Chapter 1 - THE MAN WHO KNOCKED FROM THE DEAD
Margaret reached the doorway before Daniel moved.
“Stop her!” he shouted.
Two security guards blocked the entrance. Margaret struck one of them with her handbag and tried to force her way past. Her composure had vanished. The elegant widow who had accepted condolences all morning was now a frightened woman searching desperately for an exit.
“Let me go!” she screamed. “You don't understand what you're doing!”
Daniel turned back toward the coffin.
The knocking came again.
Three slow blows.
KNOCK. KNOCK. KNOCK.
Elena stood beside the open lid, her face drained of color. She was no longer holding the shovel. Her hands hovered above the white satin lining as though she were afraid to touch it.
“Mr. Harrington?” she whispered.
A faint sound came from inside.
“Daniel…”
Victoria clapped a hand over her mouth.
Daniel leaned over the coffin. “Dad?”
The voice came again, weak and muffled.
“Get… me… out.”
For a moment, Daniel could not move. His father had been pronounced dead three days earlier. A doctor had signed the certificate. The family had arranged a funeral. Guests had traveled across the country to say goodbye.
And now the dead man was speaking.
“Open the lower panel,” Elena urged. “Not the lid. The panel beneath the lining.”
Daniel seized the satin fabric and pulled it aside. Beneath the wooden compartment was a second section, reinforced with thin metal strips. The small brass key Richard had given Elena was missing from her apron pocket; she had left it in the envelope with the note. Daniel found it and turned it in a narrow lock.
The panel released with a sharp click.
Inside was a cramped space lined with folded blankets and a small oxygen canister. Richard Harrington lay beneath the false floor, his face pale and his eyes barely open. A transparent breathing tube ran beneath his nose.
Daniel dropped to his knees.
“Dad!”
“Don't… let her…” Richard managed.
Daniel reached inside and carefully lifted his father’s shoulders. The funeral attendants rushed forward to help. They eased Richard out of the hidden compartment and laid him on the carpet.
Someone called an ambulance.
Victoria began sobbing. “He's alive. Daddy's alive.”
Elena pressed two fingers against Richard’s wrist. “His pulse is weak.”
Daniel looked toward Margaret.
She had stopped struggling. One guard held each of her arms. Her face had become strangely blank.
“What did you do?” Daniel demanded.
Margaret said nothing.
Richard’s eyelids fluttered. He tried to lift one hand and pointed toward the photograph that had fallen beside the coffin.
“The girl,” he whispered. “Find… my daughter.”
Daniel looked at the photograph.
The young woman standing beside Richard and the newborn baby was not Margaret. He had never seen her before. But the baby wore a small bracelet engraved with a name.
“Lydia.”
Elena nodded through her tears.
“Lydia was your father's first child,” she said. “He searched for her for eighteen years.”
Margaret finally spoke.
“She is dead.”
Richard’s eyes opened wider.
“No,” he rasped. “You told me that once. You lied.”
The ambulance siren grew louder outside.
Daniel looked from his father to his stepmother. His entire childhood seemed to shift beneath his feet.
“Why was my father in a coffin?” he asked.
May you like
Margaret’s lips trembled.
“Because he was supposed to stay there.”
