“Why didn’t you say so?” Eustace dropped low and started pulling books off the shelf.
“What are you doing?” Cordelia asked.
“Helping.”
Together, they worked their way along the length of the back wall until every book and object had been pulled from the oiled wood and laid or piled along the chairs and floor. When there was nothing remaining, Eustace stepped back.
“I haven’t come across anything more exciting than a stack of letters from someone named Hyacinth to her mother back in Virginia,” Eustace told her.
“Letters?” Cordelia echoed, blowing a strand of hair out of her face.
“Don’t get excited,” her sister said. “There’s a lot in there about bridge, the weather, and the care and keeping of chickens. Apparently, you have to up their protein intake in the winter while they molt. Or some such thing.”
Frustrated, Cordelia ran a hand through her hair. They’d been all over this room, and while the things they’d found were intriguing, they did not amount to much. What were they missing? Running her fingers along the empty shelves, she ended at the corner where her aunt had been. “She was right here. And then she was gone.”
“She disappeared from that corner?” Eustace asked to be certain.
“Yes.” Cordelia faced the shelves. “She just kind of dove into them.” She made a motion toward the wood, and something nebulous caught her ear. Cordelia leaned in, trying to track the whisper.
“What are you doing?” Eustace asked.
She raised a finger to her lips and pressed her face between two shelves. “It’s behind here,” she said. “I can hear it.” Running her hands over the grain, straining, she noticed a small, dark gap between the leg molding and the base molding where one shelf met the next.
Cordelia stood back and surveyed the line of shelves. All the other moldings were flush with their counterparts. But something at the far-right corner was ever so slightly off. “Do you see this?” she asked Eustace.
She dropped to the floor and put her face next to the seam. She could feel a drafty tickle against her cheek, in the distance, a muffled sifting of air, like speech.Whispers.Her head eased, the pill kicking in sooner than anticipated.
“Help me,” she said, jumping up. “Something’s back here!”
Cordelia gripped the carefully trimmed molding that capped the leg between shelves. Eustace stood beside her and together they pulled. As they did, the shelf began to groan, sliding open along a hinge hidden on the other side.
When they’d opened it as wide as it would go, both sisters stood back and stared into the blackness that waited.
“This is straight out of Scooby-Doo,” Eustace said as Cordelia shone the light from her phone into the forgotten staircase.
It was extremely narrow, so that they would only be able to descend one at a time. The interior walls were exposed brick with crumbly mortar and streaks of dust-laden cobwebs. Overhead, a single light clung to the back wall, unused, its metal shade covered by a layer of grime so thick you could barely see the green paint it once bore.
“Hello?” Cordelia called into the dark.
The sound of a rock skittering across the floor echoed back. “Probably just a rat,” she said over her shoulder.
“What do you think is down there?” Eustace asked.
“The basement,” Cordelia told her. “Obviously.”
“Then why hide it behind a false door?” Eustace asked. “Isn’t it basically just cold storage? Do turnips and potatoes really need to be so carefully guarded?”
“Maybe it wasn’t turnips and potatoes they were storing,” she said with a gulp.
“Are you going down there?” Eustace asked.
“Of course.” Cordelia bristled. “And so are you. This is what Aunt Augusta was trying to show me last night.” She snatched her sister’s hand in hers and descended the first step.
“You realize this is the point in the movie where someone starts yelling at the screen for the stupid girls not to go down the stairs or they’ll die?” Eustace pointed out.
Cordelia ignored her. “We’re not girls anymore, Eustace.”
With each step, a little more of the stairway came into view, until they could finally see the bottom. While the basement was roughshod to be sure, there was a stone floor in place, and the walls appeared sturdy enough. Cordelia shone her phone flashlight on a maze of piping, beams, and walls that gave the space an uncomfortable, ambling feel, with too many corners for things to lurk around. She could see some old canvas tarps,rope, crowbars, and garden tools—shovels and spades so antiquated they appeared to be fashioned entirely from wood.
