Andrea continued to be quiet, just gazing at the ring on her hand. John finally gave up and stopped talking to her, knowing there was no reasoning with her. They drove the rest of the way home in silence. He kept his eyes on the road while she admired the ring on her finger. Tears swelled in her eyes from time to time.
Tired, hungry and aching all over, he pulled into the driveway of the house. “At last we’re home. We can put the tools away later. I just want to get inside and take a hot shower, and get something to eat.” Andrea noticed John’s hands looked like he had been working in a field of mud. She didn’t look much better. They both needed to clean up.
The sun shone brightly in the eastern sky. Chirping birds announced the new dawn as they flew over the yard, flitting between trees. Glittering dewdrops sparkled on the grass as the sunbeams spread out across the land. What a beautiful morning.
Holding the old ledger still wrapped in his shirt, John opened the front door. Andrea went in ahead of him. Pointing to the small table in the foyer, she said, “Set the ledger there. We need to change clothes before we eat.” She spoke softly, knowing better than to hurry him into looking at the ledger.
They both went upstairs to clean up and change clothes. In the closet, she reached for a clean pair of jeans. The wooden box beckoned, so she bent down and lifted the lid, but because John stood so near she only peeked at the photograph and quickly set the lid back in place. John went off to shower while she changed clothes and hurried downstairs to make breakfast and a fresh pot of coffee.
Once in the kitchen, she started the coffeemaker and took a moment to sit at the table to catch her breath. John walked in and told her he would fix the food, something he didn’t do very often. He made some scrambled eggs. Andrea sat back, glancing at the clock on the wall. Six o’clock in the morning — a bright and warm day ahead of them.
Chapter Fourteen
John ate everything on his plate in record time, while Andrea hardly took a bite. She poured the coffee, knowing the time had come to get the ledger out. Anticipation rose.
He went to the foyer to get it. Andrea’s curiosity exploded. Gently, he carried the moldy leather book to the kitchen and set it on the table. Outside of being very old and somewhat decomposed, it still looked intact. “Well… let’s take a look at this great find of ours,” he said as he opened the cover. A repugnant odor erupted.
Andrea watched with great anticipation while he lifted the first page and turned it. “Be careful, John. Don’t bend the thing. It might tear or fall apart.”
The soft leather binding bent in his hand, but the pages were still solid. “It’s amazing how long this has been in the ground, and it’s still all together. You would think it would be completely destroyed after so many years.”
She moved her chair closer to his as he leaned forward to look over the first page. She clasped her hands in her lap and held them tightly together, squeezing until her fingers grew white. Her breathing grew short, and her heartbeat accelerated from the excitement she felt. Somehow she knew this would present important information about Anna. This was what she had wished for — a message, or even a clue about Anna and what might have happened to her.
The writing on the page was smeared but readable, the words written in ink. Blotches appeared everywhere, as though someone had written it in a hurry. John flipped through, finding writing on almost all of the pages. He looked puzzled. “Why would anyone do all of this writing and then bury it in an empty grave?”
A good question, but one only to be answered by reading the entries. “Read it, John,” she coaxed.
He turned back to the first page and began to read out loud.
“I hope God will forgive me for the deceitful deed that I have done. My wife Anna is gone from this world, but I have not her body to bury. Only I and the undertaker are aware of what happened. I paid him handsomely to remain silent.”
He lapsed into moment of silence. Andrea waited anxiously until he continued.
“This empty casket only contains this ledger, with an accounting of the events that brought me here, and the one thing left behind by my beloved wife before I lost her — her most beloved possession, the ring her mother gave her.
“Anna was a wonderful, loving wife and devoted mother, until something changed in her. Over a period of weeks, she became very different. Her behavior was strange. She hardly spoke to me or the children. She would not leave the house, not even to go out in the yard. In the middle of the night, I would find her walking around the house in a daze. In the daytime, she would stay alone in the attic for hours. She grew pale and thin. I could not convince her to see a doctor when her condition worsened as the days passed by. I was fearful about her mental state and did not want anyone to know about it. I kept friends and neighbors from seeing her. I told them she’d fallen ill with the croup and needed rest. Meanwhile, she ignored her responsibilities for the children and our home. I was forced to remain at home most of the time to attend to things.
“On August fourth, early in the morning, Anna left our bed. I watched her walk out of the bedroom and down the hallway to the open attic door. Then she went up the stairs.”
Andrea trembled as he read the incredible accounting of what had happened to Anna. Her hands grew hot with sweat.
“What happened to her up in the attic is unbelievable, horrifying. I find it very difficult to recount. When I reached the top of the stairs, Anna stood in the middle of the floor in front of a dark, oval-shaped opening, which began to grow larger. A cold wind came from it while it swirled around in a circular motion. The dark hole got larger and larger. Anna was being pulled toward it by some kind of force. I ran to her and grabbed her hand. I tried to pull her back away from it, but the force was too strong. I could not save her.”
A stream of ink ran down the right side of the page, as though the pen slipped from his fingers in his anguish.
He took a deep breath and then went on.
“I held onto her as tightly as I could for a long time, but suddenly her hand slipped away from mine. The ring slipped off her finger and was left in my clutching hand. Anna was pulled into the dark hole. A deep, evil voice came from the darkness, telling me that my Anna was his, that she now belonged to him. Then the dark hole closed and disappeared. It was over; she was gone. She was taken from me by evil, and I will never see her again.
“I fear for my daughters, so I must take them away from here immediately. No one must ever know where we are. I will bury this ledger along with Anna’s ring as a memorial to her.”
Andrea began to cry.
John stuttered, searching for words. “I can’t believe this, it’s so bizarre. How could this be true?” He closed the ledger and pushed it to the middle of the table. “Look, this is crazy. It sounds like this guy was wacky. Listen, Andrea, you can’t believe this wild story. It’s not real. This Joseph guy might have done something awful to his wife, and to get rid of his own guilt, he wrote all of this down in a ledger and buried it. That might have been his way of covering up some dirty deed he did. Don’t let this story get to you. Besides, this happened a long time ago. You should just forget it. It means nothing.”
He talked to her this way in an attempt to comfort her, but deep down inside, he felt the impact of the story and it frightened him. He had to wonder if there was any truth to it. Now more than ever, he needed to convince Andrea to move out of the house.
“Maybe this guy put her away in an institution, and then he made everyone think she died. If he did, it was sure a great scam with the funeral.” He paused, watching for her reaction. “Maybe she’d left him and he was too embarrassed to let anyone know. Back in those days, divorce was taboo.”
She wasn’t saying anything even though he’d tried to provide comfort with other logic. John stopped talking and watched her.
She made no indication that she agreed or disagreed with anything he’d said. He went on. “It just seems to me like this guy had a screw loose or something.” He walked to the back door. The yard lit
up bright with the morning sun. “We are going to move, Andrea. I hope you realize that. We need to get out of this house. I don’t care what happened to this guy and his wife. The whole thing is turning our lives into a nightmare.” He turned and looked at her. She sat at the kitchen table, motionless. Shaking his head, he opened the door and walked outside.
Andrea could see him standing on the patio, looking out at the yard with a strained look on his face. Then he peered back at her through the door. “I’m going to unload the car.”
Andrea looked at the old ledger. Her hand trembled as she opened the moist leather cover. She began to reread the contents. John is wrong. “This is what Anna has been trying to tell me,” she whispered. She knew down deep inside Anna was coming to her for help, but how could she help a ghost?
Hopelessly imprisoned by her thoughts, she sat at the table and stared at the ring on her finger. It had been a long night, and a very eventful one. After learning what she had from the old leather book, there was no way she would consider moving out of the house. She wanted to stay and find a way to help Anna.
John had finished unloading the car and put the thermos on the counter to be cleaned out. “I’m exhausted. I’m going to lie down for a while,” he told her. “I know there’s no sense in talking to you right now.”
In a state of emotional collapse, Andrea began crying again. Tears streamed down her face. Anxiety, fear, and anger complicated her thoughts. She wiped her face with a tissue. Her eyes felt swollen, and she was very tired. Going to the living room, she lay down on the sofa and looked around the room. This house was all she’d ever dreamed of—the charm and character, the tranquil surroundings. How desperately she wanted to stay here. If only there were a way to solve the problem of Anna, she knew John would give up the idea of moving.
Soon, despite her lingering fears, she fell asleep and began to dream. She stood in the living room of the past, wearing a white silk nightgown and a dark blue velvet robe. Her soft brown hair fell down around her shoulders. From the flowered glass globe of an oil lamp came the soft glow that illuminated the whole room.
The form of a male figure appeared in the foyer, but she couldn’t see his face until he walked into the room. It was him, the handsome man who had appeared in her other dreams. This time he wore a gray vested suit. His white shirt had a high collar and mother-of-pearl buttons going down the front.
He walked to her, standing by the fireplace. His green eyes sparkled in the flicker of the oil lamp. A tingling sensation ran through her body when he approached her. The light from the fire cast a soothing orange glow that danced on her body. She waited for his touch with great excitement.
He wrapped his muscular arms around her waist, pulling her close. He lavished kisses on her neck as he held her tightly. Her passion rose as he pressed his lower body firmly against hers. She felt like she was on fire as his lips joined hers. Slowly he lowered his hand down to her hips…
With a jolt, she bolted upright. The phone had woken her. The sudden interruption left her trembling. In a half-daze, she rose to her feet, stumbling and nearly falling as she started toward the foyer. She hurried to the kitchen and picked up the receiver. She heard John on the line talking to someone, so she quietly set the phone back in place.
Her heart beat fast as she sat at the table, trying to focus her thoughts. Outside, it looked hot and humid with a cloudy overcast. The earth shimmered with a mist of dew that hung lazily over the ground. The smell of cemetery soil still lingered on her body. In a groggy state, she went upstairs to shower and change.
John was still on the phone when she entered the bedroom. “I told you to call him in the morning, so just do what I said,” he snapped into the receiver. “Call him right now.”
Andrea went about her business, paying little attention to his conversation. She took some clean clothes out of the dresser drawer and went to the bathroom to shower. The soothing water felt good against her body. She closed her eyes as she stood under the spray, letting it come down on the top of her head, over her face, and trickle gently down her shoulders. The warmth slowly overcame the chill that had plagued her for the last several hours.
When she returned to the bedroom, she found John sitting on the bed, staring into space. As she reached for her hairbrush on the dresser, his gaze fell on the ring still on her finger. “I see you’re wearing that ring. It’s not a good idea, Andrea. This whole thing is doing something to you. Something I don’t like. We need to talk about what we’re going to do now.”
She sighed but didn’t reply. He went on. “This is a great town, and there are a lot of nice houses around here. Even an apartment would be better than staying here in this place. It’s an old house. We should have never bought it in the first place, and I don’t really need such a big yard. I don’t have time for it anyway. This is too far from my work. And there are a lot of other reasons we should move out of here, and you know what they are.”
Andrea was not convinced. She ignored him while she finished dressing, then went over to the window and gazed at the yard and trees outside.
“Are you listening to me, or am I talking to the wall?”
Andrea walked quietly to the doorway. As she was about to leave the room, she turned to face him. “I don’t want to move, John.”
“Why do you want to stay here? Is this the way you want to live — being on edge all the time, waiting for the next episode to take place? Andrea, I wish you would come to your senses and understand what we’re up against here. You’re not going to change it.”
“Why can’t you see it my way for a change? You always have to have things your way. You talk about understanding. You’re the one that doesn’t understand.”
“You think you’re going to do something about all of this. That you can make it stop.” He paced back and forth. “Andrea, there is nothing you can do to end this nightmare.” Then he rushed past her and left the room.
She went to the closet and took the photograph out of the wooden box. She stared at it for a long time. “I’m not going to leave you,” she whispered.
Chapter Fifteen
John went outside to work in the yard, hoping to relieve some of his hostilities, but the heat only aggravated him more. Sweating and thirsty, he came into the kitchen for something cool to drink. Andrea stood at the sink, washing dishes.
“What is there to drink around here?” he demanded.
“There’s some iced tea and soda in the refrigerator,” she said, and went on with her cleaning. A cool drink helped some, but John still needed to rid himself of his frustrations, so he went back outside to cut the grass.
Andrea poured herself a glass of iced tea and sat at the table. She could see John out back through the screen door and watched him walk up and down the yard with the lawn mower. Sipping on the cold drink, she let her thoughts wander to the dream she’d had. The ring on her finger sparkled as the sunlight from the open door rested softly on it. It looked so beautiful and mysterious. Anna must have treasured it.
Gazing at the ring with admiration, she imagined herself with the tall, wonderful man in her dreams, his beautiful green eyes looking down at her while they danced. She could almost feel his arms holding her in a passionate embrace as they circled around the floor. She imagined standing with him in the middle of a grand ballroom — his touch so gentle and kind, his lips soft and moist against hers. The smell of his cologne and the feel of his strong arms around her made her passion rise. Tingles ran up her arms to her back and down her spine.
Gradually, the kitchen decor began to change. The table became a heavy wooden butcher block, the vinyl floor turned to hardwood, and dark floral wallpaper took the place of the brightly painted walls. On the windows hung straight, lacy curtains, and at each side of the sink were long cabinets. She looked around the room in amazement. Another trip back in time, only this time she wasn’t asleep. It might not be a vision, but she couldn’t be sure.
The open door no longer had a screen on it. She could se
e out into an unfamiliar yard that went on much farther than the one she knew. Open fields, rows of grapevines, and a huge weeping willow stood at the back of the house. Further out, a horse grazed in the field. A railed fence surrounded the area. Beyond that, corn stood four to five feet high, going back as far as she could see. A sense of tranquility came over her, unlike the feelings she’d had with the other visions. Relaxing, comforting. The only thing that hadn’t changed was the warm breeze coming in from the open door. She could smell the sweet fragrance of the outside.
The sudden slamming of the back door jolted her upright in the chair. John entered the kitchen, startling her back into reality. He walked over to the refrigerator. “Wow, it’s hot out there,” he said as he took the pitcher of tea out and set it on the counter.
Andrea closed her eyes. John’s appearance had her shaking. When she opened her eyes, the room had come back to the present — so had the outside when she looked through the screen door. She took a deep breath before speaking,. “I didn’t expect you in so soon. It’s too hot out for you to be working in the yard today.” She stood up. “Why don’t you stay inside, take a cool shower, and forget the yard for now?”
His expression became puzzled. “So soon? I’ve been out there for the last two hours, and let me tell you, that’s enough for me today.” He left the kitchen and went upstairs.
The clock on the wall read five. The day was almost over—to her, a day that never happened. Strange. She had a sense of not belonging, of bewilderment with her surroundings. She had nothing prepared for dinner, and she knew John would be hungry after all the yard work and the physical strain of digging that grave. Neither had eaten much since the day before. She hurried to find something to make, only to come up with some ham and cheese sandwiches. That would work because it was something John liked. Some pickles and potato chips would complete the meal.
What Happened to Anna? Page 16