Ghost Box: Six Supernatural Thrillers

by Scott Nicholson

  Daddy woke up, rubbed his eyes, yelled, looked in at Mason, left him wet again. Daddy turned out the light, and as the door closed, Mason remembered the vanishing wedge of brightness, how scared he was as it got smaller and smaller, then the door banged shut and the dark was big, thick, everything.

  Time passed or else it didn’t, Mason’s tiny heart pumping, pounding, screaming. Crying would do no good. Mama wasn’t here. And his cries might bring them. He closed his eyes, opened them. One black was the same color as the other.

  Squatting in the root cellar, Mason closed his eyes, opened them, trying to blink away the memory. He covered his face with his hands. He remembered reading somewhere that rats always went for the soft parts first, the eyes and tongue and genitals. He didn’t have enough hands.

  This was the memory, the first time. The skittering in the dark. The scratching against the wall. The ticking of claws across wood. The squeak of pleasure at the discovery. So dark in the room that he couldn’t see their shiny eyes when he finally forced himself to look.

  Mason heard them, though, even with the wet blankets pulled tightly over his head. Soft whispers of tiny tongues against liquid. Daddy’s bottle. The spilled stuff had brought them. Would it be enough to fill them? Would they go away?

  Please, please, go away.

  The squeaking sounded now like laughter, like a moist, slobbery snickering. Go away? Of course they wouldn’t go away, this was the dark and they owned the dark. They crept toward the crib, the hush of their tails dragging behind. No, no, NO.

  This was now and not the memory, he wasn’t a small child, and he wasn’t afraid of rats anymore. And because the root cellar was darker than the world outside, he might be able to see the outline of the door. All he had to do was open his eyes.

  Mama’s voice came to him, and he couldn’t swear whether the words were spoken or merely imagined: It’s ALWAYS the memory, Mason. Big Dream Image. Don’t ever let go of your dreams. They’re the only thing you got in this world.

  And something quick and wet and warm flicked at his face, just under his left eye, it may have been only the corner of a blanket shifting, yes, of course, that’s what it was, rats don’t eat little boys, that’s not tiny feet pressing against your legs, it’s only your imagination, and you always had a good imagination, didn’t you?

  And you lived long enough to learn that the darkness doesn’t spread out forever, that rats don’t own everything, just your dreams, AND DREAMS ARE THE ONLY THING YOU GOT IN THIS WORLD.

  And Mama came home finally and opened the door and turned on the light and held you, but it was too late, days too late, years too late, the rats had eaten you, eaten your eyes, now it’s dark all the time and they own the dark and Momma can’t open the door because they ate her eyes, too, and she’s sitting in her rat’s-nest chair back in Sawyer Creek and—

  “Looks like you’re in a right smart pickle.”

  The voice, from nowhere and everywhere, seemed part of the dark. And darkness had to have different colors, because the deep black tunnel opened like a throat before his closed eyes. Standing at the edge of the tunnel was Ransom Streater, dripping wounds and all, a perfect row of punctures across the chest of his overalls, one buckle bent. Ransom with his grinning possum mouth and old freckled bald head and dead, dead, dead eyes.

  “Korban fetched me up to your bad place,” Ransom said. “You ought to see mine. I got it worse than you do, believe me. But Korban says if I’m a good helper, then I get out of my bad place for a little bit. All I gots to do is walk you out.”

  “Where am I?”

  “Why, in the heart, that’s where. ‘Cepting Korban wants to send you back. Says you got chores to do.”

  “What chores?” Mason forced his eyes wide, even though the rats were hungry and eyes were soft and juicy. But the image didn’t change, Ransom stood shimmering before him, the tunnel stretched out black and deep and cold, only now there was a light at the end, precious light, beautiful light, a ratless light, Mama was opening the door.

  Mason stood, heard the rats slither back into their unseen holes. He said the only thing he could think of to say: “You’re dead.”

  “And it ain’t no cakewalk, let me tell you.” Ransom touched his wounds, his eyebrows lifting as he fingered a hole in his ribs. “At least you got a choice.”

  Mason stepped closer, the light beckoned. He took one glance backward in the darkness, heard the noise of whiskers and claws and wet, sharp teeth. He shivered. Korban would keep this place waiting for him.

  But the best thing to do was put your fears behind you, as least for as long as possible. Deny their existence. Bury them.

  “Where does the tunnel go, Ransom?”

  “Why, to the end. Where else would it go?”

  Mason swallowed. He remembered Ransom, the old, living Ransom, had said the tunnel led back to the manor’s basement. He thought about running for the ladder, but he heard a squeak and a whisper of tongue. Then, Mama’s voice, unmistakable, poured from the dark throat of the tunnel. “Dreams is all we got, Mason. Now get in here and make Mama proud.”

  And it wasn’t only Mama’s voice, here in the damp, dark dirt of Korban’s estate, that bothered him. It was the suggestion of squeakiness in her words, as if they had spilled from between large, curved rodent teeth.

  Mason followed Ransom into the black tunnel, blinked as the light grew unbearably bright, then softened. A lantern was burning on the table. Mason was in the studio, his unfinished statue waiting before him.

  “Tunnels of the soul, Mason,” Mama said. “I’ll be watching.”

  Mason turned just in time to see the long hideous gray rope of tail disappear into the dark tunnel. Ransom stood by the shadows of the basement. “We all got chores. My batch is waiting back in the tunnel. Yours is on this side, for now.”

  Mason knelt, trembling, and selected a fluter. He took up his hatchet and approached the statue, studied the rough oak form. Ephram Korban was in there somewhere, just as he inhabited everything. At the heart of it all.

  Mama lied. She’d said dreams were all we had in this world. But we have nightmares, too. And memories.

  And sometimes you can’t tell the difference.

  Mason attacked the wood as if his life depended on it.

  CHAPTER 55

  Sylva opened the door just before Anna reached the cabin. “Been expecting you.”

  Anna moved past her without waiting for an invitation. Sylva looked at the folded cloth on the mantel, the one that held her spelling charm. Every trick in the book, and a few she’d only heard whispered around long-ago campfires, were ground up and sprinkled inside the cloth, and words had been said over the concoction that few lips would dare speak. But this wasn’t a time for the scared or the faint of heart.

  “Warm your bones,” Sylva said, motioning to an old cane chair by the fire. “Tonight’s one of them that lets you know winter’s right around the corner.”

  “You didn’t tell me everything,” Anna said, going to the hearth but kneeling instead of sitting.

  “They’s such a thing as knowing too much. Bad enough you got the Sight. But if you don’t mind your step, you’re going to end up too soon on the wrong side of dead.”

  “But why does my mo—no, not my mother, I mean Rachel Hartley—think I’m some kind of savior for the haunted? Why did she summon me here? If Korban’s already got them, what can I do about it? Just because I can see ghosts doesn’t mean I have any special powers.”

  “Remember what I told you about power. It ain’t what you believe that matters, it’s how much.” Sylva kept her eyes fixed on the leaping flames, wouldn’t let her gaze slide over to the folded cloth, no matter how hard they itched for a look.

  “I don’t owe Rachel anything,” Anna said. “You said blood runs thicker than water. But that’s not all that makes people belong to each other.”

  “Child, I know how it hurts. I’ve hated myself for my weakness, my sin with Korban. I tried a hundred times to tel
l myself that he caused it, he spelled me and made it happen. But it’s always easy to lie to yourself, ain’t it? It’s easy to just push it down into the dark where you hope nobody will see the truth of it, least of all yourself.”

  Oh yeah, woman, you know the truth of it, don’t you? Ephram let you kill him under the blue moon so his spirit could go into the house. But you never knew that Ephram would take up collecting, would fetch over everybody that died on his grounds. And you surely to goodness never knew he’d keep Miss Mamie young, turn love into poison like that.

  “Your sin was a long time ago,” Anna said. “You ought to be able to forgive yourself after all these years.”

  “I was always afraid to let loose and love him,” Sylva said. “You don’t know the times I wanted that night to happen again, at the same time I was knotted up inside with the frights. Maybe it was all Ephram’s doing, one of his tricks. But it’s a scary and wondrous thing when your heart gets plumb stole away. And it’s scary and wondrous to burn with hate over something, too.”

  “But Rachel—”

  “I loved her, same as she loves you. I reckon as much as Ephram loved me.”

  “You said Miss Mamie was keeping him alive. That, and the spirits of those he’s trapped at the manor. The ones he uses for fuel, some sort of soul siphon, feeding on their pain and dreams.”

  “What do you reckon Ephram burns for?” Sylva bent and took up the poker, stabbed at the back log until sparks spat up the chimney. “The dead is just like the living. They want things they can’t have. Ephram’s got unfinished dreams, a big appetite. That’s why you’re here.”

  Sylva felt the trembling in her old limbs, the rough coursing of her blood through narrowed veins. She had been old far too long. She had too many regrets, had been played for the worst kind of fool. If only she could close her eyes and rest in peace. But Ephram Korban wouldn’t allow it.

  Sylva was bound here come hell or high water, and Rachel had found out way too late that what belonged to Ephram always came back. Rachel’s dying here was Anna’s only chance. Because Ephram would find out where Anna was, that gift of the Sight would shine like a ghost beacon in a night sky.

  “And my father?” Anna said. “Do you have any pictures of him?”

  “Folks don’t keep pictures around here, especially of them that want to stay dead. You ever heard of poppet magic? Where they steal your face and then steal your soul? You’re the only one that can free them from Ephram.”

  “What do I care?” Anna said. “The dead will still be dead, and I’ll still have nothing. At least if I die at the manor, I’ll have a warm place to haunt.”

  Sylva let the tears come. That was a mighty fine weapon to have around. Anna fell for it, came close, hugged her.

  “Rachel gave up her life so you could get away,” Sylva whispered into Anna’s ear. “If Ephram takes Rachel now, you’ll lose her forever. And them that’s bound to the house, not all of them are touched by sin. Like that girl ghost, Becky, you saw on your first night here. Tree fell on her, right out of the blue. That child never hurt a fly. If anybody’s spirit deserves to be set free, it’s hers.”

  Anna clenched her fists. “What am I supposed to do? I’m just one person. I’m weak, I’m dying, my soul’s not in such hot shape in the first place. How in the hell am I supposed to believe?”

  “You gotta follow your heart, Anna.” Sylva went to the window. “Sun’s about to set. You know what that means.”

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah. The blue moon.”

  Sylva crossed the room, stooped slowly, silently cursing Ephram for knotting up her bones and wrinkling her skin. She put a hand on Anna’s shoulder, let a tear gather in her eye, then said, “You just follow your heart. That’s what believing is all about.”

  Sylva gave her another hug, and this time Anna returned it, held on with a desperation that might have been born of a lifelong loneliness. Sylva finally let go and stepped back. “You’d best get back to the house, now. Miss Mamie’s waiting.”

  Anna went out into the darkening forest. The wind was sharp, cold enough that the early dew was already turning hard. This was a night of frost, Sylva thought. A night for the dead.

  She closed the cabin door and went to the mantel, caressed the folded cloth, and offered up ashes of prayers for its contents.

  CHAPTER 56

  “You gentlemen are early,” Miss Mamie said.

  “Just enjoying the view,” Paul said, feet propped on the rail, a glass of the house wine in his hand.

  “A lovely sunset,” she said.

  Adam looked out at the edge of the world, the ridges capped with molten gold, the slopes rippling with alternating folds of color and shadow. The wind carried the promise of change, the air ripe with the last bittersweet odors of autumn. Maybe that was why he’d been so morose the last couple of days. Winter always felt like death to him, a gray wasteland to be endured, much like the nightmare from his childhood. And he’d blamed Paul for it, that seasonal shift that brought unease deep inside him.

  “Aren’t you glad you stayed, Mr. Andrews?” Miss Mamie said to him.

  Adam and Paul exchanged glances. “Yes,” Adam said. “I tend to get a little melodramatic at times. Right, Paul?”

  “Sure, my little poppet.” He patted Adam’s hand, what Miss Mamie might take as a sign of moral support instead of a romantic gesture. “We’re having the time of our lives.”

  Paul turned to Miss Mamie. “Is it okay if I bring my video camera up? This scenery is to die for.”

  Miss Mamie smiled. “Why not? I think tonight will be quite memorable, and well worth preserving.”

  Lilith came by, refilled Paul’s glass, offered wine to Adam, who held up his hand in polite refusal. “No, thanks. I’m driving.”

  Miss Mamie’s laughter carried on the wind. “Oh, you’re a funny one. No wonder Ephram is so fond of you.”

  “Speaking of whom, I’m surprised there are no portraits of him on the widow’s walk,” Paul said.

  “This was one of his favorite haunts, back when he was alive. He loved nothing better than a good party, especially under the full moon.”

  The Abramovs were seated against the railing near the impromptu bar, tuning their instruments. The drop in temperature affected the wood, and they had to constantly adjust the tension of the strings. As they ran through several series of scales, the shifting pitch gave the music a discordant, atonal quality.

  “The Abramovs have promised an original duet,” Miss Mamie said. “Written just for the occasion. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have preparations to attend to.”

  After she left, Adam leaned forward in his chair and gripped the widow’s walk railing, daring himself to look over the side to the small slanting roof above the portico, and to the hard arc of driveway sixty feet below. To the spot where he had died. He swallowed and closed his eyes, leaned back in the chair.

  “What’s the matter, Princess?” Paul asked. “You’ve gone pale.”

  “Shouldn’t have had that second glass of wine.”

  “How am I ever going to turn you into a party girl if you can’t hold your liquor better than that? The night is young.”

  “Yeah, but I feel a hundred years old.”

  Paul patted Adam’s knee. “You stay here and rest your ancient bones, then. I’m going to get my camera.”

  “And probably sneak a few hits off a joint?”

  Paul gave that irresistible, mischievous grin. “Makes me creative. And all the rest.”

  “Save some for me.”

  “You haven’t changed a bit, no matter what they say.” Paul looked around, leaned forward, and kissed Adam on the cheek. “Like the lady said, it’s going to be a night to remember.”

  Adam watched as Paul crossed the widow’s walk and slipped through the trapdoor. Lilith and the dough-faced cook were setting up a buffet table. The Abramovs had returned their instruments to their cases and now stood near the railing, talking to the Arabian woman, Zainab. Smoke drifted from the four
chimneys, rising above the trees that surrounded the manor.

  Adam hunched into his chair, shivering. He wouldn’t mind a fire right now. Fall was dying and winter was coming on. Cold and gray and suffocating. Too bad this night couldn’t last forever.

  CHAPTER 57

  Sweat poured from Mason like blood from a shotgun wound, his muscles screaming as he ran the fluter under the slope that would be one of Korban’s cheeks. He rammed his gouge down across the wooden shoulders with his left hand. He had never carved with both hands at the same time before, but anything was possible now. The wood seemed to peel away as if shucking itself. They were in a hurry, both he and his statue.

  The voice came from the bust again, the voice that had been urging him onward, driving Mason into a frenzy of chiseling and chopping and planing. It had scared him at first, but now the voice was just that of another instructor, albeit the most demanding one Mason had ever worked under.

  This was the most demanding of critics.

  The tunnel was waiting if he failed.

  The dark crib and the rats and his mama with the squeaky voice and long gray tail.

  “More off the shoulder, you fool,” said the bust.

  Mason looked at the bust, at Korban, his creation, his first masterpiece. The lantern on the table threw the left side of the bust into shadow.

  The wooden lips moved again. “Hurry. They’re waiting.”

  “Who?” Mason’s syllable was a whisper. The air of the basement was charged with an eerie static. The hairs on the backs of his hands tingled. Flames roared up the central chimney on the other side of the stone wall.

  “Get on with it, sculptor.”

  “I need to rest.”

  “You’ll have plenty of time to rest later.”

  Mason laid his tools on the table, wiped his brow, sagged to the concrete floor in exhaustion. Then he saw Korban’s painting of the manor, the one someone must have altered while Mason wasn’t around. Because the figures were clearly visible, dabbed in thick strokes of oil. The woman with the bouquet had moved into the foreground, beyond the railing, and her position had changed, her arms spread, eyes wide. She was falling.