by Susan Finlay
“No. I think I’m all right. What about everyone else? Where is my son? Is Tobias here? Please tell me he’s all right.”
“I’m right here, Mom.” Tobias bent down and hugged his mother. “I was afraid you wouldn’t find us or that we wouldn’t find you.”
Sofie held her son. “You scared me half to death. I don’t know what I’d do if I lost you. You shouldn’t have left. I warned you to stay with me.”
“Sorry.” Tobias lowered his head and scraped his foot on the ground.
“What about Tante Lotte? Is she here?”
Max said, “She landed right after you did. She’s right over here.” He shined his flashlight on Lotte. “I haven’t heard a peep from her. We better check on her.” He helped Sofie stand up, and together they found Lotte, sitting and moaning softly, looking dazed.
Sofie spoke to her great-aunt in German, then turned to Max. “She’s shaken up and probably a bit bruised, but I don’t think she has broken any bones. Do you have any idea where we are?”
“Well, that’s what we’ve been trying to figure out.” He looked back up at the circle of light, still swirling. “I think we should try to run back through that opening.”
“Oh my God. What is that?” Sofie asked, looking behind her and moving away from it as if expecting someone or something to attack.
“Looks like some weird sort of window or doorway,” Max said. “We didn’t notice it until you came through it. Don’t know if it was here when we first arrived. I’m not even sure if we were lucid at that point.”
“We came through that?” Sofie asked.
“Yeah. It’s frightening, but if that’s how we got here, maybe we can go back the same way, you know, run straight into it the way they do in movies.”
Sofie nodded, took Tobias’s hand, and waited while Max and Ryan each grabbed Lotte by the shoulder and walked her toward the circle. Lotte stumbled over a rock and screamed out in pain. As they all paused to allow her a chance to recover, the bright circle disappeared before their eyes.
“Dammit,” Max said. What is going on?”
“Are we dreaming this?” Sofie asked.
“I wish I could say yes.” He walked over to the area where the opening had been moments earlier and shined his flashlight this way and that. “What the hell? There are stalactites and stalagmites in here. Lotte tripped over one of the stalagmites.”
“You mean like in a cave?” Sofie said.
“Yeah, that’s exactly what I mean. I was wondering if we might be in a cave. Now I’m pretty certain.”
Tobias said, “How did the cellar spit us into a cave?”
“That’s an interesting question indeed. We were in the cellar. Then, when we went through the cellar door, it looked like we were in a tunnel or long corridor, or whatever it was, one minute, and then all hell broke loose and we were lying on the ground in this cave or cavern, or whatever this is.”
Sofie put her hand on her son’s head. “We were going to stay together, were we not?”
“Yeah,” Max said. “That was the plan. Until Tobias and Ryan opened the door and I went in after them.”
“Tobias, please,” Sofie said, “no more running off. You must stay with us and do what we tell you. Especially now. You two could have been lost in here alone.” She turned then, and said something in German to Lotte.
“Were both of you in the tunnel, too,” Max asked, “you know, before you landed here?”
“Yes. We heard a strange squeak sound and started looking for it. When we realized you three were gone, I rushed up the stairs to see if you’d gone back to the kitchen, but stopped when Tante Lotte screamed. I ran back down the stairs and nearly broke my neck in the process. By the time we reached the door, the only sound I heard was a whooshing noise and air sucking through the door cracks.”
“What happened then?”
“I tried to open the door. It wouldn’t open at first. I waited a minute, then tried again. Tante Lotte tried to stop me, but I had to open it. As soon as I did, we were both sucked inside. It was like a cyclone or hurricane. The door slammed shut behind us, everything went crazy, and the next thing I knew, we landed here.”
Max nodded. “I’m sorry I dragged you into this, but I’m glad you and your family are together.”
“I’m glad, too. I don’t know what I would have done if I hadn’t found Tobias.”
“Do you have your flashlight?”
Sofie nodded.
They all shined their lights around the cave. In short order, Max became convinced they were indeed now in a cave. He saw nothing anywhere around them except rock, dirt, pitch black nooks and crannies, and the few slivers of light he’d spotted earlier. There was no sign of the corridor or doorway in any direction.
“How did we get here?” Sofie asked. “How could we have gone through solid rock?”
Max sighed. “Damned if I know. This is insane. Did you get a look at the tunnel while you were inside? You know, in the room off of the cellar. ” He was trembling now not only from the icy coldness of the cave, but from a sinking gut-deep fear.
“No. I didn’t see anything. I’d barely entered the room and the next thing I knew, I was tossed on the ground.” She shivered, and then in a shaky voice asked, “Max, how do we get out of here?”
“I don’t know, but we should try to get to that area where light is coming through.” He sighed again and then took a deep breath. “If we can get outside, we can try working our way back to the house. Can you and Ryan help Lotte? I think she’s still in shock.”
Max led the way, slowly passing rocks and outcroppings, shining the flashlight back and forth. He scrambled over a sizeable mound of rocks and then reached back to help Sofie, Tobias, Lotte, and Ryan.
At the site where cracks of light seeped in, Ryan and Max were able to pry away some of the rocks, allowing Max to squeeze his head through a narrow opening and into bright sunlight. The sudden surge of light was almost blinding. He closed his eyes momentarily to slowly accustom his eyes to the light. Max pulled his head back inside, and then he and Ryan continued prying rocks from the opening, pausing now and again to allow dust and dirt to fall away. With the opening now large enough to accommodate a person, Max helped Ryan squeeze through first and asked him to help pull the others through while he pushed. They helped Tobias out first, then Lotte, with Sofie talking Lotte through in German, and then Sofie exited. Max was able to lever himself mostly through, then halfway got stuck on a protruding rock. Ryan smiled and told his father he needed to lose weight, just to taunt, but levered the stone aside enough and helped pull his father through.
They had emerged into a grassy meadow with thick forest in all directions. Birds were chirping and bees were going about their business pollinating wildflowers poking up here and there through the tall grass. Of the house there was no sign in any direction. Everyone seemed stunned and confused, the same thought apparent in each mind, Max suspected. Max was the first to break the silence, shaking his head, stuffing his hands in his pockets and stating the obvious, “This seems like the spot where the house should be, but I don’t see any sign of it. We could not have gone very far in the tunnel, I mean cave, whatever it was.”
Sofie sighed. “It was right there,” she said, pointing to a spot “I’m sure of it. I recognize that stand of trees, especially the gnarled tree with a hole in the trunk about four meters up, where the tree branches out. Do you see the trees?” She pointed ahead, slightly to the sunny side of the group. “Only they were much bigger.” She drew her eyebrows together, and rubbed her forehead. “There seems to be a lot more scattered rocks than before, though, but no walls. We have rock piles and moss everywhere. This doesn’t make any sense.”
“The wooded area that we saw from the kitchen window seems to still be there, but the barn, cows, and crop field that were over there,” Max said, pointing to another lush grassy area with wildflowers blowing in a sudden breeze, “are gone. And, look, there’s the river and waterfall. They look pretty mu
ch the same.” He raised his arms palms-up in frustration. “What the hell! The house, barn, and the rest couldn’t have vanished. If it was an earthquake, we would at least see the rubble and the fields would still be there.” He ran his hand through his hair, shook his head. “I just don’t know.” He sighed heavily. Lotte had seemed to recover her faculties during their transition above ground and was frowning. “Could you ask your aunt if she knows anything about this?”
Sofie spoke in German to Lotte, then told Max, “She claims she doesn’t know anything.”
“Claims? You have reason to doubt she’s telling the truth?” She didn’t answer. Max said, “Okay, well, I guess we need to explore the area. Look for anything that might help.”
AN HOUR LATER, Max shook his head in despair. “I give up, I don’t get it. Could we be wrong? Maybe this isn’t the same spot, but it sure looks like it to me.”
“I’m almost certain it is,” Sofie said. “Anyway, as you said, we couldn’t have gone very far from the house in the cave. Right?”
Max nodded solemnly. “You know, as a Californian, I’ve experienced lots of earthquakes. At first, I thought that’s what this was. A very odd earthquake. Until we found this.” He waved his arm and pointed around them. But I no longer think so. An explosion or storm wouldn’t explain any of what we’re seeing now, either, would they?”
Sofie drew her brows together and looked deep in thought. “No, I don’t see how. None of those would explain the sudden appearance of wildflowers in the field or the disappearance of all signs of development. I know it was rural here, but there was a farm, cows, and a stone house. The stones we’re seeing aren’t shattered as they would most likely be if the house had exploded. A storm might be strong enough to destroy the barn since it was built of wood, but I can’t imagine a storm here that would totally destroy a stone house. And where are the ruins?”
“Yeah, and the house had a cellar underneath it, and an underground bathroom. If something destroyed the above-ground structure and took away all the wreckage, which seems impossible, we should see gaping holes where those underground rooms are.” Max scratched his head.
“So, if there wasn’t an earthquake, storm, or explosion, then what?” Sofie asked.
He shrugged his shoulders, unable to come up with an explanation that wouldn’t sound crazy.
Sofie’s eyes teared and her face paled.
Max walked over to her and put his arm around her shoulder, pulling her close. “I’m really sorry I got you and your family involved. If I hadn’t shown up at your house . . . .
“If you hadn’t shown up, I might be dead or in the hospital with a serious injury. You rescued me, remember?”
Max didn’t know how to respond. Tobias and Ryan sat on a pile of rocks five feet away, watching Max and Sofie, as if they would miraculously figure out what to do. Lotte walked around as if in a daze again. “Let’s sit down over there on that big rock,” Max said. She nodded. He led her over to it and they sat side by side. “Try not to despair. We’ll figure this out,” he whispered. “We have to stick together. We’ll get back home.” He hoped he was telling the truth, for all their sakes. In the long silence that followed, a thought suddenly occurred to him. His mother had been visiting her parents when she and her father disappeared. The parents had lived in the very same house that had just disappeared. Had his mother and grandfather ended up in this predicament? Is that why they went missing? If that were the case, what had happened to them? He wasn’t sure he wanted to know.
Max stood up. “Okay. I hate to say this, but let’s go back into the cave. We’ll make a thorough search for clues. Maybe what happened can be reversed and we’ll end up back in the cellar. If we don’t, I guess we’ll have to go back to town.” He hoped they could find the town—that it was still there—but he didn’t say anything. No sense alarming the others.
Sofie nodded and picked up her flashlight. Then she looked at Tobias and said loudly enough for him to hear, “You can come with us inside the cave, but stay near the exit with Tante Lotte and Ryan unless we call for you. Do not wander off. Understand?”
Tobias nodded. Sofie explained to Lotte what they planned.
Ryan, subdued, said, “Dad, let me help search the cave.”
“Okay. But be very careful and stay within sight of us.”
They all climbed back down inside the cave. Lotte sat with Tobias next to her on rocks inside the cave, near the entrance, and flashed her light around the interior to help guide the others.
After two hours of searching, they gave up and climbed out of the cave once more, tired and bewildered. Max suddenly remembered his cell phone. The last time he’d used it was this morning to take pictures of the town while he and Ryan were walking along the wall. He’d charged the battery the night before, in his hotel room in Stuttgart. Probably won’t work here, but gotta try. He pulled the phone out of his pant pocket and checked it. The power still worked, but he couldn’t get a signal. He turned off the power to save the battery, and stuck the phone back in his pocket. “I don’t see any choice but to go back to Riesen, do you?”
“Maybe we should stay here,” Sofie said. “Someone might come looking for you.”
“For me? Unlikely. My ex-wife and daughter are the only ones that know Ryan and I are in Europe, and they don’t know where. They don’t expect Ryan back until he starts college. We were supposed to start our trip together, then split up for a while. Once we flew back to California together, I was to take him directly to his college dorm in Sacramento. His sister is going to a different school—in New York. Therefore, they won’t even know if we don’t get home. At least not for a while.”
“What about your employer?” she asked. “Won’t someone report you missing when you don’t go back to work?”
Max grimaced. “Unfortunately, no. The architectural design firm I worked for laid me off two months ago. I’m between jobs. What about you? Maybe someone will miss you or Tobias or your great-aunt.”
“Not right away. I’m self-employed. I work at home and on my own schedule. As for Tobias, school is out for the summer. Tante Lotte doesn’t go anywhere on a regular basis. I’m sorry.”
Max nodded, then asked, “What about that librarian? She knows we were looking for Grandma’s house.”
“She might come forward if someone reports us missing.”
“Yeah, well, it probably won’t make much difference. I mean, if someone looks for us, they either won’t find us or the house, or they’ll find the house but not us, or they’ll actually find us in searching the house the way we did and wind up here, too. And they probably won’t know how to get back, either.”
“Yes, you’re probably right. I guess we don’t have much choice then, do we?”
”Nope. Before we leave, we should mark this spot somehow to enable us to can find it again. Probably should hide all of our possessions here, too. Just in case.”
Sofie stared at him, a perplexed look on her face.
Max said, “Sorry. I figured that since we don’t know what the hell is going on, we should be careful.”
“Shouldn’t I take my house keys? If we get back to my house . . . .”
“Hmm. I hate to say this, but do you really think we’re going to find your house. I mean, if this one vanished, well, we might not even find Riesen.”
“Oh God, now you’re really scaring me.”
“Sorry, Sofie. I’m scared, too. This is crazy. I hate to say this, but I’m afraid we aren’t . . . well, that we aren’t—hell, I don’t know what I mean.”
She nodded. The pallor of her face made him rethink his proposal.
“Okay,” Max said, “Of course, go ahead and take your house keys. Maybe we’ll get lucky and find your house. We’ll take all our stuff. That way, if we don’t find your house, but find the town, we can get food and hotel rooms, right?” He put his arm around her shoulder to comfort her. “I’m probably being paranoid. It’ll be good to have our watches and cell phones, too.” He didn’t ad
d that he’d already tried to get a signal when they’d gotten out of the cave, but couldn’t get one. He’d told himself he probably wouldn’t have gotten a signal way out here even if he’d tried to use the phone when they’d first arrived at the house. But he had a sneaking suspicion there was more to it than that. He still wanted the phone, because even if he couldn’t make calls, he could look at photos he’d taken of his family, his home, and his trip.
He thought about his pocketknife. He normally carried it with him at all times, but had stuck it in his checked-bag for the flight. If he remembered right, while in his hotel room, he’d put it back into his pocket. He reached into his pant pocket. It was there. Thank goodness. On second thought, it might pose a problem to take it along. Well, it could also be a lifesaver. He left it in his pocket.
He looked over at Lotte who was sitting on a large boulder in the distance. Her scarf was gone, showing her light brown hair styled in a braid wrapped up into a bun near the top of her head. The bun was coming loose and threatening to fall. He turned to Sofie. “Can you talk to your great-aunt and tell her we’re going to look for the town?”
LOTTE TURNED HER head when Sofie sat down beside her, a look of concern on her face.
“Are you all right, Tante Lotte? You look lonely sitting here away from the others.”
Lotte nodded and hoped her great-niece wouldn’t see that she’d been crying. She’d been trying for the past few hours to figure out what to do. Vikktor had warned her to stay out of the cellar of that old house and to keep Sofie away. After he had faked his death ten years ago, Lotte had invited Sofie to move in with her in her Gottingen house instead of into the house she’d inherited from Vikktor. “I can help you with the birth of your son,” Lotte had told her. “You need to think of happy times right now. If you move to Riesen, you will be constantly reminded of your grandfather’s death. You can finish your college here.” Sofie had given in and moved to Gottingen for one year, until she graduated. But then she got accepted to graduate school in the U.S and moved away.
When Sofie returned to Germany a year ago, she’d moved into her grandfather’s house against Lotte’s advice. She had invited Lotte to move there, too, which Lotte did because Vikktor had asked her to look out for Sophie and her child. They were getting along fine, and everything would have been all right if Max had not come to Riesen. Vikktor—if and when he found her—was going to be angry and blame her for what had happened to them all.