by Jacob Nelson
Wiping the last of his tea of fish and chips from his unshaven chin, he looked around for a bin to throw the Siggy’s butcher paper and carton into. Letting out a long sigh, he set to work.
The man tightened his overcoat as the winds of the coast assaulted him from behind. One by one he sought out the name of the victim encased below, and compared it with the list of names to which he had been assigned.
As he searched the stones he realized that most of the graves were too recent for his purpose, having been planted in the 1700’s. He grunted to himself and wiped his brow as he took on the next row of markers. If only he could find what he was looking for, something a bit closer to the time of Columbus, around the beginning of the 1500’s.
Meanwhile as the light faded into dusk, a small crowd had gathered around the old abbey. A man dressed in a long dark coat and cloak began telling ghost stories of the haunting of the abbey and its cemetery.
‘Great,’ thought the man, ‘just what I need. Someone telling ghost stories to make this place even creepier than it already appears in the gathering dusk.’
Row after row of weathered stones passed before his eyes. Row after row of weathered stone was slowly appraised and discarded as he moved from marker to marker.
Then, even as he was beginning to give up hope, he came across one within the right time period. He drew in an involuntary breath as he surveyed the name: ‘Christopher Standish’.
He didn’t even need to consult his paper this time. The name matched. It wasn’t the first on the list, but certainly was one of the names that he was searching for, along with Christopher or Kit Walker, and Roger Nelson, or any variation thereof. He had no idea who these men were, but he really didn’t care. Instead, he mentally counted the money that would come his way if this was the one.
The ground around the grave was sunken through age. Stepping down and shaking a bit from the cold (and perhaps a bit from anticipation) he bent over to brush away the leaves and grass that covered the base of the stone marker.
There, just above the sod line, rising over it only enough to make out the top of it, was the curved outline of a familiar symbol. As he removed enough of the sod to see it clearer, his heart leapt. There before him stood out a symbol that would almost be expected in such a ghoulish place: a death’s head. Now he was certain this was the one.
Scraping the rest of the sod free to reveal more of the death’s head to his surprise the man found another mark on the stone. Puzzled as to its significance the man spat on his hands and used the spittle to wipe the scratching clean. What he had unearthed was but a single word, “Eyrie”.
Working his way around the base of the tombstone, on the backside he came across another small symbol. This one appeared to be two crossed pirate swords. He searched for more but nothing more was revealed to him.
As he stood, he wiped his hands on his clothing and though the wind blew less he imagined he heard a voice on the wind. The crowd was long gone. Looking around he could see no living person. But despite the lack of wind an intense chill came over him.
“Who’s there?” he asked aloud. His own voice broke the still of the approaching night and he grinned at himself. “Nigel,” he admonished himself, “you nearly had yourself believing in a phantom,” he said aloud. Then he laughed at his own imaginations and scolded himself mentally for succumbing to vicarious ghost stories.
Continuing to mentally chide himself, he returned to the immediate task at hand. He had one more task to do before he could collect his funds. Reaching into his pocket the man removed his smart phone and using its camera took a few photos that he immediately sent off via text. Then calling the same number, verified that the text and photos had been received.
The phone rang only a few short rings before a husky Irish male voice answered it. Instructions were given and Nigel marked on his map the location of the grave before descending the 199 steps to the city below.
It would be a few days before the others would arrive.
Two days later, as per instruction, Nigel wore the uniform of a night patrolman; an occupation that he proscribed to part-time. He positioned himself at the top of the 199 Chapel steps, which gave him an excellent vantage point of anyone approaching from below, as well as of the incoming drive from the other side of the field nearer the abbey ruins.
As the evening arrived, he found a number of men approaching the cemetery. They could easily have been another ghost walk group, or perhaps, a gaggle of students wanting to find some secluded spot to play and hang out. However, it was neither but rather the men that had been promised would arrive ‘shortly’.
One of them broke away from the others and approached him. As the man came into view under the light at the top of the stairs, Nigel involuntarily gulped as he saw the man had the same death’s head symbol on his jaw that the stone marker bore imprinted upon its façade.
“Are you Nigel?” he asked, saying it more as a demand rather than as a question. The man certainly wasn’t much for small talk. The clothes he wore were dark, his head shaven yet his face was not, with a three day stubble darkening it. His eyes were wild; catching the light of the lamp above the path and casting it about within them in a manner that reminded Nigel of some wild beast of prey.
Nigel’s throat suddenly felt dry. Something about the man seemed to make him suddenly afraid; as if there was something inherently evil about the man in front of him. Yet he recognized his voice as the husky Irish voice that answered the phone which had given him his original assignment and to which he had reported his findings.
“Well,” snarled the man.
“Um… Yes,” he meekly replied.
“Good. Show me this grave you found.”
Against his better judgment, Nigel walked the man over to the grave, and there pointed out the markings on it. Nigel glanced up as he pointed the symbols out and caught the man fingering his own tattoo of the death’s head.
The man suddenly dropped his hand and stared at Nigel with those wild eyes. Before he could say anything, Nigel was already backing away, saying, “I’ll get back to my post then. I’ll make certain you are left alone.”
“Make certain you do, Nigel.” warned the man. “Make certain you do.”
Nigel’s legs couldn’t carry himself quickly enough back to his post.
Once the guard was in place, and the word was given, men went to work immediately. The headstone was ripped out of the ground, the earth torn asunder at the wake of its departure from its place at the head of the grave.
With the grave now accessible from all sides, it was quick work to get down to the box below. As the first shovel hit the stone box, the man called out and others swiftly worked around the top, removing dirt from the exterior and sides.
Shortly they had made enough of a trench around the lip of the coffin to pry up the heavy lid with crowbars.
No one knew nor could they have surmised what they would find inside. Many assumed it would be the skeletal remains of the unknown man. Others assumed it was empty, while a few envisioned that it would be filled with great wealth: jewels, gold and silver.
Instead as the stale air escaped from the box and fresh air circulated inside, they found neither man nor cloak. Instead, the only remains to be found were from a calf and a whale: a vellum scroll wrapped around a whale bone key.
The leader of the men jumped down inside and snatched up the precious cargo. But before he could open the scroll to read it, a woman appeared at the top of the hole and calling down to the man said, “Stripes, darling. What have you found?”
Looking up, Stripes grumbled to himself but obediently passed up the scroll with the key. “Looks like some sort of paper with a key attached,” he stated numbly.
“Well don’t just stand there looking dirty,” commanded the woman, “Climb up here and let’s take a look.”
Stripes looked stunned. She had never invited him to partake in anything… and though it made him feel somewhat elated, he was also very suspicious.
“What?!” demanded the woman, returning to her ‘normal’ mood according to Stripe’s opinion.
“Why, I would be delighted,” lied Stripes, trying to cover up his mistake. The woman looked at him quizzically, as if trying to decide if he were playing a game or making fun of her. In the end she simply let it go, being too elated by the find to worry about trivial responses for now.
As Stripes watched her relax and grin down at him, he let out the breath he didn’t realize he was holding and grabbing for men’s arms, pulled himself quickly out of the grave.
They retired to a lighted column of the abbey and there spread open the vellum.
A low whistle escaped her lips. “We found it!” she whispered in a husky voice. “We found it!” she said louder than she wanted to.
The audible escape caused Stripes to look around to see who was near enough to hear them. As his eyes passed over his men, he caught the night watchman looking back his way. As they linked eyes, Nigel quickly pulled away, and deliberately looked the other way.
The woman saw the exchange and simply said, “Time to pay the guard.”
This time it was Stripes turn to smile. “I’ll be right back.”
When Stripes arrived at Nigel’s side, Nigel was more than wary. But at the invitation to see what they found, and more for the promise of payment pending, Nigel followed the man to the edge of the grave site. Looking down he saw nothing more than what appeared to be an empty box. Looking up at the man by his side, he said a bit bewildered, “Its empty.”
“Yeah, it is,” replied Stripes. “Say, could you take one last picture of the box before we go?”
“I guess so,” replied Nigel, wondering what a picture of the empty grave would do. But true to his word, he whipped out his smart phone and took one last photo.
“Can I see it?” asked Stripes in an almost too courteous way.
“Sure,” replied Nigel. “Just press, here…”
“Ah. I see it now. The box does look mighty empty, doesn’t it?”
Nigel didn’t speak. He just nodded his head dumbly. He saw what was passed over to the other man’s hand and realized his time was up.
“Goodbye, Nigel. It has been great working with you,” Stripes intoned sarcastically. The silencer let out just a small ‘pop’ as Nigel’s body filled the once empty grave.
Returning to the woman’s side, he simply stated, “I paid the man.”
She looked disgusted.
“What?” asked Stripes.
In response she handed him the vellum. Looking down Stripes read the ancient script:
Pyrate’s treasure is cursed to all
Within the well or hid in the wall
The sword shows the way to the island purse
Where the rings are the key to the treasure cursed
Stripes looked up. “It doesn’t say where it is.”
“But it does,” replied the woman. “There!” she announced to the bewildered Stripes, pointing to the gravestone. “The Eyrie… as written on the outside of the grave.”
“So where is the Eyrie?”
“In the middle of the American desert.”
“The treasure is there?” asked Stripes incredulously.
“No,” she admonished. “But the map is there. So we get the map and then find the treasure.”
Stripes took a moment to digest that. “It says we need the rings.”
The fire ignited in her eyes. “Then we have a ghost to catch.”
Chapter 26
In the darker reaches of an even darker continent many thousands of miles away…The light of the torch cast shadows onto the hard rock walls of a cavern.
The girl shifted her weight as she raised her head to see how the man took the news. Tears rolled down her cheek and collected at her tight jaw line to drip down upon her Andorra sweater. The girl wrapped herself in her own arms as she pulled her boot clad legs under her. The blue of her jeans igniting the blue of her eyes, making the whole so much more alluring.
Across from her a strong male hand picked up a handful of precious jewels from an ancient oak chest; the colors of the many faceted gems only accentuating the purple of his skin-tight outfit that covered his obviously perfect physique as the stones fell from his fingers. He shifted his weight as well, and subconsciously adjusted the pistols that hung from his hips.
He looked her in the eyes as she brought up her head and for once was thankful that he wore a mask. At least that way his eyes couldn’t betray the pain her words had caused him. However his voice was another story. “But, Diana, why?” he asked her unbelieving. “Was it the abduction? I recognize that couldn’t have been pleasant…”
Her face was impassive.
Searching her eyes and form for some clue or sign and not finding it, he continued, “Is it the cave? …Or the Pygmies? …” ‘Or me?’ he thought the last to himself, not daring to say the words aloud. He tried to deduce her reasoning, pulling at straws. He decided for now to stick to the idea of her not liking her surroundings. It was much less painful. “I know it’s not the best living quarters but we don’t have to live here. There’s always the Eyrie… or the castle…”
“The mesa in the middle of the desert or the dungeons of a drafty castle in the middle of what looks like werewolf country…” she replied sarcastically.
“Ok, yes… but maybe somewhere else…”
“Where Kit? Somewhere where you’ll look right at home dressed in purple? Where eye masks and guns are accepted as the norm? You don’t even have a real last name!”
“Well, we’ll use Walker...” he started to reply.
“Walker, Kit? Really? And what happens when I’m asked if the name comes from some Scotttish descent? What do I say then? ‘Oh, no sir, it comes from The Ghost Who Walks. No not American Indian, He’s just a phantom, a ghost if you will…’ she trailed off the last bit dripping with sarcasm.
The Phantom flinched.
Diana paused. She knew she had hurt him. But he needed to feel it. She took in a deep breath and breathing deeply attempted to compose herself. “Look, Kit. Its not that I don’t love you… because I do. I admit that the abduction scared me. And the cave scares me… and… well… lots of things scare me. But what scares me most of all is losing you.”
“So you’d rather let me go?! That makes no sense!”
“No, I suppose it doesn’t.” Looking around her she took in the great room around them. Nestled deep inside the Skull Cave, the legendary home of the Phantom (the man before her), was what the Phantoms called the ‘Major Treasure Room’.
A historian's dream come true the room contains articles which were thought to be lost forever. Things from centuries past that have been either gifted to or found by the various Phantoms over the ages. Items with no real value being far beyond the scope of a price tag; to name a few, the contents of the Major Treasure Room include: the sword of King Arthur – ‘Excalibur’, as well as the sword of Roland – ‘Durandal’, along with the ivory horn of Roland. Additionally the asp that bit Cleopatra, Cleopatra's wedding ring from Mark Antony, and more. Some items lesser known to the world, such as the tiny ark made from the wood of Noah's ark, a golden flower, Caesar's laurel crown, and the Diamond Cup of Alexander the Great which legend says that when Alexander wept because there were no more worlds to conquer, his tears fell into this cup. And some more well known but now lost to the world itself such as the original script of Hamlet in Shakespeare's own handwriting, the wig of Juliet from the original Romeo and Juliet (a part played by the third Phantom), the great ring of Nebuchadnezzar, the necklace of Nefertiti, the lyre of the blind poet Homer, and even one of Alfred Nobel's first sticks of dynamite.
Diana let her eyes wander across the opening on the far side that was filled with the ‘pocket change’ the Phantom used as currency to get from place to place; coins and jewels of every kind.
Nearby the Major Treasure Room, as the name implies, there is also a Min
or Treasure Room, so filled with chests of precious metals and stones that were they to be sold all at once into the world, the value of such would drop the world’s market value so drastically as to make them nearly worthless. There was no denying that her life as the Phantom’s wife would be a luxurious one.
However, as her gaze continued on, it encompassed yet another opening. Across from the Major Treasure Room stood the Crypt, a chamber which contains the tombs of 20 Phantom generations. They were all killed on duty. Among them, also buried there, are a couple of extras including a pirate and a Viking. Here it may be mentioned that no Phantom has ever seen his own grandfather. The Phantom's life is a violent one; and the life of the wife of the Phantom one of exceeding joy… yet equally excessive heartache.
That last thought set her resolve. ‘Fine, I’ll let him have his violent fun, but I’ll not be part of it until he realizes what I am going through for him.’
“You’re right, it makes no sense,” she agreed with him, “but… I’m leaving you.” She pulled herself up, and having walked over to the dumb-struck giant of a man, grabbed him firmly by his head and drawing him near, kissed him hard. Then drawing back her hand she slapped him, hard; across his chiseled jaw. “Goodbye, Kit.” she intoned, her back already to him.
As she approached the cave entrance she called out to Guran, the Pygmy chief, to escort her out of the jungle.
The Phantom, a man of quick decisions, a man that plays with life and death on a nearly daily basis by making life altering decisions within the blink of an eye, simply stood silent. Unconscious of the act he slowly raised his hand to cover where her hand had contacted his face. Numbly he watched through collected tears as the love of his life, Diana, in all of her perfect form, incredible mind and firm resolve, walked out of his cave and out of his life.
Chapter 27
The Phantom worked his way through the crowds of the Paris international airport. Dressed as Kit Walker, a name derived through ancestry (Kit – all first born males for generations since the first Phantom have been named Kit) and through legend (Walker – after the Ghost Who Walks) he was finally returning to the recluse of the Deep Woods. It had been a few months since he had lost Diana and though he was better, he was still emotionally a mess.