The Old Man’s House

Approx 1,966 words

©2004 by Geraldine Ahrens

“Oh, quit worrying. If fish had feet they’d be mice.”

It took a minute to seep in. I looked at Carl. “Where do you get this stuff? Is there some book called ‘A Thousand Sayings That Mean Absolutely Nothing?’ that you’ve memorized?”

He just put that goofy look on his face and smiled.

We were both becoming worried. It had been almost an hour since Steve had gone into the old man’s house. He should have been out by now. I was becoming afraid the old man had killed him and was now burying his body in the basement. I had said as much to Carl, who then gave me his ‘words of wisdom.’

It put me to thinking. The only fish I knew of that grew feet was a polliwog and one of those grew in to a frog, not a mouse. Besides, why would a fish want to become a mouse? I had heard of a ‘walking catfish,’ but they didn’t really walk. They were just able to live out of the water long enough to slither to the next pond.

“He should have been out by now,” I said again.

“Yeah, you’re right. Let’s sneak up there and see if we can peek through the windows.”

“The porch squeaks and the windows are covered with gunk.” I reminded him. “We may have to go get help.”

“Are you kidding?!” Carl almost yelled. “Dad would skin us alive if he found out we were here. You know he always told us to leave the old man alone.” He shook his head. “Nope, we’ll have to handle this one ourselves.”

The old house was a gray, two-story affair. A wide porch encircled the entire first floor and a narrow balcony wrapped itself like a ribbon, around the second floor. The whitewash had peeled off many years before we were born. At one time it must have been a beautiful place with lace curtains in the windows and genteel ladies sipping lemonade on the porch. At least that’s what I pictured. Of course, I have been known to be wrong.

We crept through the unkempt garden, working our way close to the door that Steve had vanished into, an hour ago.

Carl started up the steps. I was about to run when he said, “Mick, if you run away I’ll catch you and knock you into next week.”

Being more afraid of Carl than an unseen, unknown boojum, I decided to stick around. He had given me a good thrashing once and I swore I wouldn’t let it happen again. Besides, I’d grow up one day and be big enough to whip his pants off.

The steps and porch were eerily quiet, making no sound as we tried to look in the window next to the door. The grime was too thick to see through. Carl tried the door and the knob turned. The grunting and clicking of the knob grumbled cold and flat against the morning air. Carl’s face was white when he turned to look at me.

“Come on, Mick. We gotta find Steve.” He entered into the gloom.

I muttered a prayer to the patron saint of fools and small children and plunged after him before I changed my mind and decided a beating was preferable.

The foyer we had entered was empty; another door in front of us was partly open. Hearts thumping so loud it was a wonder no one heard us, we peeked around the edge of the open door. We could see all of a sizable room and through a large opening into another room. There was nothing to be seen. No furniture, no lamps, no dust bunnies, no cobwebs.

Carl looked at me and shrugged before pushing the door all the way open. Nothing jumped out at us or swooped down from above. I followed at his heels as we explored each room of the downstairs. By the time we were done searching the upstairs, we were whispering to each other.

I touched a window, half expecting to feel the stickiness of grime. Only there wasn’t any. Closer inspection revealed an opaque paint. I scraped at it with my fingernail and it came right off, revealing the greenery outside.

I was wondering why the house had painted windows. Maybe it was a new way of decorating? Or maybe secret satanic rituals were performed on moonless nights; people sacrificing goats and chickens and doing all manner of evil things. I looked around for traces of blood or leftover markings of symbols that may have been drawn on the floor.

“Carl.” I whispered loudly. “This is some kind of paint on the windows.”

“Let’s go find the basement. Steve has to be here somewhere,” was all he said.

Carl has no imagination. I was wishing mine wasn’t so active.

I almost darted for the door again, but he grabbed my arm. “Come on Mick, we’ve come this far. Don’t run out on me now.”

The stairway leading down into the gloomy basement gave us our first clue that Steve had been there. A gleam on the steps turned out to be his pocket watch. It was still ticking.

I felt tears of fear welling up in my eyes. Carl shook me. “Don’t start Mick. I don’t want to hear your blubbering.”

“Okay.” I squeaked, and then sniffled back the rest of the flow. Carl was as scared as I was only he had to act valiant for Steve and for me. He was the oldest.

Just as we were wondering how deep the basement was we came to a door. Carl opened it and even my imagination couldn’t have conjured up what we saw.

A cavern so big I couldn’t see its end spread out before us. A wide causeway was lined on either side with four drawer file cabinets. A steel grating above us showed more file cabinets lining its sides. We walked for what seemed an eternity before finally reaching the end only to find another causeway off to our right, only this one had narrow rails down its center.

Garage size rooms branched off this corridor, each filled with various equipment. One room had computers and monitors, another had office supplies and another was filled with test tubes and glass bottles of all shapes and sizes.

We were standing in a room with sealed boxes of do-it-yourself steel shelves when we heard a soft rumble. Carl peeked around the corner and a small open car was leisurely coming our way. At first we thought it was floating, but Carl noticed that it followed the

track, so it must be some kind of electricity that guided it. As it approached us it slowed to a stop.

I almost fainted when Steve’s head popped up from the inside, like an old Jack-in-the-Box. Carl even had to grab the side of the thing to keep from falling over. Steve on the other hand did faint when he saw us.

Carl lifted him out of the car and laid him down in the ‘shelf room’. The car continued, unescorted, on its journey. I reached down to touch Steve.

“Let him be, Mick, he’ll come around in a few minutes. He’s just fainted.”

My next thoughts were very unchivalrous, but I couldn’t help it. I knew I had something that I could use against Steve anytime I needed a favor or just pick on him.

Steve’s eyes jerked open. “Carl! Mick! Boy am I glad to see you. Get a load of this place would you? I looked in some of the file cabinets. They’re files on people. Tells all kinds of things about them. Where they were born and who they’re related to. Practically everything! I even found Grandpa Horn’s file. I had it taken it, but then I fell asleep and when I woke up it was gone.” Steve’s tendency to babble when he was excited increased exponentially if you let him continue, so Carl placed his hand over Steve’s mouth.

“It’s okay. Just calm down and let’s get out of here. You can explain more after we get outside.”

In the movies, just as the person or persons was about to escape, the monster would usually leap from behind a door, or in our case, a file cabinet. This unspoken fear chased us all the way to the fresh air and sunshine. We were running so fast we didn’t even have time to notice Poppy waiting for us.

He followed us home and a good thrashing was given to us for doing exactly what he told us not to do. When we tried to explain, he shamed us for telling huge lies.

Finally Carl stood up and faced Pop squarely. “I know we did wrong. But what we saw is the truth. We just want you to give us a chance to prove it.”

“Okay. Tell you what. We’ll all go over there tomorrow morning. If what you say is true, I’ll apologize for calling you liars. But if you’re wrong, you’ll be grounded from doing anything for a month. Agreed?”

In unison, we nodded our heads.

The next morning the four of us trekked across the open field to the old man’s house. Sure enough, a crotchety old man came to the door and greeted us like we were long lost kin. The inside of the house was fairly clean, but smelled like an old person’s house will sometimes smell.

His name was Kenneth Barker and his wife had died three years earlier. He was unable to drive and didn’t get out too much but he offered us iced tea and store bought cookies.

We sat at a clean kitchen table and looked out the window to the hummingbird feeder hanging from the porch while we drank the tea and ate the cookies. Mr. Barker said he liked sitting and watching the birds come to feed because they had such brilliant colors. Pop and him chatted about the ‘old times.’

I kept looking around for some tell tale sign of what hadn’t been there the day before. An old curtain was hanging partly open and as we were leaving I hung back just a bit. Sure enough, the paint was there. I opened my mouth, but before I could speak, Mr.

Barker caught my eye and shook his head vigorously. Something in his manner told me he was protecting me and not himself. I stayed silent.

For a few months we would see Mr. Barker sitting on his porch and we’d stop to say hello. I never mentioned the paint and neither did he.

One day, on the way home from school, we noticed bulldozers at the old place. They told us Mr. Barker had died and his relatives wanted the place torn down so they could sell off the land.

I had the distinct impression that Mr. Barker was well and fine and the reason this place was being torn down was because we had discovered its secret.

Carl, Steve and I rarely talked of our adventure. It was awful, knowing that someone was keeping all that information about everyone in the world and nobody believing us.

Oh well. Such is life and ours continued to forge ahead into the seasons that followed.

* * *

Carl Eckert, Sr. watched his three children walk dejectedly home that day. He knew the day would come when one of them, probably Mick, would do some real digging and emerge with the truth. When she did, he would probably tell her the part he had played in the gathering and storage of the information contained in those many millions of files; and the reasons it was there.