The Fullness of Time--A Novel of Watervalley

by Jeff High

  I stared at her in disbelief. “Wow, this is doubly upsetting.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Well, it’s bad enough that John’s in my bed...given the possibilities of the moment. But now I’ve got not one, but two images of your mother in my bedroom. That sort of thing puts a real damper on a guy’s imagination.”

  Christine rolled her eyes. “Bradford, you are so predictable.”

  I gathered her in even tighter. “Completely bewitched.”

  She responded with a taunting grin. “Tell you what. Why don’t you follow me out to the farmhouse and you can sleep in the guest bedroom? And if you’re lucky, maybe one of Santa’s elves will come and tuck you in.”

  “Hmm, I think I like this plan. You sure your mother’s okay with me staying?”

  She took my hand, and we began to walk toward the house. "Quite sure. It was her idea. She's already left to get the bed ready."

  Christine continued walking, but I stood frozen. After another step, she stopped and looked back at me. "What's wrong?"

  “Your mother’s idea, huh?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Which part?”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Using the guest room part or the tucking me in part?”

  Christine shook her head and turned toward the house. “Wait and see, Bradford. Wait and see.”

  She left, and I crept upstairs to grab a few things to throw in a duffle bag. My stealth probably didn’t matter. John was making snoring noises that only an exorcist could cure.

  As I walked downstairs, I realized that I had completely neglected to talk with Christine about the letter. After a moment’s reflection, I shrugged it off. Our conversation in the moonlight had been too delightful, too perfect. There would be a time to talk through the matter with her. But tonight was not it.

  I unplugged the tree, turned off all the lights, and walked out the front door. From downtown, I heard the clock tower on the courthouse faintly chime the midnight hour. The excitement and adrenaline of the evening were finally expended, and I was consumed with a complete and total exhaustion. Sleep at Christine's farmhouse couldn't come soon enough.

  Nevertheless, it was Christmas Eve and the night was filled with a solemn, inspiring presence. Before walking to my car, I once again stared toward the lonely stars and into the vast and enchanted universe. All the world seemed peaceful, expectant, listening. In the distance, random lights from the houses on the encircling hills formed a twinkling wreath around the town.

  Yet even through my weariness, something odd drew my attention; a strange and obsessive flickering in the distance. Somewhere from the recesses of boyhood, a memory clicked. I recognized what I was seeing.

  The peculiar, flashing light was coming from the high tower of the old mansion on Society Hill...the home of Matthew House.

  Chapter 8

  SOS

  THE BLINKING LIGHT was whispering through my drowsy stupor, triggering an ancient lesson from the past. It was Morse Code.

  There were three dots then three dashes followed by three dots again...the international distress sign for SOS. Decades before, during a brief tenure with the scouts, I had attained a handful of merit badges. One of them was in Signaling. Over and over the light beamed into the night, broken by an occasional and irregular pause.

  Reality finally registered.

  “Oh, crap!” The words were spontaneous and involuntary.

  On impulse, I rushed toward my car, jumped in, and swiftly closed the door behind me. But just before turning the key, I stopped.

  “What was I about to do?” I thought.

  My first instinct was to call the sheriff’s office. Then I quickly realized that I was reacting to a rather thin observation...a supposed SOS flickering at quite a distance. There were consequences. Once the sheriff was involved, if my observation turned out to be false, the story would roar across the whole of Watervalley, providing fodder for yet another toxic rumor about Matthew. I had no clue as to his cell phone number, and after a quick directory check, I dialed the landline to the inn. It was no longer in service. My choices were few.

  Urgency had now been replaced with apprehension. I sat frozen, staring vacantly ahead. The moment was rich with irony.

  My entire evening had been crowded with people and conversation, well-meaning souls who had exhausted my normal preference for polite detachment. Now, I desperately wished for company, for someone with whom to decide what should be done. Christine was probably home by now, and rousing John was highly unlikely. I would have to go it alone.

  Reluctantly, I started the engine and turned on to Fleming Street, moving more from reflex and instinct than from a definitive plan. Somewhere in those moments, the air of the evening elusively changed.

  A light fog had rolled in, cloaking the street before me. I drove slowly, cautiously, and all the while deliberating on what to do. The car passed under the street lamps one by one; small islands of illumination in a landscape that now felt obscure and lonely. This strange, distant signal had altered the mood of the night. The warm, festive spirit of the previous hours had been swept away, and all that remained was a stagnant, brooding intensity.

  Watervalley after midnight was frozen and lifeless. The shadowed lawns were covered with heavy frost, petrified; thinly illuminated by the frail luster of the moon. All the houses were darkened and asleep, napping in the oblivion of a snug winter night. Weary, I returned my attention to the lane before me, questioning my own actions.

  Downtown was quiet and deserted, a barren world of closed shops and empty pavements. Life and sound seemed held in abeyance. The unpeopled desolation gave the streets an odd, haunting stillness as if the entirety of Watervalley were mystically locked in a cataleptic trance. A drained, sleepy voice in the back of my head whispered that I should turn around and go to Christine’s. Immersed in a foreboding uncertainty, I exhaled and accelerated.

  The car rounded the Courthouse square. Three blocks further I turned and began the long ascent up Society Hill, straining to catch a glimpse of the tower section of the old mansion. I ardently wanted to confirm the reality of the distress signal. But the angle of approach offered no such vantage point. I continued up the winding lane, my headlights tunneling through the black cavern formed by the canopy of trees that lined the road.

  Upon arriving at the mansion’s entrance, I stopped and cut my lights. The heavy iron gates were wide apart but the trees surrounding them obscured a view of the house. My trepidation grew. I didn’t want my presence known. At least, not yet. With my headlights still off, I pulled quietly on to the long, cobbled drive, creeping so as not to be heard. After easing the car to a stop beside the broad stone steps of the front entry, I quietly cut the engine, gently turning the key as if it was fragile and might break.

  Nagging doubt had accompanied me the entire way. Now that I was here, I openly felt like an intruder whose presence would be difficult to explain. Yet, I had come this far. There was no choice but to settle the matter. The car was too close to the house to see the signal up above, and I had to walk into the yard to attain a better view. High overhead a thin layering of wispy clouds had moved in, veiling the moon and giving the once familiar night a peculiar, disturbing presence. But upon opening the car door, I was thrust into a different world.

  A savage burst of colder, frozen air hit me, hard. Its effect was immediate, fierce, and jagged, shocking my body into full wakefulness. Briskly, I excited, shut the door behind me, and impulsively blew into my hands. My movements were fearful and erratic. My eyes went everywhere, skittishly canvasing everything around me. I stood for a moment, adjusting, struggling to gather my senses. Then, another bitter, scoffing wind gusted by me, scattering the last remnants of leaves and sending a hardened shiver down my neck. Tugging nauseatingly at my throat, an involuntary wave of dread and indecision was swiftly consuming me.

  I grimaced, pulled my coat collar tight, and tramped stubbornly on to the front lawn. Once there,
I turned to view the high tower and was thoroughly baffled. The flashing light had stopped. The distress beacon was no more. There was nothing, nothing but the low dim of a single lamp from a window on the third floor. Cold, anxious, and clouded with doubt, I shivered in the frozen grass, watching, waiting. Still, there was nothing. Except for the lone, solitary light, the vast estate was dark and asleep.

  Then slowly, something primal within me became aware of a larger attendance; an overpowering, eerie feeling that I was not alone. Its presence was overwhelming and unmistakable. I shook uncontrollably. A hard trembling, monstrous and uncontrolled, bristled over me. My eyes pierced sharply into the gloom of the enormous mansion. It seemed that something secret and immense waited inside; a larger authority, a breathing reality that was watching my intrusion from within the shadows, regarding my movements with a vicious curiosity.

  I wanted to ignore it, to detach myself from such a foolish notion. But doing so proved impossible. Another tingling chill ran across my skin; an unexplained, instinctive warning.

  Then it began; a kind of ghastly whispering on the surface of the air, pleading words that were ancient and muffled. There was only a single voice at first, but it quickly thickened into a discordant blend, an earnest and cacophonous imploring. Initially, I doubted what I was hearing. But that was to change quickly. Faster, louder, harder, the deep, gurgling words came, swirling around me, encircling me, escalating into a raucous harmony of singing voices. There was no processing this, no instant means of grasping what was happening. A galling panic convulsed through me. I was stunned, paralyzed, waiting for my mind to catch up. Then, just as quickly, the murmuring tones cooled and receded into a low hum, ending in a somber, spectral moaning of wind. And then, it was gone.

  Words exploded from me. “What in hell was that?”

  I was heaving for breath, and after one hyper-vigilant second of scanning the darkness around me, I bolted in a terrified run back to the car.

  That had done it. I no longer searched for any rational definitions or clung to any sense of noble cause. Escape from whatever creepy heebie-jeebies I had just witnessed was now my new life priority. The curiosity that had previously prompted me to go on this hero’s errand was long gone and had now been replaced with a healthy dose of spineless fear.

  Yet just before reaching the car I caught a glimpse of another damnable flicker from the high tower window. It was only three dashes and three dots...not a full signal. I ignored it and moved quickly. But before opening my car door, once more, I stopped. Feverishly, I deliberated. Perhaps I had simply missed the first part, having lowered my gaze in my haste to depart.

  Reluctantly, I stepped back into the yard and waited. The signal didn’t repeat. I again pulled my coat tightly around me, bracing against the strange, piercing cold of this high hill. Admittedly, for the first time in my adulthood, I was scared to death; plagued with a consuming fear that everything about my presence here was wrong. But I knew what I had seen. With quaking determination, I climbed the stone steps and moved into the shadows of the massive porch. Under my breath, I whispered, "Bradford, you're a total idiot."

  Peering through the side glass, I saw nothing within but swallowing darkness. I couldn't find a doorbell, so I proceeded to give the door a solid knock. But after the first rap, it gave way, swaying open with an unsettling groan. Cautiously, I stepped inside, shutting it behind me. The massive estate was permeated with the smells of accumulated time, the pungent and quiet sternness of many decades.

  “Hello?”

  Admittedly, my volume was modest. It was a fool’s task; attempting to make my presence known without making my presence alarming.

  “Hello? Matthew? It’s Luke Bradford.”

  My inquiries were met with complete silence.

  I stood and waited to see if my eyes might adjust to the darkness. But after what seemed an eternity, little had changed. I retrieved my cell phone and used it for a light. Again, I called out.

  “Hello? Matthew?”

  Nothing. I was in a sizable entry hall with thick stone walls and a towering ceiling that was vaulted like the nave of a cathedral. Tall gothic windows were to either side and before me was a broad cased opening that gathered to a high, pointed arch. I walked toward it, my footfalls echoing rudely across the marble floor. Beyond the opening was a grand space that perhaps had been a ballroom in the estate’s former years.

  “Hello? Matthew? It’s Luke Bradford. I saw the distress signal! Is everything okay?”

  Still, there was nothing. Cautiously I eased around the furniture, endeavoring to find a light switch. I found several antiquated brass wall plates with large black buttons labeled with faded letters for “on” and “off.” None of them worked. I pressed them repeatedly, but there were only meaningless clicks in the darkness.

  My uneasiness grew. I had the haunting feeling that my small phone light was in truth, my enemy, serving only to expose me and illuminating little else. Choking panic began to re-emerge. I felt vulnerable and shut it off, desperately trying to keep my wits. But in my apprehension, my mind raced.

  In the face of so many ominous uncertainties, the human brain has a dreadful capacity for fabricating horror, for imagining all manner of grisly fictions, especially when such ill-omened circumstances convince the mind that something sinister and supernatural may genuinely be near. And that was the problem.

  I truly thought something was near, watching me. Illogical fear was taking over, overwhelming me, knotting every muscle. I felt an unexplainable, menacing presence as if at any moment, the singing voices would break the tense silence, wildly reaching at me from some dark corner. I was convinced of it. But still, there was nothing; no voice, no movement, no sound.

  “What am I doing?” I thought to myself. I was in another man’s house, in the dark, uninvited. What absurdity had brought me to this? The SOS signal had stopped, and, in my flustered state, I began to doubt it had ever been genuine at all. What if I was mistaken and had only seen the errant flickering of holiday lights?

  All the uncertainties had finally overcome me. I was dreadfully fearing what I could not see and desperately afraid of being discovered. All that mattered now was to leave, to escape, to move quickly to my car and speed away.

  I was halfway to the entrance hall when the voice called out.

  But this time, it was full-throated, clear, completely audible. It had come distantly, echoing down from the labyrinthine darkness of the upper floors. Using my phone light, I crossed the room and stopped on the second step of a grand, looping stairway.

  “Hello? It’s Luke Bradford. I’m down here. Is everything okay?”

  The response was more pronounced. “I’m on the third floor. Can you hear me?”

  “Yes, I hear you. I’m coming up.”

  I practically sprinted up the stairs, covering two steps with each stride. But when I arrived at the wide hallway at the top, I stopped abruptly and listened. Here the previous silence of the house was broken by the nocturnal creaks and groans of the night, as if ghosts were sliding along the walls; watching, waiting, listening. I called out.

  “Hello? Matthew? It’s Luke Bradford. Are you up here?”

  I heard a brisk rapping on the second door to my right. “Yes. Down this way.” His voice was now clear, filled with urgency. I stepped quickly.

  The knocking continued, and as I approached, I could discern a thin line of light glowing at the door's bottom edge. My heart was thumping. "Matthew, are you alright? I saw an SOS signal."

  "Yes. I'm fine. Somehow, the door bolted behind me, and I can't get out."

  I held my small light near the lock. It was a relic of decades past; a raised brass box mounted to the door with a rounded knob and a key slot below. A more modern deadbolt had been installed above it. I tried to turn the handle but to no avail. "It's not working from this side either. What should I do?"

  “Look in one of the other rooms. There will be a skeleton key on the inside of the lock. They’re universal. Tr
y it on this one.”

  I understood. Using my phone light, I stepped to a door across the hallway and found a key on the room side of the lock. I returned and inserted it into the slot. After a moments’ fidgeting, the key rotated and clicked. I turned the knob and swung the door open. Standing before me was an extremely embarrassed and eternally grateful Matthew House.

  Chapter 9

  GHOSTS

  Matthew grabbed my hand and held it firmly. His words drenched in relief.

  `"Thank you! Thank you so much for coming. I got locked in, and there was no way to get out."

  I blurted something in response to assure him. But in truth, I was still catching my breath. We both were in a staggered state, wide-eyed, breathless, shaking our heads in an amused exhilaration. And while the adrenaline of the moment seemed to demand a lengthy exchange of accounts and explanations, nothing was said. Instead, there fell between us a wordless and automatic understanding, much the same as a bond formed by two strangers who had just narrowly missed being hit by a passing train.

  Then, in an instant, Matthew's elation was replaced with a labored urgency, and I could sense from his movements that he was straining to get past me.

  “I need to go check on the twins. Do you mind waiting here? I’ll be right back.”

  “Sure. I’ll come with you?”

  “No!” Matthew immediately realized that his answer was oddly abrupt. He stopped and held up his hand while gathering his response. “It’s...it’s just that if they’re awake, your presence might frighten them. Look, I...I’m sorry. I’m not wanting to be rude. I just need to go check on them.”

  “Sure. No problem. I’ll hang tight.”

  He turned toward the stairs, clicking on a large flashlight. It had likely been the one that he had used to signal the SOS. For some reason, though, I hadn’t noticed it before. Then it occurred to me that he had been stiffly holding his left hand close to his trousers, almost as if he had wanted to keep the flashlight hidden. It was all rather odd.