Chapter 8
eight
The measuring tape stretched across the lighthouse’s north wall, its metal surface catching the afternoon sun. Lily gripped one end while Sarah walked backward, counting off feet until the tape reached the corner where new stonework met the original construction.
“Twenty-three feet, eight inches,” Sarah called, scribbling in her field notebook. “Someone did major work here.”
Lily wound the tape back, examining the differences in the masonry.
After developing yesterday’s photographs, she’d convinced Sarah to help her take proper measurements and document the architectural inconsistencies.
What she’d initially dismissed as routine repairs now revealed something far more complex.
“Look at this,” she said, kneeling beside the foundation. The newer stones bore expertly cut surfaces, but under close examination, the tool marks differed. Modern equipment had shaped these blocks, not the hand tools artisans would have used in 1851. “Someone rebuilt this entire section.”
“When?” Sarah crouched beside her, running her fingers along the mortar lines. “The painting looks old, but not original-old.”
“That’s what I need to figure out.” Lily pulled out her camera, a sturdy 35mm SLR she’d borrowed from the school newspaper. “The newspaper archives mention lighthouse renovations in 1923, but they don’t specify what kind of work the crew accomplished.”
She snapped several frames, documenting the junction between old and new stonework. The differences emerged as variations in stone color, different carving techniques, and even the slightest changes in the overall construction pattern.
“What’s that?” Sarah pointed to a section where the mortar had cracked slightly, revealing a dark gap behind the stone.
Lily adjusted her position, peering into the narrow opening. “There’s space back there. A cavity.”
“Maybe it’s just wall construction. Double thickness for insulation.”
“Lighthouse walls are solid stone. They don’t require insulation.” Lily took several close-up shots of the cracked mortar. “This is deliberate. Someone created a hollow space behind the exterior wall.”
They worked along the foundation, measuring and photographing each section. The modified area stretched further than they’d expected—almost forty feet of rebuilt wall, creating what appeared to be a continuous hollow space behind the lighthouse’s north face.
“This feels deliberate,” Sarah said, checking her notes. “You don’t rebuild forty feet of foundation wall unless you’re installing something significant.”
“Or hiding something significant.” Lily changed lenses, switching to macro for detail shots. “Look at these scratches around the mortar. Fresh marks. Someone maintains this section regularly.”
“Maybe your dad knows what’s back there?”
“Dad turns strange whenever I mention the lighthouse’s history. Yesterday he begged me to change my research topic.” Lily’s camera trembled in her hands. “Everyone in town treats the lighthouse as if it carries the plague.”
“Maybe it does. Small towns guard their secrets fiercely.”
“What secrets, though? It’s a building. It guides ships. What threatens people about that?”
Sarah studied her accumulated notes. “Lily, what if you’re right? What if something waits behind this wall? Can you handle what that might mean?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, if people work this hard to keep something secret, they won’t appreciate a high school student exposing it.” Sarah’s voice tightened. “Maybe we should approach this investigation more carefully.”
Excitement and apprehension warred in Lily’s chest. Sarah spoke sense—they’d moved beyond academic research into dangerous territory. But the mystery pulled her forward, impossible to abandon.
“We’ll be careful,” she said. “But we need to know what hides behind this wall.”
They spent the next hour documenting the modified foundation from every angle.
A pattern emerged, both fascinating and disturbing.
The hollow space appeared to extend not just along the wall, but inward toward the lighthouse’s interior.
If their measurements proved correct, someone had created a significant cavity between the building’s exterior and interior walls.
“This grows more complicated by the minute,” Sarah muttered, trying to reconcile their field measurements with the lighthouse’s official blueprints. “According to the architectural plans, this space shouldn’t exist.”
“Maybe the plans lie.”
“Or maybe someone altered them deliberately.” Sarah looked up from her calculations. “If someone wanted to hide structural modifications, changing the official records would be logical.”
Ice shot through Lily’s veins. They weren’t just dealing with architectural inconsistencies—they’d potentially uncovered evidence of deliberate concealment.
“We need to discover what fills that space,” she said.
“How? We can’t knock a hole in the lighthouse wall.”
“No, but we can search for access points.” Lily studied the foundation more carefully, hunting for any indication of how the hollow space might open. “If someone built this, they must have a way to use it.”
They circled the lighthouse’s perimeter, searching for concealed doors, removable stone blocks, or any other means of accessing the hidden space. The search frustrated them—the stonework appeared solid and undisturbed from the outside.
Sarah spotted the anomaly.
“Lily, examine this section.” She knelt beside a portion of the wall that appeared identical to everything else they’d studied. “The mortar lines don’t quite align.”
Lily joined her, studying the area Sarah had identified.
At first glance, it resembled normal masonry work.
But when she examined it more closely, she could see Sarah’s point.
The mortar lines differed—too straight, too uniform, as if someone had painted rather than applied them during construction.
“It’s fake,” she breathed. “The whole section is fake.”
“What do you mean?”
“Examine the pattern. These aren’t real mortar lines—they’re designed to mimic mortar lines.” Lily ran her fingers along the surface, feeling for irregularities. “Someone created a false wall section that mimics the surrounding stonework.”
“But why?”
“To hide an entrance.”
They examined the suspect area more carefully, hunting for any mechanism that might open the concealed section. The craftsmanship impressed them—without their detailed measurements and photographs, they never would have noticed the deception.
“There,” Sarah said, pointing to a small protrusion that resembled a natural irregularity in the stone. “That doesn’t match the surrounding texture.”
Lily pressed the protrusion experimentally. Nothing happened. She tried turning it, pushing it from different angles, applying pressure in various directions. Still nothing.
“Maybe it’s not a single mechanism,” Sarah suggested. “Maybe you need to activate multiple points.”
They spent the next twenty minutes examining every irregularity in the false wall section. The breakthrough came when Lily noticed that two of the “natural” stone protrusions sat at precisely the same height, suggesting they might connect.
“Try pressing both simultaneously,” Sarah suggested.
Lily positioned her hands on both protrusions and applied pressure. For a moment, nothing happened. Then she felt a subtle shift—a mechanical response that suggested hidden machinery.
“Did you feel that?”
“Try again.”
This time, the response was unmistakable. The false wall section shifted slightly, revealing that it worked as a carefully concealed door. The engineering impressed them. The entire section pivoted inward while maintaining the appearance of solid stonework.
“Someone invested serious thought in this,” Sarah said, wonder coloring her voice. “This isn’t amateur work.”
Lily pushed the concealed door open further, revealing a narrow passage that led into darkness. The space beyond appeared artificial—smooth stone walls, level flooring, and what looked like ventilation shafts.
“It’s a tunnel,” she whispered.
“A tunnel to where?”
“I don’t know. But someone built this for a specific purpose.”
They stood at the threshold, peering into the darkness. The passage extended beyond the reach of daylight, disappearing into the lighthouse’s interior. The construction looked professional-grade, clearly designed for regular use rather than emergency access.
“We need flashlights,” Sarah said. “And probably more equipment.”
“The hardware store’s still open.” Lily’s pulse quickened. “We could get supplies and return tonight.”
Sarah’s hands tightened on her notebook. “Tonight? Lily, we don’t have proper planning. We don’t even know what we’re walking into.”
“We have plans. We know where the entrance is. We have measuring tools, cameras.” Lily gestured toward the tunnel opening. “Sarah, whatever’s down there has been hidden for decades. Every day we wait is another day for someone to notice we’ve been asking questions.”
“Or another day to plan this properly.”
“What if there is no proper way? What if we’re already in too deep?” Lily turned to face her friend. “My dad acts strangely every time I mention the lighthouse. Mrs. Pennington practically shut down when I asked about the 1920s. People are nervous, Sarah. They know something.”
Sarah stared at the tunnel entrance. “That’s exactly why we should be careful.”
“Or why we should act fast.” Lily closed the concealed door, noting how perfectly it sealed against the surrounding stonework. “Ten minutes in the hardware store. Flashlights, batteries, chalk to mark our path. Then we find out what someone’s been hiding.”
“What if we get caught or in trouble?”
“By whom? It’s a historical landmark. We’re doing research.”
“At night. Breaking into hidden passages.”