Bentley Little - The Burning

"Nothing."

"Why? Do you think Anna May would be against it?"

"No," Jolene admitted. "One thing I'll say for Anna May is that her commitment to history is pretty pure. She's not planning to hush this up to save reputations or protect the family because they donated the house. She's keeping quiet until she finds out everything she can and gets an accurate picture, but she intends to go public with all this and tell everyone."

"A house of horror brings in a lot more tourists than a dusty old museum."

"It's not even that. She genuinely thinks all information should be available no matter how gruesome or damaging or embarrassing it might be. I kind of admire her for that."

"Information deserves to be free. Isn't that the computer hackers' code or something?"

"I don't know." Jolene thought for a moment, finished her drink, then sighed. "I guess I can take you over there if you want. I do feel kind of bad for bailing on poor Anna May. I should at least apologize. She's called my mom's house about a dozen times over the past week, and I've been ducking her."

"Really?"

"Yeah."

"Now, about your mom's house ... ," Leslie said.

Jolene groaned. "One problem at a time, please."

Leslie laughed.

Maybe it wouldn't be so bad, Jolene thought. Maybe she'd built up the cellar experience in her mind so much that it had been blown way out of proportion and she was obsessing over something that wasn't nearly as horrific as she believed it to be.

She hoped.

They drove over to the Williams place in Jolene's car. Anna May's Oldsmobile was parked in the circular driveway, and Jolene pulled to a stop behind it, tapping lightly on the horn to announce their presence. Maybe the old woman wasn't as skittish as she was, but Jolene knew that if she were working in this house and someone surprised her by showing up without warning, she'd probably have a heart attack. The place was spooky. Even if she hadn't seen what she'd seen, she'd be creeped-out by the building. Especially on a day like today, where the sun was hidden behind a dark bank of threatening clouds, and the entire town lay under a gloomy shadow.

By the time they got out of the car, Anna May was on the porch. She was smiling widely, and for that, Jolene was thankful. At least the old woman wasn't angry with her. Although that also ratcheted up her guilt another notch. How could she have been so thoughtless as to abandon Anna May without an explanation?

She wasn't thoughtless, Jolene told herself. She was scared.

She found herself wondering if the reason Anna May was working alone was because the other members of the historical society had been frightened away, too.

"Mrs. Carter!" Leslie called. She bounced up the porch steps and gave the old woman a hug. "Haven't seen you in a while."

"I've been busy," Anna May said. "As you can see."

Indeed, the interior of the house was filled with boxes, papers and pictures that had been brought over from the old museum. The Williams family's furniture had been temporarily pushed against the wall along with other donated pieces. Jolene glanced over at Leslie, who shot her a "What do we say now?" look. Neither of them knew how to bring up the questions they really wanted to ask.

They needn't have worried. Anna May was eager to describe her most recent discoveries. In all her years of researching the history of Bear Flats and Pinetop County, she said, she had never run into such | a treasure trove of bizarre and fascinating findings,

"This house," Anna May said, marveling, "is a twelve-year-old boy's dream. There's a secret passage from one bedroom to another; there are double attics and, of course, that hidden cellar. It's like a house built for the underground railroad." Her eyes took on an excited gleam. "Although when you read the diary, you'll find that Chester Williams-the first Chester Williams-was definitely not the kind of man who would have been involved with that."

Jolene shivered.

"I'll let you read it after I'm finished," Anna May said. "It's ..." She shook her head. "I can't even describe it. But there are big revelations in there. Major revelations."

"What happens?" Leslie asked. "Can't you even give us a hint?"

The old woman grinned. "Murder!" she whispered excitedly.

A file folder filled with papers slid from the slanted top of a box onto the floor, and all three of them jumped at the sound. Leslie laughed. "We're a brave bunch, aren't we?"

It was the opening Jolene needed. "How have you been able to work here all by yourself?" she asked Anna May. Her voice dropped. "Especially after what we found."

"I don't know," the old woman mused, seriously considering the question. "It is very ... spooky, I must admit. But it's so exciting that I suppose I forget and lose myself in the adventure of it all." She smiled broadly. "Do you want to see what I found this morning?"

"I don't know," Jolene said honestly. "Do I?"

"We do!" Leslie announced for both of them.

Anna May led them along a pathway between the stacked boxes to the parlor. She picked up something from atop an antique table that at first glance looked like the corpse of a baby tied up with string. "I found this in a closet behind one of the closets." She held up the object and for the first time they could see it clearly. It was a marionette. Made from glued-together body parts, mummified pieces of nose and toes wrapped in motley and attached by gutstring to cross-hatched sticks, the figure grinned at her, small white teeth, like the teeth of children, embedded in its upward-angled mouth.

Jolene's blood ran cold. The face of the marionette looked like the face that had peered in at her and Skylar through the window, down to the brown parchment skin, and she turned away from it, hoping the other two couldn't see the trembling in her hands. "I have to pick up my son from school," she said.

"You have forty-five minutes," Leslie told her. "The school's two minutes away."

"It is scary," Anna May admitted, putting the maronette back down on the table. "A lot of the items I've come across have been. And that diary ..." She shook her head. "I assume that's why you didn't come back after that first day?" she asked Jolene. "You got scared off?"

"I'm sorry," Jolene said. "Really. I meant to call you, and I feel so bad that I didn't, but ..."

"Don't worry about it." The old lady smiled. "Theo was frightened away, too. I don't blame either of you. I guess I just get so ... carried away with finding out new things, I just don't think about everything else around it. History's my life. I love it. The good, the bad and the ugly."

"The older generation's made of sterner stuff," Leslie jokingly offered.

"I think you're right," Jolene said seriously.

"Oh, pshaw," Anna May said, smiling.

Jolene wasn't sure she'd ever heard anyone actually say "pshaw" before.

"So what is it with all this?" Leslie asked. "Do you think Chester Williams' father or grandfather or whatever really was a serial killer? And why did the rest of the family keep all this stuff? You'd think they'd throw it away. I mean, I can see keeping quiet about an old relative and not wanting anyone to know you had a murderer in the family, but to hold on to these body parts as family heirlooms or something?" She shook her head. "We're talking Texas Chainsaw Massacre here. The Williamses had to be one seriously disturbed brood."

There was a thump from the floor above. "Hold on a moment," Anna May said. She moved quickly back between the boxes and up the stairs. "I'll be right back!" she called. Her footsteps stomped up the stairs.

"What do you think that was?" Jolene asked. Her first irrational thought was that Anna May had found something alive in some secret room in the house.