This is a new, unpublished middle-grade sci-fi family adventure. Odd, comical characters and talk of gold and ghosts can excite the younger readers, and the outlandish scientific notions and eccentric writings of Uncle Proctor can entertain slightly older readers on a higher level.
If you are a literary agent or publisher that finds this story fun and compelling, the author would be quite happy to provide the full 74k-word manuscript for your reading enjoyment. Contact the author directly at edsech@gmail.com.
Falling into the Distance – Manuscript Description
“It is ‘distance perception,” wrote Uncle Proctor. “Why call it ‘depth’ unless one can fall there?”
The unexplained demise of creepy old Uncle Proctor left a curious inheritance for Orlando and Abigail. They didn’t get his dilapidated mansion with angry crows roosting high on the peaks. They didn’t get the vintage automobile or any of the furniture. But they did get the contents of his library, which included his journal wherein he’d recorded his experiments into the perceptions and trickery of the human mind.
With rumors that the old man had piles of gold coins, and with Lando and Abby in dire need of at least a few of them, Lando sets out to recreate those experiments, risking himself, his children Andy and Annabeth, and even the family dog, Barkley von Mayhem.
When Lando’s tampering with reality uncovers a hidden world, they find old man Proctor trapped there. But he claims it’s too risky to try to save him—he tells Lando to save his children and dog instead. And if he can salvage the gold which he’d taken to that secret realm, they’re welcome to bring it home to his beloved niece, Abigail, who had once danced in his grand foyer as a child.
Falling into the Distance – Manuscript Sample
Chapter 1 – Abby’s Uncle, You Said?
“Abigail Proctor! I require the immediate audience of one Abigail Proctor!”
Abby’s husband Orlando winced and snapped their home’s landline phone receiver farther from his ear. The woman had wielded her words like angry tapping of bony fingertips against the rusted, almost frozen keys of an antique typewriter.
“Abigail, you said? Abigail Proctor?”
“Mom’s name is Abby.”
Lando gave his young daughter a quick glance and a quicker nod.
“Indeed,” said the woman on the phone. “That is precisely what I said.”
Lando looked down at the eight-year-old looking up at him from where she was stepping on his shoes, shifting herself from one to the other.
He tousled her long, curly brown hair and said, “Annabeth, not now, Honey. I’m—”
“She’s AB2,” said Andy, two years older than her, with shorter hair that was attempting to curl, too, and leaning against the kitchen counter.
“And you’re AB1,” she said to him, giggling and crushing her father’s toes. “But you’re not allowed to be called—”
Lando raked his fingers through his own wavy brown hair and said, “Kids! Just a minute, alright?”
Through the phone, he heard the woman peck out the words, “Kindly curtail your collaboration with what sounds like pesky juvenile people. I did not state my requirement, which was not a request, by the way, only to have you, whoever you are, and your tribe, whoever they are, not produce Abigail but rather launch into some kind of—”
“Whoa. Hold up a second. Abby, you mean? She’s married. She’s Abby Banyon now.”
“Regardless of her preferred appellation, and without any further unrequested disclosures about the choices she has enacted in the continuance of her existence, make the aforementioned party available promptly so that I can—”
“Hey!” he called into the phone, smiling and about to laugh. “Settle down a second, will you?”
Lando scoffed at the sound of the woman’s snort easily navigating frequencies and circuits and invisible waves through the air and striking his ear sharply. His scoff turned into a grin when he brushed aside Annabeth’s hand from rubbing the short whiskers on his chin, earning a giggle from her.
“Very well. I have settled myself. But only long enough for you to locate then relocate your wife, or so you claim, close enough to the telephone to—”
“Hey! You call that settled? Look, Abby’s not here right now. What’s this about? Who are you?”
“I elect to answer your pair of questions in reverse order. Kindly hold your protests in abeyance until at least my first response is complete. Can you accept these terms?”
“I, um, you’re kind of—”
“And I’ll require also that you maintain some level of supervisory control over what I would suspect are your yapping offspring.”
“Uh, the kids? I mean, they do yap sometimes, but they—”
“I must insist,” she said, each syllable an evenly timed strike against stubborn mechanical keys with faded letters.
“Fine. Go ahead.”
“Very well. I am Priscilla Penobahosh, the . . . you find that amusing?”
Still laughing, Lando said, “Uh, yeah. Sorry. Please, continue.”
“Very well. I am the officially registered and eminently qualified executrix of Miss Abigail’s—did I just hear you snort? What now?”
He cut short his laughter while trying to ignore fingers again playing with his short beard and said, “Well, heck. She’s not a ‘miss’ anymore. Like I told you, she’s—”
“Very well. Let’s just reference her by her given name of Abigail, then. She—”
“Abby. Abby Banyon. She’s my—”
“Very well! May we continue? Thank you! I am the executrix of her late uncle’s ‘Final Wishes and Falling-to-My-Doom Testimonial,’ as the esteemed Maestro Proctor insisted the document be identified.”
“He insisted the . . . wait, Abby’s uncle, you said?”
“We both know with certainty that that’s what I said.”
“He, uh . . . the esteemed Maestro Proctor? What on Earth is that all about? And what kind of joker would call his own last will the—”
“Can we not demean the recently departed by critiquing his self-selected title, as recorded in said Testimonial, regardless of its mystery and morbidity?”
“The, uh, ‘Falling-to-My-Doom thing?”
“I believe you’re already cognizant that that’s what I said. And I will gladly anticipate your next inquiry and provide an answer before your vulgar and inconsiderate laughter again makes clear your lack of concern for the seriousness of these affairs. Yes, he insisted that the document be called by that peculiar title rather than simply calling it his last will and testament. There. That should suffice.”
“Uh, yeah. Sure. That will, uh, suffice.”
“Finally. Now, I believe I have unwillingly belabored the point long enough for you to scurry along, tamp down your urge to mock my demand further, and hand whatever communication device is in use to Miss Abigail—Abby. Yes, fine, it is Abby now. Even that annoying, non-adult person that is there with you, the one with a grating, squeaky voice, seems to concur by its remaining silent. Please, summon Abby to—”
“Sorry, she’s at work. Oh, and no one summons Abby anywhere. Wow, the stories I could tell you. I thought I could do that, back in the day, and I learned real quick that—”
“There is no time for reminiscing about historical trivia concerning your relationship with the intended target of my communications about a matter of the utmost, most urgent, and undeniable—”
“Wow, why use ten words when a thousand will do just—”
“Patience, or I will effortlessly deliver in the tens of thousands. Your levity is unwelcome and unhelpful. I was selected for this mission based on my resolute and unfailing attention to details. I now proceed as dictated by the written terms of my engagement. Abby, as she is called by some now, has inherited the contents of one specific room of Maestro Proctor’s home. Said contents must be removed in their entirety before 5:00 pm today, or what is left will be forfeited. It will likely be incinerated as well in short order. Is that clear?”
“Abby inherited stuff? If we don’t take it, it’ll just get burned up?”
“Mom got stuff?”
“Honey, just a second.”
“AB2, let Dad finish talking,” said Andy. “It’s probably garbage—they’re just going to burn it.”
“Andy,” Lando said. “Let’s not insult Maestro Proctor’s stuff.”
Andy smirked and didn’t notice that Annabeth was covering a giggle with one hand and pointing at him with the other.
“Fine,” Lando told Priscilla. “The kids and I can come over and grab some of the—”
“Are you a blood relative of Maestro Proctor?”
“Well, uh, no. I married Abby, so that means that I’m—”
“Less than a Proctor—ineligible and barred from entry on your own. I believe the spawn gnawing at the woodwork and leaving sticky stains everywhere, while technically blood relations of Maestro Proctor, are below the age of adulthood and lacking any legal standing in regards to consciousness and ability to reason. They, too, are barred. Barred! No, this claiming of inheritance, whether of any discernible value or not, will require the aforementioned Abigail Proctor to—”
“Abby!” Lando yelled, then scoffed.
“Mom’s at work, Dad!”
“Honey, just—”
The sharp pokes through the phone said, “Very well! Yes, Abby. It will require the actual physical presence of Abby.”
“She’s at work. They don’t quit there until about—”
“She has until 5:00. This is Priscilla Penobahosh, faithfully administering the final requests of Maestro Proctor’s estate, bidding you good day, as every clock within view inexorably marches toward what might be the inevitable forfeiture and subsequent annihilation of some quantity of unknown and uncatalogued inheritance goods.”
Lando shook his head and said, “Sheesh. Alright. And a good—”
They all heard the click.
“Huh.”
“You’re calling Mom, Dad, so we can go pick up some junk?”
“I like junk.”
“Of course, you do, Annabeth. Yeah, Andy, I’ll just—”
“I’m AB2.”
She pointed at her brother and said, “And he’s—”
“AB Prime,” Andy said with a big grin.
“Because you were first,” said Lando.
“He’s not allowed to be more important! It’s not fair!”
“Of course, Annabeth. And yes to both of you—I’m calling Mom.”
“How’s that editing going, Abby?”
Horace, Abby’s frail and weathered boss, who appeared little more than a hanger holding up a wrinkled suit jacket, slumped against the jamb of her open office doorway.
She looked up with her fingers still on the keyboard. A quick shake of her head parted her curly brown hair, almost identical to and long like Annabeth’s, off to each side.
“Oh, uh, almost there. I’m finding only a few typos, so we should be good to go soon.”
He stayed fused to the woodwork but raised an arm, pried back the sleeve like it was a heavy, crusted tarp, and scoffed at his watch.
Looking her way again, where she studied him above the top edge of her open laptop, he said, “Deadlines, Abby. There’s always some kind of a dead—”
He squinted at her cellphone chiming and rattling on the wood desk surface beside her computer, then looked up in time to see her shrug.
Pointing, seemingly too weak to smile, though, he said, “Do be mindful of time constraints, hmm, Abby?”
“I will, Horace. Yep.”
He nodded, turned slowly and stiffly, then appeared like a vintage garment hanging on a conveyor at the dry cleaners as he glided away, then off to the side and out of sight.
“Oh my gosh,” she said, shaking her head and grinning.
With the phone up, she smiled at the caller ID, then gave it a tap.
“Lan. Hi.”
“Abby, sorry to bother you at work.”
“It’s fine. I just probably shouldn’t talk too long. There’s no emergency, is there? The kids are alright?”
“Yeah, they’re fine. So’s the dog.”
“Barkley. Can’t forget him.”
“We can try.”
“Lannie, you’d be too sad without that dog following you everywhere. He’s a special guy. What’s going on?”
“You were just referred to as Abigail Proctor by someone named Priscilla Penoba . . . something. She—”
“Priscilla who? Lannie, what are you talking about?”
“Some woman called, asking for you. She said she’s handling the estate of your uncle, who she called the esteemed Maestro Proctor.”
“Oh, that guy? Huh. I only met him once when I was little. Annabeth’s age, I think. I barely remember him, and he wasn’t an actual uncle—something like a distant cousin’s grandfather.”
“Maestro?”
“I remember even as a kid how everyone had such a high opinion of the guy. I honestly don’t know why. He kicked the bucket, huh?”
“So she says. Well, he remembered you. He left you some inheritance, but it’s probably just junk.”
“Why do you think it’s junk?”
“She said whatever isn’t picked up will probably get incinerated.”
“Oh, yep, sounds like junk, then.”
“Yeah. She said you can claim whatever you want from one room of his house, but you have to pick it up today before 5:00.”
“Or else, what?”
“Or you lose it. That’s what. She said I can’t just run over and look through it either—it has to be a blood relative. How weird is that?”
“He was very weird! That’s about all I remember. I didn’t even know he’d died. How did he die?”
“She didn’t say, and I didn’t ask. So, you want to just forget it, or what?”
“Oh, Lannie, we should take a look, especially if the rumors are true.”
“Rumors?”
“Yep. Some say he had a lot of gold.”
She giggled and added, “Maybe he hid some in the stuff we’re supposed to pick up.”
“You think there’s gold?”
Abby grinned at hearing both of her children cheering for gold.
“Kids,” Lando said, his voice not directly into the phone, “it’s just a rumor. Shh.”
“Are you back, Lannie?”
“Yeah. Those kids.”
“Yeah. No such luck about gold, I’d say. Still, we should go see. How much stuff? Did she say?”
“Uh, no. She said one room, but that could be anything. Furniture maybe? I don’t know.”
“Um . . .”
Abby gave her screen a look, then glanced out of her small room toward the rest of the office, then said, “Hey, I’ll see if I can borrow the truck from work. What do you think?”
“Good plan. How much gold can we pack in there?”
“Lannie, we won’t be packing any gold. I shouldn’t even have mentioned that silly rumor. But if there’s any useful furniture, we can sure pack that up and take it.”
“Okay, sounds good. I’ll get AB1 and AB2 ready, and when you—”
“Oh, how about Andy and Annabeth? I like those names, Lan.”
“I do too. So, AB Prime is probably—”
“Not a good choice either. Nope.”
“But he’s kind of a science fiction nut, and he likes—”
“And Andy is a very nice name, right?”
“It’s a very nice name. Yeah. We’ll finish up lunch, then, and meet you out front when you pull up. Unless you need to come inside?”
“Oh, no, just come on out when I toot the horn. If I go inside, I’ll just want to lie down on the couch and not bother with old man Proctor’s junk.”
“How old was he?”
“Oh, I don’t know. He was practically a fossil even back when I was little.”
“Nice—Uncle Fossil. Okay, see you in a bit.”
“Bye, Lannie.”
Abby had just set the phone down when Horace seemed to hover into view, no part of him moving enough to fold or bend any portion of his clothing.
“Everything okay, Abby?”
“Uh, sort of. I have two requests.”
She held up two fingers and watched his unamused eyes scan them without interest, then focus again on hers.
“First, I’d like to finish this editing tomorrow and take off the rest of the day.”
“You would surely not remain absent tomorrow, too, would you?”
“Well, no. Nope. I just hope this work can wait that long.”
“I suppose it can. We’re not right up against that dead—”
“That’s the other thing, Horace. There’s been a death in the family. Extended family.”
“Oh, I’m sorry to hear that. Not someone close to you, I trust?”
“No, not really, but there’s some inheritance for us. We just have to go pick it up today, for some reason.”
“How odd. Why the rush?”
“Because the dead guy—kind of like an uncle—was odd. From what I remember and heard, everything about him was odd. I guess that’s not about to change just because he passed on.”
“There’s some logic to that. Our oddness survives our demise. There’s a title for you.”
“Yeah. That’s, uh . . . nice. So, can I borrow the truck?”
He replayed his deliberate watch checking, then looked up at her again.
“I don’t suppose it will be needed until morning. You don’t intend to damage it, do you?”
“Horace. No, why would I? We’ll be careful.”
“Good. This deceased uncle didn’t live in a neighboring state, did he?”
“Uh-uh. He lives—I mean, his house is just across town. We won’t use much gas.”
“All acceptable conditions. Yes, just grab the keys, Abby, and you can leave your car in the lot if you wish.”
“Thanks. Alright.”
Chapter 2 – There Might Be Gold
“All of you,” Lando said, looking across the table then glancing lower, toward the floor, “finish up. Mom’s coming to pick us up in the truck.”
Annabeth giggled with a mouthful of peanut butter sandwich and struggled to say, “Barkley has to hurry too?”
“Oh, I don’t know, Honey. He can take his time, I suppose.”
“No, he can’t,” Andy said, then took a gigantic bite from his sandwich before continuing. “If he’s going to—”
“Andy, really? How does that monstrous bite help you communicate?”
Andy only snorted and grinned and chewed.
“It doesn’t,” said Lando. “That’s right. Let me speak for you while you keep your teeth busy, and you—”
“Mandible,” he said, his cheek bulging on one side.
“Huh?”
He gave his jaw a few snaps, succeeding in only mushing things up and not actually clattering any teeth.
“Oh, right. Keep that mandible busy, too, and finish that up. You were going to suggest that the dog come with us? To that Uncle Proctor house?”
“For stuff!” said Annabeth.
Andy swallowed hard, got his hand on his milk glass, and said, “We might need him.”
“Always thinking ahead, huh?”
“Yeah. Was he rich? How did he get rich? How did he die? Is his ghost still there, did Mom inherit his ghost, and when we—”
“Whoa! Easy, there, AB1.”
“Not Prime,” Annabeth whispered, then giggled.
“You can’t be Prime either, AB2,” Lando said, smiling at them both. “Look, I don’t know anything about the guy. Let’s just wait and see what kind of stuff he left us. It’s probably just old junk that nobody would want anyway.”
Annabeth pointed at the dog and said, “Maybe Barkley von May Ham would want some of it?”
“It’s ‘hem,’” said Andy. “Barkley von Mayhem. Not ham. Not May Ham.”
“Oh. I know. It’s just not as fun. Can he be Barkley von September Ham sometime?”
“No,” Lando and Andy said together, and she pouted and took a drink of milk.
“Annabeth, we found him as a pup in the month of May, and he was pretty rowdy at that young age. So, that’s that. Come on. Finish up.”
After clunking down his empty glass, Andy said, “So, he’s coming with us, right? Barkley is, in case we need him?”
“How about this: we keep him on a leash and always watch him. We can’t have him tearing through the house, wrecking things.”
Andy nodded knowingly, then said, “Because the ghost would get angry. You’re right, Dad.”
“No, not because—Annabeth, finish that sandwich.”
“I’m saving some for the ghost.”
Lando looked from one grinning child to the other, then at Barkley, who sat quite still and panted, his big brown eyes bright.
After a deep sigh, he said, “There’s no ghost, okay? Just junk.”
“Ghost junk,” Andy said under his breath.
Annabeth giggled and said, “Yeah. A hungry ghost with a pile of gold!”
“Guys, don’t plan on finding any gold. Mom said that was just a rumor. There probably won’t even be anything nice enough that Barkley would want it. Right, Barkley?”
He barked once at the ceiling, then glanced at each of the smiling faces looking down at him.
Abby coasted the boxy white cube van to a stop in front of their work-in-progress two-story house in a leafy neighborhood. The engine continued to rumble as she swept up the lever on the steering column, clunking the transmission into park. That hand then tapped the horn button three times quickly.
Both hands again gripping the wheel, she tipped her head and let her eyes drift to the pine tree air freshener forced to dance where it hung from the passenger side visor.
Snorting out a soft groan, she quickly snapped the key to let the engine rest, and she studied the faded green tree as it gave up its last few shakes.
Reaching out with a finger locked and ready to flick the thing, compel it to jiggle some more, she paused and observed her hand, halfway there, shaking without any pistons working or belts turning or exhaust parts belching hot gas.
“Oh. It’s that house. I don’t want to go.”
Strangling the wheel again, she looked to her own house, and she ignored the bicycles in the grass, the untrimmed shrubbery bordering the porch, and the cracked wood siding starving patiently for paint. Her eyes fixed on the warped wooden front door, willing it to open.
It didn’t.
“Once was enough. I don’t know what was creepier—that creepy old man or his creepy old house.”
She let go of the steering wheel and used both hands to smooth out her blue jeans several times, then let one of them brush aside her hair. Her eyes were still focused on a door that looked quite content to stay closed a bit longer, holding inside two children, a husband, and a dog.
“Which one of the two was older, the uncle or the house?” she said, laughing for herself. “I’m sure they only got creepier together over the years.”
Twisting around enough to spy through the metal mesh stretched across a narrow opening to the van’s empty storage area, she scoffed and said, “But if we can fill this thing with gold . . .”
Barkley bounded down the porch steps with two giggling children close behind, but Andy stopped and looked back when he heard Lando slam shut the front door.
“Did you lock it, Dad?”
“Oh, good catch, Andy. Always thinking.”
He reached inside, turned a lever, then yanked it shut again before giving his son a thumbs-up sign.
The dog and Annabeth were near the passenger side of the truck, and both were jumping to look in through the open window.
“Hi, Mom!”
“Hi, Honey. You guys ready to go?”
“We are. Barkley and me.”
“Well, get in, then. Let’s go.”
Annabeth struggled with the handle before Andy, coming up behind her, took control and pried it up, loosening the door and allowing the dog to jump in first.
While Barkley was kissing Abby and she was saying, “Oh, good dog!” Annabeth giggled more and scooted up against her.
“Hey, Lan, you get these urchins fed?”
Climbing up and sitting, then pulling shut the door, Lando said, “Even the dog. Yeah. We’re all ready for—”
“Gold!” said Andy.
“Ghosts!” said Annabeth. “Hungry ghosts!”
“Lannie, what have you been telling them? Stories about gold and ghosts?”
“Well, uh, they did hear us talk about gold, but they came up with that ghost bit on their own. It wasn’t me.”
“Kids are smart,” she said.
“Huh? You mean—”
“It’s just a creepy old house, Lan. You’ll see.”
Abby started the engine and gave the aromatic hanging tree a quick glance.
“Guys,” she said, “it’s probably just a pile of junk waiting for us there. Really, everything about Uncle Proctor was old, even when I was little.”
“The house is old?”
“Yeah, Annabeth. Even years ago. I was only over there once, when I was your age, and that was enough.”
She put the truck in gear and idled away from the curb and into the driving lane.
“How come, Mom? Too many ghosts?”
“Andy, no. There aren’t any ghosts.”
She grinned and kept her eyes on the road and added, “There might be gold, though. Who knows?”
“We could sure use it,” said Lando. “I’ve almost given up on ever being a teacher.”
“To finally be a science teacher? I know, Hon. I haven’t given up for myself, but it’s not likely to happen.”
“Oh. That dance school,” he said. “If we do find some gold, that’s what it’ll be for, alright? You still are an incredible dancer, and you’d be a wonderful teacher too.”
“Aw, thanks. Not to brag, but I do think I’d be a good teacher. I certainly do love dance.”
“I want to be a dancer, too, Mom.”
“I know, Honey. Everyone knows from you wearing that tutu so often.”
“I like it,” she said while fussing with a short pink tutu over her jeans.
“It’s silly. There’s no reason for it. Even the ghosts will tell you so.”
“Andy,” said Abby, “be nice to your sister. And there aren’t any ghosts. Lannie, should Barkley keep his head out the window like that?”
“Sure, why not? Hey, you remember where that house is?”
“Yeah. It’s etched in my brain, I think.”
“It was really that creepy when you saw it?”
“Oh, probably not. I was just Annabeth’s age when—”
“She’s AB2. I’m—”
“You’re not more important, Andy!”
“I can be Prime if I—”
“Guys! We’ll figure that out later, alright?”
“I want to give away an ‘n,’” said Annabeth.
Without looking away from the road, Abby frowned and said, “What, Honey? What are you talking about?”
“My name, Mom. If it started with just ‘Ana,” then I’d be AB1. It’s alphabetical, right?”
She gave Lando a quick look, saw him stifling a laugh and shaking his head, then focused again on her driving.
“Honey, no. I think it’s more about who showed up first. That was Andy.”
“Oh.”
“Hey, how about if you be the AB1 girl of the family?”
The girl of the family sighed deeply and fussed with her tutu.
“Okay. Can I be Prime, too, then?”
“No,” Andy said without hesitation. “I invented that. That’s my name.”
“Can you both just be our kids,” said Lando, “and not some distant world somewhere?”
Annabeth giggled and said, “Okay, if Mom opens a dance school and I take lessons.”
“There’s probably no gold,” said Abby.
“But if there is, Dad can go to college?” said Andy.
“Yeah, I would. But Mom and I will find a way to figure that all out without Proctor’s gold.”
“Maybe the ghosts will help?”
Andy snickered and said, “Funny, AB2. Ghosts don’t figure things.”
“Unless I’m not remembering right, that creepy old house is right around this corner.”
Abby idled the truck beneath a canopy of twisted branches extending out over the road from both sides of the street. Every leaf on every dead limb was brown and dry, all rattling and some dropping like flat, crunchy rain.
“Even this area of town is creepy,” said Lando, his head almost out of the window like Barkley’s. “Most of these houses look abandoned.”
“Only ghosts live here?”
“Annabeth, no. These houses just need some sprucing up, that’s all. We can’t blame everything on ghosts.”
Andy said, “That means we can blame some things on—”
“Andy, no,” Abby said. “We really should forget about ghosts.”
She turned the corner, cruised along a wall of tall hedges encroaching on the cracked sidewalk, and jerked the vehicle to an abrupt stop just when the corner of the old Victorian house showed itself.
“Easy, Honey,” said Lando. “You almost clunked Barkley’s head.”
“Mine too.”
“You’re wearing a seatbelt, AB2. You didn’t come close to—”
“Guys, hold up. Abby? Why did you stop?”
“Ghosts!” Annabeth whispered.
“No ghosts,” Abby said. “Just memories of creepiness.”
She sighed, eased up on the brake pedal, and let the bulky truck idle until it came to a stop at the curb directly in front of the house.
“Oh, wow,” said Lando. “That’s a, uh, unique kind of place.”
All three stories were capped by a variety of steeply sloping black roofs that were dwarfed by a single sharp peak cutting into the sky. Every window was either wearing closed curtains, or covered in cardboard, or just black all on its own.
“Uh-huh. Just like I remembered it.”
A porch spanned the entire width of the structure, deep enough and tucked under a roof low enough to keep the far reaches of it as blackened as the windows.
Andy snickered and said, “He didn’t have any gold. He would have fixed his house.”
“No, Andy,” said Abby, “I think he just didn’t care at all about the house, just his experiments. He really was kind of wealthy, I think, at least at one time.”
A flagpole jutting out horizontally from one of the thick stone columns arrayed along the porch held only a long piece of shredded cloth, which somehow resisted every breeze and stayed in place like a fabric icicle.
“Experiments?”
Lando and Barkley extended themselves out farther to look up at the cawing of a small, solemn congregation of crows landing one by one, lining themselves up evenly on the highest peak.
“Yeah. That’s what I’ve heard anyway. Really, though, I’ve had like no contact with any of these relatives since my parents moved to the Bahamas.”
“When are we going to visit them?” said Andy.
“Can Barkley come too?” said Annabeth. “He wants to play in the sand. So do I. Is there a lot of sand there? Is the water warm? Is—”
“Annabeth! Let’s talk about that later. I think we’d all like to go someday soon.”
Barkley whined softly, and Lando whispered, “Something’s coming!”
The kids gasped, and Abby, near panic showing in her voice, said, “Everything about this place is just so . . .”
They quieted as they watched an elderly woman, dressed in formal clothing from a bygone era, as she descended the steps. The front door, behind her, crept itself closed without a sound.
Chapter 3 – A Legitimate Heir
The dog and every member of the family sitting in the truck watched in silence as the slender woman took slow, deliberate steps on the moss-covered stone walkway toward them. Her long dress barely swayed near her clean black boots, and she held her hands together in front of her as if in prayer.
A single black feather reached up from the side of her hat and toward the black crows congregating high above her, and the wide brim rendered her face little more than a smudgy charcoal sketch.
“Is that the ghost, Mom?”
“Honey, shh. No.”
Lando laughed nervously and said, “Uh, maybe wait and see. Don’t stop that engine just yet.”
“You’re scaring the kids, Lannie.”
“I’m not scared,” said Andy. “She appears human.”
“Oh, Andy.”
“Humanoid, at least.”
“That’s helpful.”
But Abby didn’t shut down the motor.
The woman paused five steps from the truck, the shadowy face grudgingly succumbed to more detail, and she turned to look to her left. Then, her right.
Then, back at the truck.
Everyone heard Barkley swallow.
She tipped her head back enough to allow the stingy sun above the twisted dead tree branches to light her mouth, chasing away any notions of her being constructed of clumps of coal dust.
“Oh, Andy,” Abby said with a chuckle, “I think you’re right.”
“She’s not a ghost?”
“Annabeth, shh. No. Um, probably not.”
The human mouth, uncloaked from the hat’s shadows, opened and formed words directed toward the truck’s interior.
“I trust that one Abigail Proctor is present in that conveyance?”
“I know that voice,” Lando said, his mouth in a sideways smirk to direct much of his statement back toward Abby and the children. “That’s, um, Pauline, I think she said—”
“It’s Priscilla,” the woman snapped, each syllable like a metal rod being poked into the side of the truck. “Priscilla Penobahosh.”
“Yeah,” he whispered. “Uh, that’s the one that—”
“My hearing is quite adequate—I hear all, even when I’m discussed as if I’m not present. I’ll repeat: if one Abigail Proctor lives and breathes somewhere in that—”
“I’m Abby,” she said, leaning over Andy and Annabeth, supporting herself with a hand on Lando. “It’s Abby now. Abby Banyon.”
“Yes,” Priscilla said. “So I’ve been advised.”
With her mouth still catching some light, she tipped her head to one side, letting a few rays illuminate just one eye. Abby slipped back from the sight and gripped the steering wheel. Lando and the children stared. The dog held his breath.
“You, a legitimate heir to the estate of the late Maestro Proctor, have responded with acceptable timeliness and brought reasonable means of transport. These smaller creatures,”—she wrinkled her nose, also visible in the light below the curving hat brim as she stared at the children, then the dog—“were and likely always will be more burden than benefit. However, if they remain suitably tethered and restrained, whether through sturdy physical means, such as is visible for this only slightly more savage of the bunch, then they may set their small feet inside the house.”
She stared.
Lando and Abby and the rest stared back.
Lando muttered, mostly to himself, “When a thousand words will—”
“I hear quite well Mr. Husband of a Proctor heir. And rid yourself of any doubt that,”—she snarled silently and pointed a stiff finger at his face—“should I decide to spew a thousand or more words in your direction, all at once and flowing like sap from an axe strike in a tree that was too slow to flee my wrath, you shall remain quiet and attentive until the very last one.”
“Uh, sure. Okay. Can we just—”
Priscilla scoffed and spun herself around, then began careful steps toward the house, her long dress matching the reluctance of the last shred of the flag on the pole to sway or even twitch from any motion or breeze.
“Huh,” said Lando. “I suppose we should—”
Abby yelled from behind him, “What about the gold? My creepy Uncle Proctor was supposed to have lots of gold!”
She stopped dead in her silent tracks, facing the house, and no one in the truck uttered a peep. They only watched her turn to reveal that the distance and the hat brim had combined forces to yield a murky mask swept together with ash from one of the old house’s fireplaces.
“She’s a ghost, Mom.”
“AB2, no,” said Andy. “She’s just—”
“She’s just Priscilla,” said Lando. “Yeah. I mean, what else could she be?”
“Mom,” cried Annabeth softly, “I want to go home. The ghost is coming for us!”
Abby tried fussing with the girl’s hair while she and the rest of them watched Priscilla begin her silent travel back toward the truck. But she stopped farther away than before.
“Gold? Hmm. Gold, you say.”
The words seemed to appear on their own from the general direction of a dark face in the gloom under a wide brim, from a woman dressed in clothing that was never current and clasping her hands together like a performer waiting to recite her next line.
“Yeah,” said Abby, “I kind of remember hearing that he was rich and had a pile of gold.”
Priscilla turned her head enough to suggest that she was glancing back toward the dilapidated mansion, but the lack of light on a dim face offered no confirmation of it.
Turned again toward the truck, she said, “Your memory is functioning accurately enough. Yes, the departed scholar was quite wealthy, and he did indeed, at least at one time, lord over a substantial stash of the precious and, some would say, cursed metal. But my eyes scrutinize all things in their path, much like,”—she swept up one arm and held it there, and the crows on the roof began squawking in unison—“them.”
“You,” said Lando, his voice shaky, “you and the birds and—”
She snapped her arm down and allowed the two hands to clasp once again, and the black birds roosting near the sky fell silent.
Lando kept quiet and watched Priscilla give the crowded rooftop a slow glance, then pointed at the dog on his lap.
“Do make every attempt to keep the yaps from that unruly thing to a minimum. This fine manor home once housed such a beast, but they,”—she froze long enough for one finger to point straight up, then return to her previous clasp—“did not tolerate such outbursts.”
“You mean . . . the old man used to have—”
“They prefer quietude, and we, the crows and I, do not miss much. No, we surely do not. And these eyes of mine have not touched upon any such metal, whether coins or bars or ingots or any other geometry, anywhere within the confines of this stately, though sadly fallen into disrepair, manor.”
“You like to talk!” Annabeth called out, then giggled.
“AB2,” said Andy, “shh. It’s like Dad said, ‘Why use ten words when—’”
Priscilla took a solid step closer and tipped her head enough to let sunlight enliven her entire face, which, as she held a tight smile for just a second before speaking, appeared quite beautiful, much like one would find in a portrait of an important lady from a century abandoned to a forgotten history.
“I will speak a thousand words whenever I please. But there is no time for that now. Inside the good Maestro’s home, I will entreat you to officially acknowledge the single-page note, addressed to one Abigail Proctor and delineating the extent of her inheritance and the terms which dictate procurement and removal of said items.”
The children stared, eyes big and mouths open, and Barkley tipped his head and whined.
When Abby spoke, Lando fought to pry his eyes away from the woman, face in the light, staring quietly and waiting for a response.
“So, uh, you’re saying that we should—”
“Vacate your unsightly vehicle, Miss Abigail Proctor, and enjoin your troupe to travel with you into the bowels of this enviable and expansive property. There, with the enforcement of all control over these smaller creatures as you can muster, Maestro Proctor will speak to you—in written form, though. With the dust and gloom and occasional unexplained creaking of exhausted floorboards when no one is visible, you may indeed feel that you are hearing his actual raspy, pained, and pleading voice.”
She turned enough to study the house for a second, then faced the staring family in the truck again.
“From beyond.”
Barkley swallowed loudly, and Lando kept staring while his hand, which had been flopping around the dog’s ears, slipped forward and covered his eyes.
Priscilla offered them a generous smile, showing rows of perfect teeth, then let the brim tip again, drawing a curtain on a blurry and unidentifiable mask.
“Do stay close. It will help somewhat in keeping you all . . . intact.”
She spun slowly, like some antique figurine on a post, then began a steady walk toward the porch, with a renewed chorus of cawing from high above.
“Oh my gosh,” said Abby. “This isn’t worth it. It’s too creepy.”
“What about the gold?” said Andy. “Shouldn’t we at least look?”
“We could use the gold, Honey,” said Lando. “Even one lousy coin would help.”
Everyone watched as Annabeth shook her head and stared at the departing figure.
“I think the ghost took the gold. That’s what I think.”
Chapter 4 – His Unexplained End
The stern woman gave the house’s front door a gentle push, then paused, rigid and silent, as the door continued opening on its own, its protesting squeals sharp against the dull darkness beyond the doorway.
Priscilla turned enough to see all of them hesitating at the bottom of the stairs and waited patiently until the crying of the hinges had ceased.
“We enter now. Stay close.”
“Wow,” Lando said with a laugh. “That was only five words. If you try, you can actually—”
“Hush, husband of Abigail—you who do not qualify as a true descendant of the deceased ruler of this stately home.”
Lando scoffed but didn’t smile or protest or speak further.
She stepped closer to them and farther from the dark cave behind her.
“Brevity in a home such as this is not just economical and perhaps admirable—it is a necessity. Some who have scavenged from room to room, through levels above and below this one, have attested to the distinct sense that objects within the house maybe have conspired to effect the nearly total disappearance of Maestro Proctor. They have—”
“Wait,” Abby said as she maneuvered to the head of the line. “You said he disappeared? But before, you called him deceased? What’s the story?”
“Oh dear, you wouldn’t know, would you Miss Abigail? It’s just that, well, a portion of him has been found and persists, still, in an area of the house that will not be investigated by you or by children or by that shaggy, drooling thing on a rope. You will follow me to the—”
“Wait again,” said Abby. “Come on, this is silly. Did he die or didn’t he?”
Priscilla looked briefly toward the nearest neighbor’s house, then back at Abby.
“Some from adjacent dwellings have stated that the venerable Mister Proctor was expecting his imminent demise—perhaps even welcoming it. He was seen repeatedly just outside his back door, wearing odd contraptions and reaching for things that were not there. Tears, Miss Abigail. Tears and sobs were his pleadings to whatever his eyes were struggling to grasp.”
“But is he really—”
“There is only a trace of him remaining, almost just a reminder of his general shape and character. One might call it a layer of what he once was, a veneer which became fixed at the moment of his unexplained end and persists to this day. No other portion of him remains for any of us to witness, engage in conversation, or venerate. He has been pronounced, by individuals we sloppily refer to as authorities, as—”
“A ghost!”
“Annabeth, shh,” said Abby. “No, I think she means—”
“Dead. If you were suspecting the next word to be ‘dead,’ that is correct. There is general and unanimous agreement that he is, in fact, quite dead. Now, shall we enter the abode for a perusal of his last ever words for you, Abigail, and, as it turns out, for you as well, husband of—”
“Lando is fine. You can call me—”
“His last words are waiting, then I shall direct you to the portion of his left-behind possessions that you may cart away or leave for the destruction that’s more likely justified for everything abandoned in this house.”
She spun slowly, keeping her eyes locked on Abby as long as she could, then vanished slowly into the darkness.
“Oh my gosh,” said Abby.
“Mom, there are ghosts!”
“Annabeth, no, it’ll be fine.”
“I want to see the dead guy’s stuff,” said Andy. “It’s probably cool stuff.”
“Me,” said Lando, “I’m curious about what she was talking about—how he left part of himself behind. What’s that all about?”
“That’s odd,” Lando said as he ventured into the deep shade inside the house. “He’s usually first, especially for something new.”
He’d paused to look down at Barkley, as far back from him as his taut leash would allow.
“Maybe he’s just being polite for a change, Dad.”
“That could be, Andy. Good thinking.”
“Maybe he doesn’t like ghosts.”
“Oh, Annabeth,” said Abby. “There aren’t any ghosts. What do you say we get inside and get this over with?”
“Good plan,” said Lando, and he continued on with the leash stretched back behind him.
Annabeth followed after Barkley, needing a few shoves and snickers from her brother to keep her moving, and Abby creaked the door shut after she’d gotten herself inside too.
“What?”
She looked from one to the other, including the dog, and saw them motionless, heads locked with unblinking eyes examining their selected regions of Proctor’s home. With a scoff, she ignored them and looked around for herself.
“Oh my gosh. Again.”
“Yeah, Abby. Uh-huh.”
The grand foyer was a study in grays and darker grays, with only occasional highlights of slightly less somber grays. While sweeping their eyes at all of it, each of them lost for a second the distinction of a woman seemingly made of charcoal and standing at attention against a chipped, gray plastered wall.
Until the apparition spoke.
“Light has never been the most welcome guest in this prison of—”
“Prison?” said Lando. “Why would you call it that?”
“I say that mostly in jest. My serious mission at disposing of Scholar Proctor’s Earthly belongings does allow brief respites of levity. This structure was not an actual prison, husband of—Lando, I mean. It’s just that he, the one pronounced deceased, had not left this property in quite some time.”
“Is he really gone now?” said Annabeth, her little fist clutching the fur of Barkley’s back.
“Well,” said Priscilla, “that is quite a question, young . . . thing.”
She didn’t step closer, but she did lean toward Annabeth.
“Let’s say, for the sake of academic discussion, that he did not entirely vacate the premises.”
She kept the details of her face disguised by shadows, but everyone knew that she was focused on the child clutching a dog’s fur.
“He just might, then, have good cause to say . . . boo!”
“Ah! Mom!”
“Hey,” said Abby. “Easy, okay?”
Barkley stepped between Annabeth and the smiling woman but didn’t manage to say anything about it while staring up at her.
“Very well. Enough comedic entertainment. There,”—she pointed to a closed door lending its gray to the gray of the foyer’s wall—“is good Maestro Proctor’s library. Your bequeathed bounty lurks in there. In a moment, I will enable your access. First, though, let us devote our attention to what the good though very misunderstood gentleman had to say to you, Miss Abigail Proctor, in a recital of his written words. Shall we? Yes. We shall.”
While everyone stared without moving, rarely even blinking, Priscilla snapped both of her arms out to the sides, held them for just a second, then bent them at the elbows to nearly touch her fingertips together. From there, she compressed herself further, reaching into a sleeve with the opposing hand and drawing out a document rolled into a tight coil.
Andy whispered toward his father, “I thought she had a sandwich in there.”
Lando leaned closer and whispered, “She still might.”
They both lost their smiles when they caught sight of a solemn, ashen face observing them with elbows still propped out like a wind-damaged scarecrow rooted in a forgotten, overgrown field.
“Sorry,” said Lando. “We were just, you know, kind of—”
With her elbows settling toward her sides, she said, “Yes. Levity. In modest and respectful amounts, it can be tolerated.”
She gave Barkley a stare, then looked up at Abby.
“The canine member of your salvage brigade. How developed are his oratory skills?”
Abby snorted a laugh and said, “Levity. Yeah, good one. Um, not too good for the dog. Except for, you know, barking and stuff.”
“Very well.”
She thrust the spindle of paper toward Andy.
“You will just have to do—until your four-legged companion completes his linguistic studies.”
Andy stared at her and fumbled the document into his hand from hers.
“Do make an attempt not to embellish on what the good Maestro has written. Take notice of your surroundings, young Proctor descendant, and let not any urge to make light of the accomplished gentleman’s words detour you from a clear, direct relaying of the message he intended, I believe, for both of your parents—and by extension, you and this girl and that unsightly and uncivilized beast too.”
“Huh?”
“She means just read the thing, Andy.”
“Okay, Dad.”
Andy gave the dingy room quick looks while clearing his throat quietly, all the while unrolling a paper with a message from a distant relative that he’d never met. It fought to curl itself as he held it out, at eye level, and squinted in the near dark.
“Dearest Abigail Proctor, who visited this archaic tomb of a home only once that I can recall yet brought myriad colors and reminders of life like a bouquet of fresh-cut flowers. Welcome. As you read this, Abigail, recall that—”
Andy stopped, stared up at Priscilla, and said, “Should my mom be—”
“Continue. I exercised my prerogative as executrix and delegated the reading of his litany to a lesser Proctor: you.”
“Huh?”
“Just keep reading, Andy.”
“Okay, Dad.”
He coughed again while scanning to find his place.
“—recall that I once called you, with much affection, Gabby Gail. You, at the tender age of eight at the most, were not amused. I assure you, grown-up Abigail, that I was simply overwhelmed with the life and gleeful chatter that you brought to this dim shelter from nature’s furies.”
Andy looked up at his mother and said, “You were gabby? You chattered?”
“Andy, keep reading. Never mind that.”
Smiling, and getting his back patted by Lando, he said, “Okay, Mom.”
He coughed just once, then found his place on the document.
“But that is all in a past that is relegated to a dire existence replayed only in memories. I composed this simple note to you and Orlando—yes, I do know that you have gotten yourself married—and whatever children might have blessed your lives when my experimentation had progressed to the point of likely cal . . .”
He held it up for his father to see.
“Calamity, Andy. Something bad.”
“Oh, okay.”
He coughed and continued.
“—of likely calamity. It is with great certainty, since the contents of this note is being revealed to you, that some ominous and irreparable calamity has indeed befallen me. Hence, these are the last words you will likely ever know from me.
“I have left to you, Gabbigail—as I sometimes thought of you but never actually said out loud—the entire store of sundry items in my library. You may ask why the library, if you wish.”
Abby laughed softly and said, “Sure. Why the library, Uncle Proctor?”
Andy was grinning when Lando elbowed him, and he looked back at his reading.
“I will tell you,” Andy read, then stared up at his father, who stared back, then at his mother, who also stared back.
“Should I read it just to Mom now?”
“No, Andy, it’s fine. Just keep reading.”
Andy shook his head while finding where he’d left off.
“It is because I know that you, and most likely who you have chosen as your spouse, have hearts that are focused on lifelong learning and betterment of yourselves. That being the truth of which I am certain, it is my wish that you find whatever you seek and deserve with the aid of the humble articles I have left for you.
“Now, heed my words more closely than you have up until this point in my final memorandum. Know that there is a depth to the world around us that is unseen and unknown. Once seen and known, it can be a source of woe or riches. Most likely, though, it is hardship and disaster that will befall anyone that follows in my careful though plodding footsteps.
“So, take my books and other curious items and run along to live normal, safe lives. Remember that what you have in your life today, without venturing into the depths of the world around you, is more valuable than gold.”
Andy and Annabeth were swiveling their heads around, watching their parents stare only into each other’s eyes. Finally, Lando looked down at him and elbowed him.
“Anything else, AB1?”
Andy looked at the paper and read, “Au re—something.”
He held it up for Lando to see.
“Au revoir,” he read. “It’s French.”
The frozen gray figure known as Priscilla regained enough life to say, “The good Maestro Proctor was not French, I can assure you.”
“What does it mean, Mom?”
“Oh, Annabeth, I think it means—”
Priscilla said, “It means that you should hurry to load up whatever of that refuse you—”
“No, it doesn’t,” said Abby. “Honey, it means goodbye but only until we meet again.”
“Regardless of what the late gentleman wrote,” said Priscilla, “and no matter what quaint foreign terminology he employed, we are present in this house, on this day, for reasons both specific and urgent. Now that his maudlin note to the beneficiaries has been read aloud, as he had directed, let us proceed with the fulfillment of what he conveyed with his final words to you.”
“What did she say, Mom?”
“Annabeth, hush for now, Honey.”
Priscilla ended her expressionless stare at the child, then looked toward the closed door to the library. She snapped her elbows up, reached inside the other sleeve, and withdrew what appeared to be a pale piece of ivory or bone.
“This,” she said, holding the irregularly shaped item up for their inspection, “will assist in gaining entry to the, if I may put forth a weak attempt at sarcasm, treasures in that room.”
“Is that a bone? This is way more dramatic than I would have—”
“Please restrain your comments, husband of—Lando, I should say. You are correct, though, in asserting that he had fashioned a key from a bone.”
She stared at each of them for a second, even Barkley.
“We will not discuss what once-living thing contributed the raw material for such a fashioning, shall we?”
“Uh-uh, not me,” said Andy.
“Very well. It was likely unrecognizable, even to the ruler of this noble estate, as it fell from the sky into his grasping hand from a helpful crow in its traversal of the still air above the manor.”
She seemed to glide toward the door without troubling her dress with any reactions, inserted the bone key, and let a heavy clunk echo through the quiet house from a forceful turn of it in the lock.
While looking from face to face, she pushed the door in behind her, cutting a thin squeal through the gloom and silence of the house. Beyond her, a room more alive with light than the rest of the house tempted all of them to tip their heads around, eyes focused on the crowded bookshelves directly across the room.
Priscilla stepped to one side and said, “Recall that there is an imposed limit on the time you have to remove those items that you wish to keep. There are boxes and bags over there,”—she pointed to an orderly pile of them near the grand stairway, a wide and curving construction that beckoned the foolhardy up to absolute blackness—“which you may use as you wish and not be troubled by returning them.”
“Uh, how about if we take a look first?” said Lando. “Maybe none of it is worth taking.”
“That might very well be the case. A point could be made that none of the esteemed gentleman’s possessions spared him from whatever horrible fate befell him.”
“He fell, Mom?”
“Annabeth, it’s just a saying.”
“What horrible fate?” said Lando. “What exactly happened to the guy?”
“It is not at all clear. As I said earlier, there were indications of unfortunate events, but his remains, the tangible bulk of it, have yet to be located.”
“Uh, that’s weird,” said Lando. “So, we just figure he’s dead, then?”
“That is correct. If he had been diligent enough to leave some written record of his experimentation, some aspects of his fate might have been revealed.”
“Like a journal, you mean?” said Abby. “What kinds of experiments?”
“Yes, a journal would have been a valuable record. We do not know the intent or methodology of his experiments. As stated earlier, his neighbors witnessed odd behavior outdoors, in the backyard. That is all I can tell you. Please, make your choices, haul out what you want, and—”
Some part of the mostly gray woman’s body halted her mid-sentence with a tone much like a distant gong.
“Pardon me,” she said and raised a phone up from her pocket, held it to her ear, and didn’t speak.
After a few seconds, with Lando and Abby and the children watching, she nodded and put it away, never having spoken a word.
“I must step outside to make a call to the home office. Please, proceed with your hunting through the departed gentleman’s belongings. Bear in mind the prescribed physical boundaries of that search.”
She spun silently and smoothly and began a soft float toward the house’s front door.
Annabeth pulled on her mother’s arm and said, “Mom, is she the ghost?”
Andy snickered and said, “She’s just one of them. This place is probably full of them.”
“You two,” said Abby. “There are no ghosts here. Maybe not anywhere. Come on. Let’s go shopping.”
“That’s funny, Abby,” said Lando. “I’ll grab the boxes and bags if there’s anything we actually want.”
“Okay, Lannie. Maybe none of it, huh?”
“Yeah, probably.”
Abby turned and led the way with an eight-year-old girl’s hand in hers. Andy followed, a dog leash in his hand, and Lando was the last to enter the library of the departed ruler of the estate.