Things That Go Bump

When a novel’s main character walks through a forest on a dark and lonely night, you know something is going to happen. You want it to happen. Tension-building scenarios are why people write novels. They are also why other people read them, safe in their cozy chairs and with the doors locked.

This is not a novel. But if it were, I would be the main character.

In real life, you want the main character to sing her way through the dark forest and come out the other side, into the moonlight, unscathed.

Since I don’t usually walk through dark forests, that does not apply. But I have often wondered how I would respond if I heard a threatening noise in the night. A bump, perhaps.

My husband was on a trip—of course.

We were living in a rental house outside Vienna, Austria, the location, at the time, of the headquarters for Campus Crusade for Christ, Eastern Europe. Shortly after we moved in, a local policeman walked into my house unannounced—without even ringing the doorbell—and looked into every room, including my husband’s study. He examined all the books on the shelves. He did not talk or offer any explanation. Just before he left, he said, “Lock your doors, my woman, it is dangerous.”

I assumed he was who he appeared to be. But I did learn to keep the doors locked, as well as the gate (every house in Austria has a fence and gate), at all times, even in the day.

The house had an uncharacteristic open wooden stairway that led to the basement. No door at the top of the steps, no door at the bottom. The basement contained several rooms, each with a door opening onto a central room and each with a window to the outside, ground level.

Though the house was recently built, the wooden stairway already creaked loudly on one particular step every time someone walked up or down.

On this night, my two young children were snug in their beds and asleep.

So was I.

I was awakened out of a sound slumber by the loud creaking of that step.

I lay there, frozen.

After listening for a few moments and not hearing any more noises, I had a decision to make: lie there in fear? Or get up and face the enemy?

I decided I would rather face the enemy than be stalked in the darkness.

I got up and turned on all the lights. I checked on the children, looked in the other rooms, and went down the hall toward those steps.

I went down the steps. I went into every basement room and made sure each window was locked. I closed and locked every door or put a chair under the handle where there was no lock.

I found no one. As far as I remember, I went back to sleep.

The next morning, after settling the baby, I said to my three-year-old, “Let’s take a walk around the house.” I did not tell her I was looking for footprints in the turf outside the basement windows. I am not Sherlock, but I could not find any footprints.

Why did the step creak?

Scientific research suggests I was suffering from “auditory hallucinations.” But that applies mainly to people who hear voices in their heads, usually repeatedly. Nothing about a one-time creaking of a step in the dark of night.

I concluded it was a subconscious nervous response to being alone in a yet-unfamiliar situation and a country whose language I could barely speak. I had not dreamed about an intruder. My mind apparently supplied the creak.

Certainly, I did not have a cell phone, and the nearest telephone was down the hall anyway, and plugged securely into a wall cable. Only later I learned about an equivalent 911 number, should I ever need it. I never did.

But I did find out what I would do if I heard a threatening noise in the night.

I must have prayed, because that is always my first response. I only remember the impulse to get up and see for myself. What I would have done had I encountered a person, I will never know.

But there was a Presence there. Surely it was He who gave me the courage (I marveled later) to get up, rather than shut my door and lock myself in my bedroom. There were, of course, the children to consider, which was surely a stronger impulse than my fear.

God has built into us mechanisms, triggers, impulses—whatever we might call them—that we don’t need until the situation arises. Imagining a similar situation now and by the safe light of day, I wonder if I would have the same courage again. I can’t know ahead of time.

But these days, at the rare times when my husband travels, I do keep my cell phone by my bed. And I lock the door at the bottom of our bedroom stairs.

But I also count on that Presence.