Stirrings in the Black House

  Stirrings in the Black House

  Ambrose Ibsen

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Thank You For Reading!

  Copyright © 2017 by Ambrose Ibsen

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Cover by Coverquill.com

  Created with Vellum

  For Haruki and Seiji

  1

  I haven't got too many firm memories of my Uncle Gustav, but you know which one tends to stick out most for me?

  It's an old one. I was probably fourteen or fifteen years old, and was performing Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 20 in D Minor at a university hall; my first real performance since taking up formal piano lessons at five. Truth be told, I don't remember the performance very well. I'm sure that I played well enough to impress the adults in the room, and that I received a lot of applause when all was said and done. Winning over your run-of-the-mill classical music listener, the sort who can't differentiate between a Bach and a Mozart playing overhead at the grocery store, isn't a hard thing to do if you play quickly, and with confidence.

  But you know who you can't fool? A trained ear. A maestro.

  What I do remember about that gig, with the utmost clarity, was the cold way my Uncle Gustav, a composer of some renown, merely shrugged when it was through. My mother had begged him to come, had wanted for him to lavish some praise on his only nephew, who was himself a budding musician. His advice to me after that performance? “Study hard. Piano will make a fine hobby for you, but you've no career in music, lad.”

  Looking back on it now, maybe I should've listened to the man.

  I beat myself up after that, practiced harder than I'd ever done before, but Uncle Gustav never did bother coming to any of my other performances. Even in my university years, when I was tagged as an up-and-coming talent and words like virtuoso were thrown around, he acted like I didn't exist. He was busy touring the world then, conducting for the Boston Orchestra and the New York Philharmonic, and spent his precious off-time composing his own works.

  He never married, never visited on the holidays. I don't think my parents and I even got a Christmas card from the guy in all those years.

  That was why I was so shocked to hear that he was leaving me a house.

  It was a cold and rainy day in the fall when Gustav died. Like every other milestone in the man's impressive life, my parents and I first heard of his passing on the news. He'd been on a plane bound for Vienna, where he was planning on recording with the Vienna Philharmonic, when he was taken by a sudden stroke mid-flight.

  There was a funeral service. My parents and I couldn't afford the plane tickets to Vienna and had to watch it live-streamed on the internet. Somehow, I don't think Gustav minded too much. There were more than enough high-profile mourners in attendance to offset our absence.

  A Mr. Sherman Randall, a lawyer hired as executor of Uncle Gustav's estate, got ahold of us a few weeks later. To my mother, his only sibling, he left a small sum. And to me, his only nephew, he left something most unexpected.

  “Your uncle was in possession of a house out near Portland, Oregon. It's a two-story place, just outside the suburb of Newberg. A somewhat rural spot. Emil, your uncle wished to leave that residence to you. I understand he used it as a home during his breaks in conducting, and did much of his composing there. It is unfurnished, but he stipulated in his will that it should be left to you upon his passing.”

  I couldn't believe my ears. My uncle and I had seen each other three or four times in my entire life; he probably wouldn't have been able to pick me out of a lineup, frankly. That he'd left me something in his will—a house, no less—incited in me a strange mix of feelings.

  Chief among my feelings at this bequeathal was happiness. For the past few months, I'd been having financial troubles, owing to my lack of work. An infamously blown performance had left my professional status reeling and my confidence lacking. I hadn't been able to land a new gig since suffering a nervous break during a one-night performance with the Baltimore Chamber Orchestra, where a niggling wrist injury and an over-dependence on Percocet had seen me botch Chopin's Nocturnes. This inheritance meant that I now had a place to live, and the minute the ink was dry I jumped ship on my studio lease, more than one month in arrears, and packed what I could into the trunk of my Civic.

  But there were other feelings that accosted me, too. As I sat there in disbelief at the lawyer's office, I wondered just why the hell the man had left me a house in the first place. I hate to sound ungrateful, but seeing as how Gustav and I hadn't been close or friendly, my first question was, “What's wrong with the house?”

  The lawyer assured me the place was in good working order—if not a little dusty—and that, despite the lack of furniture, there was something included in it. “There is a piano in the house that is yours as well, Emil. The will makes no direct mention of the model, but as it was owned by a world-class composer, I expect it's an exceedingly valuable piece. Do take good care of it, young man.”

  Papers were signed, perfunctory handshakes given all around and items changed hands.

  That was how I came to inherit my Uncle Gustav's place, the Weatherby House.

  My parents and I went out to lunch after that fateful meeting with Mr. Randall, and my mother spoke kindly of my notoriously churlish uncle in ways she'd never done while he'd lived. “You see,” she told me, her small hands dabbing tears from her cheeks with a napkin, “your uncle did care about you. He recognized your talent after all these years, Emil. He wanted to look after the next generation of musicians in our family. He was a good man.”

  I was in no position to argue, having received a free house and piano from him, however I was in no rush to canonize my uncle, either. “I'm thankful,” I admitted. “I've never been so far out West as Oregon, but maybe it'll be good for me. Lawyer said the house is a little out of the way, so perhaps I'll be able to get myself sorted out there and get back to the piano.” I flexed my hands, gave my wrist a slight turn and stretched my fingers one by one. The soreness was gone, thankfully. And so was the last of my Percocet. If I was ever going to return to the piano, now was the time.

  It didn't take me long to pack. My clothes, computer, numerous books on music theory and the mattress of my old futon got tucked into the Civic on a cool autumn day and I exchanged long hugs with my parents, who urged me to drive safe and get back to practicing my playing. The two of them wanted to see me succeed so badly; though they never said it outright, I knew they'd always wished to see my name in lights like my uncle's had been. Raising a concert pianist is neither a cheap nor simple thing, and both of my parents had undergone a great deal of hardship in fostering my skill over the years. Paying for instruments, lessons, funding travel to different performances had been a drain on the family for about fifteen years. I was twenty-three years old now, and felt like I owed them, majorly.

  Checking my phone for directions every twenty
or so miles, I hopped onto the expressway and started driving west. It was a grueling drive; 48 hours, roughly, coming from Rhode Island. I stayed a night in a budget motel and broke up the trip further by taking hours-long naps at highway rest stops. Finally, more than three days after setting off, I arrived in Oregon.

  Stopping at a gas station, I asked for directions into the suburb of Newberg. I drove around in a daze for almost an hour before I stumbled into the city, and once there, I stopped at a convenience store to ask a middle-aged clerk with a pot belly where I might find the Weatherby House. I'd scrawled the address on a slip of paper, but as I went to hand it to him, I realized he didn't need it.

  He knew right where the Weatherby House was. Everyone in town did, he said. What he wanted to know was why I was going there.

  I made up some answer, unsure of how to take this suspicious turn of his, and he eventually offered up some simple directions—through not without first urging me not to linger there, to be careful. He had a look on his face like the old house was teeming with vipers, and when I asked him, “Why the need for such caution?” he simply shook his head.

  I'll admit, when I hopped back into the car, drove for twenty minutes down a country road lined mostly in overgrown grass and pulled into the gravel driveway that fronted the address I'd been given by the lawyer, I suddenly understood what the pot-bellied clerk had been going on about.

  The Weatherby House struck a large, imposing figure in the surrounding emptiness. It looked like the sort of place that just wanted to be left alone, and had I not just inherited it, I'd have been happy to get back into my car and do just that. It wasn't a welcoming place by any stretch. If that house could see, then its stare would be absolutely penetrating, even from the drive. Windows on both levels seemed pinched into the exterior as if in a scowl, and the black door fronting the property, taken for a mouth, was large and unkind. I looked it up and down, sitting on the hood of my Civic, and for the first time since I'd signed for the thing I felt my spirits dampened.

  I clutched at the keyring in my pocket. “So, this is home now, eh?”

  2

  I struck out towards the house, pacing up a few soiled concrete steps to the door. Black windows flanked the entrance on both sides. I walked between the two of them, tried to have a look inside before opening the door, but couldn't make out a thing. There were no curtains or blinds in place, just a darkness my tired eyes couldn't penetrate. As I slid the key into the brassy deadbolt, the autumn sun vanished wholesale behind a veil of clouds and thrust the property into unwelcome shadow. The dying grass, the dim exterior of the place, lost all color just then and I shuddered a little as I shouldered the door open.

  It gave with a creak, the hinges in need of some oil. As the door fell open and I stepped into the foyer, my eyes still grappled with the low light. Whoever had designed this house hadn't done so with an eye towards natural lighting. The floors, a polished but dusty wood, squealed beneath the soles of my Sketchers as I peered about. There was a light fixture, some kind of tacky wrought iron thing, hanging from the ceiling, though no flipping of the switch on the wall could get it to turn on. I soon realized why.

  There were no light bulbs in the damn thing. I cursed under my breath, treading deeper into the murky house and approaching the stairs. The bannister was made of thick wood and was dressed in an undisturbed layer of dust which I promptly dipped my finger into, drawing a squiggly line. By the looks of it, my uncle hadn't even been in this house at all in the months prior to his death.

  How long had it been since anyone had set foot in Weatherby House, I wondered?

  I bypassed the stairs and started hacking as I started for the dusty kitchen ahead. A year or two, at least, I thought.

  The kitchen was every bit as dusty as I'd expected, and was bathed in the selfsame darkness which seemed to cling imperiously to the house's every corner. I walked up to the counter, gave the tap a go, and was surprised to find semi-fresh-looking water sputtering forth. While I let it run, I reached over and wrenched open the kitchen window, hoping that some fresh air might serve to banish the dust. You're going to end up with black lung, staying in a place like this, I thought. You'd have to spend all day wiping the house down to get rid of this dust... There aren't enough Swiffers in the world for this mess...

  There was a load of counter space, all of it a nice, shining marble beneath the veneer of dust. The cabinetry and fixtures were all of attractive make; a thorough clean and some mood lighting would have made it a model kitchen. The appliances, too, were very nice, though they looked as though they'd never been used. There was a dusty sales sticker on the outside of the dishwasher, and the surface of the stove looked pristine beneath the dust. I couldn't help but laugh at the thought of my uncle standing in this very room, attempting to cook something. The very idea was outrageous. The man had been absorbed always in his work and had been on the gaunt side all his life. My mother claimed that even as a teenager, Uncle Gustav had skipped meals to practice the piano and had to be dragged out of his room to eat.

  Ensuring that all of the cabinets were empty I walked into the next room, a small space with no clear-cut function, which bore only a single window. I slid it open and continued on my way, entering into what looked like a massive living room. There were no furnishings, of course, but in the corner, near a sooty fireplace with a dust-ladened mantle, I caught something lurking in the murk that took my breath away. Even in the low lighting I knew what it was, and I approached it with quivering hands.

  My uncle's piano.

  Though, to call it a simple piano would have been a travesty.

  It was no ordinary piano, no; it was a grand piano, fit for a world-class composer. A Steinway. I paced around the black behemoth, running my hands against its dusty exterior and feeling my heart go to work in my chest like a jackhammer.

  To someone who doesn't know pianos, my reaction to this thing must have seemed overblown, however the significance—and more specifically, the value—of this specimen could not be overstated. Steinways of this kind were worth an enormous sum, prized by famous musicians for their craftsmanship and sound. I'd played a couple in concert halls and the keys on them felt like nothing else in the world. The cheaper models easily went for as much as a new Lexus, but those built out of Mahogany, like this one, approached a hundred grand or more on the market.

  And one of them had just unexpectedly fallen into my lap.

  I felt woozy, like some lottery junkie who'd just hit the Mega Millions, and touched the fallboard that covered the keys. This was a master's instrument; in the world of music there were none finer than this. I backed away from it a few paces, heart still racing, and wondered if I was even worthy of owning such a thing. My uncle, Gustav Abbado, had been a legendary conductor and composer; his name was a byword for classical music in the modern world. Standing before the piano at which he built his legacy I was not a little awed. Me, his nephew, whose talent he had deemed rather minor.

  I opened the two windows in the room and turned to have a look at the piano once more, intimidated by it now. The instrument was probably worth as much as the house it sat in, and would require professional maintenance. Feeling very much unworthy of such a treasure, I spared it one more look and continued on my maiden tour of the house, opening the remaining downstairs windows and hiking up the stairs.

  What struck me most about the house, aside from the priceless piano and the impressive dust that pervaded, was that virtually nothing of its former owner remained. My uncle had, after his previous time at Weatherby House, taken everything with him, apparently. The closets in the four upstairs bedrooms were empty of clothing. I didn't find so much as a stray button as I wandered through their midnight depths. The rooms themselves were all of a uniform and generous size, and it dawned on me as I walked that this was way more house than I needed.

  There were two bathrooms in the place; one in the upstairs and one on the lower level. Only one featured a shower, and I was relieved to find that the f
aucet, after some initial pipe-rattling, provided fresh water. One thing that baffled, even unsettled me, as I walked through the rooms was the complete absence of light bulbs in all of the fixtures. As things stood I wasn't sure whether there was any electricity in the house. Probably I'd have to make some calls and have the local electric company hook everything up.

  That was money I didn't have. I'd worked odd jobs in the past few months but had blown a lot of that money on Percocet and living expenses. My rent had gone overdue and I'd been faced with the prospect of crashing on my mother's sofa semi-permanently when this house had come down the pipeline. I wasn't about to complain, but my meager savings were only going to keep this place lit up for a short while. I'd have to find myself a job; not an easy task, seeing as how I was from out of town. Probably I should have considered that before driving all the way out to Oregon...

  I forced all thoughts of job-seeking from my mind and focused instead on my good fortune. Though dark and dusty, this house and the land it sat on was all mine. The lawyer had told me that the property included roughly two acres of land, total, and that my nearest neighbor was a good mile or so away. If I could work up the nerve to try out my uncle's Steinway, then I could play as loudly as I wanted without bugging anyone. Moreover, out here, away from the hustle and bustle of a big city, it was easy to focus on just one thing. No wonder my uncle had liked this place so well; he could be alone here, concentrate on his work and nothing else. It was the perfect place for a reclusive genius to live.

  I didn't have much to my name and I moved it all in within the course of a half-hour. In that time, the sun didn't come back out, and seemed to slump in the sky. I drove around in circles through Newberg until I found a chain store and then popped in to buy some snacks, light bulbs and candles with a handful of crumpled singles; the latter just in case there was no electricity in the place.