Orpheus - Haunting the Dead.pdf - Dice

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CORRIDORS
skipping over the next room in the sequence. But imagine
if you could move freely through the corridors, from one
room to another, one floor to another, re-visiting some
spaces, skipping ahead to others.”
Ed sees another exit, a smaller doorway flanked on
either side by a sagging bookcase and an empty hat
rack. “I just need to find a telephone,” he says. “Somehow,
I need to get someone’s attention, ask them to
make a phone call, okay?”
Goodman ignores him. “Death brings us gifts, you
see. Some of us gain the gift to peer into other moments,
other rooms, if you will. To steal a look around
the corners of time. I’ve done this, and when I do,
forwards or backwards, I see you standing there. And I
see you looking back at me, and past me, into some dark
corner my eyes can’t quite pierce. Some deep nook that
holds the key to everything.”
Ed is shaking his head. “I don’t know what you’re
talking about.”
“Your father was a tall fellow, thick mustache, red
hair and walked with a slight limp? Your mother
favored green blouses and cracked her knuckles when
she was nervous? This was a while ago, but am I right?”
Ed stands, balls his fists as Goodman smiles at him.
“How do you know that? Tell me how you knew that!”
“Tell us what happened when you were seven, Mr.
Lighthouse. Tell us about that.” He points to the scar
on Ed’s neck.
“I… I don’t’ remember much about it…”
“You know how it happened, don’t’ you?”
“It—it was a dog. My parents told me a dog attacked
me, almost killed me.”
“Where did this happen?”
“I can’t remember. We—we moved around a lot
until I was ten, my father had trouble finding work….”
“It happened here, Mr. Lighthouse. It happened in
the courtyard behind this hotel. Your mother and
father worked here then. I remember them, even
without peeking around time’s corners. Your parents
were nice people.”
HAUNTING THE DEAD
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