Chapter 10

Eric and Jane were nervous Tuesday as they waited for their new tutor to give Deet the results of their tests.  Eric thought he'd done pretty good because he'd been an average student at his school in Castelton before his mother died.  Then his grades started slipping, and when Marcie turned to alcohol to ease her own pain at Annie's death Eric failed his last semester of school.  His self esteem disappeared completely when he was sent to live with his uncle. Now he thought he could pick up where he'd left off the year before and looked forward to school.

Jane knew she had done miserably.  Her education had always been hit or miss.  She'd never spent much time in any one school and her mother dragged her from town to town until she completely disappeared from the educational system.  She'd had to fight back tears of anger and frustration as she struggled through her test.  She was beginning to feel safe and even a little happy in the big, beautiful house and was terrified that Deet would decide she was so stupid that he wouldn't want her anymore.

"Come on, you two," Deet told them after they finished eating a fresh batch of cookies Deidre had waiting as a treat, "we need to get to work on the decorations."

Deidre removed the empty plates and milk glasses from the kitchen table and Deet spread out old family photographs of the house.  Deet and Jane recognized some of them from the books Deidre had shown them at the library.

"It was so pretty," Jane finally said.  "I wish't I could always live here."

"We'll just have to see that you do," Deet told her.

"The house looks the same in most of the pictures," Eric exclaimed.  "There's only one or two a little different."

"My family believed in tradition," Deet said. "The architecture of the house is Victorian, a style that was very popular at one time.  They tried to keep the decorations in line with the style.  But we don't have to do that if you want to make changes.  Most of the decorations I have are old ones, used by several generations, but we can go buy some new ones if you'd like.  I know a lot of people like to put lights along the eaves that look like icicles.  One of the neighbors put some nice wire frames with lights on them in his yard last year.  When he turned the lights on it looked like reindeer and a sleigh.  It was very pretty."

The children looked at the pictures again and huddled together in serious conversation.  Finally, a decision made, Eric said, "We like this picture," he said and indicated a faded black and white photograph.

"This is one of the earliest pictures of the house," Deet said.  "Some of those decorations were brought over from Europe.  I think some of those pieces are still in the attic.  Are you sure this is what you want?"

Eric and Jane nodded their heads in confirmation and Deet asked, "Would you like to help me find the rest of the things we need?"

Anxious to do anything to take their minds off of Pieter Musselman, grading their tests in the parlor, they instantly agreed.  Their visit to the attic the evening before had been a short one, only long enough to carry boxes.  There was better light this time, sunlight filtering through several high windows, and the attic became a wonderland.

Old furniture, older than anything in the rest of the house, was scattered across the attic.  A faded mirror sat at one end, reflecting some of the light. Several trunks stirred their curiosity and Jane cautiously opened one while Eric and Deidre helped Deet move a stack of boxes.

"I bet the lady who wore this was real pretty," Jane said as she touched a faded ivory dress of heavy brocade and lace.

"That was my great-grandmother's wedding dress," Deet said softly.  "I have pictures of her and my great-grandfather.  I'll show them to you sometime. She was a very pretty lady, even when I knew her and then she was almost a hundred years old.  She was very German, an old matriarch from a different era. There's a lot of history in this old attic."

Jane carefully closed the trunk, an odd feeling coming over her like she had disturbed something.  "Is she a haint?"

Deet was puzzled.  "A what?" he asked.

"A haint, you know -- do she haint the house?"

Deidre said, "Oh, a haunt -- a ghost."

"I don't think she's ever haunted the house," Deet told Jane.  "But if she ever does it would only be in a good way, like to catch you if you tripped on the stairs and started to fall.  My grandmother told me she was a gentle lady who loved her family.  Oma Graschel said she only saw her get really angry one time, when she found out the director of an orphanage was abusing the children in his care.  Greatgrandma, who always carried a fan in her skirt pocket, stormed into the director's office and started hitting him on the head and shoulders with her fan shouting, `Perverser mensch!  Kinder vergewaltiger!'"

Eric and Jane both asked, "Huh?"

Deidre, who knew exactly what the old lady had said, replied, "Not words you ever need to repeat." Then she burst into laughter.  "I wish I could have seen her," she said.

"Well, I know `kinder' means kids," Eric said, "so it must be something about the kids that really piss... I mean upset her."

"It was," Deet said.  "In fact, she's the one who brought the things we're looking for with her when she came here as a young bride."  He was anxious to divert Eric and Jane from this vein of conversation since his ancestress had exposed a dark secret of child prostitution.

"What was her name?" Jane asked.

"Katarina," Deet said.  "Her name was Katarina but everyone called her Katia."  His voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper.  "Great-grandpa called her Kitty, but that's a family secret."

Jane buried the information away for another day.  
 

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