The Explorer

Image found among Melanie's papers.

   I continued to contemplate the whereabouts of my own mother and father as the days passed at the Alms House. What did they look like? Could they be among the dispossessed on the island? Our mistresses attempted to return to us a sense of normalcy and routine, but my own brooding persisted for the next several days until, unable to relieve my desire to seek out my kin, I decided to go in search of them. 

     One day, as we were playing on the exterior grounds, I managed to slip away from my playmates. I slowly crept toward the octagonal-shaped central building. As I reached its stone staircase, I heard a strange noise. I recessed myself into one of the crannies below the stairs and listened. All was silent, so silent that I could hear my own soft breath as I remained pressed against the wall. I stayed there so long through the quiet that I began to wonder whether I had indeed heard a sound. Several feet away stood a huge and ancient-looking oak door with black forged hinges. The door was slightly ajar, so I moved toward it and slipped noiselessly inside. 

     After allowing my eyes to adjust to the new interior, I attempted to gauge my surroundings. I moved slowly through a narrow passageway which was dimly lit by a single gaslight at the far end, all the while shivering from the cold, slimy stone floor beneath my bare feet. I turned at a corner to find myself faced with two more passageways—which one to take? Suddenly, the gaslight went out and I was once again plunged into utter darkness. I tried to quell my rising panic—what was this strange place, so quiet, so dark, so still?

[TO BE CONTINUED.]