Read Online Once Beyond a Time by Ann Tatlock - Free Book Online

them, and I hear the boy cry, “Wait, Dad!” and the next thing I know the barrel of a pistol is pointed directly at Sheldon.
    Linda and I both scream and drop to the floor, and I hear the sound of the gun going off, and I hear myself crying, “Sheldon, dear God, Sheldon!” and I’m trembling and crazy with fear. This man, whoever he is, is going to keep shooting until he has killed us all. In a split second I think of Digger upstairs and pray to God that somehow he survives, and I think of Carl, whom I will never see again, and I scream with my face to the floor until I realize that the room is quiet and whatever has been happening is over.
    I lift my head. The strangers are gone. Linda is crawling toward me across the room, tears rolling down her cheeks. I rise to my knees, and she falls into my arms and, oh, how I’ve wanted to hold you, but not like this.Not because of something like this. Together, as though we are one person, we turn to face Sheldon, afraid and trembling at the thought of what we will see. We are still kneeling on the floor, huddled in fear, gasping for air, expecting to see blood—blood everywhere and Sheldon’s body slumped over the footstool.
    But he is standing by the chair, unharmed. He comes to us, kneels down, puts his arms around us.
    “You’re all right,” I whisper.
    “Yes.” He sounds amazed.
    “You weren’t hit?”
    “No.”
    “How can that be?”
    Linda pulls back from us and looks at her father, then at the now empty hall. “What just happened, Dad?”
    Sheldon shakes his head slowly. “I don’t know, sweetheart.”
    “Where’d they go?” I wonder aloud.
    “I don’t know that either,” Sheldon replies. “But—” He frowns and slowly stands. “Let me just check something.”
    He walks to the reading chair—no, he walks behind it. I can’t imagine what he’s doing. I watch silently. He seems to be studying the painting on the wall. Then he reaches up and grabs it by the frame and eases it off the nail where it has been resting for who knows how long. There, behind the painting, is what appears to be a bullet hole, a splintered circle in the wood.
    “Jeff said this place is haunted,” Linda reminds us quietly.
    “We don’t believe in ghosts,” Sheldon says.
    “Maybe
you
don’t, but how do you explain what just happened?”
    Sheldon takes his eyes off the wall and turns his gaze squarely on us. “I don’t have an explanation for this right now. But there’s got to be one, and we’re going to find out what it is.”

14
Sheldon
    Wednesday, July 17–Thursday, July 18, 1968
    I HANG THE picture back on the nail and with that, the three of us look at each other and wonder what to do next. What does one do when the inexplicable happens? The thought of turning back to the business at hand—the brushing of teeth, turning off lights, going to bed—is laughable. Minutes pass. No one moves or speaks. Our eyes alone shift left and right as we continue to gaze at each other, hoping one or the other will find words to make sense of what we have just seen.
    At length, Linda says, “I’m scared, Dad.”
    “I know,” I say. Because I’m afraid too. Terrified, really.
    “Maybe we should just get out of here,” Meg suggests. “Just leave, you know?”
    My wife and daughter have their arms wrapped around each other. I haven’t seen them like that for a very long time. They are pale and wide-eyed, and yet it is a beautiful sight. “Where would we go?” I say.
    “Steve and Donna’s. They’ll take us in for the night.”
    I think about that for a moment. “Let’s not do anything rash.” As soon as the words are out, I wonder why I’ve said them. Meg must feel the same because her jaw drops.
    “Rash? You just got shot at by a man who suddenly appeared and justas suddenly disappeared, and you don’t want to do anything rash?”
    I’m trying to decide how to respond when Linda interrupts. “Dad, do you think Digger’s all right?”
    Digger! I rush to