The Cellar Read online

They chose to eat breakfast at Sarah’s Diner across from the Chevron station. After seeing the selection of doughnuts displayed on a counter-top cake stand, Sandy decided against them. She ordered bacon and eggs, instead.

  “This place is gross,” she said.

  “We won’t eat here from now on.”

  “Ha ha.”

  Sandy put a hand underneath the table, and crinkled her nose with disgust. “There’s gum under the table.”

  “There’s always gum under tables. Some of us have sense enough to keep our hands off it.”

  Sandy sniffed her fingers. “Gross.”

  “Why don’t you go wash your hands?”

  “I bet the john is really the pits,” she said, and got up from the table as if eager to verify her theory.

  Smiling, Donna watched her step smartly toward the far end of the diner. The waitress came and filled Donna’s heavy, chipped cup with coffee.

  “Thank you.”

  “Welcome, sweetie.”

  She watched the waitress head for another table. Then the opening door caught her eyes.

  Two men entered the diner. The emaciated one seemed far too young to have white hair. Though nicely dressed in a blue leisure suit, he had a harassed look like a refugee. The man beside him might have been his keeper. With deep blue eyes in a face that made her think of carved, highly polished wood, he had the confident look of a cop. Or a soldier. Or the guide in Colorado, many years ago, who led her and Karen on a deer hunt with their father.

  The two men sat at the counter. The strong one had light brown hair neatly clipped above his shirt collar. His wide back filled the tan shirt, pulling it taut. The black belt looked stiff and new in jeans so old that one of the belt loops hung loose, dangling over his rear pocket. His rubber-soled hiking boots looked older than the jeans.

  As if attracted by the intensity of her gaze, the man looked over his shoulder. Donna fought an urge to turn away. She met his eyes for a moment, then glanced at the next man, then on down the counter casually. She lifted her coffee cup. Steam no longer rose from the coffee. An oily film on the dark surface reflected swirling colors like a rainbow, or spoiled roast beef. She drank, anyway. Setting down the cup, she allowed herself another glance at the man.

  He was no longer watching her.

  Disappointment shadowed Donna’s relief.

  She drank more coffee and watched him. His head was turned as he listened to the nervous, white-haired man. A shoulder blocked her view of his mouth. She saw a slight rise on the ridge of his nose, apparently from an old break. A scar slanted from the corner of his eyebrow down to his cheekbone. She looked back into her coffee, afraid she might again attract attention.

  When she heard quick, familiar footsteps, she saw the man’s head turn. He glanced at Sandy, then Donna, then looked back at his friend.

  “All clean?” Donna asked, perhaps too loudly.

  “They didn’t have anything to dry my hands on,” Sandy told her, and sat down.

  “What’d you use?”

  “My pants. Where’s the food?”

  “Maybe we’ll be lucky and it won’t come.”

  “I’m starved.”

  “I guess we can give it a try.”

  The waitress soon came, bringing plates of eggs, sausage links, and hash browns. The food looked good, oddly enough. As Donna sliced into her sausage, her stomach rumbled loudly.

  “Mother!” Sandy giggled.

  “Must be a thunderstorm on the way,” Donna said.

  “Can’t trick me. That was your gut.”

  “Gut isn’t polite, honey.”

  The girl grinned. Then, with an expression of wrinkled distaste, she picked a sprig of parsley off her hashbrowns and flicked it over the edge of the plate.

  Donna glanced at the man. He was drinking coffee. As she ate and talked with Sandy, she looked up at him often. She realized that he wasn’t eating. Apparently he and his friend had only come into Sarah’s for coffee. Soon they got up from the counter.

  The man reached into his hip pocket as he headed for the cash register. His nervous friend protested, and lost. After he paid the bill, he took a thin cigar out of his shirt pocket. He unwrapped it. As he wadded its cellophane wrapper into a tiny ball, he scanned the area near the counter, probably searching for a trash container. Finding none, he stuffed the ball into his shirt pocket. He clamped the cigar between his teeth. His eyes swung suddenly toward Donna. They fixed upon her, held her stunned like a doe in headlights. The eyes stayed on her while the man struck a match and sucked its flame to the tip of his cigar. He shook out the match. Then he turned, and pushed through the door.

  Donna let out a deep, trembling breath.

  “You okay?” Sandy asked.

  “I’m fine.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing. Everything’s fine.”

  “You don’t look so fine.”

  “Are you about done eating?”

  “All done,” Sandy said.

  “Ready to go?”

  “I am. Aren’t you gonna finish?”

  “No, I don’t think so. Let’s be on our way.” She picked up the bill. Her hand shook as she reached into her purse. She tucked three quarters under the edge of her plate, and got up quickly.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I just want to get outside.”

  “Okay,” the girl said doubtfully as she followed Donna to the cash register.

  Outside, Donna looked down the sidewalk. A block off, an old woman with a poodle was stepping awkwardly off a curb. No sign of the two men from the cafe. She checked the other direction.

  “What’re you looking for?” Sandy asked.

  “Just trying to decide which way looks best.”

  “We’ve already been that way,” the girl said, and nodded toward the left.

  “Okay.” So they turned right, and began walking.

  “Do you think we can leave this morning?” Sandy asked.

  “I don’t know how long it’ll be. I think we’re a good hour or so from where we left the car. The girl at the motel didn’t say what time Axel went to get it.”

  “If we aren’t gonna leave right away, can we go see Beast House?”

  “I don’t know, honey.”

  “It’s half-price for me.”

  “Are you certain you really want to see a place like that?”

  “What is it?”

  “It’s supposed to be the home of a horrible beast that kills people and tears them up. It’s where those three people were murdered a few weeks ago.”

  “Oooh, that place?”

  “Yes indeed.”

  “Wow! Can we see it?”

  “I’m not sure I’m up to it.”

  “Oh come on. We’re almost there. Please?”

  “Well, it wouldn’t hurt to see what time the tours start.”

  3.

  Standing at the northern corner of the wrought-iron fence, Donna looked at the bleak, weathered house and felt a reluctance to approach it.

  “I’m not sure I want to do this, honey.”

  “You said we can check on the tours.”

  “I’m not sure I want to go in there, at all.”

  “Why not?”

  Donna shrugged, unwilling to put words to her dark chill. “I don’t know,” she said.

  She moved her eyes from the slanted bay window to the veranda with its balustraded balcony overhead, past a gable to a tower at the south end. The tower windows reflected emptiness. Its roof was a steep cone: a witch’s cap.

  “Afraid it’ll gross you out?”

  “Your language is enough to gross me out.”

  Sandy laughed, and adjusted her slipping sunglasses.

  “Okay, we’ll have a look at the tour schedule. But I’m not guaranteeing anything.” They started toward the ticket booth.

  “I’ll go alone, if you’re scared.”

  “You will not go in there alone, young lady.”

  “It’s half-price for me.”<
br />
  “That’s not the point.”

  “What is?”

  You might never come out, Donna suddenly thought. She took a deep breath. The air, scented like high mountain pine, calmed her.

  “What is the point?”

  Donna made her grin as evil as she could, and muttered, “I don’t want the beast to eat you.”

  “You’re awful!”

  “Not as awful as the beast.”

  “Mother!” Laughing, Sandy swung her denim handbag.

  Donna blocked it with her forearm, looked up, and saw the man from the cafe. His eyes were on her. Smiling at him, Donna fought off another assault by her daughter.

  She saw a blue ticket in his hand.

  “Okay, honey, that’s enough. We’ll go on the tour.”

  “Can we?” she asked, delighted.

  “Shoulder to shoulder, we’ll confront the awful beast.”

  “I’ll smash it with my purse,” Sandy said.

  As she approached the line at the gate, Donna saw the man turn casually to his nervous friend and start talking.

  “Look.” Sandy pointed at a wooden clockface near the top of the ticket booth. The sign above it read, “Next tour departs at,” and the clock indicated ten. “What time is it now?”

  “Almost ten,” Donna said.

  “Can we do it?”

  “All right. Let’s get in line.”

  They stepped behind the last person in line, a pudgy teenage boy whose hands were folded judiciously across his belly. Without moving his feet, he swiveled enough to cast a critical eye at Donna and Sandy. He made a quiet “Humph,” as if insulted by their presence, and swung his shoulders toward the front.

  “What’s his problem?” Sandy whispered.

  “Shhhh.”

  Waiting, Donna counted fourteen people in line. Though eight seemed to be children, she only saw two who might qualify for the “children under twelve” discount. If none of the others had complimentary tickets, she figured the tour would net fifty-two dollars.

  Not too shabby, she thought.

  The man from the cafe was three from the front.

  A young couple with two blond girls stepped up to the ticket booth.

  “That makes sixty-four,” Donna said.

  “What?”

  “Dollars.”

  “What time is it?”

  “Two minutes to go.”

  “I hate waiting.”

  “Look at the people.”

  “What for?”

  “They’re interesting.”

  Sandy looked up at her mother. Even with sunglasses hiding most of her face, Sandy’s skepticism was obvious. But she sidestepped out of line to check the people more closely.

  “Fiends!” someone shrieked from behind. “Ghouls!”

  Donna swung around. Crouched in the middle of the street, a thin pale woman pointed at her, at Sandy—at all of them. The woman was no older than thirty. She had the trim, short hair of a boy. Her sleeveless yellow dress was wrinkled and stained. Dirt streaked her white legs. Her feet were bare.

  “You and you and you!” she screeched. “Ghouls! Grave sniffers! Vampires, all of you, sucking the blood of the dead!”

  The ticket-booth door slammed open. A man ran out, his gaunt face scarlet. “Outta here, damn you!”

  “Maggots!” she shouted. “All of you, maggots, paying to see such filth. Vultures! Cowards!”

  The man jerked his wide leather belt free of its loops, and doubled it. “I’m warning you!”

  “Corpse fuckers!”

  “That about does it,” he muttered.

  The woman scampered backward as the man rushed her, belt high and ready. Stumbling, she fell hard onto the pavement. “Go ahead, maggot! The ghouls love it! Look at ’em gawk. Give ’em blood! That’s what they’re here for!” Rising to her knees, she ripped open the front of her dress. Her breasts were huge for a woman so small. They swung over her belly like ripe sacks. “Give ’em a show! Give ’em blood! Tear my flesh! That’s what they love!”

  He raised the belt overhead, ready to bring it down.

  “Don’t.” The word shot out, quick and sharp.

  The man looked around.

  Turning, Donna saw the man from the cafe step out of the line. He walked forward.

  “You just stay put, bud.”

  He kept walking.

  “We don’t have need of interference.”

  He said nothing to the man with the belt, but walked past him to the woman. He helped her to her feet. He lifted the dress, covering her shoulders, and pulled it gently shut in front. With a shaking hand, the woman held the torn edges together.

  He spoke quietly to her. She thrust herself against him, kissed him wildly on the mouth, and sprang away. “Run! Run for your lives!” she yelled. “Run for your souls!” And then she dashed away down the street.

  A few people in the crowd laughed. Someone mumbled that the madwoman was part of the show. Others disagreed. The man from the cafe came back and stood silently beside his friend in the line.

  “Okay, folks!” called the ticket man. He walked toward them, threading his belt through its loops. “We ’pologize for the delay, though I’m sure we can all appreciate the gal’s dilemma. Three weeks back, the beast took her husband and only child, tore ’em to ribbons. The experience unhinged the poor gal. She’s been hangin’ around here the past couple days, since we started doin’ the tours again. But now here’s another woman, a woman who passed through the purifyin’ fire of tragedy, and came out the better for it. This woman’s the owner of Beast House, and your personal guide for today’s tour.” With a grand, sweeping gesture, he led the eyes of the crowd toward the lawn of Beast House where a stooped, heavy woman hobbled toward them.

  “Do you still want to do it?” Donna asked.

  Sandy shrugged. Her face was pale. She had obviously been shocked by the hysterical woman. “Yeah,” she said, “I guess so.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  1.

  They passed through the turnstile, and gathered on the lawn in front of the old woman. She waited, ebony cane planted close to the side of her right foot, her flowered dress blowing lightly against her legs. In spite of the day’s warmth, she wore a green silken scarf around her neck. She fingered the scarf briefly, then spoke.

  “Welcome to Beast House.” She said it reverently, in a low, husky voice. “My name’s Maggie Kutch, and I own it. I began showing the house to visitors way back in ’31, shortly after tragedy took the lives of my husband and three children. You may be asking yourselves why a woman’d want to take people through her home that was a scene of such personal grief. The answer’s easy: m-o-n-e-y.”

  Quiet laughter stirred through the group. She smiled pleasantly, turned, and limped up the walkway. At the foot of the porch stairs, she wrapped a spotted hand over the newel post and pointed upward with the tip of her cane.

  “Here’s where they strung up poor Gus Goucher. He was eighteen at the time, and on his way to San Francisco to join his brother working at the Sutro Baths. He stopped here on the afternoon of August 2, 1903, and split firewood for Lilly Thorn, the original owner of the house. She fed him a meal in payment, and Gus was on his way. That very night, the beast struck for the first time. No one, but only Lilly, lived through the attack. She ran into the street screaming as if she’d met the devil himself.

  “Right away, the town got up a posse. It searched the house from cellar to attic, but no living thing was found. Only the torn, chewed bodies of Lilly’s sister and two little boys. The posse tromped through the wooded hillside yonder and found young Gus Goucher fast asleep.

  “Well, some of the townspeople recalled seeing him by the Thorn place that afternoon, and figured this was their man. They gave him a trial. Weren’t no witnesses with everybody dead but Lilly, and her raving. They judged him guilty quick enough, though. A mob broke him outta the old jail, that night. They dragged the poor lad to this very spot, whipped a rope over the balcony post up there, and
hoisted him.

  “Course, Gus Goucher didn’t kill no one. It was the beast done it. Let’s go in.”

  They climbed six wooden stairs to the covered porch.

  “You can see this is a new door, here. The original got shot up, three weeks back. You probably saw it on the news. One of our local police shotgunned the door to get inside. He’d of been better off, course, staying out.”

  “Tell me,” asked the critical boy, “how did the Zieglers get inside?”

  “They got in like thieves. They broke a window out back.”

  “Thank you.” He cast a smile toward the rest of the group, apparently pleased with the service he’d performed.

  “Our police,” Maggie Kutch continued, “spoiled an antique lock we had on the door here. But we did preserve the hinges and the knocker.” She tapped the brass knocker with her cane. “It’s supposed to be the paw of a monkey. Lilly Thorn stuck it here. She was partial to monkeys.”

  Maggie opened the door. The group followed her inside. “One of you get the door, if you would. Don’t want the flies to get in.”

  She pointed her cane. “Here’s another monkey for you.”

  Donna heard her daughter groan, and didn’t blame the girl a bit. The stuffed monkey, standing by the wall with its arms out, seemed to be snarling, ready to bite.

  “Umbrella stand,” Maggie said. She dropped her cane into the circle of the monkey’s arms, then snatched it up again.

  “Now I’ll show you the scene of the first attack. Right this way, into the parlor.”

  Sandy took Donna’s hand. Sandy looked up nervously at her mother as they entered a room to the left of the vestibule.

  “When I came into this house, way back in ’31, it was just the same as Lilly Thorn left it the night of the beast attack twenty-eight years before. Nobody’d lived in the house since then. Nobody’d dared.”

  “Why did you dare?” asked the chubby, critical boy.

  “My husband and I were duped, pure and simple. We were made to believe that poor Gus Goucher did the dirty work on the Thorn people. Nobody let on about no beast.”

  Donna glanced at the man from the cafe. He was standing ahead of her, next to his white-haired friend. Donna lifted her hand. “Mrs. Kutch?”

  “Yes?”