this stuff?” he asked. His heart was beating faster again, and as the now fading beam of the flashlight hit each object, he felt a strange sense of excitement. Suddenly, he wanted to touch everything — to feel the objects — to experience them. It was almost as if the contents of the room had found voices and were whispering to him, calling to him.
But it was more than that, more than merely a need to look at the strange amalgam of seeming junk that filled the room.
No, it was much, much more. Eric — indeed, all three of the boys — were feeling an almost electric eagerness to absorb and understand everything in the room.
As the flashlight beam faded to a dull yellow, Eric hit it onto the palm of his hand. It flickered strong for a moment, then faded again. “What’s the matter with this?” he muttered.
“What time is it?” Tad asked.
Eric glanced at his watch, then looked again. Disbelieving what his eyes were telling him, he tapped its face, then held it up to his ear.
Its ticking was faint, but definitely there. “Five minutes to five?” he breathed, making it more a question than a statement. He looked first at Tad, then at Kent. “How could that be? We’ve only been in here — what — a half hour?”
“We got here at one,” Kent said. “I know — I looked at my watch.”
“Crap,” Eric said. “My folks’ll be back any minute.” Turning away from the room and its contents, he led the way back through the broken brick wall, leaving everything as it was, and together the three of them pulled the sheet of plywood back across the opening.
Eric put the flashlight back in the tack room, and they walked out of the carriage house into the bright afternoon sunshine. He felt strangely disoriented, as if the daylight was wrong, as if the outdoors was too big. He quickened his step as he headed up the lawn toward the house.
The message light was blinking on the phone when they came through the back door into the kitchen, and he pressed the button to play back the message.
“Hi, honey,” his mother said through the tinny speaker. “The six of us had a great round of golf and your dad picked up Marci from Summer Fun. We all decided to have dinner here at the club, and if you and the boys want to join us, Tad’s mother says there’s a taxi you can call. Or you can all go into town for a pizza if you want to. Just behave yourselves, and be careful, and be home by ten-thirty, okay? Eleven at the latest. Love you.”
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.
