Chapter 10
The abrupt loss of light sucked the remaining warmth out of the subterranean space. Clara’s phone screen cast long, distorted shadows against the damp stone walls, turning the ordinary clutter of the basement into jagged, threatening shapes.
"Julian?" Clara called out, her voice echoing up the stairwell. There was no answer, only the muffled sound of heavy footsteps moving across the hardwood floors of the kitchen directly above them.
"They’re cutting the power to the main breaker," Beatrice’s voice drifted out from the dark interior of the root cellar. She sounded unfazed, almost bored by the theatrics. "Julian always was a dramatic coward. Thinks he can starve us out before Monday morning."
Clara hurried back to the foot of the stairs, holding her phone aloft. "David, get up. We have to find another way out of here. There has to be a coal chute or a utility tunnel."
David didn't move. He remained huddled against the foundation wall, his breathing coming in shallow, ragged gasps. "There’s no other way out, Clara. When they renovated the foundation in 2005, they sealed every egress. It’s a tomb. We’re standing in a concrete tomb."
"Shut up, David," Beatrice snapped, her rocking chair creaking rhythmically in the dark. Creeak. Creeak. Creeak. "Stop whining like a whipped dog and look behind the water heater."
Clara swung her phone light toward the rusted, oversized tank sitting in the far corner of the basement. Thick layers of cobwebs draped over its copper pipes like gray lace. She crept toward it, stepping carefully over the spilled papers from her yellow folder.
As she pushed aside a rotting plywood partition behind the tank, the beam of her phone caught something unexpected: a narrow, square opening cut directly into the foundation wall, blocked only by a crumbling stack of old cinder blocks.
"There’s a crawlspace," Clara said, her heart leaping with a sudden surge of hope. She dropped to her knees, ignoring the damp grime staining her grey long-sleeve shirt. She grabbed the top cinder block and hauled it out, letting it crash onto the concrete.
"Don't go in there, girl," Beatrice warned from the darkness of her cell. "That leads to the drainage culvert under Elm Street. During a heavy rain, it fills up in thirty seconds."
"It's not raining," Clara argued, dragging a second block away.
"It’s starting to," a new voice echoed from the top of the basement stairs.
The cellar door creaked open slightly, letting in a sliver of pale gray light and the unmistakable sound of a heavy autumn rain pelting the roof shingles above. Helena’s face appeared in the gap, lit from below by the glow of her own phone. She wasn't holding a weapon; she was holding a heavy iron padlock.
"Have a nice night down there, Clara," Helena whispered, her voice chillingly calm. "The police won't check the property until the historical society files the trespassing complaint on Monday. By then, the culvert will be full."
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Before Clara could lunge for the stairs, the heavy iron door slammed shut with a finality that made the dust rain down from the ceiling, followed by the metallic clack of the padlock sliding home.
***
