“So am I.”
That changed the argument.
Samuel picked up the lantern.
Clara wrapped a wool shawl around the shoulders of her pale blue nightgown and followed several paces behind him.
They reached the pantry.
The door remained closed.
Samuel touched the latch.
Clara whispered, “Wait.”
“What?”
She pointed toward the floor.
That morning she had scattered flour in a thin line across the pantry threshold.
Not much.
Just enough to catch a footprint.
The flour remained smooth.
Samuel opened the door.
Nothing moved.
He raised the lantern.
And then both of them saw it.
Three potatoes sat on the middle shelf.
Clara gripped the doorway.
Samuel stared.
“They weren’t there.”
“No.”
“I checked.”
“I know.”
“They weren’t there twenty-three minutes ago.”
“I know.”
The potatoes were small.
Dirty.
Cold.
One still carried a tiny knot of frozen earth near an eye.
Samuel reached forward.
Clara stopped him.
“Not with your hand.”
He glanced at her.
“We already held the cabbage.”
“And perhaps that was foolish.”
Samuel used a folded cloth.
The potatoes felt ordinary.
That frightened him more.
If they had been glowing, warm, marked with blood, carved with symbols—anything impossible—his mind could have classified them with nightmares.
But they were simply potatoes.
Food.
The sort of thing anyone might put beside beans before supper.
Only nobody had.
Samuel looked behind the shelf.
Solid boards.
Above.
Nothing.
Below.
Nothing.
Clara took the lantern.
She examined the flour.
Still undisturbed.
“No one crossed this doorway.”
Samuel leaned against the pantry frame.
“Then they came through the wall.”
Clara looked at him.
“That was supposed to be sarcasm.”
He did not smile.
She didn’t either.
By morning, the potatoes were outside in a bucket.
Samuel had nailed a board over the pantry door.
Clara protested.
“What happens if we need the flour?”
“We use the other sack.”
“What if it lasts longer than two days?”
“Then I remove the board.”
“So the evil vegetable spirit is allowed only during business hours?”
Samuel hammered another nail.
“Mocking me will not improve this.”
“It improves me.”
The board remained.
Nothing appeared that day.
Nothing appeared that night.
On the third morning, Clara walked into the kitchen and stopped.
A pear sat in the center of the table.
Samuel found her staring at it.