THE SPIRIT IN QUESTION

by Cynthia Kuhn

  As we ascended, I tripped on something. My flashlight revealed a small black shape about the size of a bread box. I picked it up and brought it with me so that no one else would fall.

  Within seconds, I reached the top and pushed gently on the wall. A door swung open, outward, and after going through the opening, I came out in the wings, stage left.

  So this must have been how the person who shot Jean Claude got away. I had to tell Lex as soon as possible.

  The others soon emerged blinking in surprise.

  I looked down at the battered black case in my hands and set it in the center of the stage.

  We formed a semi-circle, staring down at it.

  The dark leather on the rectangular case was pocked with scars, the handle on top was worn, and the silver latch on the front was tarnished.

  “Should we open it?” Bella ventured, earning a glare from Clara, who probably had wanted to be the one to say that.

  “What if it’s an explosive?” Clara countered, switching positions just as a power play. We all thought about that for a moment.

  Braxton joined us on the stage, leaned down, and listened. “No ticking,” he pronounced.

  “Open it.” Clara smirked, happy to be the one to say it this time.

  No one moved.

  “I meant Lila,” she said. If someone was going to blow up, she wanted it to be me.

  The latch opened easily. Placing one hand on either side of the lid, I gently pushed it up. Aside from making a creaking sound, the case was inactive.

  Thankfully.

  On the top was a pool of fabric. I pulled it out and shook it. A beaded black negligee formed itself into proper shape.

  Braxton cleared his throat self-consciously.

  I set it carefully on the stage.

  A roll of velvet was the next item. I put it down on the floor and unfurled it slowly. A silver letter opener glinted in the bright lights. It was tarnished as well but still reflected. The letters “AG” were engraved on the handle.

  I went back into the case to retrieve the last item: a bundle of envelopes with neat cursive handwriting tied with a ribbon.

  Clara’s eyes were gleaming oddly.

  “What are they?” Bella asked, her voice catching in her throat.

  “Letters of some sort,” I said, untying the red ribbon.

  Clara made a snatch for them, but I was too fast for her. I pressed them to my chest and faced her. “What are you doing?”

  “They belong to the Historical Society,” she said. “All of this does.”

  “No they don’t,” a voice boomed. “They belong to me.”

  A tall man strolled onstage; his face was tanned below heavily gelled and rakishly angled black hair. He wore a charcoal suit and shiny black leather shoes. When he reached us, he smiled widely, his teeth unnaturally white, and handed a business card to each person. Then he held out his hand to shake ours, one by one. It was a whole production.

  “Chip Turner,” he said. “Nice to meet you.”

  Clara pulled herself up and shot him a withering look. “You’re the Mr. Turner who is attempting to destroy our Opera House!”

  He made a little frown, pretending she had hurt his feelings. “I wouldn’t say destroy. I’d say improve. And, I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name.”

  That ruffled her feathers, I could tell. She was used to people knowing who she was. In a small town like Stonedale, everyone knew their places in the food chain, and Clara saw herself at the top.

  “I am Mrs. Clara Worthingham and this is my husband, Braxton. We are with the Stonedale Historical Society. You have been pestering us by email for the better part of the past year.” The feather on her hat bobbed with every syllable as she over-enunciated. She reached up to straighten it and wavered a little.

  Bella stepped closer and steadied Clara, who pointed at her in return. “You’ve been pestering Bella too. And I—”

  “Hello, Worthinghams.” Chip turned to Bella, which further irked Clara, as she had something else to say. “Hello, Bella.” She murmured a greeting. He regarded her for a long while before moving his dark blue eyes to me.

  “Lila Maclean. I teach at the university.”

  “Oh, a professor. I was not much of a student myself, I confess. Far too distracted by all the social opportunities. Barely graduated.”

  I wasn’t sure what to say to that. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see students filing into the auditorium. It was time for rehearsal to begin. I jerked my head toward the lobby, hoping everyone would take the hint and move off stage with me, but nobody budged.

  “What did you mean about these belonging to you?” Clara addressed Chip, pointing to the letters I was still pressing to my chest protectively.

  “Right. I’m in negotiations to purchase this fine property. Just taking another look-see today, making sure everything is in order.”

  “It’s not a property, it’s a historical treasure,” Clara hissed at him. “And we’re doing everything in our power to preserve it.”

  He bobbed his head to the side, acknowledging her words. “Well, it won’t need too much preservation given that I plan to knock it down and build a world-class entertainment complex here.”

  “A complex?” Her hand flew up to her heart. “But Mr. Turner, that would be a tragedy. Even worse than a new theater.”

  “I understand that you’re attached to it. But this will bring jobs and visitors to Stonedale. It will be great for the town.”

  Clara gasped. “But we don’t want more jobs and visitors here. Stonedale is perfect the way it is.”

  Braxton and Bella exchanged a glance. They’d surely heard Clara’s views on Why We Need To Keep Stonedale The Same for years.

  “Well, we’re going to have to agree to disagree on that one,” Chip said. “There will be a big improvement, I promise you.”

  “Why is that?” Clara’s laser-hot glare could have burned a hole through wood.

  “There is so much potential here. Look, I love theater. Once upon a time, I even tried to be a director, but I couldn’t make a living at it. So now I’m a developer.” His eyes lit up. “And I’m in a position to bring culture to small towns all over America.”

  “Are you saying we don’t have culture—” Clara clutched her pearls.

  “Not like in New York,” he said. “And I’ve been thinking to myself: why not share it with the world?”

  “I can’t stand here and listen to this for one more minute.” Clara went pale and swayed slightly, then stomped away, towing Braxton behind her. At the edge of the stage, she rallied with a parting shot. “Your plan is a travesty, Mr. Turner. I...I curse you and your project! And I curse Tolliver Ingersoll and everyone who wants to damage our beautiful Opera House too!”

  Everyone froze under the weight of her unexpected venom.

  Even Clara looked surprised after her outburst, and she sagged against Braxton, clutching her hat as if someone might snatch it from her. He bustled her firmly down the steps.

  “Sorry,” Bella whispered to the developer after Clara had passed him. “She just loves this building.”

  “Got it.” He didn’t seem to be bothered by the tirade.

  As they walked up the aisle, I could hear Clara angrily continuing to voice her displeasure. Bella looked back once over her shoulder.

  Once the trio had departed, I smiled at Chip. “Well, I guess that’s that. Is there something I can help you with? We’ve got a rehearsal to finish. We’re putting on a production of a new play and we don’t have much time before opening night.”

  “Understood. I’ll be going then.” He held out his hand. “The letters, please?”

  I stared at him.

  “They’re part of the theater, no? Everything in here is included in the sale.”

  “Right now the school owns everything
. And I’m working here as a university representative, so I have the authority to hold onto them.” I had no idea if that was true or not, but I said it firmly.

  He considered this, then shrugged.

  “See you next time, Lila.”

  I watched him leave.

  New York did have incredible culture, no doubt about that. I’d lived there for years with my mom and Calista, who came to live with us after her parents were in a fatal car accident. No matter how often we traveled around the country due to my mother’s various art engagements, New York was home. Yet even I felt that Chip’s attitude was a wee bit insensitive.

  The thought shook me a little. Was Stonedale rubbing off on me? If so, I didn’t know how I felt about that.

  The crew rolled out the backdrop for the first scene. Actors lined up in the wings. It was time to get back to business.

  “Dr. M?” One of the students came over with a script in hand and an inquiring expression. We went over one of the lines together and sorted out his motivation for it, then I went back down to the front row and began preparing for the rest of rehearsal.

  A few minutes later, Tolliver and Zandra joined me. We were settling in for the next scene when Zandra gasped.

  “The ghost is here.” She pointed at the stage. “And he’s not happy.” She closed her eyes and pressed on her forehead with two fingers. “Yes, I hear you, Malcolm.” After a moment, she looked up. “Who has been rummaging through things that don’t belong to them?”

  That would be me. I glanced down guiltily at the packet of letters in my bag.

  “We found a trunk in the secret stairwell—” I began.

  “The what?” Tolliver turned to me, his eyebrows nearly summiting his head.

  “The stairwell that leads from the corner dressing room to the stage.”

  He shook his head blankly.

  “The door is almost invisible, it’s blended in so well with the wallpaper, but there’s a spiral staircase behind it. And we found a trunk inside. It’s over there.” I pointed to the items still sitting on the stage.

  “Who’s we?”

  “I was giving the Worthinghams a tour and Clara—”

  He cut me off again. “You gave that woman a tour? What were you thinking?”

  “Remember I told you we had to do that? It’s part of the final approval process for the permission form.”

  He tore his glasses off and flung them onto the table.

  Zandra shrank back into her seat and reached for her knitting.

  “Yes. I’d forgotten. Well, now it has been done and I cannot take one more second of their harassment. You will not aid and abet those...those...” he scowled, “thieves of art! What self-respecting society dedicated to preservation would obstruct an active work of genius?”

  My face warmed as I became aware of the cast onstage watching his blow-up.

  “I hear you,” I said quietly. “But you’re going to have to face facts, Tolliver. They have managed to take control of whether or not we can continue with this production, and someone has to deal with them. If you will not, then it must be me.”

  His face grew redder. “I am the director,” he spit at me.

  “Of course you are. I am here to help you. But we need to handle this. And we’re very close to being shut down.”

  “Can they even do that?” He made angry jazz hands. Which, until that moment, I wouldn’t have imagined could be a thing.

  “I don’t know,” I admitted. “But the chancellor said the Worthinghams were able to make the funding disappear for the community theater, so they do have power.”

  “She’s very influential in this town,” Zandra agreed. “People listen to her and she could demolish our ticket sales.”

  Tolliver groaned.

  “Let Lila handle it,” Zandra said calmly.

  He simmered, visibly, then his shoulders relaxed and he rubbed his hands together. “I’m done with this, okay? I don’t want to hear about those people ever again.”

  He looked over at the items from the case. “And will you please move those things so no one trips over them?”

  A bunch of beeps went off from cast members’ phones. The students began conferring with one another and pointing to their screens.

  “What’s happening?” I called out to them.

  Rachel Hernandez, our Miss Marple, jumped down from the stage, landing on her sneakers with a thump. Her brown eyes were sparkling with delight. She flipped her long hair over her shoulder and showed me her phone screen. “We all have alerts set up for anything about the play. The Stonedale Scout just published a story about us on their website! They said we’re haunted and—”

  I squinted at the screen but couldn’t see anything from my angle. “Do you mind if I look for a sec?”

  She smiled and handed it over.

  The headline read “STONEDALE THEATER PRODUCTION CURSED!”

  Chapter 11

  News travels fast, they say, and in this case it turned out to be practically instantaneous. I don’t know who texted the scoop to the paper seconds after it happened, but when the story ran, everything changed.

  On Saturday morning, we had a new crowd at rehearsal. Surprised to see them when I walked in, I asked around and quickly discovered that the friends of cast members had been so interested in experiencing the “hauntings” for themselves that they’d simply accompanied whomever they knew into the theater. They didn’t seemed fazed at all about crossing the picket line out front.

  Tolliver was practically hopping across the stage. He swept his arm out, gesturing toward the gathered students.

  “Lila, look! The play is garnering so much attention that we’ve already gotten groupies.”

  I walked up the steps. “Tolliver, they’re here for the curse. Or the ghost. Or both.”

  “Oh.” The crestfallen look made me want to comfort him, even though I was a little wary from yesterday’s explosion.

  “Maybe the ghost story will sell tickets,” I said. “While it’s an old legend, it appears to have been revitalized by the newspaper.”

  “Do you think so? Oh—wait! I have a magnificent idea: what if we added some ghosts to the play? Oooh, and maybe some werewolves.” He peered off into the distance and muttered something about vampires.

  Oh no.

  “That seems like we’d be moving into a completely different genre, Tolliver. You’ve already got a lot going on.”

  He grinned. “But I’m known for breaking the rules, Lila. You know that.”

  “True, but in this case, we’re so close to dress rehearsal that maybe we could just go with what we’ve been practicing all these weeks. Think of the students.”

  “The actors come second to the art, darling. But I hear what you’re saying.” He lowered his voice and whispered into my ear. “And can you please get rid of the groupies now so we can begin?”

  Sigh. I turned to the students and said hello. They quieted down and looked up at me expectantly.

  “May I have everyone in the company come up on stage? Please take a seat in a circle.” Individuals made their way up the steps on either side, then followed my directions.

  I addressed the remaining people. “Thank you all for your interest. We have a lot of work to do, so I have to ask you to leave. But we open November first, and we’d love to see you back here then.”

  No one moved.

  “In other words, this is a closed rehearsal. If you’re not in the play, I’m sorry, but you won’t be able to stay.”

  After a few groans and sounds of disapproval, they began to shuffle up the aisle, thank goodness. Many of them were snapping photos on their way out. I wasn’t sure what I would have done if they ignored me.

  I turned back to the cast. “Hi, everyone. We need to talk.”

  A circle of bright eyes met mine.

  �
��The story that came out yesterday is likely to draw a lot of attention to the play.”

  Tolliver squiggled a little bit. That part made him happy.

  “Did anyone here talk to any reporters?”

  I didn’t expect them to volunteer that information, but I thought maybe I’d be able to tell from body language.

  “You’re not in trouble,” I added. “It would just be helpful to know what the source was for his descriptions.”

  The students looked around the circle at one another, uneasily.

  After it became clear that no one was going to say anything, I moved on.

  “Well, has anyone experienced anything...unusual?”

  The students twisted their necks expectantly.

  Parker finally blurted out, “It feels like someone’s watching me all the time.”

  There were numerous sounds of agreement.

  Several students mentioned hearing loud bumps with no logical explanation.

  Others mentioned the lights flickering or going out.

  “And...” Parker raised his hand.

  “You can just talk,” I assured him.

  “I came in early last week to work on lines in the dressing room. I kept hearing skittering sounds up and down the walls.” He shivered.

  Rachel nodded enthusiastically. “I’ve heard that too, in the prop room.”

  Another student described hearing someone singing, but when she looked into the other rooms, no one was there. Several cast members concurred. A discussion followed, which ended with agreement that they couldn’t make out the lyrics of the melancholy song.

  “Oh! And one time,” Parker said, “I thought I saw a...um...ghost go into our dressing room.”

  Rachel grabbed his hand. “Was it a man in a black overcoat?”

  His mouth fell open. “Yes.”

  “I saw him too.” They high-fived.

  “Are you sure it wasn’t an actual man?” I pressed a little. “Can you describe him?”

  Parker shook his head. “No. I only saw him for a second from the end of the hallway. Then when I got to the room, he was gone.”

  Rachel nodded again. “I’m so relieved. Thought I was going crazy.”