yes, kids in the basement, my aunt and uncle's to be specific.  my younger brother and i were visiting there with our family in the early 1970's.  we were both dressed in blue jeans, t-shirts and tennis shoes.  our jeans were post 60's with embroidered patches on them.  nothing out of the ordinary for that day and age.  so it was that my snooping younger brother was doing his usual snooping when he decided to involve me in what he was doing.  i wanted no part of this as i was happily reading a comic book of my cousin's while lying on the floor.  i said i didn't want to get blamed for him breaking something like he'd done to me too many times in the past already.  we'd always both get spanked for it.  none the less he was very persistent and i just thought he'd broken something very expensive when he said he'd give me money.  i joked with him saying i wanted to see and hold that money.  i was shocked when he did in fact produce paper money out of his pocket.  he'd made it doing some odd job but he offered to give it all to me. i wondered where he'd gotten it and refused to take it. he begged and pleaded for me to go down to the basement.  my thoughts on the matter was that he was planning some scheme to lock me down there in the dark. he showed me that the light would only turn on down there and turn off at the same spot.  he didn't want to tell me what this was about and finally he was so exasperated that he said there were two kids down there.  i asked if anyone else was visiting or supposed to be there.  i made him go and ask.  this took time and after he found out i could hear the reply in the kitchen from my aunt.  he ran back to where i was and said these kids needed help.  i spent a few minutes warning him about payback and he swore that he wasn't doing anything like that.  his face even looked different.  he said he was scared and needed a witness. he swore up and down he wasn't up to anything.  finally i went down to have a look at what was so important that he chose to have me look instead of my aunt of uncle.  i took my time going down and he explained for me to stand under the light bulb and look towards the coal bin down there.  when i had he said to look under the basement stairs.  he said he'd stay right there on the landing of the basement stairs the whole time i was there.  i laughed and turned to see two boys under the stairs.  they hadn't made a sound and when i turned to look at them they grabbed each other very hard in great fear.  their mouths were hanging open in what appeared to be screams.  their eyes were very big and when i moved towards them they got even bigger and grabbed each other harder.  my younger brother wanted to know what i thought of them.  i said, they were boys, dressed funny, acting funny, obviously mutes as i couldn't hear them.  he asked if i could hear my own shoes on the concrete floor and i moved them to see.  yes, they did.  he asked me if when their's moved if they made sounds too.  i leaned towards them and they moved alot but no there was no sound.  what was up with that?  he didn't know.  he asked if i could tell what color their eyes were.  i asked him why that made any difference.  he said to humor him.  i looked and yes, their eyes were blue.  so what? i asked.  he said for me to keep looking at their eyes and turn the one light bulb down there off.  there was still a glow from the upstairs lights down through the open stairs.  yes, i could see..........uhhhh..........red glowing things in the air.  4 of them.  he said to see if i could see the boys still.  i looked hard and yes, they were still there i could see their forms moving.  it seemed where their heads were was where the red glowing things were in the air.  i kept my eyes on them and turned the light back on to see that they were in the exact same spots as their eyes!  yes, but i said, this could be a medical condition, who knew?  my brother said he didn't know but did i know anyone who's eyes glowed in the dark?  no i didn't but cats eyes glow in the dark we'd seen this many times when breaking up cat fights in the garden at night.  well, he asked about their strange clothes.  i said maybe they were trying on halloween costumes early?  he laughed and asked how far away halloween was.  it was some time away yet.  i said maybe it's clothes their mom makes them wear to look cute?  my brother wasn't buying that either and neither was i to tell the truth.  their hair was dark on both with dutch boy haircuts like on the paint cans.  their shirts were very fine white material of a fancy design and with much white work embroidery all over the fronts and sleeves.  the buttons looked very nice too, white like pearls.  their pants were funny to the knees, short pants they used to call them in grandma's day, they were velvet and had suspenders of the same material.  they wore stockings up under their short pants.  their shoes were roughly made leather with large brass buckles on them.  yes, very strange for a halloween costume and too fine of materials to be using them for that.  i thought maybe they had to wear them to some fancy thing.  he asked me if i'd ever seen them before or if i knew them.  no i had not.  i said we should concentrate on finding out who they were and what in the world they were doing in that basment.  i mean, it's out in the sticks, way out in the country.  the nearest neighbors are a long ways away from there and only two of them.  everything else around there was wilderness.  where indeed had they come from?  i tried coming closer to them but this terrified them immensely.  i tried letting them read my lips.  my brother said, "don't you think i tried that too???!!!" i laughed at his consternation.  i was usually the one frustrated at him.  i looked back at them and told my brother i'd put a hand on them.  he yelled that he'd tell mom and dad if i did and said i didn't know what might happen.  i said, "what could they do, they're just scared kids."  he said, come on, their eyes glow red in the dark, they've got strange clothes on that look like they're from grandma's day, and they don't make any sounds with their shoes.  the last one got me and i decided he was right.  i said all we could do was tell our aunt and uncle.  he said they might not be there when they went down to look.  i asked him why and he just said i'd see.  i said, well there's no place for them to get out but the upper door into the first floor.  i said i'll stand in it to make sure they don't get out.  it was well after 10 pm.  still, i called my aunt in to tell her and my uncle came with her.  right behind them were our parents who became immediately upset that we'd been in the basement without permission.  i said, i wouldn't have gone down but rick said there were kids down there and they were really scared and he didn't know what to do to help them.  he said he didn't know how they got in or why they were even in there.  my uncle said, no one else is here but you and your family.  he asked who they were and i said we've never seen them before.  my aunt asked what they looked like and i said they had dark hair that was cut like the dutch boy paint can boy's.  i said they had funny clothes on too, like from grandma's time.  she suddenly looked very startled and they all bolted down the stairs to have a look.  no one was there.  they searched the entire room. there were no windows down there, one door which was swelled for some time into place going to the outside which also had dirt piled up in front of it. it was still stuck right there.  the coal room off the main room was still padlocked shut on the outside.  the room itself had a flap over the inside doorway to keep the dust down.  after many minutes of searching for these boys they came up to grill us on what we'd seen.  as soon as i mentioned the glowing red eyes my aunt became hysterical.  she kept yelling that she'd told my uncle that house wasn't right.  no one would explain what this meant but mom and dad told us to stop talking about it and never speak of it ever again.  he threatened to hit us if we didn't stop right then and there.  we had to stay until my aunt was calmed down a bit.  she was sobbing by then.  we sat on the bed in the room with the basement door to it.  that door was finally pushed shut and locked to help my aunt feel better.  i caught my uncle who thought this was funny and told him to please tell our aunt that these kids were scared to death of us.  i begged him to tell her.  i said it would make a big difference because i wasn't afraid of them at all the whole time.  he asked how long we'd been down there and i said it was a long time and my younger brother had been down there trying to talk to them before i went down.  i said they'd been down there quite a while during the time he tried to get me to go down there to see them.  my brother confirmed this.  he said he wasn't scared of them either but felt sorry for them.  we said we just wanted someone to help them so they wouldnt' be afraid. he seemed to stop and think for a time about this before bursting out laughing.  you see, what we didn't get, was that he felt they were ghosts that we'd seen and we'd...........scared the daylights out of them.  were they ghosts?  i truthfully don't know.  do ghosts interact with you?  it's possible i guess.  are ghosts scared of the living?  possibly.  could it be that we'd seen into another time and that other time which had kids looking at us saw into our time.  they must've thought we were dressed strangely too.  i wonder if those boys are now grown old men, still alive.  i wonder if i located one or both of them if they'd have a heart attack at seeing me again?  still, i'm curious to know if they might still be alive and remember this incident to tell us what year this happened in their time.  it might shed some light on why it happened at all.  it also might put their minds at ease to know we weren't ghosts or demons.  maybe our eyes glowed red to them?  i'll do what i can to find out.  it's possible they might still be living so i'll let you know when i find out anything. 

patty