by Blair Howard
Amanda looked up at me quizzically. I shook my head and said, “No thanks, Art. Maybe in a little while. Right now we’d like to take a look at the basement.”
“The cellars, you mean. They could hardly be called a basement, more like a crypt. Most of the floors are flagstone. But what do I know? I bet it’s damp down there, and maybe there are...” he looked at Amanda, “well, rats.”
“That’s not a problem, Art. I’ve spent most of my adult life dealing with them; most of them a whole lot bigger than any you might have here. How do we get down there?”
“I’ll show you. Give me just a minute and I’ll get the keys and a couple of flashlights. I think you should stay here though, Miss Amanda. Those cellars are no place for you.”
“Not on your life,” Amanda said. “I’m coming too. This is my family home, or at least it was. If there’s anything bad down there, I need to know about it. Let’s go.”
“Bad?” He blinked at her. “What do you mean?”
“Ummm. Nothing, just saying.”
“Okay. As I said, give me a couple of minutes. We’ll need flashlights. They go on forever, the cellars, and there are only a couple light bulbs.”
A minute or so later we were following him down a flight of wide stone steps that circled slowly to the right, following the form of the large round tower, the top floor of which was our room. The beam of the flashlights cast stark shadows on the walls as we followed the steps downward. Strong was right: it was dark down there. No, not dark. It was pitch black.
“Nobody’s been down here for years. Don’t have any need to.” Strong said when he reached the bottom, waving the beam of his flashlight back and forth, trying to find the light switch. “Ah, here we are.” He flipped the switch and a single bulb at the bottom of the steps came on.
“Jeez,” Amanda said. “Really? What wattage is that? Fifteen? It’s barely worth turning on.” She was right. It cast no more than a glimmer of light into what could only be called the far reaches of the cavern, for a cavern it was and, as Strong had said, more crypt than cellar. In fact, I’ve been in churches that would have been proud to call these “cellars” their own.
“Hah. Yes. I’m sorry. We could do with a bigger bulb, for sure. There should be another one a bit farther on.” Strong waved the beam into the depths of the cellar. “Don’t look like it, though. Oh, there it is. The bulb is shot.”
“Do you have any more upstairs?” Amanda asked.
“I do. Hang on while I go and get them.” He was gone but a moment.
“Sorry. Just the one, I’m afraid, and it’s only a sixty-watt. I’ll go put it in.” He did, and it made hardly any difference to the oppressive darkness.
“This won’t do, Art,” Amanda said. “We’re going to need more lights down here. We’ll break our necks trying to search this place.”
“Search it? What on earth for?”
“Because I want to. No, that’s unfair. We, that is Harry, thinks Jonathan may have, well….”
Damn it, Amanda. I thought we’d agreed.
“Hidden some family trinkets down there,” I said quickly.
“Oh lord. What on earth gave you that idea?”
“Just a whim, really,” I said. “I would, if I’d have owned this. White elephant.”
“Harry’s a detective, Art. Quite a famous one, too. I think it’s worth a shot. Don’t you?”
“Damned silliness, if you ask me,” he grumbled.
“Excuse me?” Amanda was about to let him have it. I put a hand on her arm.
“You’re probably right,” I said. “In fact, I’m sure you are. Nevertheless, we’re going to take a look. Now, we can’t do anything without lights, so let’s go back upstairs. You said Mrs. Strong had gone to the village. Does she have a cell phone? Can you get in touch with her?”
“I can, I think. If I can’t, I’ll go to the village myself and get what you need.”
Well, as it turned out, he was able to get in touch with her, and I gave him a list of what I need, including a couple of 250 watt light bulbs, three work lamps, and three 100-foot extension cords. Unfortunately, she was able to get everything but she was unable to do it and get back anytime soon; it was almost six when she returned: too late to do anything that night.
We were at the end of our fourth day, and I needed to give my father a call and bring him up to date. If I didn’t, the old goat was likely to send Joe on up here to get us.
Dinner that evening was an experience, one I’m not likely to forget. The food was good… the conversation not so much. We spent an hour furtively whispering back and forth to each other in an effort to make sure we weren’t overheard. Amanda, bless her heart, was still unable to get used to the idea that she was related, however distantly, to the world’s most infamous serial killer.
I have to admit, I was having more than a little trouble with that idea myself.
Chapter 16
Neither of us slept well that night. Poor Amanda must have been going through hell, because she tossed and turned until finally—I last looked at the clock at 2:10—she settled into a fitful sleep. But that wasn’t all. My head was in a whirl. These were momentous events, but they could never see the light of day, for Amanda’s sake and now, so it seemed, for mine too.
We finally crawled out of bed at a little after seven that following morning. We showered and dressed—both of us in jeans and T-shirts—and then went down to breakfast. Jonathan Miles’s portrait looked different that morning—or perhaps it was just that we both now saw him in a different light.
Unfortunately, the two elderly ladies had taken our window table, which meant we had to sit almost underneath that damned ugly portrait. Not good.
“I’m going have Strong remove him, the picture,” Amanda said over her first cup of coffee.
“I can understand the thought,” I said, “but you can’t—”
“Why the hell not? It’s mine, and I can’t stand to look at him, or to have him looking at me. He makes my skin crawl.”
“I know how you feel, but Strong will want to know why.”
“I don’t care. I don’t have to tell him, do I? He… it sickens me. Not Strong, him. Jonathan. I want him gone, right now,” she stood up, and called out, “Mr. Strong. Would you mind?” She beckoned him.
“Yes, miss. More coffee?” he held out the pot toward her cup.
“No. The portrait. Please take it down, and—and burn it. Now. Right now.”
“But….”
“Please don’t argue. I hate it. I feel like he’s watching me. I want gone. Now.”
“Well, of course, miss. You’re the boss, but burn it?”
“That’s what I said, and I meant it.”
I just shook my head, and sure enough, he did it, without another word or question. Maybe I’d read him wrong. He put the coffee pot down on the table and walked over to the painting, stood for a moment looking up at it, then turned and said, “It’s too big. I can’t do it by myself. Mr. Starke?”
I nodded and got to my feet. He was right; it was a monster, but between us we managed to get it down. We walked it out into the lobby where we laid it against the wall. Strong said he would fetch a two-wheeler and get rid of it.
“Do it,” I said to him. “And be sure to burn it. That’s what she wants.”
“I understand. I’ll finish with the breakfast and then I’ll do it. You can watch, if you like.”
“No need for that,” I said. “We trust you. In the meantime, I’d like some fresh coffee. Oh, and as soon as we’re done, I’ll be heading down into the basement. Would you mind having everything ready for me, please?”
The coffee came, and we drank two more cups each. By the time we were ready to move, I was wired. Whatever brand it was, it wasn’t bad.
“Ready?” I asked.
Amanda shuddered. “I’m not sure I am. What do you think we’ll find?”
“Probably nothing. Look, we don’t have to do this—”
“Y
es we do. We absolutely do. I have to know, and anyway, I owe it to my grandmother, and to Sarah, and… Elizabeth too.”
I nodded, pushed my chair back, and got to my feet. “Alright then. Let’s do it.”
Chapter 17
I stood at the top of the steps and threw the three extension cords down one after another—thud, thud, thud—and by the light coming through the open door I could see the dust swirling below.
I grabbed two of the 250-watt bulbs and by the light of a flashlight made my way slowly down the steps. I swapped out the two bulbs, and flipped the switch. What I saw then was, well, surprising. I’d known from what little I’d been able to see the night before that the cellars were extensive, but I wasn’t prepared for the reality. I found myself staring into what appeared to be an endless cavern. When I thought about the floor plan of the house, and how big it was, I suppose I should have expected it. Still, it was overwhelming.
The walls of the tower extended to a flagstone floor and formed a vast, round, and empty room that gave shape to the wide stone steps upon which I stood.
Opposite the steps a large gap had been built into the circular wall, providing access to the main space—I couldn’t figure out what else to call it. The ceilings, inside the tower room and beyond, were high, maybe as high as fifteen feet, arched and vaulted, and the stone pillars that held them up were of equally impressive scale. The floor was a patchwork of huge flagstones overlaid with a thick layer of dust. I was reminded of the dungeons I’d seen during a guided tour some years ago of Newark Castle in England. It wasn’t damp down there, but dry and dusty. I stood in the gap and gazed outward into the rapidly dimming reaches—there was a light beyond the tower room, the one I had just changed, but even 250 watts had little effect more than thirty feet or so out. All I could see were a few pieces of rotting furniture. Other than that, the cellars were empty.
How in the name of… what did Nicholas Cage say? How in the name of Zeus’s butthole do I even begin to search this cavern?
“Oh my God,” Amanda whispered, as she slipped her arms around my waist and peered warily around. “I hope he was wrong about the rats. I’ll die if there are any.”
“Damn. Are there no outlets down here? Stay here a minute while I go plug in one of the extension cords.”
“Oh, please don’t leave me alone down here. It’s beyond creepy.”
I grinned at her, turned to leave, then turned back again. “BOO!” She’d been gazing out into the darkness, and I swear she jumped three feet off the floor.
“Oh Jesus,” she gasped. “Oh my God. You piece of crap,” she yelled, beating on my chest with the heels of both fists. “You’re a total ass, Harry Starke. I thought I was going to have a heart attack.” I was laughing, but there was little humor in it. I don’t know if it was the atmosphere down there or what, the oppressive feeling of… not danger exactly, but something the like of which I’d never felt before.
“I’m sorry, sweetie. I really am. I won’t do it again. I promise.”
“You do and you’re dead, that I promise you, you ass. Now let me past. You’re not leaving me down here alone, not after that.” And she scampered past me, away up the steps and through the door. I followed her with the end of one of the cords. Unfortunately, the house itself wasn’t well-endowed with outlets either. By the time I found one, the other end of the cord barely reached the bottom of the steps.
I returned to the crypt—by that time, that was how I was thinking of it—and plugged a second extension cord into the socket at the end of the first one, and then one of the work lights into the end of that one. I turned it on—it had a fluorescent tube—and headed out, through the gap in the wall into the cavern beyond.
For a moment I just stood there, trying to find some sort of reference point. I turned around and faced the way I came. To the left of the tower room stood a second, smaller round room: the base of another tower. I shook my head, turned again, and walked. Far away in the dim light, I could just make out the stone walls that formed the foundations of the main house.
Sheesh. Must be a couple of acres. Seems like it anyway.
Well, it wasn’t quite that big, but it was big enough, and once again I wondered how the hell I was going to search it all.
“Need some help?” A voice whispered hoarsely in my ear. And, yes. I jumped so damn high I almost hit my head on the vaulting.
“Gotcha!” Amanda said, grinning from ear to ear. “Now you know what it feels like, you ass. Not funny, is it?”
The hell it was, and believe me, I thought I was about to lose it. I took a deep breath, put my arms around her, and squeezed her to me. “I’m sorry. I really am.”
“It’s okay.” She wriggled out of my arms. “So? What do you think?”
“I think we’re screwed. This place is huge.” But then I had a thought. “Suppose,” I said, “you’d just killed your wife, and you were down here trying to figure out where to dispose of the body. Where, do you think, would be a good place?”
“You scare me like that again, and I’ll be disposing of your body…. I dunno. Somewhere close to the steps, maybe? He wouldn’t have wanted to carry her a long way. At least I don’t think he would have.”
“That’s right. Good thinking, girl.” I held the work light high above my head and slowly, together, we retraced our steps back toward the two towers.
Together we searched every inch of the room, the walls, the floors, and especially the stonework that supported the steps, and we found nothing out of the ordinary. By then it must have been close to noon, and I was thirsty. The dusty atmosphere was beginning to effect me; my throat was dry and my voice was becoming hoarse.
“Let’s take a break. I need a drink.” And so did she, and so we did. We sat together at the kitchen table, and Mary Strong served homemade lemonade. Nothing, and I do mean nothing, ever tasted so good.
“So,” Strong said. “Find anything?”
“Not yet,” Amanda said, “But we’ll keep looking.”
“Well, for a little while longer anyway,” I said. “I’m not even certain there’s anything down there to find.”
“What, exactly, are you looking for? Loose brickwork? What?”
“We—” Amanda started, but I cut her off before she could reveal anything.
“We’ll let you know if we find it,” I said, with what I hoped was a sly smile.
“Hmmm. Buried treasure, eh? Better get it before you leave. If not….”
“Yeah, we know,” Amanda said. “You’ll have the entire place dug up before we’ve left the grounds.”
He grinned at her, and nodded enthusiastically.
“Okay,” I said, “Time’s a wastin’. Let’s get back to it.”
She heaved a sigh as she rose slowly to her feet. Her enthusiasm level was down around her feet, and I couldn’t say I blamed her. Strong was right when he said the cellars were no place for her. Still, it had to be done, and together we made our way carefully down the steps, back into the dark world of… who the hell knew?
“Where do you want to look next?” she asked in a small voice.
“The small tower seems like a good place. It’s close to the steps; easy to get to.” I shouldered the coiled electrical cord; Amanda carried the work lamp, and off we went,
The room, if it could be called that, was much smaller than the main tower, no more than twelve feet in diameter. It too had an opening in the stonework through which to enter. We stepped inside. Like the main tower, the room was circular, but the ceiling was much lower, maybe only six or seven feet. The atmosphere within was oppressive. No, that’s not the right word. It was damned claustrophobic. The air was still and musty, the floor hidden under a thick layer of dust that swirled upward and around us as we disturbed it. Even our voices were deadened. The stone walls seem to close in around us, the ceiling too.
“Okay, sweetheart.” I turned to look at her. Her green eyes glittered in the fluorescent light of the work lamp. “Let’s d
o this and get the hell out of here. It’s like a damned toilet in here.” I stepped sideways, to the left side of the opening and faced the wall; it was as good a place as any to begin. “C’mere. Hold the lamp so I can see.”
She held the work lamp high over my head. I ran the fingers and palms of both hands over the rough stonework, feeling for any hint of an imperfection or disturbance. For some twenty minutes, we slowly circled the room. I felt and probed over every inch of the wall from floor to ceiling, but we found nothing. The weight of the lamp was beginning to take its toll on Amanda; she had to use both hands to hold it up.
“Come on,” I said, taking her hand and leading her out into the great beyond. “There’s nothing here. Let’s go sit on the steps for a minute and rest up. Then we’ll have a go at the walls to the side of the tower.”
“Harry, it’s too much. There must be miles of walls here. At the rate we’re going it will take weeks to search them all, and we don’t have that kind of time. We’ve tried. We’ve tried hard. Let’s give it up and go back to Tennessee. I don’t want to be here anymore. I want to tell our friends the news.”
“What news? Oh that,” I said, when I caught the look in her eye. “Yeah. That will be fun. Tell you what. Let’s give it one more day. We can cover a lot of ground in a day. If we don’t find anything, we’ll go back home and make plans. Deal?”
“You never give up, do you?” She sounded a little put out, but she hugged me and agreed.
As it happened, it didn’t even take one day.
We went back to work just to the left of the base of the small tower. From there, the wall ran some fifteen feet to what I assumed was the main foundation of the monstrosity above, then it made a sharp turn to the left and ran for maybe forty more feet until it made another right angled turn to the left, and from that point, the wall—I assumed it was the rear of the house—was so long it disappeared into the darkness. She was right; it would take weeks to thoroughly search the entire basement area. No matter. I searched every inch of the fifteen-foot section of wall from one end to the other, and I found nothing.