Climbing the precarious steps, I carefully navigated across the sagging porch to the back door, which hung on a single rusted hinge. I slipped through and glanced around the dim interior, trying to quell the dread that something underneath the floorboards watched me through the cracks.
The house smelled dank and musty, but thankfully the death scent had faded. Mindful of cobwebs, I eased my way through the kitchen into a narrow hallway that led to the front entryway and a small parlor that looked out on the maze. Beneath the collapsing staircase was a locked door with a brass knob and back plate. I jiggled the handle a few times and then hurried into the parlor to glance out the front window.
Micah Durant had come out of the maze and stood staring up at the house. I could see the glint of sunlight in his hair, could feel the piercing stare of those pale eyes as he remained motionless at the edge of the overgrown yard.
Flattening myself against the wall, I inched back into the hallway. As I turned to cast another glance over my shoulder, my backpack caught on a nail. I heard a rip and then the ping of metal hitting the floor. I still wore the skeleton key around my neck, but the other two had fallen from the torn compartment and landed at my feet. As I scooped both up to stuff them in my pocket, my gaze lit on the plain brass door key. Each key served a purpose, I thought. Each opened an unknown door.
Slipping across the hallway, I slid the brass teeth into the lock beneath the stairs. The key fit perfectly. The door swung open and as I slowly rose, I found myself gazing into a small, windowless room.
I hovered on the threshold, an errant breeze from the broken windows stirring my hair and what I thought at first was a wind chime. Then as my eyes became accustomed to the gloom, I realized the tinkling came from hundreds of keys hanging from the ceiling.
Thirty-Seven
I caught my breath and started to back into the hallway, but the sound of footfalls on the front porch checked me. I lingered on the threshold of that tiny room, torn between the unknown danger that lurked within and the human threat that approached from without. Then, drawing a breath, I stepped quickly inside and closed the door, groping for and engaging the lock. I could see nothing now except for a beam of light streaming in through a tiny hole in the outside wall.
The keys tinkled overhead, an eerie serenade that tore at my nerves.
Turning my back to the sound, I pressed an ear to the door, tracking the creak of floorboards as Micah crossed the porch and stepped inside the house. I could imagine him pausing to scan the corners and niches for any telltale movement, then lifting his gaze to the second floor as he assessed the possibility of my having braved the broken staircase.
The footsteps came slowly down the hallway, halting outside the stairwell door to rattle the knob once, twice, three times before continuing on into the kitchen and out the rear door.
I hoped he’d keep going, back into the maze, the woods, anywhere but here. I even let out a breath of relief when I didn’t hear his returning footfalls. But I didn’t open the door. Instead, I fished a flashlight from my backpack. The light refused to come on at first, but after a couple of thumps, the bulb flickered on and I played the beam over the walls.
The hanging keys were certainly an oddity, but my great-grandmother had left behind another peculiarity. Another obsession. She’d scrawled numbers all over the walls in no apparent order or pattern.
My heart thudded in excitement and trepidation as I took a tentative tour around the room. In one of the darkened corners, the numbers were so tiny that I had to kneel and lean in closely to make them out. I could imagine Rose hunkered there on the floor, frantically scribbling out a coded message that only she could decipher while the ghosts swarmed her tiny house.
In another corner, a row of candles had been aligned on the floor before a cross that had been crudely fashioned from twigs and the same cotton twine used to hang the keys. Several stereograms had been stacked in front of the cross, and as I sifted through the cards, I decided that Rose must have used the cramped space as her sanctuary. A safe haven where she could hide away during the dark hours.
I spread the cards on the floor and held the flashlight over them. The shots were of Rose’s house, taken from different angles at various times of the day. I had no idea why she’d been so fascinated by the structure. Without a viewer through which to study them, the images didn’t reveal any secrets. But the photographs must have meant something to her or she wouldn’t have placed them at the makeshift altar.