Black Creek Crossing by John Saul Read Free Book Online

his usual carping at her, Myra couldn’t help but let a little ray of optimism touch her soul; perhaps today was going to be the day when things began to get better for all of them.
    Marty Sullivan pulled the battered Chevelle that had served as the family car since before Angel had been born to a rattling stop in front of 122 Black Creek Road. Joni Fletcher’s brand new Volvo was already there, and Marty’s lips twisted into a sneer as he eyed it. “Don’t see why people think those are so hot,” he observed. “Bet it won’t hold up anywhere near as good as old Gracie, here.”
    Myra, already getting out of the car to greet her sister, ignored the remark. Joni was coming down the front steps of the house.
    Angel, still sitting in the backseat of the Chevelle, barely heard her father.
A house,
she thought.
It’s a real house—not even a duplex.
And even better, it was all by itself in the middle of a small lawn surrounded by a forest of maple trees, with the nearest neighbors so far away you couldn’t even see them. Well, maybe you could see them, but you wouldn’t hear them at all, which meant that for the first time in her life she wouldn’t have to worry that no matter how low she turned the volume on her radio, the neighbors were going to complain.
    And then her father would yell at her, and then—
    She shut down the next thought before it could form in her mind and forced her attention back to the house.
There were some things it was better just not to think about.
    “Well, don’t just sit there,” her father growled. “Might as well see what it is got her prayin’ so early this morning.” Getting out of the car he eyed the structure balefully, and as Angel scrambled out of the backseat, she could almost hear him thinking up arguments against the house.
    “I think it’s beautiful,” she declared, believing that even though it wasn’t true, the house she saw in her mind’s eye existed somewhere beneath the tired facade she now beheld. All it needed was a straight roof beam, a fresh coat of paint, and new shutters, and it could be even prettier than she imagined.
    “You think lots of stuff,” Marty Sullivan growled. “Thinkin’ it don’t make it so.”
    By the time Angel and her father got to the front door, Myra and Joni were already inside.
    “It’s not big,” Angel heard her aunt saying. “But it’s certainly big enough for the three of you.”
    “And it’s a lot bigger than what we have now,” Myra said, her sharp eyes taking in the empty living room. It echoed the simple rectangular form of the house itself, with a fieldstone-faced fireplace in the southern wall. The firebox was small, the bricks that lined it blackened by decades of flames, and above it, set into the stone facade, there was a rough-hewn oak mantel.
    “I’m told it’s original,” Joni Fletcher said, crossing to the mantel and stroking its ancient patina with gentle fingers, almost as if she were stroking the soft fur of a mink coat. “I can’t swear to it, of course—the house has changed hands so many times and had so much done to it that it’s hard to tell what’s original.”
    “That’s the real thing,” Marty Sullivan declared, striking the mantel with enough force to make Joni snatch her hand away. “Can’t get oak like that anymore. And you can believe it’s twice as big as it looks—there’s gotta be more’n half of it buried in that stone.”
    Angel saw her mother and aunt glance at each other. Her aunt winked, and when her mother crossed her fingers, Angel did too.
    They went through the rest of the house, which consisted of the living room in front downstairs, a dining room and kitchen at the back, and three bedrooms and a bathroom upstairs. There was a basement below the house, which was a single cavernous chamber walled with concrete, and the huge oaken timbers were clearly visible above, timbers that Marty was certain were as ancient as the one that formed the mantel.
    “Probably