"Wow, I can't believe this! We are back already," announces Lanker aloud. "I wonder exactly where we have traveled to?"
"I don't know," replies Whammy, "that place was kind of scary to me."
"Let's make it back into the house where mother and father are. They must be worried about us two. It feels like we have been gone for hours," says Lanker.
Whammy grabs the flashlight in a firm grasp, and the two make it back out the door of the hidden room to the staircase; then back up the staircase, into the storage room, then finally, back out into the house. They both race down the stairway searching for their parents in the din, failing to find them. They turn through the foyer, racing into the kitchen, yet still fail to locate them. Finally, they both make it into the personal library room of Whammy's father. There she finds her own mother and father, but only the mother of Lanker. Lanker crawls up toward his mother's knees, where she sits attentively in her study chair.
"Where is father at?" he asks with an inquisitive sparkle in his eye.
"He is out working for Mr. Solomon," she tells him.
"Doing what?"
"Oh, he is spraying Mr. Solomon's rental tenements for termites, bless his poor soul. I have been working hard all day myself," his mother informs.
"What were you doing?" asks Lanker inquisitively.
"Oh, I was scrubbing his floor here, and washing dishes for him. I am cleaning his home right now. I paused to take a break from dusting this room here," she says, drawing a heavy sigh.
"Wow, you have done some work, then," Lanker gasps to his mother.
"Yeah, well, we have to earn our keep. Neither of us have jobs right now," says his mother. "So, what have you been doing today?"
"Me? Oh, well, I have been exploring this great big house with Whammy," says Lanker.
A smile suddenly eases across his face.
"Did you find anything of interest?" asks his mother.
"Uh., well., we found a few things, but not much else."
Lanker slowly glances over at Whammy with a thin smile.
"I hope you have been a good little boy for these kind people here, and not getting into mischief of any sort," his mother says to him, with her eyes narrowed in his direction.
"Oh, we both have been good as gold today, mother, you can bet on that," replies Lanker, with a broad faced glowing smile.
"Well, you had better be good, or else!" snaps his mother, with a hard glare on her face. "It will be rat-a-tat-tat time if you aren't."
Time passes as the parents of Tammy, Lanker, and his mother, remain in the study room speaking of literature, plays, artwork, and various local cultural events experienced, and those yet to come. Later in the evening they all sit down to a good meal. The father finally returns home after 2100 hours, all covered in dirt, and looking very tired. He forces himself to smile as he walks past Lanker and Whammy while playing down on the kitchen floor.
Whammy and Lanker didn't go back into the secret room for at least a week. During the day they played, but soon Whammy's mother began to ask Lanker if he "would be so kind as to carry out the trash," or fetch tools of one sort or another from various rooms and drawers for her. The father would remain out of the house from 0700 to 2100 hours, only to return home covered in dirt from head to toe, and completely exhausted. Life was lived in such fashion from Sunday through Friday; then Hayam commenced to suggest with a subtle compelling urgency, that the family attend Saturday Sabbath with his own family. On virtually every Friday night, Lanker could perceive through the walls where his father and mother were involved in a deep discussion, while lounging inside their sleeping chamber.
"How much money did you make this week?" often asked his mother, in a rather low rumbling voice.
"A hundred dollars," his father would reply in a muffled voice.
"Is that all you got for the dreadful hours you worked this week?" snapped his mother, in an excited, muffled voice.
"Look now, Lindza, we have room and board here, and some rather extraordinary company, I might add" his father would always firmly reply. "At least I have a job. Any kind of government grant wouldn't even come close to what I am earning now."
"I don't know about all of this, Hendrick. I, myself, have been working all day. Lanker even claims he was working for a few hours himself. I received no pay, however, and neither did Lanker; and for all of this bloody dirty drudgery you only received one hundred dollars in pay?" snapped his mother with urgency in her voice.
"For crying out loud, Lindza, life is just life; and a far too much of it is plain hard work, unfortunately! This man is sharing his home and provision with us. We all are indebted to him for something, don't you think?" his father firmly retorted on many occasions.
"Oh yeah? So., guess what else?"
"What?" suddenly snapped his father, with a slight astonishment noticed in his voice.
"I have been adamantly informed we all will attend Saturday Sabbath, come tomorrow."
"O.K. then, so we will. So, what about it? We'll just go and attend, while we pretend to be faithful servants of the local synagogue," firmly snapped his father in reply.
"I don't know about all of this truck, Hendrick. I personally don't like the looks of it, myself," his mother would often retort...
"Well dolly dear, can you just attend services tomorrow, while simply pretending at being both polite and grateful, for crying out loud again?"
"I don't know!" fired his mother. "I, personally, am beginning to feel like a Cinderella. You seem to be working more like old Silas McCoy, than freeborn Hendrick, at his own liberty. I fully realize we are both unemployed and living here on the generosity of Clan, Solomon, and I honestly don't mind doing my own part. Be aware, please, there lies a point in this business, Hendrick, where one begins to feel as if he is being taken advantage of, resulting from his or her vulnerable personal situation. You see, as any plumber knows honey, sewage flows downhill in both directions, depending on which way the slant is directed."
"Could you just try at being polite and thankful, for the love of Pete?" his father pleaded again.
"I will try, but I don't know about all of this. It looked alright in the beginning, but now I just don't know! I see somewhat of a change coming over Hayam," his mother retorted firmly one night, amid the sounds of sobs. The sound of the father's sigh suddenly sprang from the room, directly through the heavy wooden door, into the ears of young Lanker.
"Like what?" snapped his father, with a harsh ring of sudden disgust in his muffled voice.
"I don't know!" fired his mother in direct response. "We have been living here for over a year now, and everything was good up until a few weeks ago. Now something in him is just., different, I should say for lack of more descriptive words. He doesn't seem this way around you, but I can feel this difference in him, when it is only him and me."
"I swear, Lindza, I personally don't know about this garbage you are talking about right here, now. I have witnessed no sign of anything negative. These folks have been very hospitable to all of us, I feel. I really am astonished by your display of weakness. You seem as if you are coming apart, or something. The Solomon clan will detect any signs of your fragility, I am telling you, and anticipate your inability to remain strong in the face of adversity. This anticipation of instability in your general character will transcend into an anticipated conclusion in a character analysis; that shall stand as a future concern to all of us, including our dear son. These people are exceedingly wealthy, and well connected politically!" his father whispered as he very audibly affirmed. " We don't know who it is, they know. As your dutiful, faithful husband, I am commanding you to get a grip on it at once, Lindza!"
The room continued to ring with the sounds of sobbing from his mother.
During the coming weeks, Lanker and Whammy made their way back into the secret room a few more times. The two rubbed the crystal ball, again conjuring up the spectrum. This spectrum proceeded to teach them a number of exotic tricks he promised to in the past, such as how to zip through key holes and turn invisible. They were also taught the art of clairvoyance, and how to develop an ability for peering into the past clearly as they observe the present. To a much lighter degree, they both were taught the art of anticipating what others were thinking, especially when any intentions of surrounding people were of a negative nature.
During the course of these lessons, they both instinctively acquired the ability to peek into alternative dimensions of existence. The spectrum taught the two details and information neither could totally comprehend. The fact of these realms even existing was denied by all modern science, according to the spectrum, but only because of a government program intentionally inserting a collectivist belief system into the minds of the citizen masses, while intending one day in the ever-dawning future to deify some member of the five primary banking dynastic families who rule the world, or some close associate. The citizen masses would eventually be compelled to worship this deified person as God supreme or die. The haunting spectrum frightfully informed these two children of this eminent worldwide scenario, yet they failed to comprehend his gift in information.
Another six months passed, and nearly every Friday night more clear sobs rang from the sleeping quarters of Lanker's parents. On one particular night, a violent thunderstorm filled the house with a flashing sapphire brilliance. A comforting pelt on the roof of heavy falling rain hammered away amid an eerily comforting sound of distant rolling rumble. With the rumble of this thunder Lanker could perceive low pitched voices of his parents, who thought their voices were veiled by the outside noise of the storm.
"What on earth is your problem now, Lindza?," inquired the muffled voice of his father. "Why are you not asleep already?"
"Seems like every weekend now we have these violent thunderstorms, Hendrick, don't you think?" his mother replied.
"Yeah, and I sleep like a baby, so why can't you?" his father angrily snapped.
"These nights are certainly not ones of comfort for me, Hendrick."
"And when, pray tell, did you suddenly become afraid of thunderstorms?" his father snapped with a taunting snicker.