Through the Iron Grate

I clicked my penlight on and held the flat gray stone flush against my eye. Crouching low in the damp dirt by the foundation, I leaned straight into the bent bar of the iron vent. Through the hole in the stone, the beam didn't just scatter against thick cobwebs—it cut clean through the gloom. Past the foundation stones sits an unpaved crawlspace running deep under the house. Right beneath the parlor wall, there is a low wooden hatch propped open by an overturned clay flowerpot. The draft is blowing straight out of that dark gap. There is definitely a way in from below.