Keeper: Chapter 40

40.


Jamie shrugged into a light jacket and waved to Del as he headed towards the door leading to the basement. As he turned the door knob Jamie frowned. For nearly all of his child hood he had spent summers at Albe’s. When the weather was bad he would explore the house, sometimes with Albe sometimes without. Before Albe’s death he would have sworn he had covered every inch of the house in his searching. Now he had found there was at least one entire floor he had never investigated and with a start he realized that he had never been in the basement. Jamie let his hand fall away from the door knob as he thought. He couldn’t remember Albe ever telling him not to go into the basement. He could remember seeing the door when he was a child but he could never remember opening it. Considering how many of the doors he opened without thinking he found it odd that he had never even peered inside.



“House,” Jamie said.



“Yes Keeper.”



“Is there anything special about the basement?”



“I am the House of the Keeper of the Crossroads. All of my rooms are special.” House replied sounding a little bit offended.



“Of course,” Jamie said quickly. “I merely meant is there a reason that someone other than the Keeper wouldn’t be able to go into the basement? Like the hidden floor upstairs.”



“No Keeper.” Jamie thought for a moment, trying to figure out a way to phrase his question in a way that the House would actually understand him. He thought of how he would ask the question of a very small and less than intuitive child.



“Is there anything that makes the basement different from the rest of the house?”

“It was part of the House before me.”



“How does that make it different?”



“It is not the House of the Keeper. It was the House of the Keeper.”



“You mean it was the House of the Keeper but it isn’t any more?” Jamie asked speaking slowly, trying to not only understand what House was saying but to ask in ways it would understand.



“No Keeper. It was the House of the Keeper. It can not cease to be the House of the Keeper. And I am the House of the Keeper.” Jamie stared at the basement door as if memorizing the grain of the wood as he tried to work through what he was being told.



“So once a House is the House of the Keeper it is always the House of the Keeper?”



“Yes Keeper.” House seemed pleased as though he were a slow student who had finally managed to realize that not only did two plus one equal three, but one plus two also equaled three. Jamie realized that he was thinking of House as still a building, a sentient and somewhat intelligent building but a building nonetheless.



“Perhaps I should think of it as a living organism,” Jamie thought. “In that case the previous house and this house are two separate and distinct beings with separate lives and personalities...”



“House,” Jamie said aloud. “Can the basement speak to me the way you can?”



“No Keeper,” House said. “It was the House of the Keeper. I am the House of the Keeper.”



“So you said,” Jamie mused. “So there is no way to communicate. All right then.” Jamie reached for the doorknob and turned it, pulling the door open smoothly. “I suppose if Albe didn’t have a problem then it can’t be all bad.”



“Keeper Albrect didn’t have a problem with the basement,” House told him. “It was Keeper Alexander who had a problem with the basement.” Jamie paused on the top step of the basement staircase.



“The Alexander who watched you being built over the ruins of the older house?” Jamie asked.



“Yes,” House clarified.



“What sort of problems did he have?”



“He had nightmares.”



“What sort of nightmares?”



“I do not know Keeper, he did not tell me.” House sounded put out by the fact as though it felt that since the nightmares occurred within its confines it should have access to them.



“Nic to know there are some limitations,” he muttered. Jamie stared down the dark stairwell, suddenly not so certain he wanted to tour the basement. “There is the possibility that he wrote about his nightmares in his journals and I do have those upstairs.” Jamie thought about going back to the hidden floor and spending the rest of the day searching Alexander’s journals. It seemed like a safe and fairly rational idea. It still made him feel like a coward. Jamie tapped the edge of the doorframe with his hand. He really didn’t need his dreams to be any wierder.



“But Del said the basement wasn’t that large,” Jamie told himself. “I could do a quick tour and then go look at the journals. Dusty tomes and potential nightmares combined.” He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Right then, down we go.” Jamie started down the basement steps. He had descended less than three stairs before needing to switch on the flashlight he carried. The rectangle of light showing from the open doorway seemed to dim quicker than he thought it would. “But it could just be my paranoia talking.”



It was not a long flight of stairs and when Jamie reached the stone floor he was pleased to realize the ceiling was high enough that he did not have to stoop as he walked. As both Burr and Del reached only shoulder high on him, it had been a concern.



“No spiders, cobwebs or dust,” Jamie said as he turned, shining the light around the room. “I wonder if Del cleaned it?” Somehow he didn’t think he had. While Jamie could easily see Del finding his way into a dusty room and not leaving until it was dust free, the basement didn’t have the just cleaned feel to it. Jamie couldn’t exactly say why he felt this way, just that he did. For the moment he put the thought aside.



“I can always ask Del later,” he thought. The same instinct that told him the basement had not needed to be cleaned was also telling him not to speak aloud. He decided to trust the instinct and continued to scan the basement in silence. The floor and walls were composed of stone. He could see where the stones from the old house and the new house met. The older house had been composed of a light gray granite that still showed flecks of silver Jamie identified as mica. The blocks were large and cut square with no mortar to hold them together. In many places they were smoke stained. The mica winked from the blacked granite like stars trapped in the night sky. The newer house was also composed of stone. The blocks were a great deal smaller, measuring an average of the length of his forearm rather than the height of his body as the older stones did. There was some variation in the stones as well as though they had been composed of locally gathered river stones rather than the quarried stones of the first house. In addition they were held together by mortar, the white lines gleamed between the stones and shone bright in the light of Jamie’s flashlight.



The room was a large open square and Jamie could see all of it from where he stood. The only feature in the room was the remains of an old fireplace built into the far wall. It looked like someone had taken a giant ice cream scoop and taken a heaping helping of one of the stones. The surround looked to be all of one piece. There was a rectangle shaped piece of stone above the scooped out fireplace that looked as though it had once been a mantle but had been snapped off. Part of the former mantle gleamed bright gray while half was smoke stained.



“Maybe half was damaged before the fire gout out of control and the other half crumbled when the fire finally stopped.” Part of him wanted to run his hands along the roughly broken stone but for some reason that sounded like a really bad idea. With a start Jamie realized he had taken two steps towards the mantle and had extended his hand. Jamie balled his hands into fists and lowered them to his sides. He felt a weight surround him, pressing in on him as if he were swimming deep under water.



“I think it’s time to hit the books,” He decided. Jamie turned back to the stairs and began to climb back towards the rectangle of light. He climbed two stairs and felt his steps slow as if the air around him had suddenly thickened and he couldn’t move quickly through it. He stopped and half turned back before he caught himself. Jamie grimaced and turned back towards the open door. He took another step. The pressure increased around him. He grit his teeth to keep from exclaiming aloud and forced himself to take another step. Sweat popped out on his forehead and began to run down his hairline making him shiver. He forced himself to take another step. His heart was racing with fear and he was pretty sure the adrenaline rush brought on by the terror of being trapped in the basement helped him force his way up the staircase. The pressure around him did not feel malevolent but it did feel persistent. With a final heave of effort Jamie pushed his way to the top and stepped out onto the main floor. Jamie turned to just the door to the basement and what felt like a wave of disappointment flutter around him. Jamie frowned and closed the door to the basement. He swallowed hard a couple of times as though popping his ears after a long swim.

“Next time I think I’ll start with the books.”