Winterbay Abbey

by John Bladek

  I ran to her. Just seeing her alive and well relieved some of my frenzied state.

  She looked closer at my face and stood up. “Will? My god, what’s wrong now?”

  I hugged her.

  She squeezed me back. “Will?”

  After holding her for what seemed like hours, I finally sputtered, “I don’t know what’s happening.”

  A woman sitting behind the information desk threw us an irritated look.

  “Come on,” I said, taking Emily’s hand. I led her to the car. As soon as we were inside, I cranked the heater.

  I glanced at her belly, wondering what I should even tell her. Who knew the emotional toll this was taking on her, and in turn, our child. I looked up. Her face was covered in shadow, and she was leaning against the door, almost like she was readying herself to jump out of the car if she needed to. I put my head in my hands. “Do you think I’m crazy? Or sick?”

  “Why don’t you tell me what happened first,” she said.

  As calmly as I could, I started from the beginning, including the part about my new job offer.

  Emily beamed until I got to the part about my trip to the bell tower, the ringing bells, the cradle, the rattle, and the shadow in the corner.

  “Are you sure you aren’t letting your imagination get the best of you?” she asked, her eyes narrowed in concern. “The abbey is a big, dark place.” She reached into her yarn bag and rubbed something between her fingers, as though warming her hands. “You know old buildings as well as anyone. They creak, and things move as they settle. Maybe the bell was stuck and just happened to work itself loose, or maybe those birds disturbed it, or you pulled on the rope by mistake. If the floor sagged a tiny bit when you walked on it, that could rock the cradle. Plus, weird shadows show up all the time. It’s not that mysterious. There has to be a logical explanation.”

  “But that rattle,” I said. “How did it get there?”

  She shook her head. “That’s the least mysterious. Those things go with cradles.” She smiled and patted my hand like I was a frightened child.

  “It was identical. I know it was. Especially the teeth marks.”

  She sniffed. “Will, all babies chew. You can’t tell one from another. And we did throw it away. Remember?”

  An image sprang up of Emily telling me that we didn’t need the rattle. She had dumped it back in the trash.

  I sat back, rubbing my face. “How could it be here then?” I asked.

  “Because it’s not the same one. It just looks the same,” she said, shaking her head again. “You really are sleep deprived.”

  “The birds,” I said. “The sketch. Where is all of this coming from? I didn’t make them up. You saw the drawing, the figure in the window.”

  Emily shrugged. “We talked about that. Someone else drew it. What I really want to know is why babies would be living at an abbey in the first place. Do you think the baby who lived in that tower was okay? Who was the mother?”

  The whirring in my mind paused, struck by her question. Magically transported toys, bells ringing on their own, a drowning girl who didn’t exist, and my own possible madness seemed of greater significance to me than whose baby lived at the abbey. “Emily, I don’t know and I don’t care. That was a long time ago. Worrying about it now is pointless. Forget it. We’re going back to the hotel room, and I’m booking our flights home.”

  “No!” Her voice was sharp, cutting. “You can’t run away like that and just let this opportunity with Ted and James go. It’s too huge. We have too much to lose.”

  “I do not care!” I put my hands on the steering wheel.

  Emily put her hand over mine. Her face strained as she squeezed my fist with her weakened fingers.

  “You’re really more worried about money than my sanity?!”

  “Will, I’d wanted to tell you this earlier…in a happier context…over a romantic dinner, during a sunset or something, but this trip has been nothing but bizarre.”

  I looked over at her, trying to gauge what she was about to say.

  “The day before you left, I had an appointment with Dr. Ellis. She saw something on the ultrasound…. Something she missed before.”

  “What? You look pretty pregnant to me,” I said.

  “It’s twins,” she said.

  My hands went cold, and a lump grew in my throat. I put my head on the steering wheel as the world spun around me. “What?” I said, more to myself than to her. “How the hell did she miss that?! That’s like Columbus missing the New World.”

  “This is why I didn’t really want to go back to work now. I don’t know if I could manage twins and a job right this moment. I…. My mom said she’s going to help us in any way she can. Please try not to worry,” she said.

  “How is she going to help us, Emily? She isn’t a millionaire. We are about to lose our damn house!” I yelled.

  Emily leaned back, her expression downcast. She pulled her hand away and slid it back inside her knitting bag.

  I put my hand on my forehead and sighed. It wasn’t like me to yell. “God, I’m sorry. I just…I mean, how are we going to put two kids through college? We’re still trying to climb out of our own student loan debts,” I said, knowing how lame I sounded.

  “Could you be any more insensitive right now?! It’s not like I can control this! I didn’t tell you that night when you came home because I wanted this to be happy news, unlike the first time around. You’d just lost your account, and I didn’t want to upset you. I even tried to call you at work right after the appointment, but your phone went straight to voicemail. All I wanted was one small piece of joy in all this,” she said.

  My chest burned with guilt. I took her hand.

  She pulled it away again and turned toward her window. “I’m not ready for this,” she said in a low tone. “You have no idea how terrified I was when the pregnancy test came up positive. I’m scared to be a mother. I don’t know what I’m doing, and I’m terrified that I’m going to screw this up. What happens if I drop them both because of this hand?” She held it in front of her face, trying to force her fingers to close. After a moment, she hid it again in her knitting.

  “Emily, please don’t say that.”

  “All I want is my life back! My life before the accident. I can’t do the things I used to do. The things I love. I’m so depressed, Will. The sadness is crushing me more every day. You’re not the same either. You have become more and more indifferent. Our relationship is probably never going to be the same again. I feel like you’ve quit on us, just like you want to quit everything else. Maybe we need to think about…” she said, her voice trailing off.

  My chest caved, pulling almost all the breath out of me, as I realized my nightmare of our marriage crumbling was a reality.

  “Stop right there,” I said. “Don’t even think it. I’m not quitting on you, on us. In fact, I’m doing all of this for us. This place, that abbey. I’m doing everything in my power to make a good life for us. I just don’t want you here is all. That’s why I want to go home.”

  “So you say.”

  I gestured toward her. “So, what? You really think I’m making this stuff up? Everything I’ve seen in the abbey is just an excuse to get out of here?” I sputtered.

  “No,” she said, hollow and unconvincing. “But…”

  “But what?”

  She shook her head and looked away.

  The coolness in the air brought a clarity to my thoughts. My next words had to be as good as any I had ever chosen. “Look, I realize I may have been acting odd lately, but only because this entire trip has really shaken me up. I think the stress of everything has made me snappy and irritable. I’m trying to do everything I can to support you. And I promise you I’m going to keep doing that and whatever else it takes to make this work. My commitment to you is stronger than the day I married you. I also haven’t wanted to say this, but I’m just as scared as you, about the baby, babies. The future.”

  “That’s been more than obvious,�
�� she said coolly.

  “Just…please, Emily. I love you, and that’s why I want to leave. To get you, and me, and our babies, away from this situation.”

  “Just stop making excuses! I need you to get a grip!” Emily yelled.

  I sat back and swallowed.

  She was right.

  I had to get through this project. In fact, I had no choice. I was about to lose everything and trying to get back to Seattle right this minute was probably not the answer.

  I took her hand.

  She continued to stare out the window.

  I hung my head.

  She looked over at me. “I need you, Will. More than ever. Please.”

  I rubbed my watery eyes. “Yes, I’m so sorry. I promise.”

  Her bad hand twitched in mine.

  She looked into my eyes, and then she hugged me.

  We held each other as we listened to the traffic go by.

  My head pounded as I put the car in reverse. Emily’s words cut deep, and all I wanted to do was crawl into bed with her, hold her, and not wake up for a year. I didn’t know how much more I could take.

  “Hold on,” Emily said. “I just thought of something. I didn’t do any research like I planned. How about we do some investigating? We can look through newspaper archives on the history of the abbey and get more information. Maybe there are some answers for us here. They might help you in some way.”

  “How?”

  “Maybe there’s a history to all this strangeness, a reason the cops don’t care about drowned girls at the abbey.”

  I glanced at the library sign. I felt like I’d just been through a war. If I was tired before, I was on the verge of exhaustion now. The last thing I wanted was more work. Though if I was going to stay and go through with the project, I needed as much information as I could about what I was dealing with.

  I’d much rather do research in the hotel. However, Emily was probably on to something. Many newspapers didn’t supply their entire history of articles online, and the Wi-Fi in the hotel left much to be desired. It made sense to do the searching here.

  In five minutes, Emily and I were standing in front of the male librarian I’d first seen when I came in. He handed me a slip of paper. “This is the password to access our catalog of newspaper articles. What are you looking for exactly?”

  “Anything on Winterbay Abbey,” I said.

  He stopped for a moment, squinting his eyes, then with a sigh said, “You’re not ghost hunters, are you?”

  “What?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “The kids in this town are obsessed with the legends out there. It’s a big Halloween tradition. Lots of terribly written research papers.”

  “So we’ve heard,” Emily said. She glanced sideways at me, a glint in her eye. “What kind of legends?”

  “Stories of hauntings out there are as old as the first settlers, even older. The Native Americans have their own tales,” he said.

  I nodded. “I heard some of that. Shipwrecks, ghost sailors, and such.”

  “Exactly. And the abbey of course. For some reason, nuns are the perfect subject for ghost stories. They’re kind of mysterious. Must be the way they dress.” He chuckled. “Nonsense, of course. But no one listens to me.”

  I cracked a weak smile. “Well, I’m working on a restoration project, and I just thought I’d see what I could find about the building, old photos, things like that.”

  “I heard about that project,” the librarian said. “Sounds like a great addition to the town. I hope it goes well.”

  “Me too,” I told him, giving Emily a look. At least someone here wanted the abbey restored.

  I gave Emily the piece of paper. “How far back do the articles go?” I asked.

  “Early 1900s. Most of the articles are from the Winterbay Gazette. That paper started around 1830. It’s only been digitized for the past century though,” he said. “The rest is on microfilm.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “This should do the job.”

  Emily and I made our way toward the desktop computer the man had pointed to.

  “Well, I guess someone had to finally say it,” Emily said under her breath.

  “Say what?”

  “Ghosts.”

  I looked at her. “Don’t bring those shows you watch into this. Like you said in the car, there’s a logical explanation.”

  “I may have been playing a little bit of devil’s advocate. Besides, just a minute ago you were freaking out about how dangerous it was out at the abbey, and how you couldn’t understand what was happening. Ghosts really are the most logical explanation.”

  Logical explanation? Emily had always been drawn to the supernatural, especially angels, although I’d always thought it was mostly fun, watching pseudoscientists hunting spooks or talking about her dad looking over her from above. She’d seemed even more interested lately. Maybe because Ariel had lost her baby?

  “I’m still not sure it isn’t pranks,” I said. “And there’s that Duncan guy. He might be behind this. He didn’t seem to want a hotel at the abbey. He could be trying to scare me off.”

  “You never said that before,” Emily said. “Why are you backpedaling?”

  “I…” I wrung my hands. “Back at the abbey, I was convinced Duncan was behind it, until the rocking cradle and that rattle. And your explanation of the building settling makes sense. That makes Duncan the most likely explanation for the rest.”

  Emily pursed her lips. “Uh huh, well…Duncan must be a powerful wizard if he can do everything you described.”

  “That’s still more likely than a ghost.”

  Emily crossed her arms. “We’ll see.”

  Great. Something else to argue about.

  A dialogue box prompted us for the password. As soon as I typed it in, a search box popped up.

  Emily typed in “Winterbay Abbey.” Tons of hits appeared, the latest a small note about Ted and James buying the property.

  “Let’s see about these Halloween pranks,” I said.

  Emily nodded and narrowed the search. Thirty or so articles appeared. The kids really had been busy.

  “This is all harmless stuff,” I said after scrolling through the headlines and reading a handful of reports. “Looks like they were having fun, actually. See, these girls just dressed up like nuns and held a séance twenty years ago.”

  I skimmed through more stories. The pranks officer Vaughn had complained about were small mentions of kids caught in the woods nearby the abbey, lighting bonfires, drinking beer, and darkly—or comically—summoning spirits of the long-dead. Odd that it was usually girls conducting the strange chanting rituals. Boys seemed simply to have brought the beer. There was nothing rising to the level of pretend drownings or attempts to scare away developers with self-ringing bells and creepy scenes in tower rooms. I wanted more details. It would have been good to know what those kids were interested in up there.

  “Wait,” Emily said as she spotted another article. “Says here that a girl died ten years ago on Halloween. Killed in a car crash coming from the abbey at night. Her car slid off the road on her way back to town and ended up in the water. Ugh. Sank with her inside. How awful.”

  I shivered, remembering how cold the water was, and the bleak images of our own car accident. What must that have been like, slowly sinking into the ice-cold bay, frantically trying to get out of a car in blackness as the air slowly seeped away?

  Emily scanned down further. There was another death notice. “Look, this girl, back in 1992, after a Halloween bonfire, lost her way and tripped in the dark. She fell off the cliff onto the rocks at high tide right by the abbey. They found her floating in the surf.” She glanced at me. “Maybe those pranks aren’t as harmless as we’ve been told.”

  I nodded, still unsure. “Car crash, falling off a cliff. That’s tragic, but hardly evidence of a ghost. Kids get hurt all the time screwing around on Halloween, or anytime for that matter.”

  Emily scowled. “I don’t think that’s
the cause of what you’ve been seeing, but maybe those girls saw the same thing as you.”

  I sighed. “Maybe, but these traditions are a great cover for someone like Duncan to do some dirty work. Hide your malicious intents behind harmless fun and the occasional accident. See if there’s anything on Duncan.”

  A search for his first name, as we didn’t know his last, turned up nothing. The lighthouse was mentioned on occasion, but mostly as a backdrop to unrelated issues, or questions of its ongoing usefulness.

  “Well,” I said. “This isn’t helping much. Let’s look more into the abbey itself.”

  “Yeah, good call,” Emily said.

  An arm’s-length list of stories appeared. “Let’s start from the beginning,” I said. Emily paged forward until we’d reached the very first article about the building’s dedication in 1915.

  After that, the abbey wasn’t too newsworthy. New Mother Superiors were noted. They all pretty much died on their feet, fulfilling their vows. Nothing of interest. The most recent was dated 1962. The headline read, “Winterbay Abbey Prepares for Unexpected Funeral.” It was about an abbess who’d had a bad fall and died.

  “Crap, I don’t see anything,” I said. “None of this helps. I can’t believe kids are trying to raise nuns from the dead.”

  “Why don’t you type in ‘nun’ and ‘drowning,’” Emily said.

  “At least that would tell us if they covered my report,” I said. “Although I never saw a reporter or talked to one.”

  I typed in “nun, Winterbay Abbey, drowning.”

  “Look,” Emily said, pointing at the screen.

  The second result read, “Young Nun Succumbs to Drowning Accident.” I clicked the link and scanned the article:

  A young nun, identified as Novitiate Pamela Mayo, drowned during a storm early Thursday night. The woman was a resident of Winterbay Abbey. Police detective Richard Grant stated that Mayo had been out for a walk on the beach and somehow was swept into the sea. Her body was recovered by a boat from the Winterbay lighthouse. Funeral arrangements have not been made public.

  “Hey, it mentions the lighthouse,” I said. “That’s a possible connection to Duncan.” I checked the date next to the article: February 1, 1961.