Houses of Stone, KATHY [classic literature books TXT] 📗

it. If I don't go back to that clearing I'll wonder all my life what it was we heard that day, and despise myself for being too cowardly to find out."

"It should be an interesting experiment," Peggy said dubiously.

"It's a lovely old house," Karen said, as Peggy brought the car to a stop in front of one of the sprawling Victorian mansions on West Main Street. "What a pity the Madisons have let it deteriorate. I suppose they don't have much money."

"It's Cameron's house," Peggy said.

"What?" Karen stared at her.

"Get with it, girl. Didn't Tanya tell you her mother baby-sits with Mrs. Hayes? According to Lisa, the old lady is a candidate for a nursing home; she must be bedridden, or, as Lisa nicely put it, senile."

"She's got a heart as big as all outdoors," Karen muttered, remembering Lisa's cold dismissal of her aunt. "And Cameron's not exactly the dutiful son, is he? You'd think he could keep his mother's house in better repair instead of spending all his time and effort on something he expects to make money on."

The crumbling bricks of the walk and the overgrown lawn showed the same signs of neglect as the house. They approached the steps to the veranda cautiously; they were solid, though there was very little paint left on them.

Their knock was promptly answered. Mrs. Madison, a slim woman with a smooth, unlined face, had been watching for them. "It's nice to have company," she said ingenuously. "I get pretty bored with nothing to do all day except read and watch the soaps."

She must do more than read and watch the soaps. The living room was shabby but very neat and clean, and the silver tea set arranged on a table shone with polishing. "You shouldn't have gone to so much trouble," Peggy said, as Mrs. Madison offered a steaming cup.

"Oh, it's no trouble. Like I said, I'm pleased to have somebody to talk to."

"Mrs. Hayes doesn't ..." Peggy paused tactfully.

Mrs. Madison glanced at a closed door. "She sleeps a lot. This is usually one of her quiet times, so I hope we'll be able to have a nice chat. Tanya told me what you're doing. It sounds real interesting. I don't know if I can be any help, but go ahead and ask anything you want."

Peggy beamed approvingly at her. "Good. You don't mind if I take notes?"

Mrs. Madison looked dubious. Interpreting her reaction correctly, Peggy added, "This is off the record. If we want to publish any information you give us, we'll ask your permission first."

The other woman's face cleared. She nodded. "That's fair. It's just that I wouldn't want to embarrass Cameron, or make trouble for Tanya. Some of the folks in this town take old history too personally."

"I know what you mean," Karen said, feeling it was time for her to join in the conversation. "My landlady, for one."

The other woman's face rounded with laughter. "Tanya told me about your talk. She liked it a lot."

"I probably shouldn't have done it, though," Karen said ruefully. "I was rather rude. And now Mrs. Fowler won't have anything to do with me."

"She wouldn't be much use to you. She's a terrible malicious old gossip. You can't believe nothing she says."

"I'm sure you'll be a much more reliable source," Peggy said, folding back a page of her notebook. "You lived at Amberley when you were a child, didn't you?"

"Uh-huh. My mama and daddy worked for old Mr. Cartright back— oh, land, it must be forty years ago. Before he got so queer and mean." She settled back, hands folded on her lap. "We lived in the main house, in those rooms near the kitchen. The servants' houses had tumbled down long before and there was plenty of room, with just old Mr. Josiah living there. It was a quiet, peaceful place for children to grow up, but awful lonesome, no neighbors or nothing. We had chickens and dogs and cats, though, and all those acres to wander in."

"Do you remember a kind of hollow, a clearing in the woods, with an old ruined building of some kind?"

"We didn't go there much."

"Why not?"

"There were stories about it." She shrugged deprecatingly. "You don't want to hear them; they were just old tales, the kind kids tell to scare themselves with."

"That's exactly what I want to hear," Peggy said eagerly. "Please go on."

"Well." She settled back again, a reminiscent smile on her face. "You know how kids are. My brother Tyrone loved to tease the little ones. He was the one who told us about the slave house. That's what the stones were, he said. The place where the old devil—not Mr. Josiah; the old man that built the house all those years ago—where he put the slaves who'd stood up to him or tried to run away. He'd shut them up in the stone house, in the dark, without food or water, and leave them there."

"How horrible!" Karen exclaimed.

"It was just a story," Mrs. Madison said.

"Maybe not," Peggy said quietly. "I've heard of worse things."

"There couldn't be anything much worse," Karen muttered. "God, how awful."

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to upset you," Mrs. Madison said. She and Peggy exchanged glances, and Karen realized she had sounded like a naive child. Of course there were worse things. And people had done them, all of them, to other people.

"Anyhow, it all happened a long time ago," Mrs. Madison said soothingly. "To us kids they were just scary stories. But we didn't go there much. The place had a funny feeling about it. Probably because Tyrone was such a good storyteller. He said he'd heard them screaming. Now you know that was just foolishness, because you couldn't have heard anything through those thick stone walls even if there had been people inside. There was no proof such a thing ever happened."

Peggy carefully avoided looking at Karen. "Was the stone house intact when you were a child?" she asked.

"I guess so. It was all covered with brush