By the second week, Samuel became obsessed.
He checked wall joints.
Measured the pantry.
Crawled beneath the cabin until his shoulders were coated in frozen mud.
Nothing.
The pantry wall backed into solid earth where the cabin had been cut into the mountainside.
No crawlspace.
No loose boards.
No gap.
Clara watched him climb from beneath the floor.
“You look disappointed.”
“I am.”
“You wanted a tunnel?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because tunnels make sense.”
She handed him a cloth.
“Wipe your face.”
He did.
“What do you think?”
Clara glanced toward the pantry.
“Someone is doing this.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“How?”
“I don’t know.”
“Why?”
She looked at him.
“I especially don’t know that.”
Samuel sighed.
Then:
“Ghost?”
Clara’s eyes narrowed.
“No.”
“You sound certain.”
“I refuse to be haunted by produce.”
He laughed.
The laugh felt good.
They needed it.
Winter tightened.
Snow sealed the valley.
Their isolation became almost complete.
The animals remained healthy.
The woodpile held.
Food, while plain, remained sufficient if rationed carefully.
Clara knew exactly what remained.
Four sacks cornmeal.
One half sack flour.
Dried beans.
Salt pork.
Turnips.
Six onions.
Pumpkin preserved in jars.
Dried berries.
Cheese.
No cabbage.
That detail continued to bother Samuel most.
The impossible cabbage had not been random food.
It had replaced exactly what they had consumed.
He mentioned this one evening.
Clara was rolling biscuit dough.
“That is what frightens me.”
“Why?”
“Because whoever did it knew.”
“Knew what?”
“That it was our last one.”
Samuel looked toward the pantry.
“Could they have watched through the window?”
“From where?”
He looked outside.
Snow stretched toward black timber.
The nearest trees stood fifty yards away.
“Maybe.”
Clara shook her head.
“They would also have needed to enter.”
“Yes.”
“Through a bolted door.”
“Yes.”
“Without disturbing flour.”
“Yes.”
Samuel sighed.
“You are ruining my theory.”
“It arrived ruined.”
That evening they tried something new.
Samuel nailed a thin board across the pantry door.
Not permanent.
Just enough that anyone entering would have to break it.
They went to bed.
At midnight nothing happened.
At two, nothing.
At dawn the board remained intact.
Samuel opened the pantry.
Empty of new objects.
He smiled.
“Finally.”
Then Clara pointed toward the table.
A fresh pear sat in the center.
Neither spoke.