“Secret room?” I my eyebrows shot up.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Dante closed the book and looked at me.
One of the best parts of buying old houses was the random stuff we came across. The journal was definitely unique, but if there was a secret room, that was like finding buried treasure. We carefully walked down the steps with our flashlights dancing in the dark, because outside of the initial walkthrough, we hadn’t done a lot of exploring. We normally preferred to take it one room at a time unless we were tearing down walls.
The basement was dark, and even our flashlights didn’t help much. Some parts of the house had been updated over the years, but the basement didn’t appear to have been touched. I felt around the right wall and Dante worked on the left. We were looking for something that sounded hollow, or a pattern that didn’t match the rest of the blocks on the wall.
“I think they had to replace some parts of this.” Dante moved his flashlight around the dark. “I see breaks in the pattern, but it’s not because there’s a room.”
“It’s possible that someone found the room a long time ago, and just opened it back up.” I sighed and moved my light along the wall.
“Sorry, I may have gotten your hopes up for nothing.” Dante kept moving through the damp space.
“Wait—hold on, I got something.” My hand tapped something that sounded different from the rest of the wall. “Look, see how this cuts out.”
“Nice!” Dante confirmed my suspicions. “But where’s the entrance?”
“It has to be around here somewhere.” I moved my flashlight up and down the hollow area.
“Oh man, I think I found it. This is crazy.” There was a thud, and then I saw the wall start moving.
“What the fuck.” I aimed my flashlight at the ground. “Half the wall is on a rail. That’s pretty advanced for this time period.”
“It keeps it hidden, that’s for sure.” Dante kept pushing the wall. “Surprisingly light, too.”
Dante and I got the wall open and then looked at each other for a moment before we turned our flashlights towards the room. My jaw fell open immediately. The center of the room had a thick wooden pillar lying horizontally across two smaller pillars that had been set up for support. Each side of the pillar had leather cuffs that appeared to be for someone’s hands and feet. I lifted my light to the wall and blinked in surprise when I saw a line of neatly organized implements of discipline. There were wooden canes of varying lengths and diameter, wooden paddles of all sizes, and a number of whips. Most of them appeared to be worn with age, and unlikely to be usable for what they were originally intended for.
“That’s certainly—interesting.” I blinked and looked at Dante.
“Fuck, she left a lot out of her journal!” Dante walked over to the wall and picked up a wooden cane.
“Being taken to the basement for a thrashing must have been a regular occurrence.” I joined him near the wall, and then something caught my attention on a small table. “What the fuck is this?”
“Damn, that’s hardcore.” Dante chuckled and put his flashlight on the circular piece of metal with decaying leather straps. “It looks like some sort of gag, but it’s metal.”
“This Mr. Herrington dude was a sadist.” I exhaled sharply. “His poor wife.”
“I’ve seen stuff more hardcore than this, but yeah—not really what I like. Based on what I read in the journal, though, I don’t think she was an unwilling participant in what went on down here.” Dante shrugged and walked back to the wall.
“Maybe, but it still seems a little extreme.” I shook my head back and forth. “We’ll take some pictures when we get the lights set up down here.”
“Who doesn’t want to buy a house with an ancient sex dungeon in it?” Dante reached up and pulled one of the paddles off the wall. “What does this remind you of?”
“Heh, it looks like the kind of paddle my principal had.” I watched as Dante gave it a few swings.
“The kind that would be used on a naughty cheerleader?” Dante smirked and traced the wood with his fingers. “It needs to be cleaned up, but it’s in pretty good shape.”
“I’m telling you, she’s not coming to your Funhouse.” I rolled my eyes and turned my flashlight back towards the basement.
“We’ll see.” Dante followed me towards the stairs.
You ran her off. She’s definitely not coming back.
Dante kept working on his Funhouse, which I still thought was a waste of time, and I kept working on stuff that was going to eventually bring us money. Dante took a trip into town to get some candy the day before Halloween, but I thought that was another waste. I doubted any parents were going to take the time to bring their kids to the big mansion on the hill just to collect a few pieces of candy. He returned with several shopping bags, and tried to show me what was inside them, but I wasn’t interested when I found out it was more Funhouse junk. I was anxious for Halloween to come and go so he would get back to work on the house—and disassemble the Funhouse, which had started to impede progress into the other rooms.
8
Brianna