John Saul - In the Dark of the Night

Eric looked at his friends, and could read the decision in their faces as clearly as it was in his own mind. If they went into town for pizza, they could be back in less than an hour.

And that would give them at least two more hours in Hector Darby’s secret room.

“Let’s go now so we can get back sooner,” Tad said, voicing Eric’s thought almost exactly.

ERIC TOOK A bite of pizza, even though he wasn’t hungry. All he could think about was the secret room, and the stuff in it, and the ledger.

And the way he’d felt when he was in that room, every nerve in his body seeming to tingle.

Time vanishing away, leaving him feeling…how?

He wasn’t sure. It was a strange feeling, but not bad. It wasn’t as if he couldn’t remember everything that had happened, but somehow hours slipped away in what felt like minutes.

And then, at the end, just before they’d all left, there had been that strange sensation of hearing voices, but not really hearing them at all.

Now that he was sitting in the bright lights of the pizza parlor, it all seemed even stranger. Strange, but not really frightening. But shouldn’t he be frightened? Shouldn’t all of them be? Hours had passed, and none of them had been aware of it.

Maybe they should just brick up the doorway again.

Maybe—

“Know what I think?” Kent Newell said, breaking Eric’s thoughts as he pushed his own uneaten slice of pizza away. “I think we should stop pretending to be hungry and go buy a couple of lanterns so we can get some decent light in there — you know, those Coleman ones that are almost as good as electric lights.”

Tad nodded. “At least we’d be able to see what we’re doing.” He hesitated, then spoke again, avoiding his friends’ gazes. “I mean, if we’re really gonna do it.”

“What do you mean, ‘if’?” Kent flared. “We already broke in — all we’re doing now is finding out what that stuff is. And if we leave now,” he added, “we can get another look inside that room before our folks get home.”

“I don’t want my dad to catch us in there,” Eric said. “So let’s pay a little better attention to the time, okay?” And even as he spoke the words, Eric knew he wasn’t going to brick the secret room back up. Instead, he’d just agreed to go back into it tonight, and his excitement was starting to grow.

“There’s something in there,” Kent said softly. “Something big. Something important.”

Tad flagged down the waitress to bring a box for the leftover pizza, and a few minutes later they were out of the pizza parlor and halfway down the block, heading for the sporting goods store. But before they came to it, Eric stopped in front of the ice cream shop. Inside, Cherie Stevens was behind the counter, loading a sugar cone with ice cream the same shade of pink as her apron.

“You guys go get the lanterns,” Eric said. “Come back for me.”

“Aw come on, Eric,” Kent protested. “Not now!”

“I’m just going to say hello,” Eric said. “Go get the lanterns.” And before either of them could protest any further, he pushed the door open and stepped inside.

The cool interior was filled with the sweet scent of ice cream and toasted cones. Cherie looked up and smiled at him as she finished with the couple at the counter. The only other people in the shop were a woman and a little boy who sat at one of the small round tables, eating dishes of ice cream. Eric walked up to the counter, suddenly feeling as if he were six years old. Instead of looking at Cherie, he found himself staring at the variously colored squares of fudge that were laid out in the case.

“Hi,” Cherie said.

“Hi.” Eric tried to look up, and failed. Now his heart was pounding even harder than when he’d been in the secret room that afternoon. Except that this afternoon it had been exciting. Now he just felt like an idiot. “I–I think I’d like some fudge,” he stammered. “Is it good?” Is it good? he echoed silently to himself. Bigger idiot!

“It really is. Want a taste?”

Eric managed to nod, and pointed at a dark chocolate slab that was studded with nuts.

Cherie sliced off a bite and handed Eric a square of wax paper with the taste of fudge on it. “I’ll take a hunk of that,” he said.

Cherie’s brow rose. “You haven’t even tasted it yet.”

Eric felt himself blushing. “Don’t need to. You said it’s good.”

Cherie rolled her eyes, but smiled. “How much do you want?”

Eric shrugged.

Cherie sliced off a chunk, wrapped it up, and put it into a little white bag. “On the house,” she whispered as she handed it to him. “What are you doing later?”

“I’m going to — I’ve got to do some—” He fell silent for a moment, then: “Hey, do you know anything about Hector Darby?”

“Dr. Darby?” Cherie replied, and Eric nodded. “Sure.” She wiped her hands on a white cloth and leaned in against the counter. “He used to own Pinecrest.”

Eric nodded again. “Yeah, I know.”

“So what do you want to know about him?”

The bell on the door dinged, and Eric saw Cherie’s eyes flick to the door, then back to him, disappointment clear in her expression. “Uhoh,” she whispered, then stood up straight. “Hi, Kayla. Hi, Chris.”

“Hey, Cherie,” Kayla Banks said.

Eric turned to see a pretty brunette about his own age, holding hands with a tall, skinny kid. Then he recalled that the skinny kid had been with Adam Mosler his first day in town, when he and Marci were walking Moxie.

Eric held up the white bag. “Thanks,” he said, turning around to leave. But just before he reached the door, it opened and Adam Mosler himself walked in.

“’Bye, Eric,” Cherie called. “See you at the dance Friday night.”

Eric’s heart skipped a beat, but his gut knotted as he saw the expression Cherie’s words brought to Adam Mosler’s eyes. Then he decided he’d had enough of Adam Mosler. “I’ll be there,” he called back over his shoulder.

And Mosler walked right into him, bumping him hard with his chest, knocking him against a table, which tipped over onto a couple of chairs, then crashed to the floor.

The woman with the little boy looked up in alarm.

Wishing that he’d just kept his mouth shut and ducked past Mosler, Eric apologized to the woman and quickly picked up the fallen furniture.

Meanwhile, Adam Mosler regarded him with an evil sneer. “Oh, gee, excuse me all to hell,” he said, his tone emphasizing the sarcasm of his words.

Eric saw Kent Newell and Tad Sparks walking up outside, carrying plastic bags from the sporting goods store, and he knew it would be better to get past Mosler before Kent decided to get involved. “Apology accepted,” he muttered to Adam, and pushed the door open.

Too late. “Was that guy hassling you again?” Kent demanded. “I can kick his ass, you know. And I can do it right now.”

“No. Let’s just go.”

“You sure?”

“I’m sure,” Eric said. “Let’s just not get into anything now, okay?” Before Kent could argue, Eric relieved him of the pizza box and started toward the dinghy dock at the marina.

Kent glanced back at Adam Mosler once more, but then turned and followed Eric and Tad to the dock. Though part of him wanted to punch Adam Mosler’s lights out, another, far stronger, part of him wanted to get back into the secret room hidden in the carriage house at Pinecrest.

Already, Kent thought he could hear voices whispering to him.

Voices that wanted something.

But what?

Soon, he was sure, he would know.

All of them would know.

THE TINGLING SENSATION began to come over Kent even before he’d stepped through the door into the hidden room, and by the time he actually followed Eric and Tad over the threshold, every nerve in his body seemed to be vibrating with an energy he’d never felt before. He set the lantern on the desk, pumped it up, then carefully lit it with a wooden match from the box they’d found in the kitchen. As he adjusted the flow of fuel, the orange flame around the mantle disappeared as the mantle itself began to emit a blinding white light that banished the shadows from most of the room.