Spider Lake (28 page)

What had pushed back? It didn’t make sense to him. If something was on top of the cellar door, he would only feel resistance from the weight. He distinctly felt something push back. He was paralyzed with fear. He stood there on the steps saying nothing, listening for any sound of a voice or a grunt or a breath, but no sound came but the sound of the storm. A bug, probably a spider dropped onto his cheek and he slapped it away. If there was ever a time that he could revert to a child again, it was now. Ben wanted his mother. He wanted to crawl in bed with her as he used to do when he was little, and when he was scared.

He tried the door one more time. It gave way again in the same fashion, and again Ben felt something strong push back at him. He could feel the strength of the unseen thing’s muscle. It pushed back hard. This was the kind of scared that makes a person want to pee in their pants. Behind him, Matt asked, “Open the door Ben! What are you waiting for!”

Ben walked backwards down the steps and bumped into Matt. “Something is up there pushing the door shut when I try to open it.”

“Are you frigging pulling my leg or are you for real?”

“I am not making this up Matt. Something is pushing back when I try to open the door. Go see for yourself if you don’t believe me.”

“Alright I will. But if you are pulling my leg I am going to be pissed!”

Matt climbed the stairs as slow as molasses, holding his good arm out in front of him. He pushed the door as Ben did, and though he had only one arm he still managed to budge it. The unseen force on the opposite side of the door pushed back just as it did with Ben. He was frozen in fear just as Ben was, but for a different reason. He deduced correctly that the force pushing back was a heavy but flexible branch, and they might not be able to budge it.

en rolled out of the McDonalds parking lot and pointed his bike north. He had done his best to soak up the alcohol of the night before with the greasy fast food. It was way too early for him to check into the resort, so he decided he would take a ride to kill some time. He looked at a Wisconsin road-map and guessed the trip north to the Porcupine Mountains and Lake Superior would eat up two hours each way. He was sure that the ride and the fresh air would be the best medicine to revive him from his hangover.

Had he been a little less hung over, or a little more alert, he might have noticed the blue jeep following him until he was many miles out of town. He never did though, and he would never know about the extra hours his ride had purchased for him.

He took route fifty-one through Woodruff and Ironwood, and then rode the smaller county roads that headed north and eastward, finally turning on a road called Presque Isle which ended literally on a boat ramp which serviced Lake Superior. He parked his machine in the lot and walked along the rocky shoreline. He loved the sound of the waves, and was soothed by the huge expanse of water. Before, during his ride, he had put a lot of thought into the hiding of his bike at the resort, but each plan he had come up with fell flat. Ms. Morton would not be fooled easily.

He thought about actually having his motorcycle serviced, but his funds were limited and any motorcycle mechanic in Rhinelander would likely take advantage of him; as business owners often do with their out-of-town customers. Now, while he was putting more thought to the problem, he finally decided on making it simple; purchasing a camouflaged tarp at the builder’s hardware, and covering the bike at the resort. Then, if someone were to drive up the driveway of the place, they couldn’t make an immediate positive ID of his Honda. He sat there for another half an hour, watching the waves, and then he decided to head back.

When he finally reached Spider Lake Road his paranoia increased. He watched his mirrors for any sign of Ruben the Jeep-man, but the road was empty on all sides. He pulled into the resort and parked his bike in the small driveway of cabin four. He quickly unwrapped his new camouflaged tarp and covered the bike, being careful not to let the tarp touch the hot exhaust where it was exposed.

He was pushing tent-stakes down with his shoe to hold the tarp in place when Carly Morton walked up behind him. “Hi Mister Fisher.”

Ben jumped from the unexpected voice behind him. He turned.

“You have to stop doing that Ms. Morton. Each time you sneak up on me like that you are removing days from my already limited remaining life-span.”

“I’m sorry Ben, can I call you Ben? I know. I have a bad habit of sneaking up on people that way. My dad calls me his little Ninja, because I was always sneaking up on him. I see you know where to park your CBR. I guess you would know where to park having lived here before. I see you are covering your bike. That’s another good idea. The weatherman is calling for scattered evening thunderstorms all this week. Better to be safe than sorry, that’s what I always say. Do you want me to show you around the cabin? There are some things changed I bet from when you last lived here.”

Ben’s head was swimming from all the words that just came spilling out from the young woman’s mouth. He noticed she used the term Ninja, just as Ruben did, but in a different context. He also noticed that she was just as stunningly pretty as he had remembered her to be. This time she had her hair down in a pony-tail, she was wearing cut off blue-jeans and a white tank top. This time there were no green rubber gloves. “I guess I would like that Ms. Morton.”

“Please, call me Carly. Everyone does.”

“Okay— Carly. Lead the way.”

She walked to the door which was barely ten steps from where his bike stood, and she swiped an electronic key across a scanning device at the door jamb.

“Ben, this your e-key. All you have to do is hold it here for a second and the latch will open. Each time we get a new guest, my computer randomly selects a new code, so if someone forgets and leaves with their key, they won’t have any access to the cabin afterward. Each cabin is assigned a new code at checkout. It is all done behind the scenes requiring no human interaction at all by a script attached to the resort’s reservation system. You just swipe it like this, see?”

She swiped the key again in front of the device and thist time, the cabin door opened.

“The door opens on its own?”

“Yes, it is connected to an electro-hydraulic servo which opens the door for you. No big deal, you see this type of door servo everywhere in the big box stores and hospitals. When I bought the place, I was always banging into one door or another carrying in my cleaning supplies. I got tired of it so I installed the door systems. You can override the system any time you want by applying pressure either way to the door, which tells the servo to disengage.”

Ben wondered what his mother or father might have thought about the high-tech doors attached to their old cabins. Carly led the way into the cabin, waiting to see Ben’s reaction. Ben recognized the layout. It hadn’t changed. The entry door was midway between the open kitchen on the left, and the living room to the right. A pot-belly stove stood opposite the entry door as it always had, standing on the short wall in-between the two bedroom doors.

Even when Ben was a boy, every surface had so many layers of paint, giving the tiny cabins a sloppy appearance. Edges which were once sharp, were rounded with each new coat of paint. The cabin he was standing in was the same— but not the same. Every piece of trim was expertly painted or stained and when Ben started looking closer, he began to see the upgrades.

The most obvious change was the ceiling. As a boy, the ceilings were horizontal. This new-improved cabin had a cathedral ceiling with three high-tech fans dropped to the level just above the free-standing walls of the bedrooms and bathroom. All the switches on the walls had the same scanning device as the front door. The construction was immaculate. Carly smiled as Ben compared his memories with the beautifully remodeled cabin. Ben’s eyes stopped again at the pot-belly stove.

“Well, at least you still have the pot-belly stove.”

Carly smiled and said; “It’s not quite the pot-belly stove you remember.” She pressed a button on her I-phone and a fire started in the faux-antique.

“I should have known.”

“Ben, you have your own remote for everything in the cabin. Actually, there are three remotes, one master which controls everything, and two more in each bedroom which control only the rooms they are located in. If you own an i-phone, I can give you an app which accesses the systems. Naturally, the code changes as the front door does. Can I show you more?”

Ben followed Carly through the bathroom door. The bath had a giant-sized claw-foot tub that must have been custom made.

“Wow. You have made the old cabin a showroom. I have never stayed in a nicer place.”

She led Ben through another door which led to the master bedroom. There was a giant flat-screen TV on the wall opposite the headboard. Ben was wondering what the place was going to cost.

“My God Carly, who planned all this? The place is beautiful!”

“I had a builder out here the first two years I owned it. I gave the man room and board and paid him a decent salary. Every cabin is now upgraded just the same as this one. I gave up the small window which faced the lake in this bedroom so I could put the television on this wall. I made up for it by adding the larger bay window on the west wall.”

Ben was amazed at what the woman had accomplished in her short life. She was leading him out of the master bedroom and as he was going through the door, he noticed the painting. It was the same painting that Sam Regola had painted for him forty-five years ago. He knew it would be here; two cabins down from cabin six where it was originally hung. It was only two feet from the cabin’s entry door. How could he have missed it? He only had to turn around to see it. He was amazed at how preserved it was. It had survived all these years without fading.

“So what do you think of what I have done with the place?”

Ben wanted to tell her that she was the most energetic, beautiful, smart woman he had ever known. Her beauty was infectious. He wasn’t sure if any man could ever resist her. She had the brightest smiling eyes he had ever laid his own eyes on. He thought about Jill back home. Jill, who carried his twins— who loved him unconditionally. He knew that he would always be true, but the vision in front of him was extraordinary.

“Well,— Carly, I am amazed at what you have done with the place. It is like a showroom.”

“Tell me Ben, did you notice your painting?”

He was not surprised. Why should he be? She had all the curiosity embodied in the Sherlock Holmes character by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Any one could see that. She had found him out yesterday didn’t she? She had connected him to the resort with only one old photograph. Why would she overlook an original piece of art right here on her own property? Ben was in no mood to be coy, so he answered her directly: “Not until we walked through the bedroom door Carly.”

She was smiling at him. It was the smile of a higher being. A smile that stripped Ben of all his defenses. Where was this woman from? Was she some kind of an angel? Ben had seen all sorts of beautiful women in his life. The one smiling in front of him would inspire artists and poets. Ben could not keep himself from gazing at her.

“Are you free for dinner tonight?”

“I really shouldn’t Carly. I am a married man.”

“Ben, you used to live here. I would love to talk to you about what it was like when you were a part of this place. Besides, I hate eating alone. How about it Ben? Say, seven?”

He couldn’t resist. He had to say yes. He wished she would say his name one more time. He knew that whatever force it was that wanted him here would surely want him to accept.

“Seven o’clock then. Sure. I’ll be there.”

ne can only imagine the terror of being locked inside an ancient root cellar with no light, and lots of crawling bugs. The boys had been in the cellar before, but that was during the day with the door wide-open. They could see the bugs that were crawling. They could step on them.