuver, but he needed to find some answers.
So he arose early the next morning and slipped downstairs to look around. The place was quiet. He followed the corridor past Vale’s office and discovered a door hidden in a narrow side passage off the main corridor. It opened onto a stairway leading down into darkness. George caught his breath as a sudden wave of apprehension seized him.
“Where are you going?” Miriam’s hushed but urgent voice came from behind him.
George nearly jumped out of his trousers and cursed. “What are you doing? I thought you were asleep.”
“I woke up when you left,” she said. “And I’ve been following you, snooping around.”
George shushed her. “I’m not snooping. I’m . . .”
“Nosing? Sneaking? Spying?”
“Exploring.”
“Ah,” Miriam said with a stern tone. “Then I’m coming along.”
George stuck out his hand and stopped her short. “No, you’re not. You need some rest, so go back up to the room and—”
Miriam brushed his hand aside. “I am not going back to bed while you go exploring. I’m coming with you.”
George sighed. The last thing he needed was for Miriam to see more of this place than he wanted her to. But he also knew she wasn’t going to listen to him. Besides, she was now probably stronger and nimbler than he was, so even if he wanted to stop her, he doubted he’d be able to.
“It might be dangerous,” he said, lowering his voice.
Miriam peeked past him down the darkened stairway. “It’s a basement. I’ve seen basements before, George.”
“Yeah, well . . . somehow I don’t think this is going to be a normal basement. And I don’t want—”
“I appreciate your chivalry,” she said, placing her fingers against his lips. “But if you’re going down there, I’m coming with you. It’s as simple as that.”
George clenched his jaw and muttered to himself. “Fine,” he said at last. “But keep quiet.”
They proceeded down the stairs until they came to a narrow corridor with a door on either side and one at the end of the hall. Cold, flickering fluorescent lighting gave the area a pale glow. George tried both side doors only to find them locked. The door at the end was another supply closet containing mops and brooms and a couple of shelving units packed with cleaning supplies.
George closed the door with a frustrated sigh. Miriam frowned. “This basement looks like it should be a lot bigger.”
George tried the two locked doors again. “Yeah, I’m guessing there are more rooms behind these door—”
Suddenly they heard the door at the top of the stairs open and footfalls start down the steps.
Miriam’s eyes went round and she stifled a gasp. George pushed her back into the space under the stairwell. They watched a pair of legs descending with a five-gallon pail. It was Dwight Henderson. He continued down the hall to the closet at the end and disappeared inside.
“Let’s go back up,” George whispered.
Miriam pulled him back into the shadows. “No, he’ll come out and see us. Let’s just wait for him to leave.”They waited beneath the stairs. And waited.
And waited.
Three full minutes passed.
“What’s he doing in there?” Miriam whispered.
Another minute passed and George whispered again, “Let’s just go.”
Miriam hushed him and slipped out of their hiding place.
George grabbed her arm. “What are you doing?”
She pulled herself loose, slipped down the hall, and put her ear to the closet door. “I don’t hear anything.”
George stood at the foot of the stairs and waved her back. “Good. Now let’s go.”
But he could see Miriam was having nothing of it. She pointed to the bottom of the door. “There’s no light on.” She tapped on the door.
Nothing.
Then she opened the door and stepped back. George held his breath and drew closer for a better view.
But aside from the mops and supplies, the room was empty.
Chapter 30
George snuck down the hall as Miriam flipped on the light. “We did see him come in here, right?”
Miriam shrugged. “There must be another way out. Some kind of hidden door?”
The room was small, with shelving units on both sides and a large pegboard with hanging hooks along the back. They inspected each of the walls and the floor, looking for anything that might be an entrance.
Miriam was shaking her head. “I don’t like this. Why would they have a secret passage? What are they hiding?”
“I don’t think I want to kn—”
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br /> Suddenly they heard muffled footsteps approaching and one of the hooks along the pegboard wall began to move, twisting to the left. George switched off the light and pulled Miriam into the corner just as a section of the back wall swung outward and a pale-green light shone in through the opening. They moved farther into the corner, behind the shelving unit, as a figure emerged.
In the shadows of the closet they could see it was Henderson again. He was still carrying the bucket, but his face looked somewhat distraught in the pale light. George held his breath as Henderson pulled the secret door closed again behind him. They heard a metallic click, and then Henderson exited the supply room through the main door. They listened to his footsteps retreat down the hall and climb back up the stairs.
Then they both breathed a long sigh.
“I’m too old to go sneaking around like this,” George whispered into Miriam’s ear.
“We need to find out what’s back there.”
“It’s too dangerous.” George flipped the light on. “If they catch us . . .”
But Miriam was busy feeling around the wall where Henderson had emerged. “We’ve got to find out what’s going on out here.”
George knew it was better not to argue with her. He pointed to the hook he’d seen move earlier. “I think this might be some kind of latch.”
He tried twisting it to the left and could feel it swivel on its mounting bracket. He continued turning until he felt it snap into place like a dead bolt. The doorway was disguised as a section of pegboard mounted to the cinder-block wall, hooks and all. The board had numerous mop heads and brooms hanging from it along with other supplies. It was ingenious, really. George never would have suspected it was a doorway had he not seen it in use.
The board loosened on its hinges, and George was able to push it outward. It opened into a rough-hewn tunnel carved into solid rock with a series of stone steps leading down and out of sight. A line of light fixtures was mounted to the rock ceiling, each with a pale bulb, casting a sickly glow into the tunnel.
George glanced at his wife, still not quite used to her youthful appearance. “What do you think?”
Miriam grabbed a flashlight from one of the shelves and handed it to George. Then she gestured into the tunnel. “Let’s go.”
George nodded, his jaw clenching. “That’s what I was afraid you were going to say.”
They stepped through into the tunnel beyond and George pushed the door closed behind them, turning the locking mechanism back into place. Then they crept down the stairway, ever listening for any sounds. George wondered how many of the other residents knew about this passage. He was certain that Vale did. And obviously Henderson was using it too. He also assumed Frank Carson knew about it, since he was the one who’d brought the woman down here in the first place. In fact, it wouldn’t have surprised him if all the residents of Beckon were aware of the passage. And if that was the case, why bother keeping it a secret?
The lights were spaced every forty feet or so, creating brief, dimly lit patches amid lengthy sections of darkness. They descended the stairway as it curved away out of sight, making it difficult to see too far ahead at any given time. After several minutes of cautious descent, they arrived at a large wooden door. It looked to him like something out of a horror movie. Thick wooden beams held together with iron bands and bolts.
George put his ear to the wood but couldn’t hear anything. He pushed against the handle and felt it swing open with a dull creak. On the other side the tunnel continued straight.
They had come this far; they might as well keep going. But once through the door, they paused to listen again, and what they heard sent chills down George’s spine. Voices echoed up through the dark passage. Wailing and moaning as if in torment. George’s heart pounded and his throat went dry. It was as if they had in fact descended into some subterranean dungeon of horrors. They had left the modern world behind them and gone back into the Dark Ages, into a torture chamber.
Miriam gripped his arm. “Those are people, George. . . . What is this place?”
George felt sick inside. The voices grew louder as they made their way down the passage, and soon they came across side tunnels off the main corridor. At this point, George was glad Miriam had found the flashlight in the supply room.
He shone the beam down one of the tunnels. There were in fact more doors built into the rock walls. It was a prison of some sort. They could hear a weak male voice pleading to them in Spanish, but George couldn’t make out what he was saying.
He called out, “Where are you?”
The voice grew more earnest, and in the beam of the flashlight George could see fingers reaching out from a slat in one of the doors.
Miriam rushed down the corridor to the door. “Here, George.” She pulled on the iron latch, but it wouldn’t budge. “Help me open it.”
George followed her and inspected the handle. “They’re all locked,” he said. “We have to try to find the key.”
Miriam peered in through the opening. “We’ll get you out. . . . Don’t be afraid. We’ll find the key.”
Then George heard a voice from one of the other doors. A woman’s voice, speaking English. “Who are you? What are you doing here?”
George panned the light toward the new voice and saw a hand reaching out through the bars.
“Who are you?” the woman said again.
Miriam turned and clutched the woman’s fingers. “Oh, my . . . don’t worry. We’re going to get help.”
“How did you get down here?”
George leaned in. “We were snooping around the lodge and found this tunnel in the basement. It’s hidden. We’re . . . we’re just guests there.”
“Guests? You know Thomas Vale?”
“Yes, he invited us here,” Miriam said.
“Then listen to me. You’re in danger too. You need to get out and call the FBI. You can’t trust him. You can’t trust any of them. None of the people in this town.”
“Who are you? Why did they lock you up down here?”
“I’m a police officer—from Los Angeles,” the woman said, her voice cracking with emotion. “My name is Elina Gutierrez. I was investigating a kidnapping. I followed the van here and they captured me.” Her tone became insistent. “You need to contact the FBI. They’re engaged in some kind of human trafficking here. There’s something horrible going on.”
George’s head spun as he searched the corridor. These had to be the people they’d brought in the van and the woman he’d seen the day before. “We can’t get these doors open. We have to go back and find the keys.”
“Please help us,” Elina pleaded. “You have to get help right away. Don’t trust them. Don’t trust any of them.”
Miriam was squeezing Elina’s fingers through the bars. “We’ll get you out of here. Don’t worry. We’ll get you out.”
Elina began weeping. “I was praying that someone would find us. I was praying He would send someone to save us.”
Miriam leaned close and said softly, through her own tears, “He heard you. God heard you.”
George suddenly felt as if the darkness were closing in on him. As if something were pursuing them. He grabbed Miriam’s arm. “We need to go—now.”
He led her back up the tunnel as Elina’s voice came from behind him.
“Listen to me,” she said. “Be careful. There’s something in the caves. They said there’s something terrible down there.”
George steered Miriam away. “Don’t worry. We’ll contact the FBI as soon as we can.”
They hurried back the way they had come. Through the wooden door and up the stairs. George was puffing hard as they climbed the stairs, but now Miriam pulled him onward, her new youthful stamina driving her.
“What is this place?” she was saying between breaths. “Why would they have these people locked up?”
“I don’t know,” George wheezed. “I saw her . . . yesterday. . . . Carson took her away like a . . . prisoner.”
“What?
” Miriam turned on the stairs and glared at him. “You saw her? You knew about this place and you didn’t tell me?”
“I didn’t know about this place,” George said. “And I didn’t know . . . who she was. I just . . . didn’t want to upset you until I found out what was . . . going on.”
Miriam started back up the stairs. “We have to call the state patrol or something.”
“I tried, but the only landline is in Vale’s office, and you need a pass code to dial out.” George pulled Miriam’s arm and she turned around. “Look, if Vale thinks we’re going to cause trouble, he’ll have us both killed.”
“How could you get mixed up with these people?”
“I was desperate!” George hissed in a hushed tone. “I would’ve done anything to save you. You have no idea what it was like living with you like that. All our money, and I couldn’t even . . .” He could feel his emotions swelling up and choked off his words. In fifty years of marriage, he’d never cried in front of Miriam; he wasn’t about to start now.
She hugged him. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I don’t blame you. But we have to get out of here. We can’t stay here any longer.”
“We can’t leave.”
“George.” Miriam looked him in the eyes. “I don’t care what happens to me. I am not going to let you become Vale’s slave for me. I won’t let you live in that kind of fear.”
“I can figure out a way to get rid of him. I’m not afraid of him.”
“And I’m not afraid of death.”
They continued on to the top of the stairs. George pulled open the hidden door to the storage room. They both clambered through into the room and stopped in their tracks.
Thomas Vale stood in the open doorway. Frank Carson and Henry Mulch stood behind him in the basement corridor, arms folded.