justsee her sometime. What does she look like?
She looks sick. All shadowy around the eyes. Amanda sounded impatient. I have to go.
Nickie spent the next hour or so roaming around Greenhaven. She loved being alone here. She burrowed through the silent rooms like a miner hunting for gold. What she wanted was anything old, and especially anything written. From desk drawers and closet shelves and the backs of cabinets, and from the trunks and boxes in the third floor rooms, she pulled out packets of letters, programs from long-ago theater performances, journals and ledger books and guest lists and postcards. She sat on the floor reading until the air around her felt thick with the past. All these words, written so long ago, seemed to say to her, Remember us. We were here. We were real.
She kept Otis nearby. If she was sitting on the floor, he pushed his nose against her arm, wanting to be petted. He tugged at the leg of her pants, wanting to play. Sometimes he slept, stretched out, belly to the rug, his rear legs flopped behind him like a frogs. Now and then he would wander off, and when Nickie remembered to look for him, shed find him chewing happily on the corner of a curtain, or trying to dig through the hardwood floor. He was all the company she needed.
Around two-thirty, when Crystal still wasnt back, she decided to take Otis for his afternoon outing. She heard banging as she went down the hall, probably coming from one of the bathrooms. The plumber must be here. She went out through the kitchen to the back garden.
To her surprise, the basement door was slightly ajar. The plumber must have gone down there to get at the pipes under the house. Good. Shed been curious about the basementshe could have a look. She picked Otis up, pulled open the door, and peeked in. The plumber had turned on the light. It was dim, just a bulb in the ceiling, but it showed her a flight of stone steps. Holding Otis tightly, she went down.
CHAPTER 14 ______________
Someone in the Basement
The basement was hugea low-ceilinged room that stretched out into shadowy darkness ahead of her and to the left. It wasnt an empty darknessshe could see what appeared to be low hills lurking in the shadows. Another light bulb shone dimly in a far corner. Did that mean someone was down here? One of the workmen, maybe? She thought of calling out, Anyone here? But there was something still and heavy about the silence that made her afraid to break it. She would just look around a little, quietly, and then she would climb up the stairs and leave.
The air had a smell like the damp, earthy underside of rocks. Once her eyes had adjusted to the dimness, she saw that the hills were piles of furniture, a great crammed-together mass with just a narrow passage winding through it. Tables lay with their feet in the air, and between the feet were other tables, and dining room chairs and stools and chests of drawers, and on top of the chests were more chairs, upside down, making a nest for footstools and mirrors and lamp bases and unidentifiable things covered in sheets. Far back against the wall stood four-poster beds, some piled with three or four mattresses, and great looming wardrobes with mirrored doors. All of it had turned the same dirt-gray color because of the dust that coated it. Cobwebs drifted in long strings from the ceiling, brushing Nickies face as she walked by. Otis squirmed in her arms.
She followed the passage that twisted through all thisit was like walking down a tunnel, almost, because the furniture was stacked shoulder-high. She moved toward the light.
She heard a scrape, and then a rustling sound.
She stopped, held her breath, and listened. Was someone in here? She bent down and peered through the forest of furniture legs, but it was too dark to see.
Something stirred over by the wall. Wood knocked against wood, a head rose from the jumble of furniture, and a voice spoke.
Pa? it said. Is that you?
No, said Nickie. Her heart jumped, but
She looks sick. All shadowy around the eyes. Amanda sounded impatient. I have to go.
Nickie spent the next hour or so roaming around Greenhaven. She loved being alone here. She burrowed through the silent rooms like a miner hunting for gold. What she wanted was anything old, and especially anything written. From desk drawers and closet shelves and the backs of cabinets, and from the trunks and boxes in the third floor rooms, she pulled out packets of letters, programs from long-ago theater performances, journals and ledger books and guest lists and postcards. She sat on the floor reading until the air around her felt thick with the past. All these words, written so long ago, seemed to say to her, Remember us. We were here. We were real.
She kept Otis nearby. If she was sitting on the floor, he pushed his nose against her arm, wanting to be petted. He tugged at the leg of her pants, wanting to play. Sometimes he slept, stretched out, belly to the rug, his rear legs flopped behind him like a frogs. Now and then he would wander off, and when Nickie remembered to look for him, shed find him chewing happily on the corner of a curtain, or trying to dig through the hardwood floor. He was all the company she needed.
Around two-thirty, when Crystal still wasnt back, she decided to take Otis for his afternoon outing. She heard banging as she went down the hall, probably coming from one of the bathrooms. The plumber must be here. She went out through the kitchen to the back garden.
To her surprise, the basement door was slightly ajar. The plumber must have gone down there to get at the pipes under the house. Good. Shed been curious about the basementshe could have a look. She picked Otis up, pulled open the door, and peeked in. The plumber had turned on the light. It was dim, just a bulb in the ceiling, but it showed her a flight of stone steps. Holding Otis tightly, she went down.
CHAPTER 14 ______________
Someone in the Basement
The basement was hugea low-ceilinged room that stretched out into shadowy darkness ahead of her and to the left. It wasnt an empty darknessshe could see what appeared to be low hills lurking in the shadows. Another light bulb shone dimly in a far corner. Did that mean someone was down here? One of the workmen, maybe? She thought of calling out, Anyone here? But there was something still and heavy about the silence that made her afraid to break it. She would just look around a little, quietly, and then she would climb up the stairs and leave.
The air had a smell like the damp, earthy underside of rocks. Once her eyes had adjusted to the dimness, she saw that the hills were piles of furniture, a great crammed-together mass with just a narrow passage winding through it. Tables lay with their feet in the air, and between the feet were other tables, and dining room chairs and stools and chests of drawers, and on top of the chests were more chairs, upside down, making a nest for footstools and mirrors and lamp bases and unidentifiable things covered in sheets. Far back against the wall stood four-poster beds, some piled with three or four mattresses, and great looming wardrobes with mirrored doors. All of it had turned the same dirt-gray color because of the dust that coated it. Cobwebs drifted in long strings from the ceiling, brushing Nickies face as she walked by. Otis squirmed in her arms.
She followed the passage that twisted through all thisit was like walking down a tunnel, almost, because the furniture was stacked shoulder-high. She moved toward the light.
She heard a scrape, and then a rustling sound.
She stopped, held her breath, and listened. Was someone in here? She bent down and peered through the forest of furniture legs, but it was too dark to see.
Something stirred over by the wall. Wood knocked against wood, a head rose from the jumble of furniture, and a voice spoke.
Pa? it said. Is that you?
No, said Nickie. Her heart jumped, but
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