Castle on the Edge by Douglas Strang

eardrums; I could feel it without touching anything; I could see it without seeing anything; I could smell the metaphorical foul stench; I even almost choked on the bitter taste of the stale air.
    However, I answered Mary by saying, “Feel it, Mary?” Then my eyes fixed on hers, I softly whispered, “I know how I feel about you…I love you, Mary.”
    Then with aggressive force but gentle passion, I took Mary in my arms and embraced her tightly. Our lips moved into a head-on crash to ecstasy. Then she sweetly murmured the words, “I love you too, Alex, with all my heart.”
    For one short moment my mind was teleported to another dimension, a sphere of love, security and peace…Mary’s Castle. I wanted to stay there forever.
    Then, Mister Dudley came out into the hall carrying his big flashlight, immediately followed by Mrs. Dudley.
    “Don’t worry, Doctor Ramsey and Miss Holden, I’ll go up there with you. I’ve got my big torch here,” Mister Dudley said with an air of authority fueled by the whiskey-laden punch he had been consuming up to that point.
    “Never you mind throwing your weight around, Shamus Dudley,” snapped back Mrs. Dudley, “you shine that torch for Doctor Ramsey and Miss Holden; they’ll both be needing their hands free for latching on to Mister Strutmire if he’s not in a mood for cooperating.”
    Mrs. Dudley returned to the rec. room and then Mister Dudley, Mary and I marched down the long hall past the out-of-commission elevator to the south-west stairwell. The bright beam of Mister Dudley’s lamp guided us up the stairs to the third floor. When we got there, I remembered about the fountain. Then I asked Mister Dudley why he’d turned it off when he had instructions to leave it on because of tonight’s Halloween party. He said he’d never touched it and that it was on before the lights went out. I couldn’t worry about that now so we proceeded down the corridor to the door of Mister Strutmire’s room. I knocked on the door; there was no answer. I knocked again, still no answer. I tried to open the door; it was locked, of course. Mary and I looked at each other, not saying anything; we didn’t have to…our thoughts were speaking loudly enough. Then all of sudden, in the quiet darkness, on the other side of the door, we heard it, all three of us. The thumping, dragging sound, the sound that Doctor Lederer and Mary had heard earlier; but it was the first time I had heard it and it was coming from Mister Strutmire’s room. Boom, swish, boom, swish, boom, swish. Then it stopped.
    “No time to find any key, we’ve got to get into that room now. Help me break down the door, Dudley.” I yelled.
    Mary took hold of the big light and shone it on the door; then Dudley and I started slamming our bodies in unison against it with all our might. We were like one great wrecking ball pounding the wall of a condemned building. Then after the nineteenth or so blow, the two hinges snapped, one after the other, and the solid oak door collapsed by literally falling into the room onto the floor. Mary then stepped under the archway and commenced waving the flashlight around Mister Strutmire’s room, while Mister Dudley and I were catching our breath.
    “Mister Strutmire, Mister Strutmire,” Mary called out, “where are you?”
    Then Mister Dudley took the big light and entered Mister Strutmire’s chamber. He positioned himself in the middle of the room in such a way as to give off the fullest possible range of light so Mary and I could look around. I called out to Mister Strutmire, no answer. We looked in the bathroom, checked the bathtub behind the door, and pulled open the curtain to the shower stall; he wasn’t in there. Then as Mister Dudley continued to shine the light, Mary was looking through all the drawers of the dresser and nightstand. I looked into the closet. In both instances we found nothing out of the ordinary. Mister Strutmire’s suits and robe were hanging neatly in the closet