Spider Lake Read Online Free Page A

Lake, with my best friend Matt. We are rowing to our favorite fishing hole on the west side of the lake. We see the capuchin monkey climbing the old wooden water tower at the lake’s edge on the Rule estate, and Matt says to me “There’s that frigging monkey, I wish I had a rifle. It would be an easy shot.”
      I agree with Matt whole-heartedly and I answer that “If we shot him, my dad would hear it. It would be better to vaporize him with a ray gun. “Set your phasers to vaporize.” I hate that little monkey but my dad loves the fur-ball, and he would kill me if he found out that we vaporized or shot him.”
    The monkey continues to climb the tower and is up and out of site in a flash. Matt and I are starting to fish and a cool wind transforms the smooth surface of the lake into a rippled one-foot chop. Matt and I begin to see the western sky darken, and we hear the first rumblings of a thunder storm.
    I say: “We better get heading back. I am not going to be turned into a skeleton rowing a boat.” And Matt laughs.
    “That was a favorite standard joke which always came out when you heard thunder. Getting struck by lightning and turning into a skeleton could be applied to any endeavor, such as riding a bike, and it always garnered a belly laugh. Anyway—”
    Matt and I are reeling in our lines, and we realize that we would never make it to the resort on time, because the storm looks like a real bad one and it is coming fast so we start rowing to the nearest shoreline which is at the Rule estate. We both know it is our only choice, and we knew it would probably get us into trouble with old man McCann.

    “There was strictly no trespassing at the Rule estate doctor. Old man McCann the caretaker guarded it as if it was Fort Knox.”

    Matt and I are now really rowing furiously directly towards the Rule estate and the storm is really coming on strong. We turn the boat over up against a large flat rock on the shore and hunker down under the boat for protection. The wind is now blowing wildly, snapping off large branches from the near-by trees. The day turns dark and grayish-green with the immensity of the storm. The bolts of lightening are striking everywhere all around us. The only view I have is the old Rule mansion and the grounds leading up to it from the lake. The wind is blowing so hard that the boat we are under is shaking.
    As I look out from my vantage-point from underneath the boat, suddenly two connected bolts of lightning directly hit the mansion. It catches fire.
    The orange light from the now blazing mansion is mixing with the dark gray-green light of the storm casting an eerie light on the mansion grounds. The lightning is coming down everywhere. The wind is driving the rain horizontally and I am getting wet underneath the boat. Then, in the light of another huge lightning bolt, silhouetted in the fire-light, I see the monkey running directly towards us from the direction of the water tower. He looks like he wants to take shelter under our boat. He doesn’t see us until he is right there upon us. When he finally notices that we are there, he hisses and bares his vicious teeth in a freakish grin-snarl. Then a bolt lands very close. So close you can smell the ozone and the simultaneous thunder is deafeningly loud. The monkey screams. Then Matt and I scream.”

    “That is when I wake up doctor.”
    Doctor Levine was still writing in his note pad. He had composed himself since his last interruption with the mention of the organ-grinder, and he asked, “Do you think that is the dream in it’s entirety Ben?”
    “I think so doctor. That is pretty much all I can remember. It doesn’t make any sense to me. The second half of the dream is really just a memory. The storm, the fire, and the monkey all happened when I was eleven years old when I was living at my father’s resort up in Rhinelander Wisconsin.”
    “Ben, can you remember when you began dreaming the dream?”
    Ben thought about the question.