The House of Dies Drear (3 page)

Thomas was interrupted by Mrs. Small awaking and stretching. “Where are we now?” she asked.

“Getting closer,” Mr. Small said. “Outside of Bluefield.”

“You mean Bluefield, West Virginia?” Thomas asked. “How many more hours until we reach the Ohio River?”

“Just be patient,” Mr. Small told him. “You’ll see the Ohio River in about three hours if we don’t stop too long.”

In Bluefield they stopped twenty-five minutes for lunch. Once they were on their way again, Thomas leaned forward to talk to his father.

“We were going to talk about Mr. Pluto,” he said.

“Now, Thomas, he’s told you enough about him,” said his mother.

Mrs. Small didn’t like hearing about Mr. Pluto. No matter how often Thomas and his father kidded her, she really didn’t like hearing about anything that had to do with the house of Dies Drear.

She won’t like it, Thomas thought. She hasn’t seen it, but she doesn’t like it at all.

“I want to be sure I know what Mr. Pluto looks like before I run into him,” Thomas said. He had tried making up a picture of Mr. Pluto from what his father had told him. But that was hard; never had Thomas heard about anyone quite like Pluto.

Thomas’ shoulders jerked nervously; he cocked his head to one side as he did always when he was about to listen hard. “Please, Papa,” he said, “tell about him.”

Mr. Small sighed. “I might as well,” he said. “We still have a long ride ahead of us.”

Mr. Small started talking and Thomas listened, letting his long arms dangle over the front seat.

“As I’ve told you, he’s the caretaker of the new house,” Mr. Small said. “Pluto isn’t his real name, but another name for Hades, the Lord of the Underworld. Well, Hades had cloven hooves.”

“I know that,” Thomas said.

“Mr. Pluto has been lame in one leg for as long as anyone can remember,” Mr. Small said. “I have no idea how old he is. Neither does the foundation, which hired him years ago. He’s spry, although that isn’t quite the right word to describe the way he gets around. He’s a big man, with white hair and a beard. I believe he has the most piercing green eyes I’ve ever seen. With that beard and hair and those eyes, it’s no wonder he’s known as Pluto. Otherwise,” Mr. Small added, “he’s harmless enough, and takes fine care of the place.”

“The dream!” shouted Thomas. “It was him!”

“Thomas, please!” said Mrs. Small, holding her ears.

The twins began yelling, too, and Thomas had to hold them for a moment before they calmed down.

“I had this dream,” Thomas told his mother and father. “Mr. Pluto was in it, but I didn’t know it was him until just now!”

“Pluto knows many of the secret recesses of the house,” his father was saying to Mrs. Small. “He was kind enough to show them to me. I’m glad we’re keeping him on as caretaker—Thomas, I want you to be nice to him, no funny business. He’s an old man with quiet ways about him. You could even say he’s a bit secretive and strange. He rides around in a two-wheeled buggy drawn by two horses, one bay and one roan. He has a black, too, that he switches off with the other two. He’s lived all alone on that property for such a long time, I’m sure he wouldn’t know what to do without it.”

“Does he live in our new house?” Thomas asked.

“No,” said Mr. Small. “No, he lives on the other side of the hill from us. You’ll be surprised by his house and the way he lives.” He was about to say more, but seemed to change his mind.

“I’ll warn you though,” he said. “Pluto walks as agile as a cat. He came upon me while I was in the cellar. I hadn’t heard him or seen him coming, and I nearly jumped out of my skin.”

“Does he really look like the devil?” Thomas asked.

“Oh, anyone can startle you in a house as old as that,” said Mr. Small. “I don’t think there’s a straight angle in the whole place. All the ceilings are amazingly high. But Pluto’s no devil. He did try to convince me not to live in that house. He was serious about it, too. He knows the legend, and I’m sure by now he believes it.”

“Are there a lot of old people?” asked Thomas. “I mean in the town—old ones who remember everything and talk a lot, like Great-grandmother always did?”

Mr. Small was silent a moment. “You are going to miss her, aren’t you?” he said.

“Yes,” said Thomas, “I guess I will miss her.”

“I’m sorry she wouldn’t come with us,” said Mr. Small, “but she has that right to end where she began. Anyway, it’s time you learned about young people. You are already wise in the ways of the old.”

“I like old people,” said Thomas. “They never need to know what you are carving out of wood or even why. They just wait until it’s done and then they say it’s good.”

Mr. Small had to laugh. “You don’t like to be bothered, do you? You have to be free. Well, there was a freeman’s community in the town even during slavery. Many slaves probably settled there. There are young people and there are old ones who remember things.”

Thomas had a jumble of thoughts he couldn’t quite make come clear, so he began to ask question after question about the town. They had driven a long way before he did catch hold of what he was after.

“Papa!” he said suddenly. Mrs. Small raised her head from her pillow and looked around at him.

“Papa,” Thomas said, “whatever became of that third slave?”

Mr. Small stiffened over the steering wheel. He looked straight ahead, gripping the wheel with both hands.

Thomas held his breath for a second, then blew a silent whistle through his teeth.

His father began speaking so gravely and in such a low voice, Thomas had to lean very close to hear. “When we get where we’re going… . Now listen closely,” his father said, “because I don’t want to tell you again. You are to speak to no one about the foundation’s report on the house of Dies Drear, do you understand? And nothing about the three slaves. Don’t even think about it, and speak of it to no one!”

Thomas sat back with his brothers, watching the bleak West Virginia landscape through the rain that right-flanked them in dull, white sheets across the highway.

So the third slave is the question, Thomas thought. I have found that much out.

Thomas’ eyes grew heavy with fatigue. His brothers played happily around him. As he fell asleep, his mind curled around one thought.

But what is it? What is the answer?

Chapter 3

THOMAS DID NOT
wake in time to see the Ohio River. Mr. Small was glad he didn’t, for through the gloom of mist and heavy rain, most of its expanse was hidden. What was visible looked much like a thick mud path, as the sedan crossed over it at Huntington.

Thomas lurched awake a long time after. The car went slowly; there was hardly any rain now. His mother spoke excitedly, and Thomas had to shake his head rapidly in order to understand what she was saying.

“Oh dear! My heavens!” Mrs. Small said. “Why it’s huge!”

Mr. Small broke in eagerly, turning around to face Thomas. “You’ve waited a long time,” he said. “Take a good look, son. There’s our new house!”

Thomas looked carefully out of his window. He opened the car door for a few seconds to see better, but found the moist air too warm and soft. The feel of it was not nice at all, and he quickly closed the door. He could see well enough out of the window, and what he saw made everything inside him grow quiet for the first time in weeks. It was more than he could have dreamed.

The house of Dies Drear loomed out of mist and murky sky, not only gray and formless, but huge and unnatural. It seemed to crouch on the side of a hill high above the highway. And it had a dark, isolated look about it that set it at odds with all that was living.

A chill passed over Thomas. He sighed with satisfaction. The house of Dies Drear was a haunted place, of that he was certain.

“Well,” Mr. Small said, “what do you think of it, Thomas?”

“It must be the biggest house anyone ever built,” Thomas said at last. “And to think—it’s our new house! Papa, let’s get closer, let’s go inside!”

Smiling, Mr. Small kept the car on the highway that now curved up closer toward the house. In a short time they were quite near.

At the base of the hill on which the house sat, a stream ran parallel to the highway. It was muddy and swollen by rain; between it and the hill lay a reach of fertile land, lushly tangled with mullein weed and gold wild-flower. The hill itself was rocky and mostly bare, although a thaw had come to the rest of the land and countryside. At the very top of the hill Thomas noticed a grove of trees, which looked like either pine or spruce.

The house of Dies Drear sat on an outcropping, much like a ledge, on the side of the hill. The face of the ledge was rock, from which gushed mineral springs. And these came together at the fertile land, making a narrow groove through it before emptying into the stream. Running down the face of the ledge, the springs coated the rock in their path with red and yellow rust.

Thomas stared so long at the ledge and springs, his eyes began to play tricks on him. It seemed as if the rust moved along with the spring waters.

“It’s bleeding,” he said softly. “It looks just like somebody cut the house open underneath and let its blood run out! That’s a nice hill though,” he added. He looked at the clumps of skinny trees at each side of the house. Their branches were bare and twisted by wind.

Thomas cleared his throat. “I bet you can see a lot from the top of that hill.” He felt he ought to say this. The hill was hardly anything compared to the mountains at home. Otherwise the land in every direction was mostly flat.

“You can see the college from the top of the hill,” Mr. Small said. “And you can see the town. It’s quite a view. On a clear day those springs and colored rock make the hill and house look like a fairyland.”

“All those springs!” Thomas said. He shook his head. “Where do they come from? I’ve never seen anything like them.”

“You’ll get used to the look of the land,” Mr. Small said. “This is limestone country, and always with limestone in this formation you’ll find the water table percolating through rock into springs. There are caves, lakes and marshes all around us, all because of the rock formations and the way they fault.”

Mrs. Small kept her eye on the house. It was her nature to concentrate on that which there was a chance of her changing.

“No, it’s not,” she said softly. “Oh, dear, no, it will never be pretty!”

“Everything is seeping with rain,” Mr. Small said to her. “Just try to imagine those rocks, that stream and the springs on a bright, sunny day. Then it’s really something to see.”

Thomas could imagine how everything looked on a day such as his father described. His eyes shone as he said, “It must look just about perfect!”

They drove nearer. Thomas could see that the house lay far back from the highway. There was a gravel road branching from the highway and leading to the house. A weathered covered bridge crossed the stream at the base of the hill. Mr. Small turned off the highway and stopped the car.

“There’s been quite a rain,” he said, “I’d better check the bridge.”

Now Thomas sat with his hands folded tightly beneath his chin, with his elbows on his knees. He had a moment to look at the house of Dies Drear, the hill and the stream all at once. He stared long and hard. By the time his father returned, he had everything figured out.

They continued up the winding road, the house with its opaque, watching windows drawing ever nearer.

The stream is the moat. The covered planks over it are the drawbridge, Thomas thought. And the house of Dies Drear is the castle.

But who is the king of all this? Who will win the war?

There was a war and there was a king. Thomas was as sure of this as he was certain the house was haunted, for the hill and house were bitten and frozen. They were separated from the rest of the land by something unkind.

“Oh dear,” Mrs. Small was saying. “Oh dear. Dear!”

Suddenly the twins were scrambling over Thomas, wide awake and watching the house get closer. By some unspoken agreement, they set up a loud, pathetic wail at the same time.

“Look!” Thomas whispered to them. “See, over there is clear sky. All this mist will rise and get blown away soon. Then you’ll feel better.”

Sure enough, above the dark trees at the top of the hill was deep, clear sky. Thomas gently cradled the boys. “There are new kinds of trees here,” he told them. “There will be nights with stars above trees like you’ve never known!” The twins hushed, as Thomas knew they would.

Up close the house seemed to Thomas even more huge, if that were possible. There were three floors. Above the top floor was a mansard roof with dormer windows jutting from its steep lower slopes. Eaves overhanging the second story dripped moisture to the ground in splattering beats. There was a veranda surrounding the ground floor, with pillars that rose to the eaves.

Thomas liked the house. But the chill he had felt on seeing it from the highway was still with him. Now he knew why.

It’s not the gray day, he thought. It’s not mist and damp that sets it off. There are things beyond weather. The house has secrets!

Thomas admired the house for keeping them so long.

But I’m here now, he thought happily. It won’t keep anything from me.

The twins refused to get out of the car, so Thomas had to carry one while his mother carried the other. They cried loudly as soon as they were set on the veranda.

“They don’t like the eaves dripping so close,” Mr. Small said. “Move them back, Thomas.”

Thomas placed the boys close to the oak door and then joined Mrs. Small in front of the house. His father was already busy unloading the trailer. The heavy furniture and trunks had come by van a week earlier. Thomas guessed all of it would be piled high in the foyer.

“It’s old,” Mrs. Small remarked, looking up at the dormers of the house. “Maybe when the sun comes out… .” Her voice trailed off.

Thomas placed his arm through hers. “Mama, it must be the biggest house for miles. And all the land! We can plant corn … we can have horses! Mama, it will be our own farm!”

“Oh, it’s big,” Mrs. Small said. “Big to clean and big to keep an eye on. How will I ever know where to find the boys?”