Chapter 10

There was silence after Ramona's pronouncement that not only was Smith ... not Smith ... he was also their uncle.

Debbie managed to make the first noise. "But we don't HAVE an uncle!" she gasped.

"Am I then a ghost?" asked Robert, smiling. "Perhaps one of the ghosts you say inhabit my house?"

There was, despite the emotion and uncertainty of the moment, a subtle shift in Debbie's thinking. Her rational brain accepted that this man was Robert Nettleton, whatever that meant. She didn't believe her mother would simply lie to her about that. While she didn't understand what that meant yet, her mind DID accept that this was a Nettleton, and that he had the right to say it was "his" house.

"You're dead!" choked Robby.

Robert kept smiling and addressed Ramona. "Your children have an uncanny ability to communicate with ghosts, it appears."

Ramona, after getting her last sentence out of her mouth, had been unable to go on. She hadn't been prepared to tell her children about Robert, much less about what she and Robert shared. But, during the silence and interchange between the children and Robert, she had thought frantically about his statement ... that Debbie and Robby had been kissing in the woods ... and what she had seen them doing as the bookcase was opened. She had thought about what that meant, and it allowed her to go on.

"Children," she started, her voice that of a mother. "My sweet darlings," she said, altering her voice to try to express the love and excitement that was welling in her chest. "I couldn't tell you about Robert. There were ... difficulties. I didn't tell you about so many things. I was worried that it would affect you badly. I have so much to tell you I don't know where to start."

"Nettleton!" said Debbie suddenly. "ROBERT Nettleton!" She looked at the man in awe. "You're the little boy ... your parents ... you found them..." Her face filled with grief at what this man's memories must contain.

Robert's face didn't smile now. "Your grandparents. Yes, Rami and I found them. It was a bad time."

"No!" said Debbie just as suddenly. "Your sister's name was Elizabeth. We read it in the papers!"

"Papers?" asked Ramona, not understanding.

"Yes!" said Debbie. "At the library. They had old newspapers. They had stories in them about what happened. We read them." she said, looking wonderingly at her ... uncle." She looked at her mother, her face twisted with questions. "The papers said Robert and Elizabeth Nettleton. And your maiden name was Shanks." She shook her head, denying what she had been told in this room.

Robert held up his hand. "Be at peace child. We can explain all this to you."

"I'm NOT a child!" Debbie said, her anger sudden and hot.

"No," mused her uncle, looking at her in a way that made her feel uncomfortable. "I suppose you are not at that." He smiled again. "You are a beautiful young woman. Please accept my apologies."

He stared at her a little longer. Then, "Your mother changed her name after the ... when we were in foster care. Things were very difficult for us then. People thought we carried some kind of curse. We were in boarding school for some years, and when we came back we didn't talk much about who she was."

Ramona joined in, having something now she could talk about.

"He didn't care. About our name, I mean. I wanted to forget everything. We went first to a place that was horrible, and they wouldn't let me see Robert. I hated that place. Then, suddenly they took us to live with a nice woman, who cared for us and loved us. She was so nice to us. But then she got sick and had to go away. Our new guardian was a cold man, and there were other children in the house who treated us badly. They called me names."

She trailed off, her face sad. Then she went on.

Even at the boarding school people looked at me strangely when they heard my real name. So when our guardian suggested that I take his name I agreed. Anything that would cause people not to stare at me I thought was a good thing. I began using my middle name too, Ramona, instead of Elizabeth. All I wanted was to be invisible ... to be left alone."

Debbie's heart was breaking at the story. She realized there were unshed tears in her eyes.

"Why didn't you ever tell us?" she asked. "Daddy never said anything either."

"I never told your father who I was." said their mother. "When we married and he brought me to our new home he had no idea it was next door to the place I hated more than anywhere else in the world. I couldn't tell him. He was so proud and we loved each other. Then, when you were so young he was taken from us. I blamed the house ... this house. Maybe we ARE cursed." she gave in a low cry.

"Nonsense!" said Robert. "Things happen in this big wide world. Some are good and some not. Life is what you make of it. You were happy with Richard, yes? And your wonderful children? Did they not make you gloriously happy?"

"Of course" said Ramona sitting up straighter. "They were my whole life."

"And all that happiness took place next to this house, did it not?" he pressed.

"Well, yes, but..."

"That is why I came back here." he said. "I knew that I could find happiness here, near to you. And I knew that if, for some reason you were not happy, I could give you happiness." It was an egotistical statement to make ... the assumption that her happiness depended on him.

Yet, he spoke mere fact. Both of them remembered the only happiness they had experienced as they were growing up in a harsh world, the happiness they felt when they were together. And, while their sexual passion for each other was unbridled, that was not the primary reason for their happiness together. They shared so many things that no one else in the world could understand. Their bond had been forged with a heavy hammer, and they were welded together beyond anyone's ability to separate. To Ramona, his statement did not come as one of self importance.

Still, she had spent a long time alone, with only her children.

"You took your time coming back to make me so gloriously happy." she commented dryly.

He actually bowed to her. It was a movement that looked natural to him, as if he had been raised in an environment where bowing was normal.

"I wanted to come sooner, but could not. When you stopped writing I used some of my money to have men check on you." He smiled at her reaction to having been survielled without her knowledge. "I know, it was a terrible thing to do, but I had to know whether you were well or not. I lived in the most squalid conditions, with people who had only two sticks to rub together to make fire. When the reports came that you were doing well, I knew that those people needed me more than you did. When they were finally able to feed themselves, and had the knowledge to carry on, I came here instead of finding another destitute village. I found that I needed you, as much as I thought you might need me."

That speech brought back into the light what the children had peeked at those several times ... what they had been spying upon when they were caught.

"But..." squeaked Debbie, "You're brother and sister!"

"As are you two." said Robert smoothly.

That caused both teens to blush and avert their eyes.

Ramona was thinking what they were thinking.

"How could this happen? Between you two I mean?" she asked.

"How did it happen between us?" asked Robert, looking at her intently.

"That was different. We were alone in the world. You gave me love and tenderness." she said.

"Is it so different for two children who have lost their father to accident, rather than crime?" asked her brother. "They have still lost their father, and are growing up alone in one sense. The world is just as harsh a place today as it was then. They have fared better, perhaps, but it has still been difficult for them."

He turned his eyes on the children.

Robby found his voice. He was amazed by all he had heard, and had been content just to listen. But now he spoke.

"Our lives have been wonderful." he said. "I hardly remember my father. We have no complaints at all!"

"This is wonderful for me to hear." said their newly discovered uncle. "Perhaps I have spent too many years with people who had to struggle every minute to make their lives bearable. I know I felt as if I were more blessed than possible when I saw what they had to live like day in and day out. Perhaps I am jaded."

"I still need you." said Ramona. She darted a glance at her children. While their lives might have been carefree, hers had not. She didn't know how to explain that to them without making it sound like they weren't worth everything she'd had to go through.

"You have to understand," she said to them. "I wouldn't change anything if it meant that you would disappear from my life. I love you more than life itself. But I have never loved a man like I love this man."

"Not even Daddy?" asked Debbie, who had only the vaguest fragmented memories of the man she had just named.

"I loved him." said Ramona firmly. "He loved me and saved my life. He gave me you two, and YOU saved my life when he was taken from us. It's hard for me to explain, but when we were little, Robert saved my life too. Without Robert I would have wasted away and died of a broken heart. I love him too, and I always will. I cannot change that."

"This is all so strange." said Debbie. She looked at the man who, until an hour ago she had called "Smith" and hated. Now she didn't know how to feel about him. She had a sudden thought.

"Then this IS our house!" she yipped. She realized how that sounded and restated it. "I mean, our grandparents lived here, and YOU lived here, Mommy. That's YOUR bedroom upstairs ... the one with the girl's things in it!" She looked at her uncle. "And the one with the toys! That one was YOUR room!"

"How do you KNOW all this?" cried her mother. She suddenly remembered them in the secret passageway. "How did you know about the secret places?"

That led to another hour of discussion and explanation as the children confessed to their countless trips to the house, how they'd found the bent place in the fence, and then the root cellar and its secret tunnel. They talked about the games they played. They left out the sexual games -that was still something they were uncomfortable discussing - but described how they had found things, and what they had thought of the things they found, and how they had felt at home here, like they belonged in this place.

"I never knew." said Ramona. "My own children, spending hours and hours here and I never knew!"

"We were afraid you would have forbidden us to come back if you ever caught us." said Debbie.

"You were right." said their mother firmly. "I would most certainly have done that. I can't believe you kept that secret from me!"

"Like you kept the secret of who that horrible bearded man was when he came to our house? When he ruined everything?" Debbie shot back. Then her head jerked as she realized what she'd said. "I mean it's not really ruined, I guess. But it was then." She got flustered.

"I always hoped that once this place was restored to its original condition that I might lure your mother and you to live here with me." said their uncle. "I hadn't planned on suggesting that until you had gotten to know me, but such is life."

And THAT led to another hour of discussion about why the disguises and subterfuge had all been necessary when Robert first came back ... was STILL necessary for another few weeks at least.

And THAT led to an attempt to discuss, on the part of the kids at least, where the money was coming from to do the extensive restoration that was going on. Neither of the teens was stupid, and they knew that it was going to cost more money than they could imagine to complete the task.

"Your Grandfather's fortune was passed on to us." said Robert simply.

"I don't know about you," said Debbie, "but WE certainly don't have any fortune."

She looked at her mother, who was looking at her folded hands on top of the dining room table.

Ramona talked to her hands. "There are several other things I never told you."

And THAT led to Debbie attempting to grill her mother about money, at which point Robby stood up and said "I'm starving. Can't we get something to eat before we do any more talking?"

Debbie was obviously consumed with curiosity about the "Nettleton fortune", but Ramona stood up too.

"An excellent idea!" she said. "Be patient Debbie, we can talk about all this more later."

Debbie groaned and made much of being told to be "patient" again. She did, however, reflect for a moment on how much information she had gotten in the last few hours, and how many of her questions had been answered, albeit in an astonishing manner. So she clamped her jaws together and stood up too, at which time she realized she was also ravenous.

"Would it be all right if I invite your Uncle to dinner again?" Ramona asked. Her voice was neutral.

Both kids looked at each other. This wasn't anything even remotely like what they had expected when they wondered who Smith was, and it was all so new that they still didn't know how they felt about things yet. But he WAS their uncle, and their mother DID love him.

"Of course." said Robby, speaking for both of them.

"We'll call for pizza." said Ramona. "When was the last time you had pizza Bobby?" she asked.

"I can't even remember." he grinned. "Must I wear my disguise, just to go next door?"

"You do and I won't speak to you." growled Debbie. But she smiled tentatively too. "I have more questions."

"I can't wait to give you answers." said her "new" uncle.

Ramona, who had driven her car to the house, found her briefcase and told the kids to come with her. Robert suggested that by going the secret way, he could get to the back of the house without being seen. He asked Robby and Debbie to go with him, and they immediately agreed.

Ramona said she'd get pizzas on the way.

The siblings and their uncle, who grabbed a flashlight, entered the passageway through the same bookcase they'd been uncovered behind, pulling it closed behind them. Then they led their uncle back down to the tunnel. The only thing they'd ever used for light was candles, and the flashlight made it seem both lighter, where they were standing, and much darker, where the light did not penetrate. When they got to the root cellar and Robby pushed the shelf/door open he commented on how amazing it was that a mere six year old boy could have opened the heavy door.

"There was a counterweight on it back then" said Robert. "And the hinges were oiled. It opened quite easily. I imagine the rope has broken over the years. I'll have to add that to my very long list of things to repair."