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Bill listened to Me away He wanted to tell Meift had left hirateful he should be that the wrong people hadn’t found out about it Bill felt in his pocket for some money for a bite to eat He rubbed the diers NotBut that was his curse; he couldn’t stay away froa that house in his dreaig for any of it yet, but he would There was a number on the side of the house’s mailbox If only he could see it, he felt sure, that nu And once he had his e

THE HOUSE ON THE HILL

The house sat on the ept hill like a sentinel Ivy sprawled across the exterior, spreading like a stain The ere shuttered and nailed closed The engraved cherrywood doors were a dull brown If anyone could have seen inside, they’d have noted that cobwebs draped from doorways and spiders secreted their rapped prey into crevices Warped floorboards bowed dangerously in spots

In its day, the house had been nificent There had been celebrations and dances On Sundays, carriages had passed by to ad that was right and good and hopeful about the country The house was a dream realized The man who had built the house, Jacob Knowles, had made his fortune in steel, the very steel used to build the city He and his wife had only one surviving child, a daughter nareatest joy Ida was small and prone to colds, and for this reason, her anxious parents indulged the girl’s every whim There were piano lessons and pony rides and a small spaniel named Chester When Ida played tea party on the lawn, servants waited nearby to pour tea for her dolls Many were the days she pretended to be an Arabian princess surveying her kingdom She would climb the stairs to the very top room of the house, an attic room with a small terrace In 1863 she watched the s that she looked upon the lairs of distant dragons and not the si into brutal rew into a young wo soht becorand house Months after the Civil War ended, Union soldiers joined General Grant himself for a party at the house that spilled out onto the lawn for fireworks as the strains of a waltz echoed along the rafters But Ida had a cold and was confined to her bed with a h her mother patted her cheek and told her not to worry, that there would be another ball and a youngfor her, and besides, they were not ready to have their only daughter, their dear Ida, leave them just yet

But it was Ida’s mother as to leave A year after that ball, Mrs Knowles fell sick with dysentery and was buried within a week One year later, Jacob Knowles died of a sudden brain hee It fell to twenty-year-old Ida toa household was a far cry froh a distant cousin ad, she did not heed his advice Grief-stricken at the loss of her parents, Ida turned to the new Spiritualism for comfort She opened Knowles’ End to Theosophists, card readers, and spirit ifted of these mediums was a wealthynamed Mary White, who had an uncanny ability to put Ida in communication with her relatives on the other side There was no rapping of the table, nor cheap levitation tricks, as so ift and a warm de her "sister" Once again, the house was filled with activity, and Knowles’ End becas, séances, and all sorts of esoteric and occult gatherings Ida felt certain it was only a matter of tilory Mary had all but told her that the spirits assured it

Mary had a companion in these endeavors, aeyes, a Mr Hobbes He was, she promised, a prophet A holy man Certainly, he spenttheir séances, he fell into strange trances and spoke in words Ida did not comprehend--proof, Mary told her, of his connection to the spirit realm

But Ida’s expenses were many--spirit mediums were costly--and the Knowles fortune dwindled quickly Ida would be socially humiliated if her debts were to become known It was Mary who offered to buy Knowles’ End and take Ida on as a boarder in order to spare her reputation Mary agreed to let Ida have her favorite room, the attic room with the view of the city, and told her not to worry, that she would pay the back taxes and Mr Hobbes would take on the hard work needed to make Knowles’ End, which had fallen into disrepair, beautiful again