Corner Of The Housetop: Buried Secrets

by Leen Elle

  Well, except for Gabriel's mother. But she was completely different. For one thing, she was still alive. And for a second, she was annoying and pushy. It wasn't even the fact that she was Gabriel's mother that made him be mean about her sometimes. It was her personality. The way she treated him personally. There was no way Anthony could even know his mother or father, let alone have reason to hold a personal grudge against either of them.

  But I should be grateful for Mrs. Worthington, he reminded himself, hearing Beth's voice echo in his head. She has been very kind to me. Looking around the open loft, smelling the horses below him, and shivering in the cool night air, he repeated to himself, I should be very grateful.

  Sighing, he pulled the sheet off the hay and crawled underneath it. I should see if I can get a blanket from Beth. Shivering once more, he thought longingly of the wool lap blankets in the carriage house.

  After a few more minutes of lying awake, he stood up and pulled his pants on. Taking a match and his lamp, he climbed down the ladder as quietly as he could, slipping out the door.

  Once he was outside, he lit the lamp and hurried across the lawn, the night sounds of the forest echoing around him. It's only the wind, he told himself when he jumped at a branch snapping. Just the wind knocking down some of the branches that started to fall in the storm yesterday. That's all.

  Ducking into the carriage house, he took one of the blankets and ran back across the lawn as fast as he could, slamming the stable door closed by accident.

  Lady Sarah Mary-Ruth brayed loudly, kicking wildly at the wall, her white eyes wide and petrified as she thrashed her head back and forth. Blueberry was startled awake and began to carry as well.

  "Who What Who's there?" Devon yelled, coming out of his room, grabbing the pitchfork off the wall, and brandishing it at him.

  Derek tossed the blanket behind the pile of grain sacks quickly. "It's just me!" he said over the racket the horses were making, holding up his lamp so Devon could see him. "Had to go to the bathroom," he explained.

  Shuffling forward, muttering under his breath, Devon grabbed at Lady Sarah Mary-Ruth's nose, holding her head steady. "S'okay, girl. S'okay. Easy, easy."

  Derek, in turn, patted Blueberry, soothing him until his frightened racket was reduced to nervous twitches of his tail every few seconds.

  Pointing a callused finger right between Derek's eyes, Devon said gruffly, "Do it again, boy, and I'll have your head," then shuffled quickly down the walk and slammed his door closed, the pitchfork still in his hand.

  "Sorry," he said softly, more to the horses than Devon.

  Retrieving his blanket, Derek climbed back up to the loft and curled up on his bed. After only a few minutes, he slipped into an odd dream in which millions and millions of little letters were chasing him down the path to the river in the dark.

  Chapter Eight

  The following week went by with ease, the calm, cool weather adding to the mellow mood that settled over the Worthington Plantation.

  During a particularly mild midmorning, Derek was resting against the wall in the loft, scanning his book for new letters. He had finished his chores earlier was taking advantage of his free time. He sighed. The first couple pages of his ledger pad were covered in scribbles and copied Bible verses. Though his handwriting was finally beginning to look something like the print, he was no closer to understanding its meaning.

  Sighing again, he leaned forward and looked out the window.

  Devon was far below in the corral with Blueberry. The horse, as happy with the comfortable weather as Derek was, galloped in a circle at the edge of the fence.

  Derek smiled a little. Since being allowed to care for the horses more, he felt Devon warming up to him. It was a very slight warmth, but it was there. He'd even ordered Derek out to the corral the previous day and showed him how to use the short lead to exercise Blueberry. It had been two hours of Devon shouting and Derek being dragged in lopsided circles around the corral, but it was a step he hadn't expected to take so soon, especially considering the incident on Sunday night.

  Just as he was about to go back to his book, Derek saw Gabriel walk over the hill and down towards the corral. He said something to Devon, then started towards the stable.

  Sighing again, Derek closed his book. He should have known it was hoping too much to think he might have a day to himself to work on his writing.

  "Derek?"

  "Yeah?"

  "Mother wants you up at the house."

  Scowling a little, Derek climbed down the ladder and walked across the lawn with Gabriel. "Do you know what she wants?"

  "I don't know. She just said to make sure you go in the side door."

  "What? Me go in through the main door? I wouldn't dream of it."

  Smiling a little, Gabriel shook his head. "She's in a pretty good mood today, so if you just nod and say, 'Yes, ma'am,' you should do all right."

  "I'll remember that. Thanks," Derek said, pulling the door open and stepping into the house. It was much warmer inside than it was outside. Derek figured it was from the fire downstairs. As he walked around the corner into the parlor, he saw Mrs. Worthington and Jonathan sitting quietly together and drinking tea.

  "Derek," Mrs. Worthington said in a very business-like way. "There is a matter you need to take care of before the end of the day. Catherine has been complaining about hornets in her room. Jonathan found the problem this morning. There's a nest in the attic."

  At the word "attic," Derek nearly walked right back out the door without so much as a word. He hadn't been up to the attic in over a year and he didn't want to have to go up there again.

  Looking at Jonathan, he thought, If he was just up there why couldn't he have taken care of it?

  With a glower, Mrs. Worthington said in a clipped tone, "That is all. You may leave us."

  Struggling against saying something he knew he would regret, Derek nodded a little and left the house. Part of him wanted to put it off until the last possible moment, but that might leave him up there after dark: the only thing worse than having to be in the attic was having to be in the attic after dark.

  Taking the shed key out of his pocket, Derek unlocked the door and swung it open. It took him a couple minutes to shuffle the wheelbarrow, shears, and large oil can aside. Once they were out of the way, he took the step ladder out and leaned it on the side of the carriage house. Grabbing a pair of heavy, leather work gloves, he stuffed them in his back pocket—having dealt with several hornets' nests and bee hives in his days of helping keep up the main buildings, Derek knew they were essential.

  Putting everything else back, he closed and locked the door then started back to the house.

  Walking through the side door, Derek went around to the main staircase. Even if the small one wasn't blocked any more, he highly doubted he'd be able to get the ladder up it without banging the banister and putting dents in the walls.

  As he walked up the stairs, the tension in his gut mounted. His throat began to close up and his palms sweated. Stopping for a moment half way up to get a better grip on the ladder, he told himself, It's just a room. Like any other room in the world. The only difference is it's a very high up, very big room with a lot of old junk in it. It sounds just like the loft. You don't mind the loft, he reasoned.

  Derek continued up the stairs until he got to the top, then started down the hall to the door at the far end. The entrance to the attic was in his old room, hidden behind a door papered over to look like the wall. It was the sort of scary door that was only visible to people who it was there in the first place. If a person got closed in there by accident they may never be found….

  "Jonathan?" a weak, tired voice called.

  Derek jumped at the sudden sound, nearly dropping the ladder. When he realized where it had come from, he stepped backwards and looked through the open door of Beth's old room. He was more than a little surprised to see Catherine.

  Despite the warmth of the house, the bed he'd helped put together was hea
ped with blankets, the topmost being a poorly-sewn patchwork quilt of many mismatching materials. It seemed very out of place in the clean, organized house Mrs. Worthington kept.

  "No," Derek answered softly. "It's me, Derek."

  "Derek," she repeated in a hushed voice.

  Leaning the ladder against the wall, he moved into the room a couple steps. "I could get him for you. He's just down stairs."

  "No," Catherine said, rocking her head from side to side slowly. "Thank you, but no."

  Her voice was hollow and withered, barely audible from across the small room. She was paler than Derek had ever seen her, her face shiny with perspiration.

  "Are you too hot?"

  "Chilled, actually," she answered with a shaky smile, her white lips trembling.

  Worry gripped Derek. Had she been this bad all along? How could he have not noticed? I suppose she only went outside on her better days, he mused. "Are you sure you don't want me to get someone?"

  "No, I'm fine. Just sleepy." Sighing as if it had taken all her energy to say those few words, Catherine slowly closed her eyes, her head sinking farther into her pillow. "Ever so sleepy," she whispered.

  Debating whether or not he really should get Jonathan, or at least someone, Derek decided against it. Catherine knew if she wanted to see anyone or not, and people walking needlessly around her room would just keep her awake; a bad thing when she obviously was in desperate need of rest.

  Closing the door silently, Derek continued up the hall with careful steps, the ladder tucked close to his body so he would be sure not to hit anything with it and make noise on accident.

  When he got to Beth's room, he knocked on the door lightly. After a moment of silence, he went in.

  The room wasn't much different from how it was when he lived in it. It was still small, with the same straw mattress and little table. The only real changes were the curtains which Beth must have added herself and the standing cupboard. Beth obviously hadn't gone too much out of her way to make herself at home. Aside from the curtains, the room was as bare as it had been before. With a pang of remorse, Derek noticed that the cupboard was blocking his secret store box.

  On the small stand there was a stub of a beeswax candle with a blackened wick sticking out of it sitting in a candleholder. He was suddenly struck by the fact that he'd left his lamp in the stables. Wishing he had something a little bigger to take up with him, he opened the drawer, hoping Beth kept her matches where he had. Taking one out of her little box, he struck it and lit the wick.

  It isn't much, but, he reasoned, it's better than nothing.

  Sighing heavily, he looked at the camouflaged door. Up to the attic, he thought.

  The attic was the worst place Derek could imagine in the whole world. The stairs up to the attic were narrow and steep, with open spaces on both sides. Spiders' webs clung to each step and were strung across the gap from the edge of the stairs to the wall.

  The attic itself was either very hot or very cold. If it was warm outside, the air was still and stale tasting. If it was cold, there was a howling draft that blew the sheets and dust all through the room.

  Its smell of dust and mildew was thick enough to choke someone if they just thought of it. The floor boards creaked even when no one was walking on them and there was about a foot of open space along the front wall that dropped into the dark crawl space below.

  As for wildlife, there were fat, ugly, spiders in the summer and vicious, red squirrels in the winter. There were no windows and the dark shadows seemed to absorb any light a candle or lamp might have given off. All bringing a light into the attic did was make the patches of blackness shift a little.

  In the massive room there were piles of boxes and old trunks full of clothes. Moth-eaten dresses hung against the walls and torn furniture covered with white sheets was stacked every few feet. Shelves of dusty books and broken, cobweb-covered knick-knacks were pushed against the far wall.

  Derek had been well-acquainted with the attic from a very young age. Shortly after Mr. Worthington died, Mrs. Worthington discovered that locking Derek away in the dark was a very effective punishment. He would spend days at a time curled up at the bottom of the stairs, huddled as close to the attic door as he could make himself, just waiting for someone to let him out.

  Now, standing in front of the open door, holding Beth's small candle and looking up into the darkness, Derek felt his throat tightening as the hot smell of rot and old fabric wafted down to him.

  Using the small table to prop the door open thought technically it stayed open completely on its own, he was taking no chances of it accidentally closing he held the ladder in front of him and started the long, steep climb to the attic.

  As he got to the top of the stairs, Derek heard a low humming noise from the far corner. He lifted his candle to get a better look. Up by the ceiling was a large, gray mass with several hornets swarming around it.

  "Oh, wonderful," he muttered.

  Were it smaller, he would have just brought it down and drowned it in a bucket of water. However, with the size of the nest and the number of hornets flying around and crawling on it, he didn't dare get that close with just his knife and unprotected arms.

  Leaving the ladder by the top of the stairs, he went back down to Beth's room. Blowing out the candle and leaving it on her table, he walked quietly down the servant stairs and out through the side door. The best thing to do would be to get one of the burlap sacks to tie the nest up in and then take outside and burn it.

  As he went by, Gabriel was sitting on the porch, a book open in his lap. "What did Mother want you to do?"

  "Get rid of a hornets' nest in the attic."

  "Are you finished?"

  "No. The thing is so big, if all the bugs got together and flew up at the same time they could probably carry the whole house away. Beth had to have noticed them coming out of the crawl before now," he added in annoyance.

  "Maybe she just didn't say anything because they didn't bother her."

  Scowling, Derek replied, "How nice for her," before continuing across the lawn.

  In less than five minutes he'd climbed up to the loft, gotten several burlap bags and lengths of twine, then returned to the house. This time, however, he had his oil lamp with him. The more light, the better. After double-checking that the table propping the door open wasn't going to move by any means, Derek climbed back up into the darkness.

  He looped a length of twine around the top of one of the bags, weaving it between the threads of the material every few inches until he'd fashioned a sort of large, draw-string purse.

  "All right." He pulled the gloves on quickly then set the ladder up under the nest. Taking the bag, he stepped up, careful to move slowly so he didn't startle the hornets.

  He remembered the first time Mrs. Worthington told him to get rid of a hive that was under the awning. Several bee stings and a few falls off the ladder later, he'd been sitting in the kitchen with Beth slathering a thick, white paste all over his arms, chest, and back.

  The hive had been taken down and burned, however, and as that was all Mrs. Worthington cared about, she was in a good mood.

  A little older and little wiser, Derek was careful to keep his footing as he held the top of the bag open as wide as he could, lifting it slowly around the hive. When he got it to the ceiling, he pulled the strings quickly, securing the bag around the nest. The few hornets he'd caught mid-flight were buzzing loudly.

  Keeping his arms away from the sides of the bag, he jumped down and got another bag and piece of twine. After slipping the second bag over the first and tying it more tightly around the top, he took the knife out of his back pocket and cut the nest away from the ceiling, letting the weight of the falling mass pull the drawstring on the bag the rest of the way closed.

  Caught off-balance by the sudden weight, Derek dropped the bag and slipped off the ladder. In a desperate attempt to catch himself, he reached his hand out to grab the top of a tall chest of drawers that stood close besid
e him. He got his fingers on the top, but something on it slid under his hand, sending him crashing to the ground, followed closely by several objects that bounced and broke as they skittered across the floor. Derek strained to hear if anyone was coming to see what the noise was over the frenzied racket the hornets in the sack were making as a thick cloud of dust gently floated down around him.

  Sitting up just in time to see the chest of drawers tipping dangerously towards him, he moved as it fell over on its side, sending up another cloud of dust. The hornets in the bag buzzed furiously while the ones he hadn't managed to scoop up in the bag lighted on the stub of nest that was still clinging to the ceiling.

  Derek groaned in pain, rubbing his side. That could have been me, he thought, looking at the toppled-over chest of drawers. He sighed with relief, then waited quietly for a moment for someone to come storming up the stairs, yelling for him to get out of the house.

  There was no sound except the humming of the hornets.

  Finally moving, his back and legs aching terribly, Derek looked at the chest of drawers. "There is no way I can pick that up," he muttered, getting to his feet with a wince. Shaking his head, he picked up the third bag and dropped the first two in it, tying it closed with the last piece of twine. He felt secure in the thought that it would be impossible for a hornet to sting him through three, thick layers of burlap.

  He started towards the door, lamp and bag in hand, when he stopped. If he went down now, he'd just have to come back up to clean the mess he'd made. He figured he might as well do it all while he was right there.

  Setting the bag down, Derek used the side of his foot to scoot as much of the broken pieces of dishes and glasses into a pile in the corner as he could. He set several books on the shelf against the wall then went back for the large picture his hand had slipped on in the first place.

  "It's all your fault," he told it in annoyance, lifting it off the floor.