by Alexie Aaron
“I wonder,” Jesse said, unrolling his copy of the building’s blueprints. “I’ve been looking for why the utility rooms are missing square footage. See, over here we have dumbwaiters and laundry chutes, but here the measurements are wrong,” he said, patting the wall.
Cid walked around the outside of the room and knocked on the walls until he hit stone. He came back in and knocked on the back wall. More stone. Cid smiled. “Come on. I’ve got a hunch,” he said.
Jesse caught up to him on the west side and Cid knocked on the walls until he hit stone. He then examined the floor. He took a broom from the utility room and swept the ground along the wall.
Cid got to his knees and pointed out. “See these faint scratches? They arc. I’m betting that there is a pressure door.”
Cid found two seams. He pressed on one and shook his head. He pressed on the other and moved back, pulling Jesse with him as the wall swung open. There before them was the entrance to the subbasement. The stairs, however, were guarded by a locked iron gate.
“Nothing says stay the fuck out of here like a cast-iron gate,” Jesse said.
Cid walked over to his toolbox and extracted two thin files. He got on his knees and inserted the first into the lock and probed until the lock gave.
“Where did you learn that?”
“Mia.”
“That is one interesting woman.”
“She’s one of a kind,” Cid agreed. “Let’s block this open and take a few lights with us.”
“Why do you carry two flashlights?” Jesse asked.
“This light runs on batteries, easily drained by a ghost. This is Murphy-tested, and it takes a massively strong creature to drain this one. If this light goes out, start praying,” Cid said, handing the light to Jesse.
They walked down the carved stone steps. There were four flights of steps to get down to the subbasement.
Cid stopped a moment to reassure himself which direction was west before he started off. The subbasement was half as wide as the basement above it. It had several rooms with walls made of foundation stone. They were empty, and the doors were propped open. The last door was closed but not locked.
Cid put his head to the door and listened. He closed his eyes a moment. When he opened them, he backed away. It’s behind this door, maybe, a few feet. Do you want to see it?”
“Yes,” Jesse said.
Cid opened the door. Before them looked essentially like another empty room, a copy of the four previous rooms. Jesse started to walk forward. Cid stopped him and picked up a piece of fallen mortar and tossed it into the middle of the room. A flash of light occurred, and the mortar disappeared.
“Wow.”
“Need to see anymore?”
“Nope, I’m good.”
“Good because look,” Cid said, pointing to the ground.
Jesse saw the dust motes and bunnies being pulled into the room.
They closed the door.
“I was thinking of building another wall, maybe out of some of that loose foundation rock in the old greenhouse. The more we make this look like the end of the house, the better.”
“It’s going to be tough getting the rock down here unnoticed,” Jesse said.
“I’ll just tell Walrus that we need it for shoring up the foundation. It’s not exactly a lie. And if I have to explain, I’ll tell him that his pal up in the attic requested it.”
“I don’t know what’s worse, taking orders from a demon or Kiki?” Jesse said.
Cid looked at him oddly. “Really?”
“She can be pretty pushy.”
“You’ve put our boss in the house demon category. Why did you tell me this was a cakewalk of a job?”
“I didn’t want to suffer alone,” Jesse said.
Cid rolled his eyes, realizing, “You’re putting me on!”
“Took you long enough.”
“You were very convincing. I think you’ll be in charge of explaining the situation when things go pear-shaped.”
“Pear what?”
“It’s a phrase. It means things don’t go according to plan.”
“Then why not say it that way?” Jesse argued.
“Because it’s boring.”
They had reached the steps. Cid ducked his head in one of the east rooms. “Jesse, we should check out this part of the basement too.”
“Why not? It’s not that I’m three days behind schedule or anything like that,” he sniped.
They walked through three empty rooms, but the door to the fourth room was locked.
Cid twisted the handle a few times before opening up his toolbox and extracting a set of lock picks. “Before you ask, we do need to know how to get in and out of locked rooms as paranormal investigators. Don’t judge.”
Jesse raised his hands and laughed. “Man, you’ve changed. You were elected safety guy because you were such a rule follower. PEEPs has taken you down a dark road, my friend.”
“I thought I got that job because of my safety record,” Cid said, disappointed.
Jesse watched as Cid worked a few minutes. Cid stopped, walked back, and took out a flat piece of sandpaper. He slid it under the door. Cid popped the key out that was on the inside of the door. “It was locked from the inside.”
Jesse felt a chill. “That’s not a good sign.”
Cid pulled the sandpaper back and lifted the skeleton key off the gritty side of the paper. He placed it in the lock and turned.
The door opened inwards.
“After you,” Cid said, collecting his tools.
“No, I’ll wait.”
Cid picked up the box and turned on the flashlight. He reached in and flipped a switch.
Hundreds of painted faces stared at the contractors. Wide painted smiles gave the two a feeling just short of a heart attack.
“Dolls?” Jesse said, not daring to take another step in the room. “Clown dolls?” he said, backing out.
Cid, who was admittedly uncomfortable by the shelves of dusty toys, stopped to put a wedge under the door to stop it from closing. He walked in and pointed to another closed door. “There’s the door. Let’s get this over with.”
“Oh gee, what could be creepier than clown dolls,” Jesse said through his teeth.
“Come on. They’re just toys.” Cid put his phone on video and began chronicling their discovery.
“You tell that to the kid in Poltergeist and the people in The Conjuring.”
“Fiction, and the doll in The Conjuring wasn’t a clown doll,” Cid pointed out.
The door to the next room opened. Cid found another light switch and flipped it on. One of the lights blew, but the others came on.
Inside, they found a workshop with doll parts stored on shelves and in baskets.
“Oh great, they have spare parts,” moaned Jesse.
“Don’t you see, someone who lived here, their hobby was making dolls,” Cid said, admiring the neatness of the abandoned workshop. There was only a light layer of dust on the equipment. Did this speak of how long ago the doll maker had lived or that this space had not been visited in quite some time?
“There’s another door. Cid, I’m not sure I have the stomach for another surprise,” Jesse admitted.
“Best to get it over with. Otherwise, you’ll build it up in your mind.”
Jesse steeled himself and walked over and twisted the knob of the door. It too was unlocked. He pushed the door open and felt around but didn’t find a light switch. “No lights.”
Cid walked in with the big flashlight. He systematically moved the light so they could take in the empty room. There wasn’t another door, but there was a steel circular staircase leading up. He walked over and tried to shake the stairs to see how sound they were. There was no movement that he could tell from where they were standing. He pointed the light up into where the steps disappeared.
“I can’t see too much. What’s above here?” he questioned.
“Let’s see, we’re at the back of the house. There is a stora
ge room in the basement, above that, that staging room for the defunct greenhouse - you know, the one with all the pots and long metal sink?” Jesse took a few steps and said, “I didn’t see any staircase in either room.”
“It may be the end of a hidden passageway. The staircase isn’t as old as the house. Someone could have put this in later for a quicker way into the hobby room.”
“Why didn’t they put the hobby room upstairs? Why all this secrecy?” Jesse asked.
“Well, we can go up, or we can lock this back up and look at it after we block off the vortex.”
“I vote on the vortex. This place isn’t going anywhere. I think we should have the boss along when we go exploring. I think she’d enjoy this.”
Cid nodded.
They walked back into the hobby room, shutting the door firmly after them. Next, Cid shut the hobby room door. When they came to the doll room, he pulled out the wedge, shut and locked the door from the outside, and pocketed the key. “Just in case someone wants to do some exploring without us,” he explained. “Plus, those dolls could be quite valuable.”
“No, those dolls are creepy. I shut my eyes, and I can still see them leering at me.”
“PEEPs had a doll to deal with before I got there. It was inhabited by the spirit of one of two autistic twin boys.”
“What happened to it?” Jesse asked as they walked back out of the east wing.
“They buried it.”
“Good call. I would have torn the thing apart,” Jesse said. “I can’t stand those… those… Fuck! What is that!” Jesse pointed with a shaking hand at the stairs.
There, on the bottom step, was a clown doll. It was posed as if it were climbing up a riser of a step.
“And there, look!” Jesse pointed at a doll looking down through the bars of the railing. He clutched Cid’s arm, shaking.
Cid picked up, with his super hearing, someone trying not to laugh. He tapped Jesse’s arm, pointed up, and then drew an imaginary, long mustache on his face.
“That sonofabitch!” Jesse shouted.
Cid walked up and picked up the closest doll. “Come on out, Walrus. You had your fun,” Cid called.
They heard Walrus chuckle as he made his way down the stairs. Picking up the second clown doll on his way. “I’m sorry, kid, but I couldn’t help it. There I was, looking for you guys in this room with these toys, and then I remembered Jesse’s fear, and one thing led to another…”
Jesse glared at their large friend.
“Come on, don’t be that way. I almost shat myself up there putting in the new thermostat.”
“Did the demon bother you?” Cid asked.
“No, didn’t hear a peep out of him, but the idea that I could turn around and that enormous smile would be there, was enough to have my sphincter working overtime.” He handed the doll to Cid. “You know, these are very well made. I would hate to think of them rotting down here for another hundred years.”
“We’ll bring the boss down and leave it up to her to talk to Hal about them.”
Cid unlocked the door and placed the dolls in the empty spots. He ran the video to see who belonged where. In his experience, it didn’t do any good to be sloppy. He switched the places of the dolls. He smiled at the toys. No longer did the dolls cause his stomach to flip. “Perhaps a nice glass display case with a write-up about the artist…”
“You can have them. I’m out of here,” Jesse said and left the room.
“Why is he so scared of these toys?” Walrus asked.
“It could be primal. A lot of people used to believe that the hollowness of a doll drew demons and ghosts to them.”
“I can’t see the guy upstairs messing with dolls,” Walrus said.
“Me neither, but remember, he’s probably a grown demon. If you’re ever in northern Illinois, stop in and visit me and the Martins. I’ll have Mia tell you about a certain teenage demon she ended up engaged to accidently.”
“You do hang out with the craziest people,” Walrus said.
“Present company included,” Cid said, patting him on the back.
Chapter Nine
Kiki studied the video that Cid took. She looked down at the blueprints and saw just how inaccurate they were. Was it because the mansion was in the country far away from any code enforcers? Or was someone paid off? The latter was more likely. She’d seen it before. A former insane asylum was dressed up like a country mansion and sold to a developer who made apartments for the students of a neighboring university. Her sister had been one of those students. She left after she was kept up all night by the sobs coming from the walls. How was she to study for finals and deal with that?
Kiki looked at a still of the hobby room. Who left this behind? Was he or she sane? Old houses had history and a lot of mystery too. There was more to renovation than just replacing knob-and-tube electrical. You had to get the history of the place right. Sometimes it involved little gems like these clowns; other times, it was bones, old bones.
She was aware that Cid still stood there. She looked over and asked, “Would you like a seat?”
“No. I’m going to get back to sealing up the vortex. I’ll send the video to you so you can put it on your computer,” Cid said, taking his phone from her. He typed a few commands. “I also sent it to Jake. He hasn’t gotten back to me about the broach yet.”
“Broach?”
“It’s a pin.”
“I know what a broach is, but what does it have to do with this job?” she asked.
Cid raised a finger and ducked outside the office to where he had set his locked toolbox. He took out the plastic-wrapped pin and brought it in. “I found this jammed in a root in the well. It looks expensive.”
“You found it on this property, and I’m just now hearing of it?” she asked sternly.
“You were in no shape to deal with it when I found it,” Cid answered back, not liking the tone of her voice. “I thought that someone else may have taken a tumble down that well. I’m just trying to identify it.”
“You were hired as a carpenter, not a ghostbuster.”
Cid got up. “You’re right, I wasn’t. I was doing you a favor. From now on, you deal with all the weird things that are going on here,” Cid said and stormed out of the office.
“Shit,” Kiki said. She fingered the pin through the plastic and thought about how she must have sounded. Kiki jammed the pin in her top drawer and locked it. She got up and went in search of Cid Garrett to apologize.
The hall was full of people. Gary had his team of plasterers sealing off the east wing with long, transparent plastic sheets. They were preparing to sand the plaster, and he didn’t want the dust traveling to other areas of the house.
What the Fuck had his head inside a large square cut into the wall. He was shouting instructions to someone in the basement.
Walrus had his team in the back of the house with jackhammers, dismantling the foundations of the greenhouse and loading up mortar-free rocks in the large wheelbarrows. Jesse had opened up the old coal chute, and they were dropping their loads there, where another team was loading up smaller barrows and taking them down the carefully secured planks into the subbasement. They dumped them into a pile to be sorted by Cid before he started building his wall.
Kiki looked around but didn’t see Cid. She tapped the shoulder of a masked plasterer and asked, “Have you seen Clark?”
He raised his hands and shouted, “Who?”
“Cid, have you seen Cid Garrett?”
The man nodded. “Follow me,” he said, lifting up a plastic sheet and walking into the east wing. He walked fast. Kiki followed him past the sanders already hard at work. She pulled her collar over her mouth and almost lost the worker. She found him in Suze’s two-story sitting room on the end of the east wing. He was climbing the tall ladder.
“Hello, sir? Are you sure Cid’s here?” she asked.
The man pulled the breathing mask away from his face as he looked down at her. “There was too much noise. Here it�
�s quiet.”
Kiki was confused. “Get down off that ladder.”
The man swung a rope and hooked a large chandelier and pulled it towards him.
“These things are so fragile. Listen to the crystals when they touch each other,” he said.
“You shouldn’t be doing that. Get down here!” she demanded.
“Okay,” he said. The man wrapped the rope around his neck, pushed the chandelier away, and as it yanked him off the ladder, his body flew downwards towards Kiki. He ended up just out of reach.
Fighting the urge to run out of the room, she pulled a chair over and climbed up to pull the rope off the twitching man.
The chandelier swung back towards the ladder, and she was knocked to the floor. Kiki stared up at the man’s face as it turned blue then black. His tongue bulged out of his mouth, and his eyes glowed.
Kiki screamed and screamed.
Back in the hall, no one heard her. The sanders had protective noise-suppressors on. They couldn’t hear themselves, let alone a hysterical woman screaming over and over again. No one heard her.
No one but Cid, who had just walked back into the building after walking off his temper. He heard her scream above the sanders, above the shouts of the air-handler workers. He first ran to the office where a young woman stood behind the desk, pulling on a drawer. “Kiki?”
The woman pointed to the east wing.
Cid ran across the hall through the work areas, pressing his hands to protect his ears from the machine sounds. He found himself in an area of the house he’d only visited once. He released his ears, but the screaming had stopped. All he could hear was the tingling of crystal and the dry-throated sound of a person who had screamed their voice away.
The door of the sitting room was open, and Cid moved in quickly, watching the motion of the chandelier, making sure it wasn’t going to fall. He spotted Kiki on the ground pointing at something above her that only she could see. He picked her up in his arms and walked her quickly out of there. He didn’t want to bring her past the workers, so he climbed the east stairs and pushed open the door to one of the suites. He set Kiki down on a sheet-covered settee. He took off his shirt and ran it under the faucet, giving a prayer of thanks that Walrus had already plumbed the east wing.