Chapter Three: A Meeting Worthwhile
Lucas stared at it slowly, eyes wide as saucers, mouth agape. A hungry feeling grew in the pit of his stomach. He had known deep down it must have existed but his mind had convinced him otherwise. Seeing it now before him was a slap in the face to his reality and shook him. A groping sense began to spread into his arms and he found himself walking toward the mysterious door before he realized he was standing again.
Where the hell did this door come from?
The doors were disappearing slowly on either side.
I know it wasn’t there before. I would have noticed something like this.
He was nearing the end of the hall now, only a single door to his left and the crimson one before him.
It can’t have just appeared out of nowhere. Where does it go..?
His hand reached for the glistening knob and it turned. The handle felt smooth and ice cold despite the new heating of the floor. He thought for a fleeting second it was made of ice then laughed the thought away in his mind as that would be absurd.
Besides, it’s golden and not white. If it had been clear like crystal however.. No. Nobody in their right mind would make a doorknob out of ice.
The door opened very slowly with a creak then suddenly swung on its hinges as if an immense gale of wind was behind it. A flat plane of white greeted him; a large palette of nothingness to not truly watch or see. The non-existence of the doorway’s holdings grew higher as the light dimmed and the white turned a gloomy shade of gray and melded into the wall once again, the red door gone.
Lucas’ hand was still stretched out before him like he had been burnt and had gone stock still. He couldn’t wrap his mind around what he had just seen. Or had he seen it? Such a thing couldn’t possibly be real in his world, not a boring existence of work and dreary gray walls. His life was much too boring, too normal for such a thing to occur. Yet..
“Master Lucas!”
Lucas leapt from where he stood and ran into the parlor room, away from the winding hall to the wall he thought was a doorway.
“There you are,” Maynard said pointedly and not looking at him, “Latin, downstairs, now.”
Lucas could hear the distaste of Maynard having to speak to him in the butler’s droning voice, perhaps the first time it had inspired any sort of emotion. Lucas nodded and passed him, approaching the staircase.
“Wait just a moment!” The bass called from behind.
“What is it now?”
Maynard inspected the room then onto the halls.
“How did you light these?”
Lucas wrinkled his nose and turned his head to the side.
“Light what?”
“The lanterns, you fool. They are lit, why I thought they had long since burnt out of fuel?” Maynard leaned in close and sniffed the one nearest him. “No smell of butane?” He unscrewed the small canister hanging from the lantern’s base and rattled it in his gloved hands.
“Nothing. Just as I thought.”
“Oh.” Was all Lucas could say. He was just as dumbfounded as Maynard. In fact, he was now watching all the lanterns burn out almost instantly and at once with the utmost expression of confusion. Maynard seemed to have noticed too for he turned in a complete circle with his mouth open as the darkness refilled the room with an almost tangible whoosh and the cold crept back in, pressing in on them most uncomfortably from all sides like being underwater.
Lucas’ insides shivered at what had transpired up here. This was the single most interesting day he had ever had in his life. A disappearing door, a way to nowhere, and torches that burn unhindered by a lack of fuel. Was this perhaps why the third floor was off limits to touching?
“What’s up here?” Lucas asked suddenly, surprised at the intensity of his own voice. It seemed strained, anxious for something to really be happening around him. Something worth trying to find.
“Nothing other than old antiques and the like; nothing you should worry yourself about.” Maynard replied not looking at him but instead around the room. He too appeared lost in thought for his voice was uncharacteristically high and wondering as if he had no real answer. But he was faster to hide it than Lucas and shook his head with a small pop of his neck.
“Don’t you have classes to attend to?” He asked in a falsely bored voice. Lucas could see the squinting of his eyes which always meant he was lying. Maynard sniffed again at his mustache and cleared his throat.
Lucas’ frowned up at him and crossed his arms. He was not about to go without something to contemplate.
I’ve got to have something to think about in Latin.
“Come on, Maynard, please?”
The sound of his name seemed to have brought Maynard back from his mood with an obvious reproach. Lucas instantly felt the mood of the room lighten, even with it back to its shadowed old self.
“Er, well, it’s nothing really. Just maybe some old belongings of your family’s,” Maynard rattled off as if he had been trying to find a way to explain without lying. “You know, old clothes and boxes of knickknacks and baby clothes you used to wear, books and your grandparents’ furniture. Your mother was quite the packrat..”
Maynard froze instantly and blushed a deep scarlet then swept out of the room. Lucas stood rooted to that spot and blinked. It was the first and only time he could remember anyone ever mentioning his mother around him. He knew so very little about her and had once believed Maynard when he was told at a young age he had been grown out in the back garden.
So these are my mother’s things. This is where she used to walk about and speak. She had once eaten and slept up here, actually been something. Lived...existed…
A large lump had risen in Lucas’ throat and he found it hard to swallow. He left his mother’s floor quickly and drifted into the kitchen where he found Maynard busily and with rapt attention scrubbing a large silver platter that Lucas knew had just been washed that morning.
He saw a man sitting at the table, not Mr. Fletcher but a new man he had never seen before. His hair was pure white and stuck out everywhere like he had been shocked, and he did indeed smell like something burning. His eyes were the palest gray as well, nearly silver and sat wide around the droopy eyelids that hung from them with age. His face was wrinkled and he bore an expression of being addled. Lucas couldn’t help but notice that he too wore strange clothing; something like a suit crossed with a cloak, covered in black stripes and white polka dots.
The old man looked up as Lucas approached him, apparently not noticing him or pretending he hadn’t to be polite.
“Ah, Lucas Black, I presume?” His whispery voice cooed like the wind down an empty street. Lucas jerked involuntarily and pretended the hairs on his arms weren’t standing as he nodded.
“Good, I’ve been expecting you for a long time, a very long time indeed.” He shook Lucas’ hand with his papery skin and beckoned for him to sit across from him. Lucas made sure to keep his chair scooted away from the table and kept his legs to the side in case he should run.
“Tea?”
Lucas stared blankly at him.
“Sorry, what?”
“Tea, would you like some?”
“Oh, no thank you.” Lucas lied for his mouth was quite parched. He instead chewed the inside of his lip and waited for the man to continue. He watched as the old man slurped his tea then poured another cup and slurped it down as well. Four cups later he seemed content and sighed happily. Lucas continued to stare at him in amazement as every cup was still steaming angrily.
“Now then, I am Mister Hollow Well; most people simply call me Hollow.” He announced with something of a flourish. “I am the—“
“Proprietor of many great things.” Maynard finished for him with a stern eye cast at the man. Hollow looked deflated like his introduction had been cut short for some kind of show. He ruffled his jacket and gave a plain smile.
“Yes, um, anyway, I am Hollow, and I do have many great things, but today is not about what I have, but what you have.”
Lucas’ stomach seemed to drop out from under him. His arm which he had been leaning on slipped and he fell forward from his seat and hit the table with his chin. The candles that had sat burning there fell over and rolled to the floor, extinguishing on the carpet.
Always on cue, Maynard lifted him into his seat and laughed with no enthusiasm.
“Boys will be boys will be boys.” He waved his hand as he spoke and bustled off into the kitchen. Lucas flushed red and stared at his shadow on the tabletop. His sore chin was nothing to the humility that burned in his chest.
“You alright, boy?”
Lucas nodded then sucked in a deep breath.
“Yeah..sir.” He added.
“Good, now, onto why I’m here for I am very, very busy. Have you ever had an affinity for guessing what people were thinking?”
Lucas shrugged and pondered over the question.
What does he mean ‘guessing what people were thinking’? Like reading someone’s mind or something?
“No, I..I don’t think so.” Lucas looked up and saw Hollow writing on a long sheet of parchment wrapped into a scroll he had not seen before. He leaned under the table and saw no bag or suitcase beside the man.
“Now..” Lucas jerked back up to the man before he looked up from his paper. “Have you ever made something happen out of the ordinary, like windows or doors opening?”
Lucas wracked his brain for any hidden meanings behind the question.
“Umm..no, not that either.”
Hollow began scribbling once again.
The questions went on for over an hour, Lucas answering as best he could and Hollow recording them on his sheet. Once or twice Lucas was sure he saw a grin flash across the old man’s face. Lucas assumed it was due to the oddity of each question, which became weirder and weirder until he had gone down to the bottom of the list.
“Have you ever noticed the weather to be what you prefer as soon as you step outside?”
Lucas answered no immediately as he was never allowed out and sat, sour, in his chair. His back was beginning to ache from sitting up to watch the strange man and his curiosity had long since wandered back to the red door above.
Will it reappear if I come up looking for it again? Maybe I have to relight the torches too..
“Last question!” Hollow announced.
Lucas smiled inwardly and thanked God for there being an end.
“Have you ever conjured anything or noticed something was not there until you wanted it to be?”
Lucas sat for a moment and decided at last to answer to what he was sure would bring a quick end to the interview.
“No sir, nothing.”
Hollow seemed to sink lower in his chair before looking up at Lucas again.
“You are Lucas Wayne Black?” He asked seriously.
“Yes?” Lucas asked back, stunned and confused.
“Raymon Black’s son?” He questioned further.
“Yes, yes I am Lucas Black, son of Raymon Black!” Lucas snapped exasperatedly.
Hollow seemed to freeze in his seat, lost in thought as if he had fallen asleep with his eyes open. Lucas stared at him for a minute then made to get up.
“You’re sure you haven’t done any of them? Any?” He almost pleaded. His eyes bulged and his face became pale and flustered.
“No, I haven’t done any of your weird things! I’m just a normal, boring twelve year old with nothing to do and nowhere to go! Happy!?”
The room fell silent, Lucas stood there, chair knocked over behind him, Maynard now in the room looking alarmed, and Hollow sitting in his chair smiling to himself.
“What are you smiling about!?” Lucas cried and wanted so badly to hit him.
“Yes.”
Lucas shook his head not understanding.
“Yes? Yes what?”
“Yes, I am happy,” Hollow grinned.
His long thin fingers pointed to the center of the table where the candles Lucas had knocked over were sitting, burning once again with a bright golden flame. Its’ warm glow cast across Hollow’s gnarled face and gave him the appearance of a leather coat.
“You lied, Lucas Black.”
Lucas’ mouth was even drier than before and his brain seemed to have died. It felt like someone had stuffed cotton down his throat and kicked him in the head.
“You said you had never conjured anything or had it once you wanted it to be there.”
Lucas continued to stare at the small, un-flickering flame.
Hollow rolled the scroll back up and stuffed it into his coat then stood.
“Thank you, Lucas Black, for you time and patience. We will report to you your results in two to five weeks.” He gave a little bow and turned to the front door, leaving Lucas in the room with the flame that had definitely not been there before.
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