Page 101 of The Premonition at Withers Farm
“I thought it seemed bigger than a normal coop,” Gemma acknowledged.
“It’s not Pinterest-cute,” Molly admitted. “Just a converted building. Eventually I’d like to have a lot more chickens. Maybe forty or—”
“Hey.” Sid commanded their attention. “Check it out.” She ran her finger along a very distinct edge in the floor, indicating the confirmation that it was indeed a trapdoor. “It’s not large, though. I mean, a person could hardly fit through it.”
Molly squelched a nervousness that started playing with her insides. She looked over her shoulder at the door. Chickens. Rooster. Nothing out of the ordinary. But it didn’t satisfy that chill that raced through her and caused her to shiver.
Gemma noticed.
So did Sid. “You okay?”
Molly nodded.
Sid pulled a jackknife from her back jeans pocket—because that was Sid, to carry a jackknife—and flicked it open. She ran it along the edges of the trapdoor, loosening the dirt and debris. Closing the knife, Sid slid it back into her pocket and hooked her finger through the metal ring. “Ready?” She looked from Gemma to Molly.
“Why do I feel like there’s a dead body down there?” Molly swallowed.
“Not funny,” Gemma retorted.
“Sorry.” Molly realized she was in danger of reverting to her open-mouth-insert-foot days of speaking before she thought.
“I’m just going to open it.” But Sid didn’t move.
“It’s probably just hiding old cans of nails or something,” Molly reasoned against theknowingthat was growing inside her.
“This is silly,” Sid resolved, and gave the door a yank. It creaked, releasing finally, dust puffing into the air, followed by an instant scent of old straw and mold.
They all leaned over the hole, which wasn’t much bigger than the size of a milk crate.
“There’s a tin box.” Sid stated the obvious.
Gemma looked at Molly expectantly. “It’s your property.”
So, it was Molly’s duty to extricate the box from the cavernof time and open it? She grimaced, wiped her hands needlessly on the sides of her jean shorts, then reached in. Touching the tin box sent jolts through her palms like the invisible touch of time reaching out and contacting her. Her skin tingled for no other reason than the anticipation mixed with trepidation about what they would find. Was it possible to have that awful premonition that, in opening this box, she would release spirits from the past? Ones that were better left alone, in the captivity of a tin box in a secret hole in the chicken coop?
“Are you going to pick it up?” Gemma prodded.
Molly nodded, gathering gumption, and pulled the box out of its grave. She set it on the floor with a thud.
“There’s no lock on it,” Sid observed.
No. She was right. Just a latch. A simple latch that, once flipped up, would make accessing the box a walk in the park. Old artifacts were supposed to come with booby traps, weren’t they? Or ghoulish, whirling poltergeists that swooped in and sucked your soul out of your body?
“Molly?” Sid’s concern prompted Molly.
She flipped the latch and lifted the lid without saying a word. There was a solemnity to the moment as the hinges fought against the movement of the lid being pushed upward. Then it was open. The box revealing its treasure with stark reality.
“A book of nursery rhymes?” Gemma sounded disappointed as she stared at the vintage book, its binding frayed, its cover faded—which was a colored image of a goose with a massive ruffle around its neck. Mother Goose? Maybe. Yet it looked more neutral, nondescript.
“Maybe it belonged to a kid, who hid it out here,” Sid offered, even though she didn’t sound as if she believed it, or as if she wanted to believe it.
Molly gently lifted the book and wiped her palm against the picture. “It doesn’t list an author’s name. Not BrothersGrimm.” The wordRhymeswas the only script on the cover, in faded blue that had once been brilliant but now resembled washed-out denim. She opened the cover.
Copyright 1873.
“It’s way older than 1910,” Gemma noted.
Molly still didn’t respond. She knew, even before she turned the page, that what lay inside was evil. She could sense it oozing through the pages, licking at her soul with the demand of wicked taunting. The little girl in the chicken-coop attic became a clear vision in Molly’s mind. She remembered her. A spirit, a vision, a ghost, a premonition before she lost consciousness, Molly had no idea. But somehow, she knew...
