Faerie Tale (32 page)

Patrick observed, “She takes a lot of showers and baths.”

Sean nodded. “Girls do that. They don’t like dirt.” With that sage insight they returned to their comics.

After a while the phone rang again. Sean looked up and saw that Patrick was lost in the latest adventures of Wonder Woman. He listened and heard Gabbie’s voice echo down the hall: “Get the phone, damnit!”

Sean rose and hurried to the phone, picked up the receiver, and said, “Hello.”

“Patrick? Sean?” said the voice on the phone, made scratchy by long distance.

“Sean.”

“This is Mark. Is your father home?”

“No. Mom and Dad are shopping. They’ll be back for dinner.”

“Is Jack or Gabbie there?”

“Jack’s coming over, Gabbie’s in the bath. You’ve been gone a long time. When you coming back?”

“Soon. I’m in Germany. Now listen carefully, Sean. I
want you to give your dad a message. It’s important. I don’t know when I’ll be back.…” A squeal of static erupted, then Mark said, “… but regardless of when, tell your dad to leave the stuff in the basement alone until I get back, no matter
what
he finds. And if he finds anything else, anywhere on your property, tell him.…” Again static obscured his words. “It’s very important that he doesn’t touch
anything.
You got that?”

“Sure. You’re in Germany and Dad’s not to mess with the stuff in the basement.”

“Okay. Now, tell your father I’ve got some of the translation of the parchment and some other new information—” A sudden loud burst of static sounded as lightning flashed outside; the phone went dead at the other end. Sean listened for a moment as series of clicks sounded, followed, after a long silence, by the dial tone. Something in the tone of Mark’s voice and the sudden silence on the phone disturbed Sean. He held the phone until it began a recording telling him to hang up. He did so and headed back toward his room.

Gabbie opened the bathroom door, allowing a cloud of steam to escape, and said, “Who was that?”

“Mark. He’s in Germany.”

Gabbie emerged from the bathroom wearing a white terry-cloth bathrobe, a puzzled expression on her face. “He called from Germany?”

Sean nodded. “Yeah, he’s in Germany. He said to tell Dad that he shouldn’t do anything in the basement until he got back.”

Gabbie toweled her hair. “I wonder what that’s supposed to mean. Germany? I thought he was in New York all this time. Was there anything else?”

“Yes.…” Sean thought a long moment. “But I forget.”

“Great. Well, you better remember before Dad gets back. When’s Mark coming here?”

“He said he didn’t know.” Without further comment he entered his room and returned to the latest adventures of the Batman. For a long time Sean scanned the brightly
colored pages, but he couldn’t shake the odd quality in Mark’s voice. Sean couldn’t judge such things, but he thought Mark had sounded scared.

Phil wasn’t pleased by the lack of agreement about what had happened. He said, “So he said not to do anything?” Sean nodded.

“Anything what, honey?” asked Gloria.

Sean struggled to remember. “He had something for you, I think. Anyway, he said he’d tell you when he got here.”

Gloria regarded the pouring rain outside. “But he didn’t say when that would be?”

Sean shrugged. “He just said soon.”

Gabbie ate silently. She had avoided responsibility for the lack of a complete message by insisting on her right to an uninterrupted bath. The boys were old enough to write down messages. Her father had agreed in principle, but he still looked irritated with his daughter. He had left her in charge.

A knock on the back door was followed by Jack’s entrance. He was dripping but smiling. “You ready?”

“Wait a minute,” Gabbie said, jumping up from the table. “We’re running late tonight.”

“We’ve got time. The movie doesn’t begin for another hour.”

“No, you leave now,” said Gloria. “With this rain I don’t want you rushing, and I know how Gabbie drives.” Gabbie ran from the room and up the stairs. Gloria regarded the dripping Jack. “Why in heaven didn’t you let her pick you up? Even with that slicker, you’re drenched.”

Jack winked. “Because if I’d stayed at Aggie’s, Gabbie’d have waited until the last minute to collect me, and I know how she drives, too.”

“I heard that!” came down the stairs. “Gabbie says you’re taking off for a few days,” said Gloria.

Jack unbuttoned his slicker. “First thing tomorrow. I’ve got an old friend at Fredonia who’s going to help me organize my material, then prep me for my second orals, week after next.”

“This is it, then?” said Phil.

Jack nodded, betraying a slight nervousness. “If I get past these orals, I advance to candidacy. My doctorate won’t be automatic, but it’ll be just a matter of doing the work right. But this is where they wash out the students they don’t think can cut it, the final culling of the herd.”

“You’ll do fine,” commented Phil.

Gloria changed the subject. “Mark Blackman called. He’s in Germany.”

“Germany?”

“If Sean heard right, he’s been in Germany for the last two weeks.”

Jack looked confused a moment. “This all has to do with the stuff in the basement, I guess. Germany? Fancy that.”

Phil said, “I guess.” He put down his fork. “That still doesn’t clear up the mystery of what happened to Gary. I expected him back a few days ago.”

Patrick looked up from his plate, a guilty expression on his face. “He’s still in Seattle.”

Phil said, “How do you know that?”

“He called.”

“When?”

“Last week. I forgot to tell you. He said Mark had gone to Germany from New York and he was going to stay in Washington for a while.”

“I think tomorrow I buy an answering machine.” Phil was caught between anger and resigned amusement. “With five people living in this house, why isn’t it humanly possible to get messages…?”

Gabbie jumped up at the sound of a car coming up the drive. She let the book she’d been reading fall to the floor as she peered through the window. Jack was barely out of Aggie’s car when she was flying down the porch steps to leap upon him. He staggered back against the fender of the car, dropping the book bag he had been carrying. He held her up as she kissed him. When at last she broke away, he said, “Hey. I’ve barely been gone a week.”

She kissed him again, lingering and hungry. “It seemed like a month.” She said with a grin, “I’m so damn horny, I can’t believe it.”

Jack returned the grin. “We’ll have to do something about that.” She stuck her tongue in his ear, something she had discovered made him absolutely crazy, and he jumped and shivered. Quickly he disentangled himself from her. “But not until tonight, you shameless hussy.” Over her mock pout he said, “Aggie’s got some local matrons over for tea. She’s picking brains for her book again. Unless everyone here’s gone off somewhere?” he hopefully asked.

“No such luck. The twins will be home from school in an hour and Gloria’s doing kitchen stuff. Dad’s in playing a game on the computer, though we’re all supposed to think he’s hard at work.” She pinched Jack on the rear. “We could grab a blanket and sneak off to the barn.”

Jack jumped and laughed. “You are insatiable, woman.” He kissed her. “And those brothers of yours have radar. They’d come rolling into the barn at the worst possible moment. Besides, it’s starting to get wet and the barn roof leaks, and it’s
cold.
Now, be good!”

Hugging him again, Gabbie grinned. “Good? I’m great. You’ve said so yourself.”

Jack laughed in resignation. A scattering of drops an
nounced the arrival of a rainstorm that had been glowering in the sky all day. “Let’s get inside,” Jack said.

She put her arm around his waist and they walked toward the house.

In the den, Phil was hunched over before the computer, concentrating hard on what he read on the screen. After a moment he opened the bottom drawer of his desk, pulling out a pencil and a legal pad. He consulted his notes and typed in the instruction to return him to where he left off last. Somehow, some way, he was determined to finish this and, without help from anyone, get a perfect score of 400 playing Zork. He looked up and smiled at Jack. “How are things?”

“Pretty good. I think I’m ready for my orals next Tuesday. My friend Mike came up with questions I don’t think even Aggie could have thought of. Speaking of Aggie, I thought I’d hang out here for a few hours before going home. Her coffee klatch should be finished by then.”

“Good,” said Gabbie. “We can put the time to good use.”

“What good use?”

“We’ve still got a bunch of trunks in the attic we haven’t opened. Let’s go poke around and see if we can’t scratch up something interesting.”

Jack said, “Toward what ends?”

“Who knows? Maybe we can find something that will help out Mark and Gary when they get back.” It was already three weeks into October, and Mark and Gary were still on their respective sojourns seeking insights into the odd findings in the Hastingses’ basement. “Gary called a couple of days ago. He’s bogged down with his linguist friends in Seattle. And he’s lost track of Mark and wanted to know if we’ve heard from him.”

“Lost track?” mused Jack. “That’s strange.”

“Gary didn’t seem particularly distressed. He said Mark often gets sidetracked while traveling. He must’ve uncovered something diverting after he said he was about to return. So I volunteered us to go snooping in the attic.

Anyway, it’ll give us something useful to do this afternoon.”

Jack shook his head. “All right. You’ve talked me into it, you silver-tongued devil.”

Phil’s attention had already returned to his computer screen. “Have fun, you two,” he said absently.

Gabbie said to Jack, “Come on, let’s go into the attic and poke.”

Presenting an evil grin as they climbed the stairs, he whispered, “You know that sounds dirty.”

A short elbow to the ribs was her only answer as they headed for the stairs to the attic.

It seemed impossible. If you tried to get through the gas-filled room with a lit torch, you blew up, but if you put out the torch and moved in the dark, the hideous grue got you. Phil was diverted from the computer screen by the sound of rain on the window. He glanced over and discovered the sprinkle had become a steady downpour. Then the sound of water striking glass was cut by Gabbie’s and Jack’s voices. He glanced at his watch and saw he’d been playing for almost an hour and a half. Quickly he saved his location in the game and turned off the computer.

Jack entered with a roll of paper. “Phil, take a look at this,” he said.

Phil studied the paper for a moment. “It’s a map of the property.” He noted the yellowish color and condition of the map and added, “And it’s an old one from the look of it.”

Jack pointed to a title block in the lower right corner and said, “Nineteen hundred and six, according to this. That’s about when Fredrick Kessler bought the property.”

Gabbie said, “The barn’s in a different place. And it’s smaller.”

“Must have had a new one built later,” observed Phil. He read the small notations and said, “It’s certainly the original plot plan for the property. There’s no gazebo and no tool shed beside the barn, and the drive heads off at a slightly different angle.” Something about the map bothered him, but he couldn’t put his finger on what it was.

He looked up to see Jack studying him. Jack said, “You too?”

“Something’s funny about this map, Dad.” Gabbie shook her head. “Yes, but what?”

“It’s like something we saw already, but different,” observed Jack.

“I don’t recall seeing any maps of the property, except at the bank when we bought this place, and those were the little ones provided by the land title company.”

Gabbie looked hard at it, as if by force of will she’d make it yield its secret. Then her expression turned to one of understanding. “I’ve got it!” she shouted.

“What?” asked Jack.

“Stay here and I’ll show you.” She ran from the room and Jack and Phil could hear the basement door under the stairs open. They heard her footfalls on the wooden stairs to the basement, then the distant sound of the door to the secret room being opened. In a moment she was back with a parchment. “It’s this odd thing we found when we helped Mark.” She unrolled it and they again regarded the strange unmarked vellum with its odd lines and circles. “Look at the seven lines at the right and look at the underlined words on the map!” Her tone was excited.

Jack said, “Gabbie, you’re a genius! It’s an overlay. Watch.” Jack laid the translucent vellum atop the map. “By pressing, you can see the map underneath.”

Phil looked and said, “Barely.”

“Maybe they didn’t have onionskin paper back then,” said Gabbie.

“Or they wanted something that would last a little
longer,” said Jack. He pointed. “Look at these seven lines on the right.”

Each line on the vellum underlined a word of description on the map, part of a notation made by the records clerk when the map had been filed at the turn of the century.

“That coil of lines wraps right around the base of Erl King Hill,” said Jack. He moved the overlay and read the paragraph below. It began, “From the median line of county road 15, at a distance of exactly two miles south of the junction of state road 7, to the point described as a meeting of lines extending from.…” It went on describing the property limits of the farm using geographical locations of the day. The word “to” had been underlined. The entire paragraph was strictly
pro forma
legal description, but the last line read, “… the property commonly known as Erl King Hill,” with the words “Erl King” underlined, completing the-message.

Gabbie read the seven words aloud. “‘To the home of the Erl King.’ What’s that mean?”

“I think it’s a code within a code,” ventured Jack. Gabbie and Phil looked at him questioningly. “‘The home of the Erl King’ meant something to Kessler and maybe some others, but … you know, in case someone like us found the map and the overlay, we’d still not know what it showed the location of.”

Phil’s eyes followed the long lines and saw that the larger circle was located a half mile behind the house. Pointing to the coil with circles design, he tapped it with his finger. “What’s that?”