Re: The family in the cellar

In article <memo.20080514133338.3328A@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>, 
prd@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 says...
> I've never been married myself, but in popular culture at least there
> is the tradition of the husband (and also the wife) having their secret
> place from which the spouse is excluded. 

By agreement, maybe, not threats and violence.
In their own house? Behind a coded lock and steel door? What sort of 
popular culture is this. As fiercely protective as I am of my own 
private 'space', I haven't encountered any such tradition outside of 
Bluebeard tales. 

> > The man bought food to feed a family twice the size of the one 
> > living upstairs -- but the wife saw nothing, heard nothing, knew 
> > nothing.
> 
> 
> Again, if he took the supplies straight to the basement, why should she
> even notice?

You wouldn't notice if the person you live with daily drags large boxes 
into the basement with no good reason for it?

Also, apparently the cellar was much enlarged _after_ the initially 
approved shelter had been constructed. They say he made the girl herself 
work at it. Getting all the supplies in and the dug out ground out 
without anybody noticing, doing the construction with no sound at all 
etc.. does not sound likely.

Also, there was a bathroom in the cellar. Now even if the rooms were 
very well soundproofed the pipes should have carried sound to the rest 
of the house, when banged on or whatever. But I don't believe the 
soundproofing was all that dandy, cause apparently some people did hear 
things every now and then. And dogs also behaved suspiciously.

And if even neighbours and renters are coming out now saying they heard 
strange sounds coming from the cellar from time to time, it's impossible 
to imagine the very family living in the house did not. It is likely the 
children in the cellar cried quite a lot growing up (unless the key to 
silence was keeping them all drugged to the gills, which has not been 
mentioned)

It is also impossible to imagine that a guy as perverse as he was 
behaved totally normally with all the other children in the household. I 
bet there were screwy things going on aboveground as well as in the 
cellar.

Also, don't you think it's kind of weird that the 'aboveground' siblings 
first comments are about how wondrously 'normal' Elizabeth is, not about 
how horrified they are to have lived with such a monster for a father, 
all these years? Seems they knew already who they had for a father. 
Whether consciously or not, they knew something was very wrong.

rgds,
netcat