Free The Rascal by Eric Arvin Page B

said.
    “It’s the story that’s told.” He shrugged his hangers. “Take it or leave it. But the family was strange . There’s no denying that. Why, after the problems with the boy, the mother came into town—to this very library—and borrowed one of our oldest books. A book of the occult, witchcraft, spells, and the like. She never returned it. We don’t loan out our older books anymore after that. One only has to learn that lesson once.”
    Chloe remembered the large leather book in Lana Pruitt’s personal library. If Mr. Craft’s story was true, it had to be the same volume of spells. It wasn’t like there were many of them around, after all.
    “And what about the big house?” she asked.
    “For years, it was a summer home for a very wealthy man. In time, he got too old to care for the place and it remained empty for some time, inviting only teenagers and vandals. Then the actress, Lana Pruitt—her, her husband, and her little girl—finally bought the old place and moved in.”
    Chloe’s gaze was traveling. Remembering. “The girl died. I found her grave in the garden. Stumbled upon it by accident, really.” She held up her hand before the librarian could speak. “I don’t want to know how.”
    Mr. Craft seemed deflated, as if she had taken away his fun.
    “No one ever knew what happened to the actress’s husband, Michael. Like the family in the cottage, he was just gone one day. But there are rumors.” He gave a sly look.
    “That she killed him?”
    “That she killed them both. Her husband and her daughter. That she was as crazy as the little boy decades earlier.”
    ***
    The remote control lay on his knee. The need to scratch was gone now. As Jeff sat slouched on the couch, trying to find something on the television, he didn’t feel a thing aside from the diggings his own fingers had carved into his forearm, neck, and chest. Maybe there was something in the air here. Maybe he was allergic to some plant. It would have been odd, yes, being that he had been all over the world in his career and had never once had an allergic reaction to anything. Yet he was working in the dampness of a well. He had never done that before. Caves, yes. Wells, no.
    Maybe that “something in the air” had gotten under his skin. That’s exactly what it felt like: a crawling beneath his skin. And it was spreading. The air was packed with maybes .
    Chloe was still in town. He was beginning to feel bad that he wished her away so often. But it was what it was. False happiness comes off as condescension. From an early age, Jeff was never able to pull any kind of performance out of that particular hat. His eyes always betrayed him. His best performances had always been in the sports arena.
    He had come in from the well, if hesitantly, to take a small rest from his work. He was nearly at the bottom from what he could tell. He had used a flashlight and could see strewn treasures. Rusting relics. What project would he have to keep him busy after the well, though? That was a thought that made his heart beat a little faster like a sour excitement.
    The TV was going in and out. Reception in the cottage wasn’t the best. The power to the whole place had failed more than once. It had moved past annoying and on to expected by now. It seemed to annoy Chloe more than him.
    Through the haze and fuzz of the television screen, Jeff was able to make out an older film. He knew immediately what it was. He’d seen it before, years ago. It was one of her most famous roles, the actress on the hill. The Unseen , one of those old Gothic thrillers filled with large houses, sparse lighting, and folded people. She looked younger, but it was still the actress. Her eyes were alive, though. Even through the struggling reception, Jeff saw the eyes. They were determined. She had lost those eyes now. She was merely existing these days. Her old eyes—the ones she wore in the film—had fallen to the floor and shattered.
    He wondered if, higher up on