“Hold on,” Barbara said once they reached the bottom of the stairs. She went into the kitchen and returned with a set of keys in one hand and a pot of coffee in the other.
“Here’s the house keys – keep them,” she said. “You can return them to me when this is all over. And here’s that refill I promised you!” She held out the pot and Roy uncapped his cup.
“I want you both to know I appreciate what you’re doing,” she said as she poured the hot coffee. “We just paid that charlatan thousands, and neither of you have asked me for a dime. Your generosity is kind of rare these days.”
“But you are paying us,” Roy said, placing the lid back onto his cup. “You just keep that coffee flowing, and we’ll be paid in full.”
She smiled at him and tilted her head with a look that said “I like you too!”
◊
Cell phone coverage at the Winters’ house was spotty, but as soon as they were back in Aberdeen, Steven pulled the car over and used his phone to take a picture of Roy’s drawing. Then he sent it to Eliza and gave her a call, passing the phone to Roy to hold while he drove.
“Hello?” Eliza answered.
“Hi, Eliza, it’s Roy. Got you on speakerphone so Steven can hear you too. He just sent you a picture of an object we’ve run into. We think it might be the cause of the hauntings we’re working on up here. Did you get it?”
“I was just looking at it when you called,” Eliza said. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“Any ideas?” Roy asked. “Stabs in the dark, even?”
“No,” Eliza replied, “and it sounds like you’re as baffled as I am.”
“Anyone you know who might be able to help?” Roy asked.
“Well, there is Elliott, that database guy in Magnolia,” Eliza said. “Wasn’t he starting to track objects in addition to people?”
Roy rolled his eyes. Steven caught him doing it and jumped in before he could say anything.
“Yes, he might be an option,” Steven said. “I went back to him just after we finished up with Vohuman, gave him what he wanted. We’ve got a huge credit with him. Roy doesn’t seem enthusiastic about it, though.”
“Come on, Roy!” Eliza said. “He’s just a geek! Don’t be intimidated by him!”
Roy pulled his face back in disgust. “I am not intimidated by him!” he said indignantly.
“We’ll try there when we’re back in Seattle,” Steven said to Eliza. “In the meantime, we’re stuck. We don’t know what it is or how it works.”
“Well, I’ve got something that might get you unstuck on another front,” Eliza said. “I found out more about the legend shelf. I went back to the woman who sold mine to me, and she said there are other objects that will work with it, that are complementary to it. One of them will give you more information on the yellow.”
“That’s great news!” Steven said.
“The object you want looks like a flat cork board,” Eliza said, “about eight inches round, like a trivet. When you drop into the River it will become translucent, like a glass plate. It interacts with the legend shelf somehow, and will tell you more about what’s causing the yellow area. They’re rare, but I know where I saw an eight inch round cork trivet recently.”
“Where?” Steven asked.
“Well, Roy, if you weren’t happy about visiting Elliott,” Eliza said, “you won’t be happy about this. I saw the trivet at Judith’s house, in Gig Harbor. It was on her shelves in that room where she was resting on the day bed.”
Roy groaned audibly.
“I’ll go alone,” Steven said to Roy. “If you go, it’ll just cause trouble.”
Roy smiled. “I’m OK with that,” he said, and took another sip of his coffee.
◊
Steven left Roy in the car and walked up the steps to Judith’s mansion on the hill rising above the harbor. When he knocked on the door, the same routine occurred that always played out whenever they visited in the past: invited in by Clara, told to wait in the library, then invited up to the second floor drawing room, where Judith was stretched out on the day bed, looking out large windows with a view of the water.
“I didn’t expect to see you again,” Judith said. “Your father not with you this time?”
“He was unable to come,” Steven said.
“Please forgive me for seeing you here, in my ordinary drawing room instead of the formal rooms downstairs. But I have a bad bout of arthritis today and moving about is terrifically painful.”
Steven considered confronting her about her story. He’d heard a different excuse every time they visited, and he suspected she couldn’t keep her lies straight. He looked down at the blanket covering the lower half of her body and thought he saw it move in a place where her legs couldn’t possibly be. What was it Victor had said? Steven thought. A demon had transformed them when she got a little mouthy?
“Last time I saw you,” she said, noticing where Steven was looking and adjusting the blanket a little, “you and your father were bee-lining it out of here, determined to do something foolhardy. Looks like you survived whatever you attempted.”
“That’s because we decided to follow your advice and drop it,” Steven lied.
She looked at him with suspicion. “And Aka Manah?”
“We struck a truce,” Steven replied.
“Doesn’t sound like Aka Manah,” she said, squinting her eyes.
“If I hadn’t worked something out, do you think I’d even be here, talking to you now? I’d be dead, or worse, just as you predicted.”
“That’s true,” she said, tilting her head to the side. Steven could see she didn’t completely buy his story.
“I’m here on a completely different matter,” Steven said. “I was hoping you’d loan me something.”
“Loan you something?” she said, sitting more uprightly on her day bed. “What?”
“We’re having some trouble with a legend shelf, and I was hoping you’d loan me your device for reading them.”
“What device is that?” she said sweetly.
“The cork trivet,” Steven said, pointing behind himself to her shelves. “The one that transforms into glass. I’d like to borrow it for a couple of days.”
“What are you talking about?” Judith said. “Something on my shelves?”
“Yes,” Steven said, turning to walk toward them. He scanned the shelves, looking for the trivet Eliza had seen. He spotted it under a metal pitcher. “May I?” he asked.
“Go ahead,” Judith replied.
He lifted the pitcher with his right hand, feeling a numbness begin to creep into his skin from the contact. He slid the trivet out from under it with his left hand, and quickly replaced the pitcher on the shelf. His fingers on his right hand had gone to sleep, so he shook them.
“I find that I can’t keep that Frozen Well on the bare wood for long, or the wood rots prematurely,” Edith said. “Hence the trivet you’re holding.”
Steven looked at the cork trivet. It looked ordinary, like the kind you’d buy in a three pack from any store. “You mean this isn’t an object?” he asked.
“No, it’s just a trivet!” she said, beginning to laugh. “You thought it was something that works with a legend shelf? Oh my, that’s rich!”
Steven turned to replace it, but stopped when he saw the other objects on her shelves. They were all beautiful and unusual. He noticed a vase, and under it was an intricately crocheted doily. Under another was a delicate piece of lace, and another, a beautifully embroidered cloth. Then he looked at the trivet he was holding. She’d never use something this ordinary in this display shelf, he thought. She’s fucking with me.
He dropped into the River, and the cork trivet in his hands turned to glass, emanating a white light.
“Now, that’s rude!” Judith exclaimed as he dropped out of the flow. “Quite unacceptable. I’d like you to leave immediately!”
“How much?” Steven asked. “For a week, or until I’m done with it.”
&
nbsp; Judith sputtered, huffing and puffing. She looked like she wanted to leap to her feet, but instead Steven noticed roiling under the blanket covering her legs.
“I’ll give you a thousand,” Steven said.
“I won’t loan you that!” Judith said. “Put it back, and leave!”
“You will loan it to me,” Steven said, “as an apology for lying to me.”
“I’ve done no such thing!” she said, indignantly, raising her nose into the air.
“Another lie,” Steven said. He walked back to Judith, holding the trivet. “You lied to me about my markings. You have a device here that could have diagnosed them, but you didn’t share it with me. We both know why.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Judith said, reaching down to straighten out the blanket on her legs. “It’s pure poppycock! I have no device like that.”
“I have to confess, I lied to you too,” Steven said. “About Aka Manah. The reason he’s not a problem for me anymore is that I killed him.”
Judith’s mouth dropped. “You did no such thing!” she said. “Impossible!”
“Impossible if I had listened to you. All your misdirection. All of your lies. So listen,” Steven said, walking closer to her, brandishing the trivet in her face. “I’m going to borrow this, and you’re going to loan it to me. Got it?”
“Stay away!” she said, and Steven noticed more movement under the blanket, as though things were retracting away from him as he approached her, the blanket settling to reveal that nothing was there.
He sat on the day bed next to her and placed his hand on the blanket a few feet from her body. He could only feel the cushion of the day bed under it. He let a little of the sensation he felt when he killed the demon return to his thinking, and heat quickly replaced the feeling of numbness in his right hand as his markings flared. “If I was able to kill Aka Manah,” Steven said, “I wonder what else I could do?”
She had pulled back from him as far as the day bed would allow, a terrified expression on her face. Her mouth moved, but Steven couldn’t tell what she was saying.
“I can’t hear you,” he said.
Her mouth moved again, but still nothing came out.
“Judith! Speak up!”
“Take it!” she squeaked. “Just take it!”
“It’s a loan,” Steven said. “A thousand dollars. I’ll return it when I’m done.”
“I don’t want it back,” she said so quietly he could barely hear her, her eyes wide and her head stretched back as far away from him as she could position it.
“Well then, you’d need to sell it to me,” Steven said. “What’s a fair price?”
She looked like she was about to burst into tears. Steven placed his hand on the back of the day bed, a few feet from her body, and slid a little toward her. She looked at his hand, his marking, and recoiled.
“Now, now,” Steven said. “You must have known when you decided to lie to me that this might happen. I realize you’re under an agreement you can’t break. I don’t know that I hold you responsible for the death of my son, the way that I held Aka Manah responsible. If that were the case, you’d already be dead. But since you were so fucking unhelpful with all of that, I think the least you can do is sell me this object at a fair price.”
“Take it,” he said, recovering her voice. “My gift.”
“No, I want it to be fair. Unlike how you treated me and my father.”
“Ten thousand?” she asked timidly, afraid of the reply.
“A little steep, don’t you think?”
“Five?”
“Sold!” Steven said. “I’ll send you a check. Sorry, can’t get that kind of cash from an ATM. I trust that’ll be acceptable?”
“Perfectly acceptable,” she said, forcing a smile.
“Great,” Steven said, standing up and facing her. “I guess we’re done. I appreciate your cooperation.” He walked to the large double doors and opened them. Clara was standing just outside the doors, as though she had been listening. Steven stopped and turned back to Judith.
“And Judith, please, let’s stay on a friendly level going forward, shall we? Trust me, you don’t want me as an enemy. What they did to you – I can do far worse.”
He turned and caught Clara’s eye. She was furious, but Steven just smiled at her. “Go in and check on her,” he said. “She seems upset. Don’t worry about me — I know my way out.”
Chapter Six
“She had it, huh?” Roy asked, holding the trivet Steven handed to him. He turned it over in his hands, then dropped into the River briefly to check it out.
“She tried to pass it off as a just a cork trivet,” Steven said, starting the car and pulling out of the parking space. “I convinced her to sell it to me. She was resistant until I persuaded her.”
“Damn,” Roy said. “Now I wish I’d have gone in there with you.”
“You would have enjoyed it,” Steven said, smiling. “It was real John Wayne.”
“Damn!” Roy said. “I guess I better go with you to the database kid then, as much as I don’t want to. I wouldn’t want to miss anything entertaining.”
“We’re much closer to Eximere than to Seattle,” Steven said. “I think we ought to try this trivet with the legend shelf before we go see Elliott. I wish I could just email him a picture of the rod, like I did with Eliza, but he’s far too paranoid for that. When I asked him for his email address, he just laughed at me.”
“Alright, back to Eximere then,” Roy said. “Let’s hope it’s still there.”
“Don’t say that,” Steven gulped, uncomfortable at the thought. He started the car and pulled out of his parking spot, then left Gig Harbor, hoping he might never need to return.
◊
When they opened the door at the bottom of the stairs, they were met with total darkness. The light from the stairwell lit a little of the path to Eximere, but Steven reached for the flashlight he’d brought and turned it on. Roy did the same.
“Looks like this place is still FUBAR,” Roy said, shining his light around. “Can’t see shit.”
“Come on,” Steven said, starting down the path. He could hear Roy grumbling behind him.
“I don’t like being in the dark like this,” Roy said. “Makes me think the whole place is going to come down. With us inside.”
“We’ll check out the trivet, and if it’s still dark after that, we’ll head back,” Steven said. The slight snort he heard from Roy told him he grudgingly agreed with the plan.
As they walked to the steps of the house, the lights suddenly turned on, at full intensity. Steven raised his hand to shield his eyes, and turned off his flashlight.
“I guess we’re back in business,” Steven said, walking up the steps and into the open archway. He sat the plastic bags he’d been carrying on a small table in the entryway and began pulling out electric lanterns and candles.
Roy walked around him and down the hallway to the left, returning within seconds. “Wall’s back!” he said.
Steven left the table and followed Roy to the drawing room. The western wall had indeed returned, looking normal. Steven pressed his hand up against the wall, feeling the soft wallpaper against his skin. He turned to look at Roy.
“What?” Roy asked.
“Any ideas why?” Steven said.
“Nope,” Roy replied, moving to a window. “Your guess is as good as mine. The landscaping looks fine, too. Hold on, wait a minute…” Roy was craning his neck, trying to see an angle to the far right, but couldn’t make things out.
“I’m going to check outside,” Roy said, turning to leave. Steven followed. They walked to the breezeway, out the back of the house to the porch and down the steps into the yard. Roy turned left and walked toward the corner of the yard that he had been trying to see from the window. After fifty feet they came to a dirt edge. A curved line in the ground delineated their normal, landscaped back yard from dark ground and rocks with no vegetation. Steven followed the line and saw t
hat it dissected a tree to his left, neatly eliminating the right half of it. The left half continued to move slightly in the gentle breeze that always seemed to inhabit the back yard, but whenever any part of its branches swayed over the line on the ground, that part disappeared.
“Fucked up worse than Hogan’s billy goat,” Roy said.
“It’s like it moved,” Steven said. “From the side of the house, to over here.”
“Kinda like how that rod in Barbara’s house moved,” Roy said.
“All of this disruption started the night Sam White used his machines on her house,” Steven said. “Think they’re related? Is that what caused the earthquake here?”
“I don’t understand how,” Roy said, “They shouldn’t be connected. Come on. Let’s try that object on the legend shelf.”
They turned from the barren swath of yard and walked back to the house, turning the corner to the back yard. As they walked, the overhead lights dipped once again, leaving them in darkness.
“Shit, didn’t bring the flashlight,” Roy said, stumbling into Steven.
Steven reached out to grab his father, and caught a glimpse of light coming from the house. “Look!” he said, pointing to the structure, where a dim, yellow flicker emanated from an upper room. They stared up at the lit window, watching as its interior dimmed and returned as though it held a candle. A figure passed over the window, moving slowly. Steven realized he was holding his breath.
“Wasn’t that the room where we found James Unser’s body?” Roy whispered.
“Yes,” Steven whispered back, his eyes glued to the window to see if the figure might pass by again.
“Look,” Roy said, grabbing Steven and pointing down. Steven lowered his gaze to the ground at his feet and saw that the grass was gone – they were standing in dirt.
“It shifted again,” Roy whispered. “Now we’re inside it.”
Steven raised his gaze back up to the window, searching for the figure. The faint light inside the room cast just enough light into the yard to illuminate the area in front of them. The dirt area extended ten feet toward the house from where they stood before the landscaping resumed. He turned to look behind him, and saw that the banyan tree was gone.
The Haunting at Grays Harbor (The River Book 8) Page 6