When Seth finally got a glance at the score card two holes later, he saw that his father had given him fourteen strokes on the first hole.
He’d given himself three.
Chapter 21
HE NEXT DAY WAS EVEN WORSE THAN THE DAY before. Angel had barely slept, lying awake through the long night, terrified that at any moment she would hear the door to her room open and the floorboards begin to creak as her father slunk through the darkness toward her bed. It was worse when she slept, for with sleep came dreams, and in the dreams her father was always there, gazing at her with burning eyes, reaching out toward her, his fingers straining to touch her flesh.
When she turned away from her father, her mother was there, but her back was to Angel, and no matter how Angel begged, her mother wouldn’t even look at her.
When she turned away from her mother, she found herself facing Father Mike, who looked at her coldly, then spoke: “Go forth and sin no more.”
It was always his words that awakened her, leaving her alone in the darkness, too frightened to sleep and too tired to stay awake.
By the time she got to school, she wasn’t sure she could make it through the day at all.
Seth Baker had gotten no more sleep than Angel, the stinging welts from the lash of his father’s belt making it impossible for him to lie on his back, and even the weight of his sheet and blanket hurt enough to keep him awake until almost dawn. His father was already gone when he went downstairs, and when his mother asked him if he was going to practice playing golf again that afternoon, he shook his head.
“Do I really have to play in the tournament on Saturday?” he asked as he poured some cereal into a bowl.
“Well, of course you do,” Jane Baker told him. “Why would you even ask such a question?”
He ate his cereal in silence and left the house in silence, and somehow got through the day.
By the time he had to strip for gym, the welts on his buttocks had faded enough so no one noticed them.
Five minutes after the last bell, he met Angel Sullivan.
“You okay?” he asked as she fell in beside him.
“I guess,” she sighed. “What about you?”
Seth shrugged. “I’m used to it.” Today’s lunch had been an almost exact repeat of the one the day before, with Zack and Heather and their friends making the sucky-kissy noises, and the boys grinding their hips at both Angel and Seth.
Except they hadn’t called him Seth, and every time they’d used its rhyme, Angel had seen him cringe. “How come they call you that?” she asked as they began walking out Black Creek Road toward the house that stood at the Crossing.
“I don’t know,” Seth said. “The same reason they called you all those names in Eastbury, I guess.”
“At least they called me girls’ names.” For a second Seth looked as if she’d slapped him, but then he laughed.
“ ‘Beth’ isn’t a girl’s name?” he asked.
“That’s not what I meant,” Angel said. “I meant—”
“Oh, who cares, anyway?” Seth cut in as she began floundering for the right words. “It’s just names. Let’s talk about something else.”
But instead of talking, both of them lapsed into silence, and neither spoke until they were across the street from Angel’s house, where, as if by common consent, they both stopped, staring at the house.
It looked exactly as it had this morning, and yesterday, and the day before, and yet, as they gazed at it, neither Angel nor Seth could stop thinking about the strange images that Seth’s camera had caught in the window of Angel’s room, or the odd drawing that had appeared on the mirror in Angel’s room.
Nor could Seth forget what had happened when Angel’s father had found them in her bedroom. “Maybe I shouldn’t come in,” he said, his voice sounding hollow.
Angel looked at him uncertainly. “I thought you wanted to see if there was something under the stairs,” she said.
Seth bit his lower lip, then: “If your dad comes home—”
“He won’t,” Angel said. “And even if he does, we just won’t be in my room.”
Still Seth hesitated. “I don’t know… ”
“You were the one that said ‘it can’t hurt to look,’ ” she reminded him. But as her eyes shifted from Seth to the house, her voice reflected her own sudden nervousness. “Besides, if my mom’s not home either…” Now it was her voice that trailed off, and she knew Seth had heard the fear in it. “I mean it’s not like I’m scared to be by myself or anything—”
Seth cut her off. “Quit worrying. Let’s both go in and see if we can find anything.”
They went around to the back of the house, and Angel found the key her mother had hidden under the same pot that had been on the back porch in Eastbury. “If we’re supposed to be looking for something under the stairs, shouldn’t there be a loose board or something?” Angel asked as she opened a Coke and split it between two glasses.
“I guess,” Seth replied. But ten minutes later, after tugging at every stair in the case leading to the second floor, he shook his head. “Even the ones that squeak don’t come loose.” He looked at Angel. “What about from underneath? Maybe there’s some kind of hidden cupboard or something.”
They went around to the door of the closet that was built under the stairs, but again found nothing. The walls and the steeply slanted ceiling under the stairs were plastered and painted white, and in the glare of the naked bulb that illuminated the space, they could see that there weren’t even any cracks in the plaster, let alone places where it might come open to reveal a hidden space.
“So now what?” Seth asked. But before Angel could reply, they heard a muffled sound, and Seth’s eyes widened. “If that’s your dad—”
Angel shook her head and held up her hand to silence him.
The sound came again, still muffled, but this time Angel was sure she recognized it. “It’s Houdini — he’s come back!” Leaving the closet under the stairs, Angel hurried into the kitchen, certain she would find the cat waiting for her.
The kitchen was empty.
“Where is he?” Seth asked as he too entered the kitchen.
Angel shrugged. “I don’t know — maybe I was wrong.”
But then they heard the sound again, and this time there was no mistaking it. Both Angel and Seth turned to look at the closed door that led to the basement, and when Angel pulled it open, there was the cat. But instead of coming out into the kitchen, he turned and bounded down the steep flight of steps.
Angel and Seth stood at the top of the stairs that plunged down into the basement. For several long seconds they both gazed into the gloom, and as her eyes reached into the darkness, Angel began to feel something — a strange chill seemed to be emanating from the cellar.
Seth took her hand. “Do you feel that?” he asked.
Angel nodded. “It feels like a draft.”
“But heat rises,” Seth said. “And even when it’s the hottest day of the summer, you don’t feel any cooler till
