Dead of Night

 

The evening sun hung low over the old cemetery, casting long shadows that draped over plots and headstones. Old monuments stood statuesque in the fading orange light, feigning grandeur like aging actors on an empty stage. A gentle breeze blew over the graves, winding its way between the gravestones like ethereal tidewaters, cresting ever so lightly against the graying farmhouse that stood naked on the hilltop, with only an iron fence between it and the echoes of distant mourning that sometimes carried on the wind.

Standing stark against the cemetery grounds the caretaker’s house was neglected and worn. Shadows from the coming night had begun to crawl across its face like silent stalkers encroaching on the day, emboldened by the waning sun.

The screen door slammed against the side of the house, breaking the dead silence.

“Robert?” the caretaker’s wife yelled, her hands on her hips and her voice stern.

“What?” the caretaker yelled back as he walked toward the house, weeds still in his hand that he had pulled from around a headstone.

“I thought you took care of those rats in the cellar,” she snapped.

“I put out traps,” he hollered to his wife of 42 years, “what more do you want?”

“I want ‘em gone!” she hollered back, screwing up her face. “I can still her ‘em scratchin’ in the walls!”

“Damnit, Marry!” he said under his breath, throwing the weeds to the ground and quickening his pace. “Why the hell can’t you set the damn traps yerself?” He kept his head down as he walked, growing more annoyed the closer he drew to the house.

“I’m wastin’ daylight,” he told Marry as he passed her.

“Weeds ain’t goin’ nowhere, Robert,” she answered. “They’ll still be there tomorrow.”

As soon as Robert stepped through the door he wished that he were back outside in the fresh air, for even with the windows open the house was stuffy and warm, filled with the smell of the cabbage cooking on the stove. Walking quickly through the kitchen he grabbed the flashlight from its cradle on the wall and stood at the top of the cellar stairs, staring down into the pitch, and listened. The sound was unmistakable, from within the black he could hear the scratching, the clawing, the scrapping against the mortar, and it made his skin crawl.

Stabbing through the darkness of the cellar the beam from the flashlight revealed nothing but the dirt floor and the faded whitewash on the stone wall. The stairs creaked little as Robert descended into the shadows of the basement beneath the old house, as he stepped down into the depth of the darkness staved only by the light that he held in his hand. Reaching above his head he turned on the light, shattering the darkness into shards of shadow that scurried into the corners of the cellar where they swayed in time with the bulb that swung like a pendulum from the ceiling.

To is right the scratching continued, within the wall facing the cemetery. He approached the stone wall that stood between him and the graves beyond, and placed his hand against its cold face, and felt the scratching behind it.

“Robert”, the old man jumped at the sudden sound of his wife’s voice, “come eat!” she called down to him from the top of the stairs. The old man backed away from the basement wall, and the sound behind it, but could not escape the chill that had washed over him.

 

Robert sat bolt upright in bed, his wife still sleeping beside him. A noise had wakened him, startled him from his sleep, but the house was silent. The pounding of his own heart was all the old man could hear. Moonlight spilled into the room and he could see that nothing was amiss. Mary’s favorite china doll sat in its usual spot on her dresser staring eerily at him, as if wondering why he was awake at such an hour. Its eyes were hidden by shadow, but Robert could almost feel its eyes on him. Mary prized the antique doll, but he wished she’d get rid of the creepy thing. He sat for a moment longer, listening to the dead silence, then slipped quietly out of bed.  

The cold steps made him wish that he had grabbed his slippers as he made his way silently to the first floor through the cool shadows of night, listening for the sounds of an intruder, but there was no noise to be heard.

Seeing the flashlight on the wall made him think of the cellar, and the preserves that he was now sure the rats must have gotten into. Grabbing the light from its cradle he started down the bare wooden steps leading to the earthen room under the house. He was near the bottom before he switched the flashlight on, and stopped cold for in its beam he could see that the floor was cluttered with stone.

“Jesus Christ,” Robert gasped as he took the last few steps to the bottom. He reached up and pulled the string to the bulb overhead, but was denied light, the empty click gave him pause as a chill ran through him.

Quickly searching the darkness around him with the light that he held in his hand, again fearing an intruder, he found the hole in the wall from which the rubble had spilled, it was just large enough for a man to squeeze through.

“Jesus,” Robert said again as he turned back toward the stairs, turned to flee this intrusion into his home, turned to find safety out of the darkness of the cellar, but was held fast by dead eyes that froze him where he stood. His heart pounded in his chest as his flashlight dropped from his hand, and the smell of rot and the flashing of impossible teeth were the last things the old caretaker would ever know.