of the wooden mantelpiece, which, mercifully, still showed the carving of the prairie. He glanced over, finding a new crack running up from the ground to about door height, where it zipped to the side in another straight line. If he hadn’t been in full possession of his mental faculties, he would have said it looked an awful lot like a door. A secret door, into some sort of bluish glowing area inside the wall.
“Do you see? The house is old. It’s falling apart.” He pulled his gaze away lest it open a little more. A crack he could handle. A door opening by itself he could not.
A pitter-patter thumped across the ceiling, like a toddler running on the floor above.
He and Martha both looked up.
“I sure hope that’s not a rat,” Martha said.
“That would be an awfully big rat.”
“Remember that movie with those large rats? This house might have something like that, only those rats existed in swamps.”
Sometimes he had no idea what his wife was talking about, but he’d learned early on in their marriage that it was best just to agree.
“Uh-huh,” he said, directing his gaze back to the TV.
She stood as the thumping sounded a second time, the pitter-patter moving back the other way.
“I hope she’s not hiding a child somewhere in this house,” Martha said, walking to the newly formed crack in the wall and shoving at it. It clicked shut, like a door latching.
There shouldn’t be a door in the wall that randomly opened by itself. Especially not one that glowed an eerie blue. There had to be another explanation.
He snuck a glance at the fireplace. Prairie. Clearly he’d imagined the different scene or noticed it elsewhere in the house—that was the only explanation.
“If this place is falling apart, it’ll be expensive to fix.” Martha looked up and down the wall. The crack was completely gone, the wall flush. If Martha hadn’t seen it as well, he would’ve thought he was seeing things. She couldn’t put him in a home if she was seeing the same things. Still, he’d best ignore it, just in case.
“She’s a grown woman, Martha. She knows what she’s doing,” he said, turning up the volume.
“Well.” Out of the corner of his eye, he could see her put her hands on her hips. She was getting stubborn. “I’m going to do some dusting. Surely a butler up in his years takes ages to get around to everything. Since he won’t let me braise the roast, at least I can find another way to be of help.”
“‘Don’t call me Shirley,’” he said out of reflex, quoting the movie Airplane!
The pitter-patter sounded for the third time.
“And I will check out whatever that is. God, I hope she isn’t hiding some sort of love child,” she muttered, heading out. “We haven’t seen her for a while. Maybe she adopted. Lord only knows what she’s gotten up to. Starting a new life might’ve addled her brain, poor dear…”
Her voice trailed off, so Pete didn’t hear where her train of thought led her, but he suspected it would somehow end where it always did—with Martha wondering if all his marbles were still rolling around in his head.
He chanced a glance at that mantel, just for grins.
An utterly flat piece of wood waited for him, no carvings or designs or anything, except for a woman in the center, staring at him.
“O-kay.” He flicked off the TV, placed the remote on the little table next to his chair, and stood. Time to get some air. He’d check out the garden first, and deal with the rat infestation later. There would be no re-homing him, thank you very much. He just had to get a grip on reality and then he’d be all set. No better place than a garden to clear his head and regroup. There was very little in a garden that had ever been able to shock him.
Seven
I touched down, out of breath, having flown to and from the mountain where the basajaun lived. Unfortunately, it was a large mountain, and we hadn’t been able to find him quickly enough. With dinner fast approaching, we’d decided to head home and look for him later.
Changing from my gargoyle form to my human form was a breeze now. It was slightly more difficult to pretend it was natural and comfortable to walk around nude within a group.
I tried to keep from covering myself as Ulric changed into his human form and reached into the sack of clothes