Spider Lake (29 page)

Now, in the dark, the tables had been turned, and the bugs definitely had the upper hand. If they wanted to crawl on your nose there was nothing you could say or do to change their mind. The boys had twice yelled as loud as they could during the course of the night, hoping that someone would hear them, but the storms and the commotion at the mansion had conspired to drown out any noise they made.

They yelled at the top of their lungs, and it was unfortunate that they did so, because when a person yells that way without warming up the vocal cords, they often blow out their voice box. The negative effect can last for days, causing the voice to be held to a whisper, or even worse, complete muteness. Had the two stretched their vocal cords by singing for a while, or vocalizing me me me me as opera singers do before a performance, they might have preserved their voices and hastened their rescue.

They tried to stand through the night, keeping their contact with the ground to a bare minimum, but they eventually had to sit, and the utter darkness worked to lower their spirits and heighten their fear. Both boys thought they would be found the next day with the help of daylight, but they also thought that they could be driven mad before then. Certainly someone would be looking for them in the morning when there was light enough to search. They sat in the darkness and tried not to think about spiders as best they could.

Matt had the worse of it, with the added pain of a badly bruised shoulder and an injured rib. Neither boy thought that they could sleep in such a dismal place, but they did sleep eventually. Matt was awake longer with the pain in his arm, hearing Ben snore lightly in the pitch black. He fell asleep also, but he could not tell when. Once, during the night, Ben stumbled his way all around the small room until he managed to feel the steps, and he looked with his hands to where the door jamb met the door. He looked for any indication of light, but there was none. Another distant storm was rumbling away somewhere in the night.

He crawled hand and foot to where Matt was laying, and laid down next to him. Being in such darkness takes the sense of time and throws it out the window. Neither boy had a clue when night gave way to day. Matt’s injury would sing with any movement, so he kept as still as he could. Ben made another effort to look for daylight. Fortunately the second time was a charm, and when he reached the jamb, he could see that the sun had come up.

He put his legs and shoulder into the door and when he did, he could move it about a half a foot, allowing some daylight into the cellar. When he did Matt could see their surroundings, and it did him a world of good to be able to see; because he noticed a four-by-four piece of wood, no doubt left by the last kid who inhabited the place. On top of the wood was a candle that was melted down and stuck to the lumber.

Neither boy had matches so the candle would do them no good at all, but the four-by-four could be useful. Ben had to rest from pushing the door. The branch on the opposite side of the door was still pushing back and he couldn’t hold it open any longer. Matt spoke to his friend in a hoarse voice barely above a whisper: “Ben. There’s a four-by-four you can jam into the door so we have light.”

Ben had trouble hearing Matt, so he crawled back in his direction so he wouldn’t trip over him. Matt repeated what he said and did his level best to describe where the board was.

Ben eventually found it and stuffed the candle in his pocket. He crawled back over to Matt with the four-by-four, and then stumbled around again to find the stairs. This time when he put his legs and shoulder into the resisting door, he managed to wedge the board in-between, and the cellar was transformed into a bearable jail cell.

There was one other thing that Ben thought he heard when he pushed on the door. He thought he heard a scraping sound. He had no idea what it might be, and he thought that probably it was the tree that was barring the door. Maybe it was scraping against the old foundation when he pushed.

The two boys took turns looking out the limited view the four inch board afforded them, and began to think pro-actively about how they could escape the place. In a black room, dim light is far superior to no light; and the two of them put a concerted effort into getting all the paybacks they could on the bug population. The tides were turned and they took full advantage of their opportunity, killing every crawling creature they could see.

John was standing at the ruined boat, wondering what he should do next, when a fire official walked up to him. The fire marshal standing next to him was in charge of coordinating his own fire department and that of three neighboring towns which were also called to help put out the fire at the Rule estate. The building was already thoroughly engulfed in flames, and there was absolutely no hope of any rescue.

“Mister Fisher, my name is Paul Everett. I am in charge of the emergency efforts here. I am told you have a lost son out here.”

“Yes, sir I do.”

“Where did you last see the boys?”

“I guess it would be right about there.” John pointed out into the fire-lit lake where he had seen the boat earlier.

“Could you tell from where you were if the boys were wearing their life preservers?”

“It looked like they were, but the orange preservers are just a shade darker than the boat color. I can’t be sure. He knew well enough to wear one, but the storm came on pretty quickly.”

“Do you think there is any possibility of your son and his friend taking shelter in the mansion?”

John was angered by the question. He shouted, “Listen! My son was not in that fire. You get it? And you had better not slip up and say such a thing to my wife, or I’ll—”

“Hold on Mister Fisher. I would not infringe on your wife by asking her such a thing. That is why I am asking you. Do you think that your boy would take shelter in there?”

“No. The place has a reputation with the local kids. They do all they can to stay away from it.”

“Mister Fisher, maybe your boy is over at the girl scout camp drinking hot cocoa right now. Let’s hope he is. He will probably turn up soon. In the meantime, your wife is up there on the road being restrained from coming on the property by one of our deputies. Go comfort the woman. You will never find your son here in the dark. If he fails to show up before first light, we will have a search effort in place.”

John walked up the west side of the property, and crossed the mansion’s front lawn that was now a parking lot full of fire vehicles and hoses. He zigzagged his way through the menagerie crossing diagonally to the place on the road where the onlookers were restrained. Allie was crying, and the young woman who John had rescued earlier from cabin two had her arms around her in an effort to comfort her. Allie looked up at John through tear-blurred eyes and asked, “Where’s my Benny John? Where is my boy? Why didn’t you save him?”

en resisted the temptation to pull the old painting off the wall. He somehow thought with all the high-tech gadgetry an alarm would go off and steel doors would lock him in. He studied it though, and it seemed to him that it was better than he remembered it. He walked over to the fridge and looked inside. The contents reflected the uncanny sense of detail that the rest of the cabin displayed.

One shelf in the fridge was stocked with a large selection of micro-brewed beers. There were two bottles of white wine chilling on their sides on a built-in wine rack; another bottle of champaign just above them. The door had all types of iced-teas and bottled waters. There was even a gift platter of various cheeses and cured meats. A basket of fruit better tasted cold had its own shelf.

“This woman has thought of every detail.” Ben muttered to himself.

He grabbed a beer and tried to open it. The bottle required an opener so he chose instead to open a water. He was tired. The previous night’s activities had worn him out. He sat on the leather couch and clicked on the flat screen. The set was tuned to the Weather Channel. He watched only a few minutes before he dozed off still sitting on the couch.

As he slept, he dreamed he was having dinner in the kitchen of his boyhood home. He was a young man of eleven or twelve again. His mother was calling him from another room, telling him to stay put and she would be right out. Ben was looking out the double casement window above the sink. From his sitting position he could only see trees and sky. He picked up a fork in one hand and a spoon in the other and chanted;

“This old man, he stayed four;

He played knickknack on the electric door

With a knickknack, paddy whack,

Give the frog a loan;

This old Ben came rolling home.”

From another room, Ben’s mother began to sing the modified nursery rhyme in harmony with him. Ben was aching to see her. She had passed away back in the early spring of two-thousand and five and he missed her terribly. Since her passing, he had only heard her voice a couple of times in dreams, and he wanted her to come out so he could see her again.

“Come on Mom, the dinner is getting cold.”

The woman that came into the kitchen was not Ben’s mother at all. She had his mother’s voice all right, but she was Carly Morton. She had stopped singing and was telling him to wake. Had he fallen asleep during his dinner? Nothing like a face-full of spaghetti to impress the beauty queens.

“Ben, rise and shine.”

“No, I don’t want to. I want my Mom to come back. You do the shining. You are good at it.”

“Rise and shine Ben. You will see your Mom again. God promises it.”

Ben opened his eyes. The clock read six-fifteen. He jumped off the couch and picked up his motorcycle saddle bags. He had to hurry to be on time for the seven o’clock dinner appointment. He jumped into the shower.

Ben was just about to walk up the steps when Carly Morton opened the porch door and met him at the screen door. Ben looked around for the closed-circuit video camera. It was well hidden. He couldn’t find one.

“Hi Ben, Did you sleep well?”

Ben wondered how she knew that he had taken a nap. There was a picture window in the living room of the cabin. Anybody glancing in would have seen him sleeping there, drooling on the leather couch. Still, it was kind of creepy having someone look into a window and watch you sleep. She was delivering another magazine-cover smile, and the creepy feeling left him. Still, Ben had to ask, “How did you know I was sleeping?”

She looked a bit embarrassed at his question, and paused to think of a way to put it nicely: “Well, Ben, you have caught me. I was walking past your cabin on my way down to the pier, and I heard you through your open window.” She gave him a million-dollar Vogue-cover smile.

Ben wished that he had not brought up his last question, and the redness in his cheeks gave him away. “That bad huh?”

She smiled in her full-bore beaming fashion with all her perfect teeth on full display. “Yes, Ben, like a bear! Come on inside and have a drink. I am almost finished in the kitchen.”

She led the way into the dining room, and offered Ben a drink. “Pick your poison Ben. I have a full stock of whatever you wish.”

After the festivities of the previous night, Ben had no enthusiasm for alcohol. He suddenly had a taste for citrus. Carly interrupted his thought: “How about some fresh squeezed orange juice. I made some this morning. You probably smelled it walking past the kitchen.”

“Sure Ms. Morton. That sounds good.”

“Please Ben, call me Carly.”

She left the room. Ben’s cell phone rang. It was his wife calling. He answered the call: “Hi Jill. What’s up?”

“I just wanted to see how you were doing. Are you at the resort?”

Her voice sounded as if she was far-away, as if her voice was pushed through Apple’s Garage Band and given a treatment that resembled an RCA Victrola. Ben guessed that he had a bad cell. “Can you hear me okay Jill?”

“Yes, I can hear you, but I think we have a bad cell. You are at the resort then?”

“Yeah, I got here around three. I would have called you sooner, but I fell asleep. I guess I needed the rest. The tent camping was kind of primitive.”

“Have you had any more— dreams or anything?”

Ben could tell his wife was uncomfortable talking about dreams as if there was something supernatural going on. He answered her. “No Honey. I haven’t. At least not any that were— you know; obvious. The owner of the resort has asked me to dinner. I am here in my old dining room. She wants to talk about what it was like for me living here as a kid.” He tried to change the subject: “How are Mark and John?”

“They’re fine. They miss you when they are not blowing up things on the Nintendo. Is she pretty Ben?”

Ben had just been asked the most loaded of all loaded questions. How should he answer? Should he tell his wife that if you stacked up all the super-models in the world and placed them next to Ms. Morton, they would all pale in comparison? Would she take that description the wrong way? He wondered how she knew. He decided it would be prudent to tell his other half a small white lie: “Yeah Jill, she’s pretty I guess.”