[So prayers are always appreciated. And enthusiasm. I'm planning this as the first book of three, or so. Yes, I am finally summoning the courage to plan a trilogy/quartet/heptuplet, even before I know if any publisher wants the thing. I want to write it. That's enough. So there.
[Enjoy. And if I accidentally type 'Perry' instead of 'Michael,' please forgive me. And then point it out with a minimum of laughter.]
"You don't have to do this, Michael," said his mother. "Just because Great-Grandfather left the place to you, doesn't mean you have to take it over right NOW."
"I'm already here, Mom," said Michael, talking into his cell phone.
"Yes, but you can come back. If they could afford to have a taxi take you all the way there from the airport, they can afford to send you right back."
"Let it go, Mary," said Michael's dad, also in on the phonecall. "He'll be fine. He's fifteen, they have staff there to take care of everything, and it's no more dangerous than summer camp. Actually, considering my experiences at camp, I'd say Michael is much better off at a posh manor than he is in the middle of a nest of rabbid teenagers."
"And," said Michael, "I'm already here. I'll be fine, Mom."
"You don't sound entirely certain," said his mom. "Are you certain? Absolutely certain?"
Michael firmed up his voice. "I'm certain. I've got to go, Mom. The butler wants to show me to my room."
"Of course," she said. "I don't mean to worry, but you know that I will, so you'll call regularly? And email? Text message?"
"I'll even post my status online as 'just fine.' I've got to go, Mom."
"Have fun, Mike," said his dad. "Honestly, I'm a little jealous. I never got to see Granddad's manor, so I hope you'll let us come visit soon."
"Of course, Dad. Just not right now. I want to get to know everyone first."
"No problem. Call us when you're settled, Mike."
"Yes, call," said his mom.
"Love you," said Michael, and he hung up. He looked at the metal plaque, cemented to the stone pillar next to the gate: Daimon Home. It was surrounded by ivy, barely visible. The gate to the manor's drive was rusted and bent, the road overgrown with any number of large and ominous trees. They were the sort of trees that looked down on you menacingly, much like high schoolers had looked down at Michael for years, ever since he started high school at age twelve. You're an oddity, said the trees, but we won't crush you. Yet. That was the kind of trees they were.
Yes, Michael had lied to his mother, and he still wasn't sure why. There was no butler--at least not so far--no room, not even a manor house, as far as Michael could see. There was a wall, a rusted gate, ivy, and trees with attitude.
And a name on the wall. Daimon Home.
Michael reached out, hesitated, then shoved on the middle of the gate. With a brief squeek, the two haves swung inward and open, pushing back overgrown underbrush with their metal teeth. The road between the trees was covered in white gravel, but it was all dark under the shadow of leaves.
"Wow," said Michael, to himself. "I wanted an adventure. So far, the gate is living up to expectations."
He adjusted his backpack on his shoulders, grabbed the handle of his rolling suitcase, and waked through the gate to Daimon Home.
Pulling a suitcase over gravel was no longer on Michael's list of favorite activities. Actually, it had never occurred to Michael to MAKE a list of favorite activities, but if he had, and if, at one point he had included 'pulling a suitcase over gravel' on that list, it would definitely have been off that list after three minutes of walking along the manor's drive.
The drive seemed never ending. It was trees, trees, and trees, still looking down at him as if he were insignificant, with--as far as he could see--more trees behind the other trees, all of them waiting for a chance to watch him struggle along with his suitcase. The attorney had said he wouldn't need books, but Michael couldn't help it. He had to bring at least ten, just for emergencies. Couldn't trust the manor library to have all the books he was reading.
But now, lifting his suitcase up to carry it three inches above the treacherous gravel, Michael was regretting bringing the COMPLETE works of Shakespeare. Just bringing King Lear to read for school would have been enough, and besides, surely a 'manor' would have Shakespeare inside SOMEWHERE. It was probably a rule laid down by the International Association for Places Called 'Manors.'
It would have been easier if he were taller, but Michael wasn't going there. It was bad enough being younger than everyone in high school, but he had to add to that being shorter than everyone. Even at fifteen he still had to look UP to see the five foot mark on the doctor's office wall. He didn't have to look up MUCH, but still, up is up, and he had to look it. Short. Why didn't they make suitcases shorter? Or give them off-road suspension. Stupid gravel.
Michael was so preoccupied with his suitcase that it took him a few steps to realize that he was out of the trees. All around him was grass. It looked as if it had been carefully kept grass once, like the fields you see in magazines about rich people's houses. Michael looked around and, sure enough, scattered across the massive--MASSIVE--lawn were strategically placed trees, spreading out their low, immense branches to create canopies of shade. There was even a peacock on one of the branches, its feathers drooping toward the ground. Then it pooped.
"Nice," said Michael. "What else have we got?"
He looked around at the rest of the yard. Yard? It wasn't a yard. It was a park, or maybe a small wilderness area. The manor grounds were stretched across a shallow bowl--a very LARGE shallow bowl--with trees and grass and over there was a garden of some sort, and maybe a hedge maze, though the hedges looked in need of serious attention, and even a small lake toward what Michael guessed was the south. A stream cut into the bowl on the far side from Michael and made its way past the manor to the lake, then out again in some kind of ravine. It was all overgrown and...ratty. Tattered, like someone had simply forgotten to care for the place.
The place. Michael's eyes went back to the manor house, and his brain finally caught up with what he was seeing. If the manor grounds were miles across--and they looked it--then that meant that the house in the middle was HUGE. Massive. Immense. Ponderously large. Leviathan-like in its proportions. Big.
"Wow," said Michael. "Thanks, Great-Grandpa. I think."
It was another half-hour before Michael was close enough to get a really good look at the manor house. Even as overgrown as the lawn was, he discovered it was easier to pull his suitcase through the grass than over the gravel. He still took a good, long break when he reached what he guessed was the half-way point. He made quick work of his two sandwiches and all of his water, hoping that more food wasn't far off. He couldn't tell, though, if anyone were actually at the manor. No cars, no movement, nothing. No gardeners at work that he could see, not that he expected that from how the grounds looked. The whole place seemed empty, the way a school was empty during the summer. Nothing going on, and no one around to care if there was.
Sitting on his suitcase, Michael felt a twinge of aprehension. What if there really were nobody there? He pulled out his cell phone to double check and was reassured by the four bars of signal. Worst comes to worst, he could call 911 and have cops pull him out of there. Or at least he could order pizza. He looked down in his backpack, and yes, he'd remembered to grab the flier from the pizza place back in town. He hoped they'd come all the way out here, at least if he promised a heavy tip and not to hold them to their thirty-minute delivery promise.
Pizza. Actually, the thought made his stomach churn, even full with sandwiches. What was he doing here?
Finally he stood up, stuffed his garbage and water bottle into his backpack, and heaved it all back onto his shoulders. With a resentful glare he muscled his suitcase back onto its wheels and faced the manor house.
"Onward," he said.
"Jane Austen," said Michael to himself. "That's where I've seen a place like this. Jane Austen movies." He figured it hadn't occurred to him, because he'd never expected to see a manor house from the English countryside in the middle of Wisconsin
Up close, the building looked even shabbier than from a distance. The plaster-facing on the walls was cracked and faded--unless it was supposed to be that color--and the gargoyles on the roof looked more droopy than fierce (though it was pretty cool that there were gargoyles at all). Some of the windows were cracked, one was even boarded up, but they were all dirty. All of them. All seven-million of them.
All right, seven-million was probably an exaggeration, but Michael was starting to feel intimidated. The closer he got to the front doors, the more the manor house seemed to stretch out to either side of him. Exactly how rich had his great-grandfather been? Also...how much of that had Michael inherited? He hoped it was enough to keep this place running, though from the looks of things, it probably wouldn't be.
Michael still wasn't sure why his great-grandfather had picked HIM. It's all yours, the lawyer had said. The manor house, the grounds, and the operating budget to keep the place running. You just have to visit this summer to finalize ownership.
"But why does he have to go alone?" his mother had asked. Several times. And then several more.
The lawyer had just shrugged, his eyes like hot coals. "It's in the will, madam." He was a senior partner from the law firm of Umbrage, Drought, Canker, and Crass, PLC. Michael had thought it was a pretty cool name at the time. Now, looking at the dingy (but large) front doors, Michael thought the name seemed rather...ominous. Who picks a law firm that sounds like a disaster? His great-grandfather, apparently.
"Do I knock on my own front door, or do I just go in?" What finally decided it was the knocker: a twisted, wrought-iron face, with an iron ring trapped under the top teeth and designed to swing down and strike the long, really long, really really long tongue. It was too cool to pass up. Michael reached up to grab the ring, cursed that everything in the world was designed for tall people, and gave it a swing.
HE COMES, boomed the knocker. Michael stepped back, startled. No, the knocker hadn't said anything. It was just a big boom from metal on a large door. No words at all. That was it. But to make sure, he stepped forward, lifted up the ring of the knocker, and let it go.
HE COMES, it boomed again. It wasn't words--it really was just an big knock on a big door--but at the same time it WAS words. He comes. It echoed through the house and back across the grounds, bouncing through the valley. He comes.
"That was weird," said Michael.
And the door opened.
The small door, that is. A small door that was built into the middle of the left half of the larger doors. Michael waited expectantly. He waited more, and he waited even more expectantly.
Nothing happened.
"Hello?" he called.
No answer.
"I'm Michael Arches."
Even more of no answer.
"I think...I'm supposed to own this place."
Even less answer than before.
"Huh," said Michael.
"Why me?" he'd asked the attorney. "Why did Great-Grandfather leave it all to me?"
"I assumed you would know," said Mr. Canker. "If not, I don't know if I can help you."
"Attorney-client privilege?" asked my father.
Mr. Canker cocked one eyebrow. "There's simply nothing about it in the will. I suppose I might be able to speculate, but I hardly knew the old Master Arches."
"That's more than I knew him," said Dad. "Why not speculate just a little."
The attorney had smiled. It wasn't an evil smile, but it wasn't exactly a nice smile, either. It was a wild smile, like you might expect to see from a tiger that was still making up its mind about whether you'd be tasty or not.
"I expect there is something for the young Master Arches to do," he said.
Michael pushed the door open even further, and the first thing he noticed was the dust. Dust and dark and a bit more dust with a side helping of dust. What light made it through the door and into the manor house seemed to be eaten up by all the dust until he could hardly see five feet inside. A breeze blew up behind him and into the house, stirring up some of the dust. There was a lot of dust.
Why had his great-grandfather let the place go so much? He'd only died last month. Surely the staff would take care of the place better than this--assuming there was a staff. Mr. Canker had said there would be, and he didn't seem like the sort of person who would lie. Chew you up and spit out the bones, sure, but lie? Why would he bother? Tigers don't have to lie to their dinner.
Michael left his suitcase outside the door and stepped in, leaving a large crater in the dust like Neil Armstrong stepping onto the surface of the moon. Or was it Buzz Aldrin? He'd double-check it on his laptop, assuming the place had internet. Assuming it had electricity.
Michael blinked, letting his eyes adjust to the darkness. "Hello?" he called again, hoping his 'hello' just hadn't taken the first time. Apparently the second 'hello' didn't take either, because there was no answer.
He peered into the darkness and started to make out the dimensions of the room he was in. Actually, it was more of a hall than a room. A tall, wide, loooooong hall. Some light creeped into the room through the smudged windows, hesitant light, as if it weren't sure it really belonged. Seemed there were chairs along the walls, spaced out between large, rectangular frames that probably held paintings, though the light coming into the room wasn't brave enough to really show much of anything. The rest of the room beyond the first thirty feet was lost to mystery.
And a bit of dread. Michael shifted his feet. He didn't feel comfortable. He felt distinctly NOT comfortable. He drummed his fingers against the side of his legs. He looked back outside, and the door showed no sign of closing behind him with an ominous bang, so he looked back at the hall. The hall felt like a haunted house he'd visited last October, but not like it at all. Nothing frightening or gross or shaped like a pumpkin in this hall, but it had the same sense of waiting for something really creepy to happen. No, the hall was worse, because at the haunted house he'd been sure that everything was fake.
Here, standing alone in the hall, Michael wasn't so sure.
"Maybe there's another entrance," he said.
Michael walked along the manor house to the north. There was a path around the building that, thankfully, was lined with paving stones instead of that darn gravel. Sure, the wheels on his suitcase caught in the cracks at first, but it wasn't too long before he got the hang of it and could walk almost normally.
The path was lined with decorative things. Shrubs, flowers gone wild, low hedges. Even potted plants cut into strange shapes. That one looked a bit like a small man with his hands on fire. And that one looked like a man with his face falling off. And that other one looked like a cloud.
Michael checked his cell phone again. He was still getting reception, which was a relief. The emptiness of the whole place was starting to crawl up the back of his neck and make his hair stand on end. He could always call home. Flee. Go back. It's not like he NEEDED his own manor--though the idea was really, really cool. But it probably came with all sorts of responsibility to go along with anything that would be fun about it. There would probably be social responsibilities, too, like people expecting him to throw parties or have balls or something. Did people still have balls? Michael tried to imagine himself in a tuxedo, but in his head the tux kept coming out oversized and he kept coming out undersized, a small boy drowning in his daddy's suit. Besides, he didn't know how to tie a bowtie.
He finally made it to the corner of the building, turned to start walking again, and stopped. Part way down the north face of the house, the windows were clean. Clear glass. Happy glass. The plaster still needed repair, but who was Michael to argue with clean windows? Clean windows meant someone was there, and that was a good thing. Now to find a door.
Mr. Canker had looked down at his notes. "The will states that the old Master Arches has left information for the young Master Arches in the study in the North Wing."
"Wow," said Dad. "More than one wing."
"Apparently the building is constructed as a large square," said the lawyer, "with each face of the building referred to by its cardinal direction. Master Arches seemed to favor the North Wing for his personal habitation. Or so my notes tell me."
"How many rooms does it have?" asked Mom.
"I believe it varies," answered Mr. Canker.
"Always a new remodeling project, I suppose," said Dad. "Inscrutable are the ways of the rich and famous. Speaking of which, Mike doesn't get access to all the money right away, does he?"
"No, Mr. Arches. The young Master Arches will have a living allowance, but the majority of the funds will only be available when he reaches the age of eighteen. The staff is able to draw on operating expenses as needed."
"Good," said Mom. "Too much money can ruin a person. You know that, Michael?"
"We don't even know how much it is, Mom."
"True," said Dad. "How much is he inheriting, Mr. Canker?"
"I'm afraid I can't say," answered the lawyer.
"You don't know, or you can't say?"
"I'm afraid I can't say."
Michael found a normal sized door at the north-east corner of the manor house. It looked worn, but clean. Well-used and comfortable, almost the complete opposite of the imposing and abandoned doors to the immense hall. There were small, potted trees to either side and a happy sort of stained-glass window to the side. While the main entrance had felt forbidding, this door felt welcoming. Michael was knocking on the door almost before he realized it.
The door opened.
"Again?" said Michael. There was no one there.
"I'm sorry," said a voice from around Michael's knees. "Again what?"
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ReplyDeleteYou can't end like that! It's just mean!
I am really digging this story, Drew. I can't remember all what I read of it before ... the little bits you messaged to me ... but I am excited to see where they fit in. 8o|
No one could suppose that this first chapter is a stand-alone story. A novel MUST follow.
ReplyDelete