The Ghost of a Memory

by Bobbi Holmes

  “Walt, call her back. Try. She was responding to you.”

  “I don’t think she’ll be able to help us,” Walt said. “Poor girl doesn’t even realize she’s dead.”

  “That’s exactly why we have to help her, because she doesn’t know she’s dead. The poor thing trapped all these years. She’s practically a child.”

  Walt let out a sigh and called out, “Dolly!”

  Nothing happened.

  He looked at Danielle, who silently urged him to try again.

  “Dolly!” Walt shouted.

  Again, nothing.

  “Maybe she went up to the barn or house,” Danielle said, nodding to the buildings in the distance.

  “Let’s see.” Walt reached out and took Danielle’s left hand.

  They walked a few more minutes before another apparition appeared before them. They both stopped.

  “Wilbur!” Danielle said.

  “Danielle and Walt Marlow, surprised to find you both here,” Wilbur said. “Did you come looking for it too?”

  “Looking for what?” Danielle asked.

  “My gunnysack. You said you’d help me find it. But you didn’t.”

  “And I asked you to stay at Marlow House and identify the man you overheard,” Danielle countered.

  Wilbur shrugged. “I have things to do.”

  “Why are you here?” Danielle asked.

  “I just told you, I came looking for the gunnysack.”

  Danielle studied Wilbur. “But why are you looking here?”

  “I thought it might have returned,” Wilbur said.

  “Is this where you found the bag?” Walt asked.

  “I didn’t find the bag; they brought it,” Wilbur countered.

  Danielle said something, but Wilbur cut her off. “I see you both talked to Dolly.”

  “Where did she go?” Walt asked.

  “I imagine up to the house, trying to find Baxter. She’s always looking for Baxter,” Wilbur said.

  “Who killed her?” Walt asked.

  Wilbur looked at Walt. “How would I know? I wasn’t here when it happened. But it really doesn’t matter which one. They’re both the same. Two peas. Poisoned peas. Evil as they come. And you should watch out because it hasn’t died. It lives on.”

  The next moment Wilbur vanished.

  “I guess Wilbur didn’t move on,” Walt said.

  “And I have a feeling there were three bodies buried on this property before someone removed those bones and put them in a bag.”

  Thirty-Two

  “Three people?” Walt asked with a raised brow. “I assume one is Dolly, the other one a Porter who was unfortunate enough to get shot and have his skeletal remains wash up on the beach across from our house, and also Wilbur? Maybe he didn’t go to Australia.”

  “It looks that way,” Danielle said. “It’s not uncommon for an earthbound spirit to look for his burial site. That’s why the cemetery is the first place to look if you suspect a spirit hasn’t moved on.”

  “Do you still want to look around, or should we go home?” Walt asked.

  “I don’t think we can leave now. I wish Wilbur would stop popping in and out. We need to ask him more questions about who he overheard.”

  “Finding Wilbur on this property makes me wonder if we should take the Stewarts and Barrs off our suspect list,” Walt said.

  “Why do you say that?” Danielle asked.

  “If you’re right and Beau Porter murdered Wilbur and buried him on this property, it looks as if Wilbur has been hanging around since then. He might have only left when someone moved those bones. But the removal of the remains may have absolutely nothing to do with anything ominous. Maybe one of the Stewarts found them and did not want the negative press attention after notifying the authorities, so they dumped them in the ocean. But that also means Wilbur has seen members of both the Barr and Stewart families, and if he didn’t recognize whoever he overheard on the pier, then I think for our problem, we need to look elsewhere,” Walt said.

  “You have a point. Hopefully, he’ll stick around so we can find him again and get a better description of who he saw at the pier. But while we’re here, I’d like to help poor Dolly. Bad enough she died at such a young age, not to mention murdered and trapped here for eternity.” Danielle shivered at the thought.

  “Everyone believed she deserted her little boy,” Walt said.

  “How old was he at the time?” Danielle asked.

  “I think about three or four. Dolly was a couple of years younger than me. And like I told you before, her son, Baxter, was around twelve the last time I saw him.”

  “I’d like to help Dolly, and if Wilbur would just stick around, I’d like to tell him where those remains are so he’ll stop looking. But I don’t want to do that too soon, or he might leave for good before he answers our questions.”

  “Then let’s start to the barn first,” Walt suggested.

  Reaching out, Danielle took Walt’s hand again, and together they headed to the barn.

  They were about twenty feet from their destination when the light breeze morphed into a howl, kicking up a dirt devil and, with it, bits of dry soil and brush, polluting the air around them and making Danielle cough. Wanting to shield Danielle from the unexpected assault, Walt wrapped his arms around her. As quickly as the mini-storm appeared—it vanished. It was as if someone had unplugged an invisible cord, draining the energy.

  Brushing away the dry bits of foliage now lodged in her hair, Danielle glanced around. The light breeze that had been present when they had first arrived—and there before the sudden outburst—vanished with the dirt devil.

  “What was that?” Danielle asked, giving her hair another swipe with a brush of one hand. Turning to Walt, she reached up and pulled a small twig from his hair and tossed it on the ground.

  Before Walt answered, a burst of light filled the space before them. They stared at the bright glow and watched as it transformed itself, until no longer light, but the image of a man—albeit a transparent one, with stringy brown hair falling to his shoulders. He was not a spirit either might confuse for a living person, as they had with Dolly, because they had a clear shot of the barn right through his body.

  “I have a feeling you don’t know this one,” Danielle whispered to Walt while never looking away from the spirit. Had he been a living man, she would guess his age to be a few years older than herself.

  “You’re right,” Walt whispered back, his eyes, like Danielle’s, intently focused on the stranger.

  “Who are you?” Danielle asked.

  “You shouldn’t be here,” the spirit told her. “It’s not safe.”

  “Did you make the wind blow just now?” Walt asked.

  The spirit shook his head and said, “That was Dolly. You’ve upset her.”

  “Please tell us who you are. We can help you,” Danielle promised.

  The spirit laughed bitterly. “No one can help me now.” He looked at Walt and asked, “Who is she to you?”

  “My name is Walt Marlow. This is my wife, Danielle.”

  The spirit frowned and looked confused. “I’ve heard of a Walt Marlow, but he’s dead. Are you dead?”

  “No, we’re not dead,” Walt said.

  The spirit looked down at his own left hand. Both Danielle and Walt noticed the wedding ring he wore. A moment later the spirit looked up at Walt and said, “You aren’t now, but you will be. Beware of your wife. She may seem lovely now, but someday she might kill you.” He vanished.

  Danielle cringed and looked over to Walt. “Just a hunch, but I don’t think he had a very happy marriage.”

  “I suspect it was as bad as my first marriage,” Walt said and added, “And his clothes were…interesting.”

  “If he’s dressing from his time period, he’s from the sixties, considering his colorful bell-bottom pants and the even more colorful shirt.”

  “The beads were interesting,” Walt said.

  “They’re love beads.”


  “He did remind me a little of Reverend Mike.” Reverend Mike had been the aged hippy who had married Walt and Danielle when they had eloped.

  “Of course, his hair wasn’t as long as Reverend Mike’s.” Reverend Mike’s gray hair had reached his waist. “And not as old as Reverend Mike, yet older than the average hippy back in the sixties. And his hair was a little longer than a conservative person would wear back then. I’ve seen some pictures of my dad with a crew cut when he was about fifteen, and then down to his shoulders when he was about nineteen.”

  Walt looked at Danielle and smiled. “Your dad was a hippy?”

  Danielle shrugged. “Mom said he went through a stage. But our ghost there. His hair was shorter than Dad’s during his hippy stage, but still considered long for back then. And the clothes, stereotypical sixties.”

  “I wonder who he was,” Walt said.

  They started toward the barn again, but this time at a slower pace.

  “Maybe I was wrong about three people being buried here,” Danielle suggested.

  “Obviously more, considering our hippy friend.”

  Danielle stopped walking for a moment and looked to Walt. “I didn’t mean that. It’s possible this place attracts spirits. It doesn’t mean their bodies are necessarily here. Look at Lucas, he hung around in an old office building for over a year before figuring out he was dead. And he didn’t die there.” Lucas had been Danielle’s first husband.

  “Are you suggesting none of them died here, not even Dolly?”

  Danielle considered the question. “I’m just saying I don’t want to jump to any conclusions quite yet.”

  They started walking again, their path taking them under an apple tree. Movement overhead caught Danielle’s attention. She looked up in time to see a tree limb falling down from an upper branch, aimed for the top of Walt’s head.

  Without hesitation, she yanked Walt away from the falling missile. It didn’t miss him completely but hit his shoulder before falling the rest of the way to the ground.

  Cursing, Walt grabbed hold of the injured shoulder, glaring down at the fallen limb. He glanced upwards, looking for where it had fallen from. Staring at the upper branch, he thought it looked as if someone had literally ripped it from the larger branch before hurling it in his direction.

  Danielle’s hand brushed his arm, and she asked, “Are you okay?”

  “I think so.” Walt rubbed his shoulder to make sure.

  “That was freaky,” Danielle said.

  “Are you okay?” a voice asked.

  Both Danielle and Walt turned around and faced a tall, pale-skinned man. He wasn’t transparent like the last spirit, but Danielle was fairly certain that was what he was, judging by the bullet hole in the middle of the man’s forehead. Walt identified him as a spirit, but it wasn’t the bullet hole that gave it away. Walt recognized the man, and if he had still been alive, he would now be about 125 years old.

  “Beau Porter?” Walt asked in surprise.

  “Walt Marlow? What are you doing here? It’s not safe.”

  “What happened?” Walt asked.

  Beau frowned. “What are you talking about?”

  “I don’t think he knows,” Danielle whispered to Walt.

  Beau looked to Danielle and smiled. “You’re a pretty thing. Are you Walt’s new girlfriend?”

  “This is my wife, Danielle,” Walt introduced.

  “Damn! You’re kidding, you got yourself married?” Beau grinned. “Congratulations!”

  “Do you know what happened to that tree?” Danielle asked, glancing briefly to the fallen limb.

  “I suspect it’s Dolly. She’s upset right now. Looking for Baxter again. She won’t find him. He’s not here. Won’t be coming back, and even if he did, it wouldn’t make her happy. He’s just like his father.”

  “Why are you here?” Danielle asked.

  Beau shrugged. “I live here. Where else would I be?”

  “Um…do you know Wilbur Jenkins?” Danielle asked.

  The smile disappeared from Beau’s face. “Why do you ask?”

  “We’re trying to find him,” Danielle said.

  “Why are you looking here?” Beau asked.

  “We saw him here earlier and wondered if he was still around.”

  “It wasn’t my fault. I didn’t want to do it.” Beau shook his head frantically.

  “You didn’t want to do what?” Danielle asked.

  “I told Pa it wasn’t right. I tried to stop them. Maybe I could have fought that old man, but not Ambrose and Baxter. They beat the crap outa me. When I woke up, he was already dead. Honest. They made me bury him. Ambrose said if he had to dig the grave himself, he’d make it large enough for both of us. He might be my little brother, but he would’ve done it.”

  “It was Wilbur’s grave, right?” Danielle asked in a whisper.

  Beau nodded. “I didn’t have a choice.”

  “Who dug the grave, you or your brother?” Danielle asked softly.

  “I did,” Beau said before disappearing.

  “Now we know who those remains belong to,” Walt said.

  “Yes, unless there’s another Porter out here with a bullet in his skull.”

  “Looks like you were right, they killed Wilbur,” Walt said.

  “Does this mean after Ambrose made his brother dig the grave, he shot him? Were Beau and Wilbur buried together?” Danielle asked.

  Walt considered the question for a moment, thinking back on past events, and then shook his head. “I don’t think so. Ian emailed me everything he found in the search he told us about last night. I reviewed it this morning while you were still sleeping. Obviously, Wilbur wasn’t the one on that ship to Australia. I’d say they killed Wilbur around the same time that land transferred from Jenkins to Porter. Beau was alive for at least another month after that.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Positive. The last time I saw Beau was at the speakeasy. It was a few days after I got news of the Eva Aphrodite going down. It’s a date I can’t forget. One reason I stopped in that night, I had plans to tie one on and drown my sorrows. But then I ran into Beau, who was already half-seas over.”

  “I assume that means he was drunk?” Danielle asked.

  Walt gave her a nod and said, “I ended up listening to his problems that night instead of dwelling on my own. And that was definitely after Wilbur was murdered.”

  “I wonder who murdered Beau,” Danielle asked.

  Walt let out a sigh and said, “It’s possible no one murdered him.”

  “Are you suggesting he committed suicide?”

  “He claimed he was desperately in love with someone who took off with another man. He wouldn’t be the first person to kill himself over unrequited love. I don’t imagine old Beau would want anyone to discover his namesake killed himself over a woman. It would be just like him to bury the body on the property and tell everyone his son took off.”

  “We have our work cut out for us,” Danielle said when they reached the barn door.

  “Why do you say that?” Walt asked.

  “There are spirits here that need us. We have to help them move on.”

  Walt rubbed his shoulder and said, “I understand that, but I’m questioning Eva’s assertion spirits can’t hurt innocents.”

  “I suppose I could be flippant and make some crack about you not being so innocent. But the truth is, that tree limb could have killed you. It didn’t.”

  Walt let out an uncertain sigh, reached for the barn door, and opened it.

  The two stepped inside; the only illumination came from shafts of sunlight streaming through warped planks of siding and the open door. Moments after entering, another apparition appeared before them. This one a woman.

  “Charlene Davis?” Walt blurted out in surprise.

  Thirty-Three

  The apparition vanished as quickly as it had appeared, leaving Walt and Danielle standing inside the barn, its door still wide open, letting in the bright sunlight.
>
  “It wasn’t?” Danielle gasped.

  “It was. Desiree’s sister, Charlene,” Walt said.

  Danielle stepped farther into the barn and glanced around. Hesitantly she called out, “Charlene, please come out. We can help you.”

  To both Danielle and Walt’s surprise, Charlene once again appeared before them, dressed as a flapper with a feathered cap on her short dark hair.

  “Who are you?” Charlene asked Danielle. She looked to Walt and said, “Is she a friend of yours, Walt?”

  “This is my wife, Charlene. Her name’s Danielle,” Walt introduced.

  Charlene smiled brightly. “You got married? I hadn’t heard. I’m getting married too.”

  “Who are you marrying?” Danielle asked.

  Charlene started to say something but hesitated. Shaking her head, she said, “I don’t know if I can tell you. It has to remain a secret until we’re far away from here.”

  “You can trust me,” Walt told her. “Remember, I’m a friend of your sister’s.”

  “But Desiree doesn’t approve of him. She doesn’t know I’m eloping. But he’s nothing like his father or brother. Nothing at all.”

  Danielle’s eyes widened. “You’re in love with Beau Porter!”

  Charlene quickly placed a finger over her lips, hushing Danielle. “You can’t tell!”

  “Why are you here?” Danielle asked.

  “I’m waiting for Beau. He’s meeting me here.”

  “In the barn? Is that where you plan to meet him?” Danielle asked.

  “Yes, they’re all gone. His father, brother, and that fresh nephew of his. They won’t be back until morning. By then we’ll be far away from here,” Charlene told them.

  “Charlene, do you know how long you’ve been waiting for Beau in the barn?” Danielle asked.

  Charlene frowned and shook her head. “I…I…I’m not sure.” She turned around, revealing the knife handle protruding from the back of her dress, blood staining the blue fabric. The ghost vanished.

  “Now we know how she died, but we don’t know who killed her,” Danielle said. “My guess, they agreed to meet here, but the killer arrived first, murdered Charlene, and somehow made Beau believe she’d taken off with another lover.”