Sam wished he had someone there to share it with. But surely Andrea would not draw as much pleasure from this as he did. Her interest in movies extended only as far as attending the local premieres of any productions Sam had worked on. Beyond that, Andrea’s world revolved around crunching numbers for her clients.
For a cold moment Sam imagined one day teaching his son or daughter the thrill of seeking out the special nooks of the world. For Sam, movies were secondary. Their presentation invariably paled against the sparkling wonder of discovering the richly atmospheric settings that often hide out from the rambling parade of progress: art deco bars, grand old theatres, rural churches, and countless other places like this very farm.
He fought back the wring of depression by freeing the camera from his hip-bag and beginning to snap photos of the potential set. Moving around to the rear of the house chilled Sam, even though the April sun was still pouring modest warmth on the terrain. Perhaps the sight of the high shuttered room unnerved him. Regardless, it would make an excellent shot in Gnawers. With this many possibilities Sam’s mind began to thrum with startling revisions that could be made to the script.
A wooden well sat at the edge of the property, mere inches from the untamed forest. Sam approached it, struck by just how crude it was. The surface had not even been sanded. It still bore the mossy flaking bark of the tree from which it had been hewn. Sam might have mistaken it for the stump of a great evergreen had the mouth of the stout barrel not been secured with a large granite slab that was held in place by ancient-looking ropes. Or were they vines?
Regardless, the well or cistern could have been part of the topography, for it did not look fashioned in any way, merely capped. It was as if a massive log had been shoved down into the mud. Its base was overgrown with weeds so sun-bleached they resembled nerves.
Sam frowned at the thought of how its water might taste.
The house had no back door, so Sam hastened his way to the open door-frame that faced the incline, excited by the prospect of the house’s interior.
The forest had shared its debris with the main hall. The oiled floorboards were carpeted with broken boughs and leaves and dirt. Sam clicked several shots of the living room with its lone furnishing of a broken armchair, of the pantry that was lined with dusty preserves, of the kitchen with its dented wood stove.
To his mind he’d already collected more than ample proof that this location would suit the film, but just to cross every “T”: a few quick shots of the second storey. After that he would go back home. He had a strange and sudden need to snuggle up to Andrea, in a well-lit room, with the world held at bay beyond locked doors.
Something in the way the main stairs creaked underfoot gave Sam pause. He came to question whether the house was truly abandoned after all. It must have been the echo of the groaning wood, but the sound managed to plant the idea that the upper floor was occupied.
“Hello?” he called, only scarcely aware of the fact that his hand had begun fishing one of the contracts for location use out of his hip-bag. Drawing some absurd sense of security from the legal papers in his fist, Sam scaled the steps, listening all the while for noises that never managed to overpower his own.
An investigation of the first two rooms revealed precious little beyond more dust, greater decay. Sam’s discovery of a dismantled crib in the front bedroom did summon a lump in his throat. Why should he be so moved by so banal an image—slatted wood stacked in a corner? No doubt because he and Andrea would likely never have to do the same in their home.
His emotions were running unbridled, a delayed response to his argument with Andrea. One last room and then home to see if his own desire for a family could be rescued or simply left to erode until his heart became as rotted and hollow as this house.
The final room sat behind a door that was either locked or merely stuck in a moisture-warped jamb. Amidst the gouges on its surface was a carving of a humanoid figure dancing upon what Sam assumed was intended to be a tomb. In place of a head the figure bore an insect with thin legs represented by jagged slashes in the door wood. Beneath this glyph the word SEPA had been scratched.
Sam wriggled the iron doorknob until frustration and mounting curiosity impelled him to wrench it, slamming his weight against the door itself.
If the owner had secured the door with a lock, it had snapped under Sam’s moderate force. Still, Sam allowed a quick pang of guilt to pass through and punish him for the damage he’d wrought. But really, who would ever discover it?
The window in the room was half-covered by planks, but poor workmanship did not allow the wood to block out the light or protect the grimy glass. A cursory glance led Sam to believe that this room has been used for storage, for there were more items here than in all the other rooms combined: a long table, a wall-mounted shelf upon which books and what looked to be little wooden toys or figurines had been set, even a thin cot mattress carpeting the far corner. Bulging black trash bags were heaped along the wall. Sam daringly peeked into one of the open hems, discovering a bundle of old clothing, men’s and women’s both, wadded up in a gender-bending tangle.
All the items in the room suddenly quilted themselves together in Sam’s mind, forming a larger picture that suggested the house was someone’s home. He felt his bones go as cold and stiff as pipes in midwinter. Fear had bolted him to the spot. He listened, cursing himself for lumbering through the house so brazenly, so noisily.
Ribbons of sunlight poured in between the askew planks. Sam’s gaze followed them as they seemed to spotlight the coating of dust that covered the mattress, the rodent droppings that littered the brownish pillow. The table reposed under streamers of cobweb and the titles on the book spines were occluded by dirt. A bedroom or squatter’s den it might have been, but no longer. Sam exhaled loudly with relief.
After three or four shots of the room he indulged himself by stealing a few pictures of the neglected items: first the grubby bed, then the desk, and finally the items that lined the bowing shelf.
He regretted blowing on the row of books once the dust mushroomed up, flinging grit into his eyes and choking him. When the cloud settled Sam squinted his runny eyes at the spines: The Egyptian Book of the Dead, De Vermis Mysteriis, The Trail of the Many-Footed One. Leaning against these clothbound books was what looked to be a photo album or scrapbook. Sam carefully shifted this volume to face him and pulled back its plain brown leather cover.
Photographs that looked to have been torn from entomology textbooks were sloppily pasted next to Egyptian papyri that, if the ugly hand-written footnotes were to be trusted, all dealt with an Egyptian funerary god named Sepa. There were also sepia-toned photographs of tiny churchyards. Some of the graves appeared upset. Repeated misspelled notes praised the Guardian of the Larvae of the Dead. Upon one of the pages was a poem in faded pencil scrawling: