A dark, still night it was as weary travelers pulled off from the main route onto a side road passed a sign promising a warm bed.
"I hope they have a stables for the horses."
"I would think they will have or someone else close by will have them.'
Then they both realized they were now on a red brick paving,looking up and from side to side they saw many surprisingly impressive houses,all very dark, it was "Late" you know...
They came to an impressive four-story Brick hotel towering there in the late night darkness.
Decorative Eagles perched on the marble pedestals guarding the front door.
"Huh! Those beaks would rip our little pockets apart looking for enough money for us to stay there,money we don't have!"
So the horses kept on pulling,turning the corner . the sound of hard bricks under the steel-shod wheels and horse shoes made Ben think of back East where such things were more common and just kind if "nice",a small smile landed upon his face.
"We better try a "back-Street" for our price range tonight,Charlie said,Ben nodded in total agreement. The wagon turned a corner losing the bricks,finding a well-worn dirt path with small amounts of crushed rock here and there under the wagon wheels.
"I might see the stables!" Ben said quickly before the wagon got up any more speed rolling down hill.
Looming from the darkness was a huge old barn,the smell of old hay and horse manure and a century of horse urine soaking into the barn wood was actually sort of pleasant to these men because it also meant,their quest might be completed?
Further down-grade the street was found.
"We could have followed the bricks and turned a block later and stayed out the crooked old alley, Charlie!"
"No matter,we are here now."
"So true."
There was the hanging old sign sticking out from the front porch, "INN & TAVERN".
It was a large, sort of a fancy , two-story building . It had fancy curving "Brackets" under the eaves and a front door that had seen better times ,but was still usable and solid enough,with a lavish, cast brass doorbell in the center of the old door?
"Some Doorbell salesman was recently here Ben,look at THAT!" Charlie pointed,his finger was at least a whole inch from the pretty doorbell and it rang!
"I swear, I didn't touch it! I didn't!"
"You accidentally rung it,don't worry Charlie doorbells are made to get rung!"
"But I tell YOU,I didn't touch it at all!"
"Maybe you did and you just couldn't feel it with your thick old calloused fingers,"Mr. Working Man!"
"Those "little-boy " fingers of yours might break easy if I took a-mind to twist them some.'
Then the door swung open! No one was there... they were both thinking of running away before some one began screaming , thinking they were breaking in.
But no screams came . Curiosity made Charlie look inside that room.. the faint glow of a fire in the fireplace was almost out.. ("A SNAKE!) No, an arm.. came up into view,someone was laying on the fancy couch facing the fire place.
The arm was slim,smaller ,maybe a woman's arm?
Then it acted rather "Snakey" pointing at them with fingers and thumb together copying a snake's head.
Ben gasped,he saw this slightly "late",they heard a young female voice giggle from out of their vision.
Charlie spoke, "Mam, we was looking for a room and a place to put up our horses for the night,or what's left of this night?"
The snake-arm paused as he began speaking , then moved swaying back and forth with no greeting forthcoming. Charlie cautiously took one step into that room. The flickering almost gone fire flared up in the fireplace,making Charlie stop his feet and raise up slightly with surprise and to try to see the person who owned the "snake"!
A mere "Heartbeat" behind Charlie, Ben slid his feet across the floor ready to kick anything laying there that might trip him like a rope or a snake.'
As the two men had all eyes on the couch and fire in the fireplace a pair of female knuckles quickly jabbed Ben in between his ribs from behind making him yell and do a little "jump"!
Ben spun very quickly accidentally making a quick, and hard physical contact with a young woman who had been hiding behind the front door.
As Ben half turned a flash of light from the temper mental and unpredictable fireplace sent a ray across the room aimed just at her beautiful face!
Ben felt all warmed from the sight of her incredible beauty . seconds later the fireplace kept it's light, the room darkened , but he could still see enough of her to know she was very attractive and about his age,
"I'm So sorry,Mam. I.we, didn't know,if .. well, we was just at the door ,Charlie must have rung the doorbell.. " Then she reached toward his elbow and squeezed it slightly,ever so.. slightly... He was now a male example of "Dumbfounded".. she was smiling at him! He only wanted one thing in this whole big world, and that was to just keep looking at her face as it is right now,for ever!
Suddenly it dawned on both men that there seemed to now be more light in the room,even though the fireplace was still flickering .
The young woman on the couch was then standing ,she looked older,maybe the older sister? A very mature and desirable woman and Charlie was aware that he was staring at her!
He quickly turned away,looking left and down. "I'm sorry,Mam,I didn't mean to stare like that.'
"Men do tend to do that sometimes, it's all right,here turn your head back here let me look at you.'
Charlie felt warmed inside and it could not have been from the flickering little occasional flame found there .
"You may just leave your horses outside tied to the hitching post for a little while. The water is right there for them to make use of."
"You know what? You guys caught us goofing,but at this late hour,what else can we do?"
"Wha,what were,are, you two supposed to be doing, if I might ask?'"
"Well before "HE" gets back here "WE" were supposed to have all the wine racked up where it goes."
"Why don't you have it done? Do you need us to help you?'
Ben gulped at Charlie's statement ,since Charlie could really get carried away when alcohol became involved in any way, in even tiny amounts.
The elder woman agreed quickly saying she had to show Charlie "something" first?
Then she put her hand out to him ,like Royalty,he took it like Royalty and she led him from the room.
"Wh,Where they going?" Ben asked the other girl who was still looking at him with desire! (That "Desire"-thing bothered and confused Ben,but then maybe that was how Nature intended it?)
Charlie had vanished from view.. with "Her".. now it was Ben's "turn' as his young woman walked him to the next room,the kitchen. Later Ben would guess how he could see so well in the dark was because She was So beautiful that her mere beauty stretched his retinas wider open than they had ever been before!
Ben's sense of Time was feeling altered but he didn't know how to gauge such an experience when emotions are involved. (Who does?)
"Where's Charlie?'
"Follow me, I think they went up these stairs"?
She didn't have to ask him twice,those stairs passed under his boots as if he was walking Down then instead of Up them!
She opened a door '. "Go on in,here is your room,make yourself as comfortable as you wish,I'll be seeing you in just a bit."
"OK Sure..."
Ben went into a small bedroom,it was a night-rent room nothing very fancy. He paced around the small room,too wound up to lay down in any bed. then the day's turmoils arrived,smacked him on his head,all the worries all the hours,all the doubts about where they were and how to get back to where they were supposed to be tomorrow!!
The "Wearys" overwhelmed him, and there was a .. bed.. it might be too hard, too soft, or anything else but, he needed .. a bed ,right Now! Down on to the bed he went, surprised to find himself there so quickly!
He heard a small noise a little "Click" .. is she opening the bedroom door?
The next few seconds became a ball of confusion of tumbling, tangling limbs and his body being thrashed left, then right ,then a quick dip downward,always traveling .. downward as high speed! Ben's tired brain saying"I AM NOT Doing This! No imagination here, none,ZERO! "
It all seemed real, yet it didn't!.. then darkness and a feeling of being surrounded , by. something?
Then he smelled .. something very familiar,. he was smelling Charlie! Darkness seeped into every pore,no light could ever live in this ...place ?
Ben thought some light was coming to "find" him. Flickering torches were coming up behind him! Down some stairs toward him, there was Charlie! Standing just a few feet away from him!
Those torches were in the beautiful hands of the two young women who had just tricked them into entering the wine cellar to help them do their chores!
The bed upstairs tips and sliding downward a body is sent to the wine cellar,below the ground.
Charlie didn't know whether to inquire what those neatly wrapped human shapes were that were stacked neatly around the wine cellar.
Later the girls told them yes,they were dead bodies stored there to keep them from rotting too much because the train wreck victims were to all be picked up soon and transported many miles back "home".
A pleasant time was had by all as wine got put away and girls and guys laughed and drank , just a "little " wine.
"It must be late morning by now, we should take care of the horses,how do we get back outside?"
Come this way,Sir!" The younger woman said,"Take a strong hold of this water pipe, now pull it towards your self."
The secret door made of mortared stones opened wide.
"Is there any lights?"
"Just walk very slowly with a hand against the wall,the walls are very smooth,there will be a door ,eventually. push it open."
"Thank you,Thank you for the Wine and the stimulating company,girls!" Charlie said with a "Wink" at the older woman.
Ben was moving one hand closer to touch the younger girl one more time when she and the other young woman got a terrified look across their faces at the same time!
"He's BACK! He wasn't supposed to be back for another whole day!"
"Who is back? your Boss here?"
"No, our FATHER! Quick, get down that tunnel as fast as humanly possible if you want to see the light of another day!"
"But we didn't do.."
"HE won't Be waiting for excuses or answers , he can be a very violent man,please "GO" go Now!"
That tunnel seemed extremely long,they tried to hurry at first but them became very tired and began moving more and more slowly through the tunnel.
"Will this dammed tunnel ever end?" Charlie asked nobody in particular..
"I think this might be the door!" Ben said .
"Well give it a push!"
"Help me!'
The old door swing open hard and fast! the daylight was like a bright fire in their eyes!
"We better git running!"
Charlie! THE Horses!"
"OK, we walk back to the front of the house, if the Father comes out, you run like Heck,I'll wrestle him but move then horses away as fast as you can,OK?"
They walked half a block to the front door of the house.. everything seemed very different now.. "Where's our horses?"
"Where's the wagon?"
"Look ,Charlie! That pretty brass doorbell is gone!"
"We might get blamed for that too,let's skee-daddle!
A black and white machine rolled up to them on big black wheels it was made of steel and glass and more thin glass called "plastic'.
A tall man wearing a really dark blue uniform of some kind got out of the rolling black and white steel box. He had a holster with a gun in it and other things....
"So you two must be in town with the Civil War re-in actors?"
Puzzled Charlie finally spoke first:"I was in the Civil war."
"I know."
"I wasn't ." Ben said.
"Oh,you might have been a drummer boy when it started , but then you grew up, right?"
Ben just looked very puzzled?
"We was wondering if you might have seen our horses?
"You have "horses?"
"Yup!"
"I would think you guys would like to get uniforms first,those old clothes don't impress any of the spectators very much, now would they?'
"Oh , a man doesn't need fancy clothes to impress some women! Ben bragged. "Just last night,he was smiling now, We met the two girls,er, I mean "Women' who live in this house,and we all had a really fine time, at their insistence,of course!"
"No you didn't."
'Yes we sure did!"
Looking down at the roadway, the man dressed in Blue said;" Those girls you saw last night were ghosts of two young women who were Murdered in this house over 170 years ago,don't get goofy on me now, this has happened before, two young guys say.."
He looked up,he was alone, the Sun was shining .
He stood there for a moment,opened the door ,sat down in the squad car,looked at the house,then drove away,as he looked one more time at the house in his rear view mirror he thought he saw something appear there . reflected in his mirror... on the old door,something looking like.. brass..?
