by Edie Claire
“Did you see the bat guano in the sanctuary?” Leigh interjected hopefully.
Frances’s eyes narrowed, and Leigh fought the urge to shrink. She could live to be a hundred and the sight of her mother’s keen eyes glaring out of slits would still make her feel like a preschooler with a stolen cookie. “Bat guano?” Frances repeated in a gravelly deadpan. “You have seriously seen the droppings of bats, inside this building?”
Leigh smiled weakly. “On the choir railing.”
Frances departed, bucket in hand.
Leigh breathed a sigh of relief and headed slowly down the hall. It was one thing for Bess and Frances to bicker with each other for well over a half century; it was another to have to hear about it. If she was lucky, the bat guano would distract Frances for at least twenty minutes, which should be more than enough time for Leigh to get the kids settled and herself the hell out of here before the next harangue.
She entered the sanctuary to see the kids and Bess just on their way out of the room, heading through the far door to the basement staircase. Frances was already drenching the choir railing with some substance in a spray bottle, and two men were pulling up the filthy carpet and cutting it into strips. As one man jerked up a particularly nasty section, dust exploded into the air so thickly that it looked like Bess had rented a fog machine. Leigh coughed.
“Sorry about that,” the man apologized. He seemed to be in his late twenties or early thirties, with blond hair, blue eyes, and a boyish grin. “One thing about being a smoker, your lungs are used to the abuse!” he laughed merrily. “But for anyone else, this dust is killer. When the YBC — that’s the Young Businessmen’s Chamber, you know — when we were doing the haunted houses and used the fans, the dust got so bad we had to start wetting down the carpet first. Hey, Gerardo!” he called eagerly, looking at his coworker. “We should try that now!”
He made a bizarre gesture that Leigh assumed was meant to indicate spraying the carpet with a hose, but looked more like he was waving an imaginary handgun. Gerardo, a tall and rather handsome Hispanic man in his mid to late thirties, raised an eyebrow and stared dubiously.
“Oh, never mind,” the younger man said, laughing at himself again. He turned to Leigh. “He doesn’t speak English. That’s Gerardo, and I’m Chaz. Are you another relative of Bess’s?”
“I’m her niece, Leigh. Nice to meet you, Chaz.” She turned to the other man with a nod. “You too, Gerardo.”
Gerardo nodded back at her politely. He remained mute, his face neutral of expression, but his dark eyes surveyed her with a knowing look she found unnerving. Leigh coughed again, then glanced up at the chancel area to see how her mother was faring. She needn’t have worried, since Frances was already in “haz mat” mode, attacking the guano with gloves, a paper smock, and one of her husband’s surgical face masks. She was scrubbing away like a mad woman, paying no attention whatsoever to anyone else in the room.
“Did you ever see any of the haunted houses?” Chaz chattered, dropping his end of the carpet and releasing another cloud of dust. Gerardo made a snorting sound, pulled the carpet strip his way, and began to roll it up alone.
Leigh shook her head. “Sorry. I missed them.”
“They were really awesome!” Chaz continued proudly. “I’m in the YBC, you know. Or at least I was. I worked three Halloweens here. So if you need to know where anything is, just ask me. They used to call me ‘storage guy!’” He laughed at himself once more, holding his side for effect. “It was hysterical!”
Leigh shot a glance at Gerardo, and she could swear the man returned a look of wry humor before swiftly averting his gaze.
Leigh tensed. Though neither of the two men seemed threatening, something was not right with the picture Gerardo presented, and Chaz was rapidly proving himself to be a brainless chatterbox. Before she had so much as a second to disengage herself, Chaz launched into a long story about how he had once lined up a bunch of fake sarcophaguses along the sanctuary wall and then someone else had made them fall like a line of dominos, spilling the plaster mummies out on the carpet and nearly breaking the top of his own foot, which was so badly bruised he had to borrow another guy’s shoes because his instep was so swollen he couldn’t get his work boots back on…
Leigh nodded and said “oh, really?” at regular intervals, looking for an opportune pause in which to make a polite exit, but the man was clearly a master of the game, ending each phrase with an upward inflection so that no sentence ever really ended. She was about to give up and treat him like family — with a rude, full-out, mid-sentence interruption — when something he was saying actually penetrated her gray matter.
“You know, like happened with the real murder. But some people thought that was in bad taste, so what we ended up doing instead was—”
“Real murder?” she barked without apology. “What real murder?”
At last Chaz paused and took a breath. His eyes twinkled with delight. “Oh, surely you’ve heard about that! The way the body was found and all — I thought everybody in West View knew!”
“Clearly not,” Leigh deadpanned, her limited patience dwindling rapidly.
“Of course, that was ages ago. Maybe you were too young to remember.” His blue eyes teased her. He knew damned well she was a least a decade older than he was. If she didn’t know better, she’d swear the guy was flirting with her.
Gerardo let out an odd sound. Leigh looked up to find him smothering a supposed cough, but the look in his eyes told her he was laughing.
She returned his smirk with a glare. Like hell you can’t speak English!
“Look, Chaz,” she said sharply, deciding to table the issue of Gerardo’s deception — for now. “I grew up in West View, but I haven’t lived here since college and I obviously don’t remember any murder. Are you talking about Andrew Marconi?”
Chaz’s blond eyebrows lifted. “The mob guy? Oh no, I’m talking about the first one.”
Leigh’s knees felt suddenly weak. “The first one?”
He nodded vigorously. “Way, way back. When this place was still a church.” He moved to the wall and lounged against a windowsill. “My grandma said the church members tried to keep the whole thing hush-hush, you know. There were all sorts of rumors flying around about human sacrifice and devil worship and all that. My mom says that part was probably all nonsense — and maybe it was. But Grandma says the basic facts of it were true, at least. And the church never recovered from the scandal. They sold the building and it was never used as a church again. Because you know, like Grandma says, once something really evil happens in a place—”
“Your mother was absolutely right, young man,” Frances interrupted, glaring down from the edge of the chancel with her hands planted on her hips and her face mask pulled down to yield an extra chin. “There was not, nor has there ever been, any devil worship in West View! That was a ridiculous rumor started by a bunch of gossip mongers with nothing better to do with their time than stir up trouble, and we should not be repeating such nonsense, even now.”
Leigh was beginning to see how she might never have heard of this before.
“But the body was laid out on the altar,” Chaz argued in a sulky tone. “That much was definitely true. Grandma says everybody said so.”
“Where an intruder chooses to commit a random act of violence is neither here nor there,” Frances insisted. “At the time, this was a God-fearing church with good, decent people in it. End of story.”
Leigh begged to differ. “Excuse me, but could someone please tell me what the hell murder we’re talking about?”
Frances’s glare could freeze lit charcoal. “You will watch your language in a house of worship, young lady!”
Leigh bit her lip. The building in which they were standing hadn’t been a house of worship for longer than she had been alive, and she was pretty sure that even when it was, the word “hell” was broadcast from the pulpit on a regular basis. But she had no interest in arguing either point with Frances.
She turned back to Chaz. “What exactly did your grandmother tell you about a body?”
The twinkle returned to his eyes. “It was the church custodian. He was working here all alone one night, and he never came home. When the minister or whoever came in the next morning, they found him right up there” — he gestured to the empty chancel area — “laid out on top of the altar. Dead.”
Leigh looked at the empty space near where her mother stood. The same space she’d been standing in two days ago when the hair on the back of her neck had lifted.
The same hairs crept up again.
“Stabbed through the heart,” Chaz finished darkly.
“Oh, poppycock!” Frances protested hotly. “The poor man died from a blow to the head!”
Chaz’s expression turned sulky again. “Well, yeah, maybe.” He turned to Leigh and winked. “But stabbing makes a better story, don’t you think?”
“Don’t you think,” Frances said scathingly, “that you young men — whom my sister is paying by the hour — ought to get back to work?!”
Chaz jumped to attention and started tugging on another loose corner of carpet. Gerardo followed suit. Frances uttered a loud harrumph and turned back to the choir railing.
Leigh stood still a moment, digesting the unpleasant information. Bess knew all about the building’s history, clearly. She just hadn’t seen fit to tell Leigh about it. And why not?
She turned away from the workers and headed for the door her aunt and the Pack had gone through earlier. It opened to an alcove with both a narrow staircase and a wheelchair ramp leading down to the basement. The concrete ramp was clearly an afterthought, having been built outside originally and then enclosed later with inexpensive aluminum walls and storm windows. As Leigh headed down the twists and turns of the seemingly endless incline, she noticed that the sky had turned gray, and scattered raindrops thumped noisily above her head as she descended.
Blasted creepy building, she muttered to herself, having no trouble imagining Bess’s theater group flooding the basement to put on Phantom of the Opera. Add a couple candles and a rowboat, and the atmosphere would be perfect.
She emerged into the basement to see Bess perched imperiously on a three-legged stool, rendering judgment on the fate of various objects that the Pack filed forward to present. “This birdcage is a gem, Allison!” she cooed. “It wouldn’t hold a bird, of course, but it would look lovely on a Victorian set. Put it in the ‘priority props’ pile. Oh heavens, Matt dear, throw those stinky things away.” She raised her voice to announcement level. “All ballet shoes go in the trash pile! Unless they don’t smell in the slightest.”
“There’s nothing here that doesn’t smell in the slightest!” Lenna called back with a giggle, wrinkling her perfect little nose.
“Some smells are more acceptable than others,” Bess said lightly, taking a closer look at the bizarre globe-shaped mass of paper mache that Ethan held out to her at arm’s length. It was covered with red and white globs of crepe paper and had a black circle painted on one side. “Good Lord, child,” she said disparagingly, “what on earth was this supposed to be, do you think?”
Ethan shrugged. “Giant eyeball?”
Bess’s own nose wrinkled. “Trash pile.”
“Check,” the boy said cheerfully, moving off.
Leigh sidled in as soon as the children were out of earshot. “Aunt Bess,” she whispered, “you did not tell me there was actually a murder in this building!”
“Didn’t I?” Bess said innocently. “I presumed you already knew. It’s hardly a secret, after all. It’s been common knowledge since the sixties. What of it?”
“What of it?” Leigh repeated incredulously.
Bess’s level gaze didn’t falter. “Yes, what of it?”
Leigh’s face reddened.
“How about this, Aunt Bess?” Lenna asked, bounding up with an enormous purple crushed-velvet robe trimmed with brown fur. It was big enough for a very large man. Or a small whale.
“Narwhal ceremonial gear,” Bess pronounced. “Put it in ‘costumes.’ You never know — maybe Herod could wear it in Superstar!”
Lenna skipped off, and Bess turned back to Leigh with a castigating look. “Really, kiddo, I’m surprised at you. People die in hospitals and nursing homes all the time, and those buildings don’t bother you, do they?”
“But that’s—”
“And you can’t possibly be worried about finding the poor man’s body, since it was buried over half a century ago.”
“Well, in my case, that doesn’t necessarily—”
“One can’t very well avoid any building where anyone ever kicked it,” Bess continued. “Heavens, I can’t even avoid places where you’ve personally found—”
“Can we not bring all that up, please?” Leigh begged, her cheeks still flaming. “I just want to make sure the Pack is safe here, that’s all.”
Bess frowned. “And why on earth wouldn’t they be? They’re with me, aren’t they?”
Mathias appeared before them holding a chain saw that was encrusted with a red substance disturbingly reminiscent of blood. “This must be from the haunted houses!” he enthused. “Can I turn it on and see if it works?”
Leigh opened her mouth to speak, but Bess beat her to it. “You know perfectly well you may not. In any event, it has no chain and is almost certainly out of gas. Still, put it in the donation pile for the veterans. It might be of use to somebody.”
“Okay, but can I scare Grandma Frances with it first?”
“By all means.”
Mathias trotted happily toward the stairs.
“Matt!” Leigh chastised. “Your aunt was only joking!” The boy stopped with a pout, and Leigh turned to face Bess again. “It’s more than just what happened in the sixties,” she whispered fervently. “The police aren’t so sure that Andrew Marconi took off of his own free will. They think he might have been murdered as well!”
Bess shrugged. “So what if he was? It’s not like it happened here in the building.”
Leigh threw her aunt a hard look.
Bess’s expression turned thoughtful. “So they’re not sure where it happened, are they? How very interesting. Still, that was almost a decade ago. There wouldn’t be much evidence left of him now, would there? I mean, after that length of time, with the building’s being mostly shut up and without air conditioning… I would guess all you’d find now would be bones, perhaps with hair on the—” Bess jumped. “Heavens, child! I didn’t see you there. What do you have for me now?”
Leigh looked over at Bess’s opposite elbow, and her pulse pounded. Allison stood inches away, smiling innocently. She had, as always, crept up as quietly as a cat in a sandbox. How much had she overheard?
Leigh’s teeth gritted. Who was she kidding? Allison had undoubtedly heard every age-inappropriate word.
“It’s just one of the tablecloths,” the girl answered. “I was going to put it in the donation pile with the others, but this one doesn’t have any stains on it, and it’s got this lace trim that’s kind of pretty. You want it in the props pile?”
Bess smiled. “Absolutely, dear. Good call.”
“Allison,” Leigh said sternly. “How long have you been standing there?”
The girl looked back at her levelly. “Long enough to see Mathias sneak upstairs with the chain saw.”
A blood-curdling shriek reverberated through the ceiling tiles, followed by boyish laughter and the heavy pounding of running feet.
“Oh, dear,” Bess lamented, her eyes sparkling wickedly. “However did that boy slip past me?”
Chapter 4
Leigh sat outside in the rain. It was only sprinkling at the moment, and the highest of the front steps stayed reasonably dry under the eaves, so she was content. Never mind that the concrete under her butt was freezing. All that mattered was that she was not inside the specter-ridden building.
She gazed idly at the traffic that moved along Perry Highway. The appeal of the location to a
fast food restaurant or a drugstore was obvious. Why couldn’t someone else have won the bidding and torn the place down? Even as she chided herself for disloyalty to her aunt, the thought held appeal. The sorry brick building had had its shot, and had only ever seemed to attract misery. Why not let some shiny new burger joint inflict high cholesterol on the populace instead?
“Hey you, there!” a scratchy voice called. Over the steady din of the traffic, Leigh hardly heard it, but on the other side of the highway she could see an elderly woman standing on the porch of an old house waving her arms. An older man sat in a chair next to her, a four legged walker parked by his feet. “You, there!” the woman called insistently. “Come across?”
Leigh threw a quick glance over her shoulder. She was the only person in sight; the woman must be summoning her. Most likely, the neighbors had noticed the commotion around the building and wondered what was going on.
Leigh rose stiffly from the cold concrete, waited some time for a safe break in the traffic, then jogged across the two lanes and up the neighbor’s sidewalk. The large brick house looked very much like the one Maura still owned in nearby Avalon. It had probably been built around the same time as the church and had once been a grand family home on the young borough’s main thoroughfare. But now, like so many of its ilk, it had been converted into apartments and swallowed up by commercial zoning.
“Oh, thank you!” the woman gushed, waving Leigh up onto her half of the front porch. “I’m Merle Dubanowski, and this is my husband Earl.” She cocked her head toward the man in the chair, who looked up at Leigh with a nod and a smile. “Sorry to bother you, but Earl and I’ve been dying to know what all’s going on over there. Do you know? Have a seat, hun. Can I get you some coffee? What’s your name again?”
“Leigh Koslow, and no thank you,” Leigh answered, dropping into the proffered wicker loveseat, which was significantly more comfortable than her concrete step.