Chapter 22 Chapter 21 The Building with Eyes

Leon sat down in the armchair opposite Ivana.A stack of outdated women's magazines and charade magazines had been piled on the chair, but now they were moved to the small coffee table between the two of them. Ivana didn't lean back in the chair, but sat upright, taking care not to let the hem of her robe slip off her tight legs. "I'm sorry about your wife running away," Ivana said to Leon as she poured hot tea for him. Leon twitched. "It's this house, you know? If you'd talked to me before moving in, then I could have warned you in advance." "Warn me of what?"

After pouring the tea, Ivana put the teapot back on the potholder and sat back in her chair.She clasped her hands on her stomach, and circled her thumbs continuously.This picture reminded Leon of the pair of intertwined green snake tattoos on Ivana's back. "It has eyes, you know? I mean this building. Don't you feel, as if someone is always staring at you? Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night thinking someone is sitting next to my bed, but I looked at the light, but there was no one. But I just can't get rid of this feeling, sometimes, I even check my closet like an idiot, and only after I make sure there is no one in the closet can I sleep peacefully."

Many older people tend to shake their heads unconsciously when they speak, and Ivana did the same.Leon hoped the habit wasn't one of the early signs of Parkinson's. "My God, now you must think I'm a crazy old bone." "No, I didn't think so." Leon replied.He remembered nervously how he had spied Ivana bathing and changing in the bathroom just a few minutes earlier, and the wet sheets hanging on the clothes rack, and the fact that it was Twelve Nights and the ghosts were looking for them. new residence. Leon took a sip of tea, trying to focus on the warm taste of the hot tea, hoping to maintain a connection with the real world.

"My doctor told me that all of this was my hallucination. Because Richard's departure made me fear loss, it caused such problems." "Who is Li Cha?" "It's my husband. One day after he packed his luggage, he left me without saying goodbye." Ivana once again enjoyed Leon's concentrated expression, she didn't even need to directly point out Natalie's behavior of fleeing for her life, which was almost the same as her husband's situation. "Do you know why your husband left?" "The problem is this building. Albert von Poittern wanted to build a mixed estate where friends and relatives could move in without paying rent, and that's why a poor painter like me can live here Come down. Otherwise, I wouldn't be able to afford the rent in this uptown just by selling two paintings a month and the side income from a part-time nurse. I was able to continue living here after I was no longer his muse."

Leon pointed to the oil painting above the fireplace and asked, "Did you paint this?" "Yeah! It was painted when we were in a crazy relationship. Albert was surrounded by a lot of women, but I didn't mind at all. Every artist I know has a wanton sex life, if not , that would show up on a spiritual level too. Same goes for Richard. I met him at a banquet given by Albert, who was the theater manager at the time, and didn't mind the relationship between me and Albert. Relationship. For a while, after Li Cha and I started living together in this building, a triangular relationship even developed between the three of us."

Ivana smiled, with a proud look on her face, just like when she had confessed her relationship with von Poitern to Leon in the corridor before. "Obviously your guardians like creative people," Leon said. "Yes, Albert even wrote in his will that this building must reserve a certain number of units for artists to live in." Leon nodded.In this way, it is not difficult to understand why Natalie and he can live here. "This building was supposed to be a creative paradise, but in the end it just brought misfortune." Ivana took off her glasses, which were a little too big for her, and put the plastic frames in her mouth and bit them. "It's true for every resident who lives here."

Leon raised his eyebrows high. "how to say?" "Let's say your previous occupant was a beautiful lady. That poor woman fell down the elevator shaft and died. Since then, a series of unfortunate events have followed." While Leon nodded, he also remembered the sarcastic words the administrator said on the phone. The female resident before you was blind and couldn't even operate the elevator, let alone build a second secret door into your bedroom. "Although I am not a statistician, during the years of living here, many tenants died in strange and unnatural ways, or died prematurely, and some committed suicide, or died like Albert. , was sent to a mental hospital."

"You mean Herr von Poittern?" Ivana nodded. "He wrote in his autobiography that the eccentric Albert von Poittern chose an unknown place to retreat and meditate. However, this place of retreat was not chosen by himself, but a A sanatorium for the mentally ill. He died there a few years ago of insanity." "So his son inherited the building?" "That's true, but his son didn't live a happy life because of it." "What happened?" Ivana hesitated for a moment, as if debating whether she should tell anyone else the secret. "No one knows the details. The door of his residence is always locked. All his property, cash, clothes, passports, etc., are in the same place. The only thing that disappeared and never appeared again, Just himself, as if he was swallowed up by his own house."

No wonder the administrator didn't want to help him contact the owner, because it was simply impossible. "Which household does Siegfried live in?" Leon, who thought he should know the answer, still raised a question. "I really don't want to scare you with scary stories, Leon, but he lives on the fourth floor, which is your house. If you come to talk to me before signing the rental contract, I will definitely stop you, I advise you not to live in that house." Ivana raised her head and gestured towards the ceiling: "Did you hear this?" Leon shook his head.But then, he recognized the set of scales. From the third floor, the sound was much lower and softer than what he had heard in his own home before.

"Talesky may be the next insane resident. Isn't it unusual for him to practice this piece over and over again?" Leon shrugged.After what had happened in the past few hours, he could no longer distinguish between normal and abnormal behavior with certainty. "Or, think about the Falconies who lived on the second floor." Ivana continued. "What's the matter with them?" "Did you notice that whenever someone walks past their door, those two guys will carefully watch to make sure their door is closed? Whenever someone rings the doorbell, they will stick their heads out. They will skillfully cover the visit The line of sight of the other party, so that the other party can not spy on the situation in the house. I made such a mistake recently. I helped them receive the mail. It was a heavy package. I struggled to carry the package downstairs. You Guess, did they thank me?" Ivana swirled the teaspoon vigorously in the glass.

"No one opened the door for me at all, so I just left the package at their door and left." "It's really strange." "Yeah! That's really weird. I really want to know what they're hiding. Sometimes, I think so... what am I talking about..." She waved her hand as if to erase what she had said, and smiled embarrassedly. "What did you think of?" "Not worth mentioning. Too much talk and I've become an old tell-tale woman. Would you like some more tea?" Ivana reaches for the teapot. "No, thank you very much." Leon wanted to look at his watch, but was surprised to find that his watch was not on his wrist.He was trying to remember if he had taken the watch off, or where it might have been dropped, when the phone in his breast pocket beeped.Through the blood-stained shirt tucked into the overalls, the notification tone of the mobile phone sounds a little muffled.This notification sound announcing that the battery of the mobile phone is about to run out is similar to the ringing sound that wakes people up in the morning. "Thank you very much for your tea, Mrs. Hessing. Again, I am deeply sorry for my sudden appearance at your house, but I'm afraid I really must go." "Of course! Of course!" said Ivana.But her voice could not conceal the frustration and disappointment.Apparently she had few people to talk to, let alone listen to. "Don't let me delay you." Ivana sent Leon to the gate, and for a moment, Ivana looked suspiciously at the chain pulled from inside.Leon was sure that Ivana was going to ask him why he didn't notice that he ran to the wrong floor when he locked the door earlier, because there was a women's jacket with fur inside hanging beside the door.But Ivana just whispered, "Can you do me a favor, Leon?" "What's busy?" "You seem to be a good young man. You must be able to do better than me." "I'm not sure I understand what you mean." Ivana looked out through the doorhole, and then said softly, "This building is like a magnet. It uses all its strength to hold on to you. The longer you stay here, the harder it is to leave." "You don't even believe what you said!" Leon forced a smile. "Only a few people have enough willpower to successfully move out of here. Li Cha and your wife are such people." "You don't know me and Natalie at all." Leon blurted out abruptly. Ivana opened the door and took a quick look around the stairwell, then, with a conspiratorial expression, she whispered, "Maybe! Advice to you: don’t make the same mistake as me, don’t wait for your wife to come back, you should follow in her footsteps.” "Should I move out?" Ivana gave Leon a clear look. "It's a dream first, and then it's a real event, Leon. Move out now! If you stay here for too long, you will be affected by this building, and the evil side in your body will also be revealed." Ivana grabbed Leon's hand and moved closer to him, so close that Leon could see the hairs on her chapped lips clearly. "First it's a dream, and then it's a real event. Don't wait too long, or you won't be able to resist anymore." When Ivana ended with a mysterious prophecy, her warm and stale breath also came to him .