He is hardly aware of walking anymore. The house breathes beside him. His heart is pounding.

When he bursts into the twilight of the yard and can see again, he finds himself surprised, as if he had expected to be blind like that for a much longer time. He is gasping; he has been holding his breath. He moves forward, taking gulps of air. Overhead, stars slash and burn in a fiery sky, early night. The other boys emerge behind him. They are breathless, too, as they rush toward the creek. The bulk of the house waits, silent and cold beneath a crown of stars.

The three close on Nathan, and there is something brotherly in their buffets of affection. "That was great," Randy says. "Jesus."

"I could swear something was touching me," Roy says.

"Me too."

"It was like there was something in the house looking at us. I could feel it."

"We should go in there," Burke says. "We should go in the house."

Silence.

"We should." He sets his jaw and looks at Roy. They cannot meet each other's eyes. Burke is breathing hard.

"What's the matter? You don't think there's a real ghost in there."

"I ain't scared even if there is a ghost." Roy speaks calmly.

"How about you?"

"I'm not scared, I just don't want to go in there," says Randy.

"Chicken shit."

"You damn right I'm chicken shit." But he stares at the house, fascinated. He licks his Up. "You think it would be all right? You think we can get in?"

Burke laughs. He eyes Nathan up and down. "What about you?"

Nathan faces the house, tracing its shadow against the sky. "Going inside is fine with me."

Roy faces Burke belligerently. "See, asshole? Nobody's scared. The only thing I'm thinking about is we'd have to be careful. That house is liable to come down around your head if you step in the wrong place. It's dark and we won't be able to see. It's dangerous."

"Oh yeah? Well, I say you're scared. That's what it looks like to me."

They glare at each other. Roy holds his place, quiet and determined. He is a match for Burke, Nathan thinks. But Burke carries himself more aggressively, his chin juts toward Roy and trembles. His face flushes with emotion.

Nathan still faces the house. "It's a full moon. If we wait a little bit, there'll be plenty of light."

Roy is watching him, Nathan can feel it. But Nathan holds fast to the house, faces that direction, and breathes the scent of late blooming jasmine.

Roy studies the sky. He leans close, a warm presence. "You really want to do this?"

"That's what he said."

"I'm asking him." Waiting then.

"Why does he get to decide?"

But still Roy is silent. The moment is rich. Nathan can taste each fluttering of Roy's pulse, each rise of scent from his body. "It would be fun."

Roy scratches behind one ear. When he begins to smile, the tension eases. "Well, I know I don’t want to go in that front door. We'll never get it open."

Burke and Randy laugh. "All right," Burke says, "we won't go in that way."

Randy, generously, adds, "You know the house, Roy. How do we get inside?"

Secure in his leadership, Roy studies the problem. The rising moon brings soft light to the lawn, marinating the overgrown azaleas along the sweep of what was once a front yard. Eerie white glaze obscures the windows and washes the facade. "There's a door at the side. And there's broken windows. And there's doors at the back, too. Me and Uncle Heben tried a door back there. But we couldn't open it"

"Did you get in?"

"We could of climbed in a window. But Uncle Heben changed his mind."

"He probably got scared, too," Randy says.

"Maybe. It was a long time ago. I don’t remember."

They all stare at the house somberly. Burke walks toward it a few steps. This time he passes the flask to the others, and everyone drinks but Nathan. The moment has come. Roy finds his flashlight. "Just in case we need it," he explains. They trot across the yard in the moonlight, Roy leading. They are all following in no order, but Nathan runs close to Roy.

Beyond the layers of trees, white as anything, a full moon blazes. The ivory face threatens to make day, even glimpsed in pieces through branches. Nathan sees a woman in the glittering, the face of a woman staring into a high wind of whiteness, and soon she will be clearing the trees and rising into a sky filled with stars.

They travel in the shadow of the house. The size of the place surprises Nathan again as they approach. How could people need so much room? In the darkness the shuttered windows are like lidded eyes. It is a different feeling, to approach with the knowledge that they are going inside. The darkness seems darker, the sense of invisible presences more acute. They halt a moment at the foot of the stone steps leading to the main porch. Roy checks the windows nearby, slipping fearlessly up the steps and along the porch, sliding his hands along the shutters. Nathan's heart is pounding, but he keeps his eyes on Roy. From shadow to shadow he moves, and the others move parallel to him along the side of the house. He returns further along and whispers, as if they are all concealing themselves from something inside, "Everything's nailed shut. Like I remembered."

They reach the place where the tree has fallen against the house, and once there they climb onto the porch and review the wreckage. Roy clambers over the old tree trunk, peers at the splintered wood of the porch above their heads, the one that circles the second floor of the house. The bulk of the tree rests there. "The tree's leaning on the house," Roy whispers, "It didn't bust through."

"The windows?" Burke asks. "I bet it knocked some loose."

"Looks like it could have."

"You want to try up there?"

Roy considers. His face lost in the shadows of the tree. "Not yet. We can come back if we don't find something better."

Beyond the tree, they enter a fenced garden that runs the length of the house, adjoining the place where the house swells out and the porches stop.

Through the shadows of the trees they can see the stone barn and some of the outbuildings. The trees thin near that part of the house and the moonlight falls through in showers of whiteness, clear and clean. The whole farmyard is etched, as if a portrait of itself, a study of wreckage of what was once inhabited. They pick their way through the garden, where the night carries a thousand smells. Nathan is mindful of snakes underfoot, though not quite sure what to do if he steps on one. Roy keeps them to a path that he seems to know, at the same time scanning the house carefully.

"We can't get to these windows, they're too high," he says. "Too bad. Half of them are broke."

"This is weird," Randy says. "Look at this place. What kind of garden was this?"

"You still want to go inside?"

"Oh yeah." But he studies the shadowy garden nevertheless.

"Do you?" Burke asks Roy.

"You bet." By now they are crossing the back of the house, in full moonlight, through waist high grass.

The stark outline of the house leaves Nathan breathless. The upper floor swims out of darkness into stark clarity, so well illuminated he can count the cracks in the outer boards. A porch encircles the kitchen building and then crosses by means of a short gallery to the main house. Roy tests the porch, finds it will hold them. They follow him.

Now they are close to the house, sliding along the walls, near the shuttered windows. Roy still leads, though now Burke has claimed the place beside him. Randy and Nathan follow. It occurs to Nathan that with the windows shuttered the fact of moonlight will make no difference inside, the house will be very dark. But he says nothing. They cross the gallery to what must have been a door for kitchen servants.

"This is the door me and Uncle Heben tried." Roy's tone is quite soft, though not a whisper. "Now it's boarded up."

They follow along the porch, their footsteps ringing. They walk more quietly, each without prompting. They find stairs and Roy tests them. One is broken but the next is sound. They climb to the second story porch now, and with each step they sink into the quiet shroud of the house.

The porch is solid in most places, and they move with confidence. They cross the front of the house again, then along the side gallery, where the windows are also shuttered. At places the porch protests their weight and they space themselves by the sounding of the floorboards. The floor holds despite its protests. Roy has brought a flashlight but uses it sparingly.

They pause to study the darkness in the direction of their camp. Not even ghost embers of their campfire can be seen.

On the other side of the house, where the tree has fallen, they find a window with shutters that have been partially loosened. It takes both Burke and Roy to pry the shutter open. Roy makes the first attempt, alone, and then Burke tries, alone. They are watching each other, each hoping the other will not succeed. Nathan is near enough to admire the moonlight along Roy's straining arms, the snake play of muscle along Burke's back. Their separate efforts fail, and they position themselves to work together. Roy, affecting that he will dirty his tee shirt, takes it off. But instead of looping it through his belt, he hands it to Nathan.

Nathan takes the shirt. Roy stretches his shoulders a little. The moment is small and passes easily beneath the awareness of the others. Burke and Roy pry the shutter free of its remaining nails and swing it slowly on its hinges. The wooden frame is still solid and the shutter soon lies flat against the house as it used to do.

Roy shines the flashlight and carefully brushes away the remains of old glass from the windowsill. His bare back drains a streak of moon down the spine. Burke, near him, drinks from the flask again, offers to Randy, offers to Roy. Roy straightens from the windowsill, takes the bottle and flashes a warm grin to Nathan. He lifts the bottle. He is beautiful to Nathan, he is clearly aware of the fact. The swallow of liquor becomes a performance. He wipes his mouth and hands the bottle to Burke. Then he leaps through the window.

Burke follows him the next moment, with a look of reckless bravery; but he is still only the second one to enter, he has been diminished by Roy. Randy clambers over. Because he is thickwaisted, to get inside takes effort, and he breathes heavily; though maybe this is as much from fear as from exertion. Nathan slides over the windowsill, careful of the glass. His heart is pounding. They are inside the house.

The room they have entered is small and oddly shaped. From inside one can hardly tell the fallen tree is there. The place would be pitch dark except for the flashlight, which Roy washes over the floor. Randy takes a step and the floorboards groan but hold steady. The boys walk carefully.

They go through a door and then down a hallway, and suddenly they are steeped in moonlight. They are standing at the top of the gallery overlooking a grand staircase. From a skylight overhead, partially broken, wind rattles through empty panes. Moonlight falls strong from there, and the vaulted space floods with light. The lower floor is dark.

Beyond the sound of the wind, is there something else? A thread of music suggests itself to Nathan, who follows the melody in his head. As if someone with a clear voice is singing softly in a distant room. He misses the words, but the sound is very pure.

Roy keeps the flashlight at his side, in spite of the darkness. They pick their way forward carefully. The floor is solid all the way to the top of the stairs, and the stairs seem solid too, but there is the hole in the skylight and a pool of water beneath it. One can see the water from the gallery, a patch of reflection in the deep darkness. The four of them stand at the top of the stairs looking at each other.

"We should explore up here first." Randy's tone makes it clear that he is reluctant to descend into that well of darkness.

"But after that, we have to go down there." Burke squares his shoulders.

The rooms on the second floor are small and plain, like the rooms in any farmhouse Nathan has ever seen. The floors have held up, though the boards sag in a few places and groan in many. The rooms have a desolate feeling, containing little beyond scraps of furniture, the chimney from an old gas lantern, a tin plate with a bit of candle. In one room, beside an unshuttered window, they find a nearly whole chair, casting its long moon shadow across dust and cobwebs. It has a delicate look, like something that might once have faced a woman's vanity table, with slender, curved legs and one thin, spidery arm. Beneath the cake of dust that shields the cushion is a dark stain. Roy uses the flashlight here for the first time, and they see the startling pink of the cushion, the patina of dust. The dark stain's resemblance to old blood is unnerving; even Burke, buffeted by his bravura, seems wary at the sight. "I wonder why they left this," he says. "They took everything else."