The Dirt on Ninth Grave

by Darynda Jones

  “Never mind,” he said into the phone. “I thought someone was breaking in across the street, but they were just leaving a note.” His entire demeanor changed in a heartbeat, and he went from scowling at me to gaping at me, only in a really cute way. Seriously, the kid could have been a supermodel. “Yes. No, yeah, I understand. I’ll keep an eye out. Sorry about that.”

  He talked his way out of the call and put his phone down.

  “You’ve seen her, too?” I asked. “In the pictures?”

  “No. In the house.”

  Fuck. I was right. She was here.

  “Okay, tell me exactly what you saw.”

  He’d grown a little pale and had to sit down. We walked back into the living room and sat on their very used but terribly comfy couch. It was probably a hand-me-down. They clearly couldn’t afford much. Their decor was sparse but prettily placed.

  They worked hard for what they had, and I admired them both.

  “So, I got up one night about a week ago to check on Hannah. Just this weird tug inside me.”

  I wondered if he might be a little touched as well.

  “I was half asleep, but when I got to Hannah’s room, I could have sworn I saw someone standing over her. An old lady. I asked her what she was doing in my daughter’s room, and she—” He stopped as though gathering himself. “She turned and just came at me. I fell back, but when I looked again, she was gone.”

  “That’s awful.” I wanted to share. I wanted to tell him about being chased by the headless horseman and how this customer at work had a demon tucked inside him, but now was not the time for group therapy. “What did you do?”

  “I ran to Hannah and picked her up. I thought … I was worried she’d done something to her. By the time Erin got up, I’d decided I’d dreamed it all.”

  “I’m just glad Hannah was okay.”

  “But when you said the part about her eyes … This woman’s eyes were solid white. That’s all I saw, and I haven’t slept well since.”

  While I was totally glad not to be handcuffed, I was still at a loss. What if the woman really was haunting Erin? What if she really killed the babies? What then? Could one really hire an exorcist? If so, how? From what I understood, the Catholic Church tended to drag its feet about these things. Hannah was in danger now. Especially since I—aka the girl with no past—showed up.

  “Where’s the baby now?” I asked.

  “With Erin’s aunt.”

  I nodded and walked over to the pictures on the mantel.

  “Are these all of Hannah?”

  He stood. “No, these two are of her first two babies, Hailey and Carrie.”

  All I saw was the creepy old lady. It was like a horror film on pause.

  “What exactly do you see?” he asked me.

  “In every picture of the children, I only see the old lady. In the others, though, I see you guys and other assorted family members.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, how would you know? You can see past the woman, right?”

  “True.”

  “Okay, then point to the ones where you see the old lady.”

  I pointed to the first one. He nodded. The second. Another nod. The third, and so on. Erin was so into family, it was charming. We walked to the pictures on the wall. She had them artfully arranged and all framed in white.

  The babies were only in two pictures there. I started again and pointed to the one closest to me.

  Billy frowned. “You see her in this picture?”

  When I nodded, he shook his head. “This is Erin’s great-aunt Novalee. She died in the thirties or forties.”

  Surprised, I pointed to another photo. He shook his head again. “This is Novalee, too.”

  “All I see is the crazy ghost chick. Why does Erin have pictures of relatives she’s never met?”

  “She’s just like that,” he said. “She loves old pictures and antiques and stuff. And Novalee’s story is tragic. I just think she always felt a connection with her even though they never met. All her older relatives say Erin looks just like her.”

  “How is Novalee’s story tragic?” I asked, suspicious.

  “From what I understand, she was a nut. Like certifiable. Set fires. Tore up any paper with pictures for no reason. Spent almost her whole life in an institution.”

  Sadly, that could have meant any number of debilitating mental diseases. Or it could even have been a result of a childhood injury or illness.

  “You know what?” he said, heading to the hallway. “There might be something up here.” He pulled the ladder to the attic down and had started to climb up when he remembered he was wearing a towel. “Maybe I should put on some pants first.”

  “Maybe,” I said, chuckling.

  It was a shame. He looked really nice in that towel. I needed to get Reyes a towel. Everyone needed a towel. It wouldn’t look too desperate.

  Billy went to change, so I perused the pictures along the walls there. Erin had an incredible ability to decorate combining both old and new. Some of her heirlooms looked so fragile. So delicate.

  I came across a drawing and stopped. It was very old, from the early 1900s judging by the dress the woman was wearing in it. But it was her.

  “Billy!”

  He ran out while pulling on a shirt. “Did you find something?”

  “Is this her?” I asked him. “Because this woman could be Erin’s twin.”

  He squinted. “Oh, yeah, I think it is.” He took the drawing off the wall and looked at the back. “Yep. Erin labeled all of the pictures. This one is from 1910. Novalee Smeets.”

  I studied the drawing, but she was too young in it. I couldn’t tell if that was the crazy lady or not.

  “You can see her in this, right?”

  “I can. What were you going to show me from the attic?”

  “Oh, when Erin was a kid, she used to draw a lot. I think she copied a lot of the old pictures she had. She might have drawn another one of Novalee.”

  “Did she draw any of Novalee when she got older?”

  “Let’s find out.”

  I started up the stairs, and the situation seemed eerily familiar. It gave me flashbacks. “I just fell through a ceiling. I won’t fall through, right?”

  “Nah, it’s finished.”

  “Okay.”

  After some rearranging, Billy found a box of Erin’s old drawings. She was an incredible artist. She practiced hyperrealism. Her drawings looked so real they could have been photographs.

  “Does Erin still draw?”

  “Unfortunately, no. I mean, look at these. We could be rich,” he joked. “She stopped after her first baby died.”

  “She’s amazing.”

  We pored over each drawing, checked names, and searched for other photographs she’d used as reference.

  “Here’s one,” he said, holding it up for me. “The original is downstairs.”

  I could see why she used that picture. Erin had focused mainly on the face and let the other details in the picture fade away. The woman in it was old with fragile cracks along her skin and eyes that didn’t quite look right. She was staring off into space; then I realized why.

  “This is a mourning portrait,” I said to him.

  “Wow, how’d you get the time of day?”

  “No, mourning as in grieving. Novalee had already passed when this picture was taken.”

  He lurched back as though suddenly afraid to touch it. I fought the urge to chase him with it while screaming, “Death cooties! Death cooties!” Sometimes my thoughts led me way too far astray.

  “Well, mystery solved.”

  He stared a moment, then asked, “This is her? The woman I saw?”

  “Unless there are two ghosts hanging out here, that’s her.”

  “What the hell? I mean, is she trying to kill Hannah?”

  I chewed on a fingernail in thought. “I’m not sure.”

  “Then what do we do? How do we stop
her?”

  “I have no clue.” He gaped at me, so I explained. “I see her, plain as you see me, but I don’t know what to do about her. I’m not exactly an expert, but I do have connections.”

  “What kind of connections?” he asked, his brows knitting in suspicion.

  “The, um, noncorporeal kind. I’ll ask around.”

  He stared again, then snapped out of it and looked at my hand. “You know, you can put that down now.”

  I looked at the poker I still held. The one I’d climbed to the attic with. “Oh, right. Sorry.” After I laid it on the floor beside me, I said, “Look, Erin and I don’t exactly … get along. If you could, maybe, not mention that I broke and entered?”

  “Don’t worry about her. She’s a pussycat.”

  To him, maybe. She wanted to kill me with a tire iron.

  “How did you get in here, anyway?”

  I fished the keys out of my pocket. “I stole them from her purse.”

  “Nice.”

  “Okay, I’m going to do some research, check with my connections, and I’ll get back with you the minute I know something.”

  * * *

  I drove back to the café. Reyes was gone, but he’d left the posole unattended. Crazy man.

  I scooped up a bowl and went to kick Dixie off her computer.

  “I’m playing online strip poker,” she said, pretending to be annoyed.

  Knowing better, I scooted her out of her chair with my butt.

  “Fine. I have to get home anyway.”

  “I know.”

  “Oh, yeah? How?”

  “That special ringtone you use anytime you get a text from your secret lover? It dinged three minutes ago.”

  She gawked at me for the better part of a minute, then gave in and let excitement shimmy through her.

  “Oh, by the way, your ex-father-in-law is taking pictures of me in my underwear.”

  “Really? He’s good. You should get some nudes while you’re at it, too.”

  “Will do. Have fun.” I waved her off and brought up Google.

  Before I went into the whole poltergeist thing, I decided to check up on the name Headless Henry gave me: Tamala Dreyer.

  The search garnered dozens of hits about a girl who died under suspicious circumstances. Her death was eventually ruled a suicide, but her friends and family disagreed and openly accused her high school sweetheart, who they claimed was stalking her after a messy breakup, of killing her. One article showed a picture of the grieving family. In the background was Henry.

  The article listed him as a second cousin. He protested the loudest, swearing she was killed by the stalker. And then he named him. Called him out. Challenged him.

  “I have nothing to hide, and I will not be quieted by an incompetent police force.”

  Ouch. That couldn’t have helped their cause.

  “Tamala was killed by Ian Jeffries.”

  Wow. The guy had balls. I wondered what he could have done with his life if it hadn’t ended so young. I soon found myself searching every inch of the Internet for information on Mr. Ian Jeffries. A couple of years later, there was another suspicious suicide of a woman he’d claimed to be dating. When Henry heard Ian was a person of interest but nothing ever came of it, he protested again, and the proverbial shit hit the fan.

  I read further. A close friend of the deceased says the woman never said yes to Officer Jeffries’s proposal. “He wouldn’t take no for an answer.” Ian was claiming to be the fiancé of the woman, but her family denied that vehemently.

  And the million-dollar question? Was Henry’s death really just a freak accident?

  And the ten-million-dollar question? Was Ian planning a similar fate for me?

  I looked at all the facts. Ian had been a person of interest in the suicide deaths of two women. I was a woman. He had access to my house. He knew my routine and the fact that I had no phone. No way to call for help. Time to change the locks and get a stupid phone once and for all. I just hadn’t really needed one since I knew no one on the planet when I woke up.

  I called my landlord immediately, told him someone was breaking into my house, and asked for a complete lock change. He grumbled a little but said he could get to it in a couple of days. So as long as I didn’t become suicidal over the next two days, all should be right with the world. I could borrow Mable’s car tomorrow and see about getting a phone. Hopefully tips would rock.

  I remembered the hundred-dollar bill. No way was I spending that. Surely I’d earn enough for a cheap TracFone, if nothing else.

  That settled, I opened a new Google and searched poltergeists, to no avail. Actually, to too much avail. There were hundreds of thousands of hits, and the more I read, the more convinced I became that I was crazy. I was just seeing things.

  But wait! There’s more!

  Billy saw her, too.

  Okay. I felt better. From what I gathered, poltergeists were the entities believed to be responsible for physical disturbances, like moved objects and loud noises. But I couldn’t find anything about a poltergeist that actually killed people. Nothing legitimate. There was tons of fiction, but I needed real answers.

  Then I found another interesting tidbit. One researcher believed they could definitely attach themselves to people or objects and become obsessed with them. I knew that, but it was nice to have it confirmed.

  Erin had gotten off work some time ago, so I hated to do it, but I had to call Billy. He’d given me his number before I left so I could let him know what I’d found out.

  “Hey, it’s me,” I said, whispering. Not sure why.

  “Oh, hey, Tommy,” he said. Then he yelled, presumably to Erin, “It’s Tommy. From work.”

  “I am well aware of where you know Tommy from, hon.” She laughed, but it was the baby sounds in the background that brought on the attack.

  The edges of my vision blurred, and a sadness took hold, the force of it seizing my lungs. I had to sit down. To catch my breath. To try to fill the emptiness that was drowning me.

  “You there?” he asked.

  “Yes. Yes, I’m here.” I closed my eyes. Focused.

  “So, I got more of the story from Erin. About her great-aunt.”

  Alarmed, I asked, “You didn’t tell her, did you?”

  “About us? No, baby, we’re good.” His voice was full of humor, and the situation struck me as ironical as well. If there were a list of reasons for a guy to sneak around, to exorcise a poltergeist would not have been at the top. “So, what are you wearing?”

  His teasing helped. I filled my lungs, confounded by the panic attacks I’d been having. Just another day in the life, I supposed. “What did you find out, Romeo?”

  “Prepare to be blown away.”

  I bounced around and lolled my head from side to side like a prizefighter. “Okay, totally prepared.”

  “Erin’s great-aunt killed her own daughter, then spent the rest of her life in an insane asylum, telling everyone who would listen that the doll was her deceased kid. How’s that for creepy?”

  “I’d give it a solid 9.8.” The thought of a mother killing her own child disturbed me way more than I let on. I knew it happened. I just liked to be kept in the dark about it. “Okay, does Erin have anything of Novalee’s? Perhaps a piece of jewelry or a blanket? Anything?”

  “Besides those pictures, I’m not sure. Wait. Now that she’s told me the story, I wonder if that doll in the attic was hers.”

  “What doll?”

  “There’s this really creepy doll in the attic. Come to think of it, it does look like the one from the picture.”

  “There wasn’t one in the picture.”

  “Not in the drawing, but there is in the picture Erin used to draw it.”

  I perked up. “And Erin has it? What does it look like?”

  “You know, one of those old dolls that looks dead. Its face is cracked, and its eyes are solid white.”

  “Billy, can you get to it?”

  “I guess. I think it�
�s still in the attic. Why?”

  “I need you to get it out of your house.”

  “And do what with it?”

  “I’m not sure. For now, just bring it to me. I’m at the café.”

  “I’ll try. I’m not sure how I’ll do it without Erin finding out.”

  “You’ll think of something.”

  “Is it the doll?” he asked, as though it suddenly all made sense. “Janey, Erin’s aunt Noreen gave her that doll the very first time she got pregnant. Noreen had tried to have kids for years but miscarried several times. Then when she finally did carry all the way, her baby died two weeks later in its sleep.”

  “Just like Erin’s.”

  “Exactly.”

  That fact only reinforced my belief that this was somehow connected to that doll. “Billy, get that doll out of the house. Now. I’ll wait for you here.”

  “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  We hung up, and I started a new Google. Good thing they were free. This time I looked up how to destroy a possessed item. From what I could tell, I’d need holy water, the heart of a dragon, and the nail clippings from a canonized saint.

  17

  Ahhh, Friday …

  My second favorite F-word.

  —T-SHIRT

  A little while later, Billy knocked on the office door.

  “Come in,” I said as though I had a right to.

  He walked in with a brown paper bag. “It’s in here. You think this will stop her?”

  I took it. Opened it. Shivered. “I hope so. What did Erin say?”

  “Nothing. I told her I was meeting my mistress. She told me to make sure I wore clean underwear, ’cause she’d rigged the brakes and it would be awkward if the EMTs had to cut off dirty boxers.”

  “She plans ahead. I like that.”

  He nodded, suddenly nervous. “What if this doesn’t work?”

  “Then we’ll keep looking. I won’t give up, Billy.”

  “Thanks. I can’t imagine why Erin hates you so much.”

  “Boggles the mind, right?”

  Billy left, and I let myself acknowledge the heat that I’d begun to associate with all things Reyes Farrow. I tucked the bowl I’d used to confiscate a sample of his posole against my side and hurried to the kitchen sink.