The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson Read Free Book Online Page B

from the city.”
    â€œYeah?”
    â€œDo you like it here?”
    â€œIt’s all right,” the girl said. She looked again at the man, who was listening carefully. “Not much to do.”
    â€œHow large a town is it?”
    â€œPretty small. You want more coffee?” This was addressed to the man, who was rattling his cup against his saucer, and Eleanor took a first, shuddering sip of her own coffee and wondered how he could possibly want more.
    â€œDo you have a lot of visitors around here?” she asked when the girl had filled the coffee cup and gone back to lounge against the shelves. “Tourists, I mean?”
    â€œWhat for?” For a minute the girl flashed at her, from what might have been an emptiness greater than any Eleanor had ever known. “Why would anybody come here? ” She looked sullenly at the man and added, “There’s not even a movie.”
    â€œBut the hills are so pretty. Mostly, with small out-of-the-way towns like this one, you’ll find city people who have come and built themselves homes up in the hills. For privacy.”
    The girl laughed shortly. “Not here they don’t.”
    â€œOr remodeling old houses—”
    â€œPrivacy,” the girl said, and laughed again.
    â€œIt just seems surprising,” Eleanor said, feeling the man looking at her.
    â€œYeah,” the girl said. “If they’d put in a movie, even.”
    â€œI thought,” Eleanor said carefully, “that I might even look around. Old houses are usually cheap, you know, and it’s fun to make them over.”
    â€œNot around here,” the girl said.
    â€œThen,” Eleanor said, “there are no old houses around here? Back in the hills?”
    â€œNope.”
    The man rose, taking change from his pocket, and spoke for the first time. “People leave this town,” he said. “They don’t come here.”
    When the door closed behind him the girl turned her flat eyes back to Eleanor, almost resentfully, as though Eleanor with her chatter had driven the man away. “He was right,” she said finally. “They go away, the lucky ones.”
    â€œWhy don’t you run away?” Eleanor asked her, and the girl shrugged.
    â€œWould I be any better off?” she asked. She took Eleanor’s money without interest and returned the change. Then, with another of her quick flashes, she glanced at the empty plates at the end of the counter and almost smiled. “He comes in every day,” she said. When Eleanor smiled back and started to speak, the girl turned her back and busied herself with the cups on the shelves, and Eleanor, feeling herself dismissed, rose gratefully from her coffee and took up her car keys and pocketbook. “Good-by,” Eleanor said, and the girl, back still turned, said, “Good luck to you. I hope you find your house.”

5
    The road leading away from the gas station and the church was very poor indeed, deeply rutted and rocky. Eleanor’s little car stumbled and bounced, reluctant to go farther into these unattractive hills, where the day seemed quickly drawing to an end under the thick, oppressive trees on either side. They do not really seem to have much traffic on this road, Eleanor thought wryly, turning the wheel quickly to avoid a particularly vicious rock ahead; six miles of this will not do the car any good; and for the first time in hours she thought of her sister and laughed. By now they would surely know that she had taken the car and gone, but they would not know where; they would be telling each other incredulously that they would never have suspected it of Eleanor. I would never have suspected it of myself, she thought, laughing still; everything is different, I am a new person, very far from home. “In delay there lies no plenty; . . . present mirth hath present laughter. . . .” And she gasped as the car cracked against a rock and reeled back