Kindling Point

A Short Story by New York Times Best-Selling Author Marcia MullerOld Victorian houses, Ouija boards, and forces beyond human ken are familiar devices in macabre fiction; but the use Marcia Muller makes of them in this contemporary tale is unusual, surprising, and disquieting in its ambiguousness.Excerpt“SO HOW are the ghosts today?" I asked.The two nine-year-olds started and looked up at me. My daughter Carolyn and Alison, the little girl from across the street, sat cross-legged on the dining room's Oriental carpet. On either side of them, long white tapers burned in my silver candelabra, and the heavy red drapes were pulled shut. The girls had been leaning forward, their eyes closed, fingers on the heart- shaped pointer of a Ouija board.I stood in the doorway, my arms folded across my breasts, trying to look severe. Did they realize that those tapers had cost three dollars each? Had they noticed wax was dripping onto the—mercifully—as yet unfinished floor? I maintained my stern stance for about fifteen seconds, then started to laugh.The girls relaxed and exchanged relieved smiles. I went in and dropped to the floor beside them, wiping wax from the base of one candlestick."That's what you were doing, wasn't it?" I said. "Contacting ghosts?"