Rabbit Hole

“Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.” – Alice

* * * * *

“What do we have here?” Christopher Allen whispered to himself as he popped open the black metal box. Inside, he found an odd collection of items with a note lying on top written in sprawling cursive:

Property of high sentimental value.

If found please call

213-555-1987

Daydreaming wasn’t something Chris did much…that was, until his beloved wife had passed. Since then, his mind had made a habit of wandering, perhaps searching for an alternate world that had more to offer than the barren one he now endured without Veronica. Chris had been swimming in his own thoughts again behind the controls of the excavator when he had heard the clamor of metal hitting metal.

“Chris!” came the familiar voice of the superintendent. “What the hell happened?”

“It’s fine,” Chris said, breathing a sigh of relief. He removed his hard hat and ran his hands through his matted black hair. “These knickknacks were buried on-site.”

“Hmm,” Mitchell groaned without taking his eyes off Chris.

“I wasn’t all there, Mitch,” Chris mumbled, disappointed.

“Lucky for us, it’s just a box,” said Mitchell. “Could’ve just as easily been a water main or a gas line. You lucked out, Chris. That could’ve meant millions in damages, and your ass on the street. What’s in there anyway?”

They noted the objects in the case: a battered sheriff’s badge in the shape of a five-pointed star; a brown harmonica with golden edges; a pink cigarette lighter; a golden compass rose; and a wooden baton that looked a like a wand.

“Looks like junk to me,” Chris thought.

“One man’s junk is another man’s treasure, huh?” Mitchell said. “Day shift arrives in an hour. Are you sure you’re okay?”

“Yeah, go ahead,” Chris answered. “I’m about done here, too. I might call this number just to be sure it’s not someone’s life savings.”

“You’ve got to be more careful operating that excavator, Chris. I won’t be able to cover for you if you screw up again.”

Mitchell patted his friend on the shoulder and left him alone with the case. Chris felt an irresistible magnetism toward the collection of objects, though he couldn’t venture a guess as to their meaning or value. He was reaching for his cell phone before his awareness caught up.

It rang once. Chris wondered if it was already too late to turn back from that odd sense of inevitability. He had a strange sensation as though a current was pulling him toward something he couldn’t comprehend. It rang twice. Chris felt an instant of self-doubt and considered hanging up before opening Pandora’s box any further. But the box was already open, wasn’t it?

There was no third ring.

All of Chris’s brain noise suddenly ceased and his attention was fixated on the quiet breath he barely made out on the other end of the line. Someone was there, but was waiting for Chris to break the silence. He wondered if his curiosity would lead him down the same path as that unfortunate – and notorious – cat. But what use was caution now?

“Hello? Who’s this?” Chris asked with much less conviction than he wanted.

“Did you find it?” came a feeble female voice in an accent. “My treasure trove? You found my trove?”

“Yes,” Chris responded, suddenly aware of how rough his own voice sounded by comparison. “I think so.”

“Are the contents secure? The sheriff’s star? The harmonica?”

“Yes, how would you like me to get these to you?”

“Do you know The Ink Bard?” the woman asked.

“The bookshop downtown?”

“Yes, would you be so kind as to meet my husband just before the shop closes this evening? That’s 8:00 pm tonight. We can offer a modest fee, if we can trouble you.”

“That’s not necessary,” Chris said. “But I can be there, sure.”

“The Coalition thanks you.”

A click ended the phone call. The Coalition. At the sound of the familiar name, what had started as a harmless school boy curiosity had evolved into dread.

* * * * *

Chris usually napped after working the graveyard shift, but sleep didn’t come that morning. The afternoon hours passed laboriously. After the sun finally ceded its celestial throne to the full moon, Chris found himself on the corner of Spring and Fifth Street, waiting for someone to notice his abnormally clunky case. In his attempt to be unsuspicious, Chris felt all the more so and noticed every passerby’s stare on him like a laser beam. Only a few stragglers dawdled over last-minute purchases, shortly before the bookstore’s closing hour.

“Mr. Allen?” asked a resonant bass voice.

Chris turned and saw a broad-shouldered bald man wearing a tailored suit. The man had a perfectly trimmed moustache and sharp grey eyes. Chris thought his visitor’s face seemed familiar, but couldn’t quite place from where.

“Yes…?” Chris asked.

“Lucky guess, old boy,” the man responded. “Not many men stand outside bookstores at this hour with such strange looking cases.”

After a split second of silence, Chris released his nervous laughter. He noticed the bald man restrained from joining him.

“Are you…are you Coalition?” he asked on unsure footing.

“My wife co-owns this establishment,” the bald man replied without acknowledging Chris’s question. “She’d like to give you her personal thanks, if you have a moment.”

“Fine,” Chris obliged.

The gentlemen shook hands and the bald man led Chris into the store. In the back corner, a narrow spiral staircase descended into the floor to a basement. Something in Chris’s mind attempted in vain to trigger his caution, but a foreboding sense of inevitability swelled again. He may as well have been the white rabbit falling down the rabbit hole. Indeed, he was…Chris was already halfway down the staircase before he realized he was moving at all. He looked back up at the bookshop’s interior and couldn’t conceal his uneasiness.

“I admit the setting is strange,” the bald man offered. “This bookstore was constructed on the ruins of an old masonic temple.”

“Is that right?” Chris answered.

“Indeed. My wife values her privacy and she considers the basement somewhat of a personal office space.”

The rabbit hole went further still. Chris followed his host as they continued their descent. With each step, the space became mustier, until a raw humidity made it difficult to breathe. At the base of the staircase, the bald man said, “She’ll see you briefly now.”

Chris proceeded into a chamber that resembled a medieval prison cell. Lined by white stone, the circular chamber was lit by torches hung at even intervals along its perimeter. The only other thing in the room was a marble altar behind which stood Miss Havisham incarnate. The woman had straggly grey hair and was dressed in a long white nightgown. Chris almost recognized the woman behind the unkempt strands, but again couldn’t place from where.

“My apologies, Mr. Allen,” she said behind an eerie smile.

“I – I’m sorry?” Chris stuttered.

“Could I bother you to place the case on the altar?”

Even if Chris had words, he couldn’t have uttered them if he’d tried. All he could manage was what the lady had asked of him. She clicked the case open and inspected its contents. Seemingly pleased, she turned the case towards Chris and proceeded. “My sincerest thanks for finding my treasure trove. I cherish it so.”

Curiosity and fear battled within him. He felt a compulsive need to see his journey through and yet he was legitimately frightened. He resolved to uncover the truth about the case and its relationship to the Coalition. Oh yes, and he vowed to steer clear of daydreaming in the future. Hadn’t that been the first in this odd row of dominoes? If he hadn’t been daydreaming, he would’ve dismounted his excavator at shift’s end that morning. As it was, he was staring at a random box of random objects speaking to a random stranger hundreds of feet below a random bookstore.

“Do you prefer Chris or Christopher, Mr. Allen?” the lady asked.

“Dealer’s choice,” Chris answered.

A realization slowly dawned on him. How was it that these two complete strangers knew his name? Had he said it inadvertently on the phone or just moments before outside the store? Chris wondered how he could have two opposing desires simultaneously. He longed to run and yet refused to move his feet from where they were planted.

“I prefer Christopher,” she decided. “Reminiscent of the saint, at one time the patron saint of travelers, if I’m not mistaken. May I ask what you’re fiddling with, Christopher?”

“Oh, this?” Chris replied. In the midst of his anxiety, he hadn’t noticed he was twisting his pin between his fingers. He removed it from this shirt and handed it to the old woman behind the altar. “My late wife gave me this on our second date.”

“Wings?” she whispered.

“Angel’s wings,” Chris added.

“For the saint?”

“From a saint, more like.”

“It’s…perfect,” she gasped, fighting back a smile.

It was that look-what-I-just-did expression of achievement that enlightened Chris as to who she was…that was the same moment a piercing pain cracked his skull. He collapsed from the dizzying blow, and noticed a warm sensation trickling down the back of his neck. The bald man walked into Chris’s narrowing field of vision, dropping a torch stick as he approached the woman. Chris detected the advent of an eerie finality as he fought to remain conscious. His eyes were fixed on the objects in the case and two palpable truths began to take shape.

He had been deceived.

And he knew what was going to happen.

“But you’re…” he tried to say. “Coalition. Victor said that...”

“I know what Victor said,” the woman cut him off, her voice raised in anger. “I’m sorry he deceived you, Christopher. You aren’t the first, and you won’t be the last. Forgive me, but this is for your own protection and for the protection of the ones you still love.”

The movement was so sudden that Chris didn’t see it unfold through his failing vision. The woman stretched out her right arm, holding the pin in her palm. With her left, she held her right wrist while she muttered what seemed like an incantation. Chris felt as though anesthesia coursed through his veins, draining his consciousness in preparation for a surgical operation. His energy was being coaxed from him. Before he could have another thought, darkness enveloped him.

He found the bottom of his rabbit hole.

* * * * *

“Welcome back, ladies and gents!” The anchorwoman was positively giddy. “A Saint Among Us is the book, Nora Moret is the author. It’s been a while since you’ve come out with something new. Where did you get this brilliant idea?”

Nora gritted her teeth and flashed a fake smile to the host. She found her husband slightly off camera shaking his bald head, and she rolled her eyes at him knowingly.

“I steal them, Diane,” Nora laughed. “How else!?”

The studio audience erupted with laughter as did the giddy host. Eventually, she straightened out and continued with the interview. Who besides the late Christopher Allen could know Nora Moret was telling the truth?