Glory Comes Clean
St. Francisville, Louisiana
December 8, 2015
With his arm around Sabrina to support her as they walked, Josh followed Glory to the small cabana-like building set on the opposite side of the yard from the patio table where they had been sitting. The rain was finally abating, and the thunder had slacked off to just a distant rumble as the storm appeared to be moving southeast toward New Orleans and the Gulf of Mexico. Glory opened the door and let Josh help Sabrina inside before following them in and taking a seat across the small wooden table in the center of the building. Sabrina was still visibly shaken from what had happened to Wendy, but her tears had stopped, and she was finding an anger rising in her fueled by the apparent fact that this woman…this witch…Glory Trevil had deliberately misled them and hidden who she really was just to get them down here.
“OK, Glory…” Josh said as he released Sabrina and leaned into the table, letting his forearms rest on the surface, “time to fess up.”
“It’s not like I meant…”
“Look, Glory…” Sabrina interjected with a real bite in her voice now, “just save it. I do not know why you did what you did nor what your end game in all of this is to get us involved. Nor do I especially care at the moment, though I am sure you will try and justify it to us. Right now all I know is you had a significant, albeit indirect, responsibility in the death of my partner and friend, Wendy. Do you have any idea what if feels like to lose a friend of over twenty years? If I was not so weak from all that has happened this night…”
“I am sorry, Miss Sabrina. I never meant for such a thing to happen to your friend, Miss Wendy. And though I know it is of little consolation, trust me when I say you have no idea what loss of people close to you is relative to myself. I mean no disrespect, nor do I say this to try and garner sympathy from you. Just know when you reach my age, your cumulative losses can be high. Please believe me…”
Sabrina listened carefully as Glory spoke. She got her message, but it did not lessen the pain and grief she was just beginning to suffer from Wendy’s unnecessary death. However, on some level, she did let go of some of her anger and resentment toward the woman. Sabrina exhaled heavily and nodded her understanding as she let Josh take over, still afraid she might lash out again.
“OK, Glory…” Josh said once the exchange between the two women was over. We both appreciate your words. But the fact of the matter is, there still remains the unanswered questions of who you really are, why you misrepresented yourself to us—apparently anyway—and what your true goal at this mansion really is. As you might imagine…and I am sure you might feel the same way if you were in our shoes…it is quite irresponsible and deceptive to be treated like this. Let’s hear it…”
“Certainly, Mr. Josh. Let me begin by saying I did not technically misrepresent myself to you.”
“Technically? What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“I will try and explain. I do possess psychic abilities. And as I told you and Sabrina, I prefer the title of witch. I could go into all of my background to explain that distinction thoroughly, but it is not of any relevance here at this time. But there is a bit more that I did withhold.”
“Just as we suspected, Glory. Pardon me for being blunt, but—and I am sure I speak for Sabrina as well on this point—we are not fond of being lied to. In this business, it is not a luxury we can afford to take on, and I would imagine you can understand that. I am guessing there are as many frauds and charlatans and con artists in your part of the world working you as in Indiana.”
“What you say is true, Mr. Josh. Fortunately, with my insight, I can pick up on this. Most of the time, anyway. And I am sorry you feel you were lied to. It was a sin of omission only.”
“Fine line, Glory.”
“I suppose it is. If my doing that has offended you and Sabrina then again, please accept my sincere apology. It is just that well…”
“You needed someone with some experience and credentials in the field to draw out whatever seems to be attached to this mansion? Something along those lines?”
“You have more intuitive skills and psychic insight that I think you give yourself credit for, Mr. Josh. Very good, sir…”
“Thanks…I guess…so what have you left out?”
“My—shall we say—special abilities are beyond what I described to you. I guess the best way to explain it is that I am a bonafide exorcist as well. I am not sure if your specific religious beliefs encompass that or not. I know of many deeply religious folks who do as well as many with no spiritual beliefs who do as well.”
“I do not adhere to any real formal line of faith. In fact, I guess if I had to describe myself, it would be a borderline agnostic. My only opinion on exorcisms is that sometimes the idea makes good movies. But a lot of the time it also makes for pretty shitty films as well.”
Glory chuckled to herself.
“Did I say something funny?”
“I just appreciate your honesty, Mr. Josh. And you make good jokes, too. Can I ask you a personal question?”
“Shoot.”
“Do you believe in some sort of a higher power? Maybe not God per se, but some force or power or whatever you might prefer that is beyond our complete understanding?”
“I suppose so,” Josh replied, wondering what she was getting at.
“Do you believe that there is good and evil at work in our world?”
“Sure.”
“I am not speaking of people who steal and cheat and lie their way through life, Mr. Josh. I am speaking of a manifestation of real evil.”
“Until this trip, I had not given it much thought, Glory. But now…”
Josh just shrugged as he let his words trail off.
“Fair enough. You may believe me or you may not. But all I can tell you is that in my experience, there is a real, viable, palpable evil at work in the mortal world.”
“And you perform exorcisms to try and clean that up?”
“Something like that. If we were speaking of a personal possession—much as in that hideous film, ‘The Exorcist’ from back in the 70s—then we would be looking at an exorcism. For a place—like this mansion, for example—it more of a spiritual cleansing to get the spirits that are attached to it to move on. They are in just as much agony and pain and suffering as those they seem to inflict this on from afar.”
“So you wanted us to stir the pot, so to speak? Get the lingering spirits of Daucourt Mansion up in arms so you could try and clear them out?”
“Well said. I have been working on this place for some time, but for whatever reasons I am good at getting places cleaned but not so much in—as you so colorfully put it—stirring the pot.”
“Then why not just have been upfront with us in the beginning?”
“I find that even in the spirit world, entities are good at discerning trickery. I needed you and your company to come and work your own special magic without being under any preconceived or false pretenses. I hope that makes sense.”
Josh looked over at Sabrina and could see she got it. And though he still had his doubts about this woman, he supposed he was beginning to soften toward her as well.
“Are you aware of anything deeper on this Charles Wilder than we know of and that we found out in this diary?”
Josh held up the loose pages of the journal that Sabrina had deciphered.
“I was not aware of the journal that Miss Sabrina found, but I am well aware of the situation that occurred between Charles and Suzanne Wilder that led her to murder and then her suicide.”
“You just divined it?” Josh asked. “I am not being snarky…just curious.”
“I know you are not, Mr. Josh, and yes…I guess that is as good as description as any.”
“So, now what?”
“Well, I think the entities here have been sufficiently aroused now. Would you agree?”
Josh and Sabrina both chuckled appreciating her sense of humor at last.
&nbs
p; “Good. Then what I would suggest is for us to go back inside. Back to the playroom where all the serious psychic energy is concentrated, and I will try and do my thing. The real threat here is Charles Wilder, who is very angry and wants to avenge his untimely murder. Despite his wife’s belief that the child he arrived with was his, it was a false assumption.”
“Yes, Charles was quite promiscuous in his day, but the child in question? Not his. It was from the rape of one of his clients, and he was bound over by attorney-client privilege to keep the identity of the child a secret. He was merely to look after the child—as sort of award—until a proper home could be secured. Much like today, foster care was hit-and-miss and Charles was just trying to help. I sense that once Florian is dispatched, then all the other spirits in his wake will follow suit. Right now, he is so filled with anger and resentment, that any intrusion into his milieu causes him to lash out.”
“Including us? And you?”
“Yes.”
Josh looked at Sabrina.
“Let’s rock!” she replied.
The three of them left the cabana and Glory picked up a set of ancient-looking scrolls from the table on the patio and led them back inside the mansion through the kitchen. However, just as they were walking through the kitchen, a large kitchen knife whistled past Sabrina’s head and impaled Glory to the wood of the corridor wall making her drop the scrolls. It stuck in her neck, and soon the blood was flowing rapidly from a carotid artery, and she slumped to the floor when Josh disengaged the knife from the wall. He tried in vain to stem the bleeding, but it was futile. Even using cloths lying close by were of no use and Glory clutched the scrolls in one hand while she gathered a bunch of Josh’s shirt in the other.
“Let me call an ambulance!” Sabrina cried as she kneeled next to Josh beside the fallen form of Glory Trevil.
“There is no time, my children.” Glory sputtered in a whisper. “Take the scrolls. I have faith that you can do this.”
“Us?” Josh replied in shock. “We know nothing of cleansing rituals!”
Glory smiled weakly as she knew her time was short.
“Trust me, Mr. Josh…you do. You just don’t remember it right now.”
“Remember it? What are you talking about?”
“Just trust me, OK? Take the scrolls. Follow the ritual. As soon as you begin, it will all come back to you. Like riding a bike, Mr. Josh…”
With that, Glory Trevil took her last mortal breath, and she was gone. Josh looked at Sabrina with an air of disbelief.
“I can’t do this, Sabrina. I have no idea what to do.”
“She seemed to think so, Josh.”
“What? You buying into the dying words of a crazy old witch now?”
“How was she crazy? It seemed as if she was just more in tune with the psychic world than most. She sure knew more about us than we ever revealed. And she saved us from that fire. Somehow, she knew we were in danger and poof! There she was. I say we have to try at least.”
Josh felt his gut flip over with anxiety and doubt, but if Sabrina had faith in him, then he guessed he had to give it at least a shot. If Glory had been right about them riling up the ghost of Charles Wilder, then for sure more evil was likely on its way.
“OK. Like you said earlier…let’s rock!”
Josh Rediscovers Himself
St. Francisville, Louisiana
December 8, 2015
Josh scooped up the scrolls from the floor from under Glory’s dead fingers, and Sabrina followed him hurriedly down the corridor toward the playroom to try and complete what Glory Trevil had begun. The closer they got to the playroom, the more alive the mansion seemed to be growing. The rumbling vibrations picked up once again as they neared the entrance and the petrifying wail that had chased them from the room before had sprung up as well. They skidded across the corridor in their haste and slipped into the playroom. Josh still had no idea what he was doing, but something in Glory’s last words and that look in her eyes before they went dark for good were giving him confidence.
He spread open the documents and illuminated the scripts with his flashlight as Sabrina stood off to the side and gave him two thumbs up. As soon as the parchment was fully opened, a glowing rose-tinted light began to form in the center of the room pulsing like a beating heart. They looked over in fascination as the pulsing orb grew larger and then elongated finally taking on a human shape. But as the shape became more defined and clearer in detail, they realized this was not a good thing.
They had never seen an actual picture of Charles Wilder, but the clothing and other personal effects of the apparition, plus the fact that they could actually see through him, left them no doubt that this was he. His face was twisted in anger and rage, and bright green lights shone in the empty sockets where his eyes should have been. Blackened and decaying flesh hung in nauseating strands from the bleached bones of his arms and legs and the wail they had heard before came roaring at them at full volume.
This is not a happy ghost, Sabrina said to herself, trying to distract her brain from the serious situation they had found themselves in.
“Josh!” Sabrina yelled, trying to get his attention over the wail of the Wilder-thing, “it’s now or never! Better get moving on that ritual! I’ll try and draw his attention, but step on it!”
Josh nodded and began using the scrolls Glory had with her. His voice was shaky and unsure as he began, but as he moved through the ritual, much as Glory had foretold, the words suddenly seemed familiar, and soon his confidence rose, and his voice grew loud and certain. Sabrina had initially been able to provide a temporary distraction while Josh did the ritual, but once he got further into the words, the Wilder-thing snapped his attention from her and roared violently in rage and anger at Josh. Knowing he still needed more time to complete the ritual, Sabrina upped her ante as well hurling insults toward the entity as quickly as they could come into her brain.
The apparition was thrown off enough to look away from Josh momentarily. Sabrina smiled.
“Pretty thin-skinned for an adulterer!” Sabrina yelled toward the emanation, trying everything she could think of to give Josh extra time.
The specter arched its back and spewed a fetid cloud of a dark red spray that nearly made Sarina vomit. She had grown up on a family farm and had been around her share of vile-smelling odors, but compared to this stench that was like violets. With another bellow, the Wilder-thing began to levitate inanimate objects and hurl them at Sabrina. She twisted and dodged and spun in place as she avoided all the projectiles, but as she ducked down to avoid a flying knife, the specter sent a large chest her way and Sabrina could not move in time. She tried to jump over it, but one of her feet got wedged below, and the chest smashed into her leg, and she cried in pain as she heard the snap of the bone in her ankle.
Sabrina fell to the floor, grasping her ankle as she cried out in pain. This made the ghost certain he had dispatched that annoyance, and he once again focused his attention on Josh as he was wrapping up the cleansing ritual. It moved toward Josh bellowing in earnest as it moved, but just before it could touch him, it arched severely backward and without warning burst into flames. Josh folded up the ritual documents and dodged his way around the flaming apparition, now in full distress. He dropped the flashlight, using the illumination from the conflagration of the burning ghost to light his way as he scooped up the fallen body of Sabrina and headed for the exit out through the kitchen as the playroom blazed away from the fire.
He laid her gently on the grass of the backyard and told her to sit tight while he got some bracing for her ankle. Josh returned instantly just as the sounds of sirens from police, emergency vehicles and fire trucks began to pierce the night.
“What do we plan on telling everyone?” Sabrina asked as she grimaced through the pain of her broken ankle. “Not sure a burning ghost is going to cut it…”
Josh laughed at her.
“If you trust me, I got an idea.”
“After all this, you have
to ask? It’s all yours, Josh…”
……….
Epilogue
Evansville, Indiana
March 12, 2015
As Josh and Sabrina relaxed in their office over coffee that morning, they went back over what he had done to end the nightmare of their project in Louisiana, as well as what he had told the authorities in regard to the destroyed Daucourt Mansion to allow them just to walk away unscathed…at least criminally and legally unscathed. Sabrina was still amazed at how easily Josh had performed the cleansing ritual, despite him still denying he had any idea what he was doing. It was, he told her, like things he had read about people who describe performing automatic writing. Once he began, the words just flowed, and it was like he was watching from outside his body as he read off the words Glory Trevil had handed over. He was conscious of the words, but he described it as if an entity outside of him was guiding him. For someone not as into the paranormal as she was, Sabrina found Josh’s description of the ritual events unusual at best. He did into seem to want to further elaborate on the whole thing at the moment, so she just let it go thinking another time would be better for this discussion.
As for dealing with the police and other authorities when they arrived on the scene at the burning mansion, that was another story. They handed over all the required permits and other paperwork that had been issued by the overseers of Daucourt Mansion allowing them to be on site to do their investigation when requested by the police, so that cleared the first hurdle. Fortunately, the firemen arrived in time to extinguish the growing fire before it spread any further beyond the lower level. Most of the long corridors as well as the rooms that branched off of them were scorched, including the playroom where Josh had dispatched the ghost of Charles Wilder. It was not a serious loss, meaning the structural integrity of the lower level was still intact, but there would need to be a major renovation before the mansion could be opened to tourists again.
Haunted House Tales Page 116