The Closet

Chapter 19

            Marius was disturbed.  He walked home and sat in his favorite chair thinking. He realized that his rash action of locking the intruder in the chamber was wrong. He did not want to perpetuate the evil acts which had taken place there so long ago. He resolved to return to the door and to open it; to let the intruder out. He would accept whatever the consequences might be. Perhaps it was time to abandon his mission now instead of waiting for the time in the not-too-distant future when he could no longer carry it out. Perhaps it was time for people to really know what lay deep beneath the city.

            His wife, Alexandra, had been his loving companion for 53 years. She was strong and supportive, but knew little of what he did under the ground. She knew that her father had given himself a commission to watch over secrets in the cave below, but she did not know what the secrets were. When her father died, she was not surprised to find that her husband had been given the commission by her father and she observed with pride the reliability with which he had carried it out through all these years. Now, despite his age, she saw the dogged determination that he pursued the obligation with.  And yet she saw something else in him today. She could see by the sad and troubled look on his face that something was bothering him deeply. She and he had grown to be one and she could feel the uncertainty he felt. 

            She asked him in their native German, “Marius, is everything OK?”

            He replied, likewise in German, “I have fulfilled the responsibility your father gave me long ago as best as I could, yet this morning I committed an offensive act in that duty. I have decided I was wrong. I must go and make amends for my mistake.”

            She held him for a moment, looked into his eyes, and then let him go. This sense of duty and morality was one of the many things that she loved about this wonderful man who was her husband.

            His problem was the lock. He had no key and was not physically strong enough to break it off. The only thing he could think of was his old pistol.  If he could shoot the lock and break it, he would be able to free his temporary prisoner. He went to the dresser drawer and lifted up his clothes. The gun had rested there for decades, with the old ammunition beside it, and he picked it up and took it to his workshop. He oiled it to make sure it would function, wiped it off, and loaded it. Then he bid Alexandra goodbye as he re-entered the cave and began to climb down for the second time in a day. He had just begun to climb when he heard a distant explosion echoing through the tunnels. He had no idea what that might be, but he quickened his pace.