By the time they finally made it into town, Sterling had settled down, but he still wasn’t doing a very good job of blending. He reacted to the new world outside his window with startled gasps and looks of astonishment. It was like he’d stepped straight out of one of those bad time-travel flicks that Peter loved so much. At least this time, they could just write his odd behavior off as extreme tourist syndrome. If that was even a thing.
It probably wasn’t.
Thankfully, the walk to Marian’s Waterside Treasures shop was a short one. The store was open and already bustling with souvenir shoppers. However, Marian herself was nowhere to be seen.
“She is here, isn’t she?” Michael asked.
“I’ll go ask the girl at the cash register,” Luke said. With that, he marched right up to the counter, stepping in front of several customers who’d lined up to make their purchases.
“Hey!” the chubby woman who’d been next snapped at him.
“Do you not see the line?” another younger woman asked.
The girl behind the counter was equally unimpressed.
“Sir, I’m afraid you’ll have to wait -” she began, but Luke quickly cut her off.
“Don’t have time for a lecture. I just need to know if Marian Davis is in today.”
“No, she isn’t, Sir. Now, if you’d please step aside -”
“Do you have her phone number by any chance?”
“If I did, I wouldn’t give it to you.”
“No, it’s alright, she knows me. I’m Luke Rainer, we met a few days ago. She’s going to be a guest on my nationally acclaimed television series, Cemetery Tours. Perhaps you’ve heard of it?”
“I’m sorry, but I haven’t. Now if you’ll please get out of my way and let me see to these customers.”
Luke could tell by her tone that she was almost done being polite. Almost.
“Please. I just need to talk to her for a few minutes. It’s about Joanna Stanton.”
“I don’t know who that is and if you do not step away from this counter in the next sixty seconds, I’m going to call the police.”
As much as Luke liked to think he could charm his way into or out of any situation, he also knew when it was time to bow out gracefully. Hoping the sad and defeated look on his face would at least make the salesgirl feel a little guilty for refusing to give him Marian’s phone number, Luke sighed and turned away.
He found Michael near the front of the store, attempting to explain the workings of a disposable camera to a visibly perplexed Sterling.
“But if you wind it, doesn’t that scratch the image? How do you get the photograph out?”
“You take it to the store and - oh, look! There’s Luke!” Michael announced, probably a lot louder than he’d intended. “Anything?”
“Nada. Looks like we’re on our own on this one, friends.”
“Excuse me.” A new voice interjected. Luke turned to see a woman, probably in her mid-thirties, with light brown hair tied back into a ponytail. “I couldn’t help but overhear... you have a question about Joanna Stanton?”
“Not a question so much as every bit of information you could possibly tell us about her,” Luke answered. “I’m Luke, by the way.”
“Luke Rainer, I know. I recognize you from your show,” the woman smiled and shook his hand. “I’m Beth. Are you filming over at Stanton Hall?”
“We were, actually. Now we’re just doing a little bit of follow-up research.”
“Oh, alright. Well, I can’t tell you much, but I do know that Joanna is buried over in Cape Porpoise Cemetery with the rest of her family.”
“The cemetery?” Michael asked.
Luke was equally surprised.
“She wasn’t buried at the manor with her husband?” he asked.
“No, there was some kind of feud between Hall and her father. Old Man Stanton thought Sterling may have had something to do with her death, so he demanded that she be buried with the family. Hall didn’t even try to fight him.”
Luke turned back to Sterling.
“Any of this ringing a bell?”
Sterling just stood there, eyebrows furrowed, like he was trying to work it all out for himself.
“How do you know all this?” Michael asked.
“I wrote a report on the history of Stanton Hall Manor in high school,” she replied.
“Did Sterling have something to do with Joanna’s death?” Luke asked.
Sterling immediately snapped out of whatever stupor he’d been in and glared at Luke with such a look of insult and betrayal that Luke was surprised that Beth wasn’t whipping out her phone to call the cops. Or the nuthouse.
“Most of the records I found indicate no, he didn’t. It was natural causes. But she was Stanton’s only daughter, and he wanted to take his anger out on someone. Sterling became his scapegoat.”
“That’s interesting,” Luke said. “You know, we talked to a lady a few days back who is a descendent of the Stanton family, and she told us that Sterling remained on good terms with the family after Joanna’s death. He even left his entire estate to them.”
“For the most part, I think that’s true, especially after her father died, which wasn’t too long after she passed.”
“Let me ask you something else. Do you think that not being buried with her husband would have upset her?”
“It would upset me,” Beth said. “I wouldn’t care how angry my family was. I’d want to be buried next to my husband.”
Luke turned to Michael and Sterling.
“Comrades, I think we have a cemetery to investigate.” Then he looked back to Beth. “Thank you so much for your help.”
“Oh, it was my pleasure. Here, I’ll give you my business card. I can’t guarantee that I’ll have the answers, but if you have any more questions, feel free to give me a call.”
“Thank you. We might just do that,” Luke told her. To Michael and Sterling he said, “Let’s head out.”
Chapter 28
Michael had never really liked cemeteries.
It wasn’t because they were haunted. He actually rarely encountered spirits who enjoyed hanging around their burial sites, which was partially why he doubted they would find Joanna there. There was always the possibility, but despite ancient folklore and spiritual beliefs, he’d never been convinced that cemeteries were meant for the dead. No, cemeteries, just like everything else, were designed for the living, so that they’d have a place to visit their loved ones, or at least their bodies.
Michael had only lost one person to death. His brother Jonathan had taken his own life almost a decade earlier, and he was the only person Michael had known and loved who hadn’t found him as a ghost. For the first time, Michael understood just how excruciating it felt to be separated by something that before had never been a barrier. Even still, he’d felt neither comfort nor closure at the gravesite. It wasn’t his brother lying beneath the ground. His body was no more than a shell, as cold and empty and hollow as a vacant tomb.
He knew that others might be consoled by the idea of visiting their loved ones at a cemetery, and to be honest, Michael envied them, but for him, Jonathan’s death only reaffirmed his belief that a body without a soul was just... nothing. And yet, century after century, headstones and grave markers were crafted, marble shrines to lost life and to bodies that could neither see nor touch nor think nor feel, bodies that were respected and appreciated more after death than some ever could have hoped to be in life.
It was a little sickening, really.
Cape Porpoise Cemetery was small, no more than fifty graves or so, and protected by a border of trees. Most of the graves were from the late 1800s to the early 1900s, and according to a quick Google search Luke had conducted, several of them belonged to sea captains. Michael caught a glimpse of one lonely spirit meandering through the trees, but judging by his modern clothes, he was not there to haunt his final resting place.
“Anything, Mikey?” Luke asked.
“No,” Michael conf
irmed. “She’s not here.”
“Why would she be? Who wants to hang around a bunch of corpses all day?” Brink commented. Michael knew his friend had never understood the haunted graveyard stereotype.
“Are you sure we’ve come to the right place?” Sterling asked.
“Cape Porpoise Cemetery, 1812. This is it,” Luke said.
“Then she is here,” Sterling said.
“Just her body. Her spirit... it could be anywhere,” Michael told him honestly.
Sterling either didn’t hear him or didn’t care to acknowledge what he was trying to tell him. “I want to see her,” he announced. Then, without waiting for Michael or Luke, he set off, moving Kate’s body gracefully through the graveyard.
“Mikey, you go after him. Keep an eye on Kate. I’ll go search the other half of the cemetery,” Luke told Michael before sprinting off in the opposite direction.
Michael didn’t hesitate a moment in catching up to Sterling.
“Wait a minute,” he said to the ghost. “Are you sure you want to do this? Maybe it’s not a good idea.”
“And why wouldn’t it be?” Sterling demanded.
“You have this idea of Joanna in your head. You see her alive and vibrant and loving, the way she was with you. That’s not what you’re going to find here.”
“You speak as though you think I don’t know that,” Sterling snapped.
“I just want to make sure that you’re ready. Seeing her grave... it might make it too real for you,” Michael warned him.
Sterling made no reply. He just kept walking, staring at each grave as he passed. Brink glanced over at Michael. “You tried, brother.”
Just then, Luke called out across the yard, “Hey, I found her!”
Sterling stopped in his tracks and turned to look at Luke. Michael recognized the look in his eyes, or rather, Kate’s eyes: pure, unadulterated, and heartbreakingly false hope.
“Sterling, wait -” Michael began, but it was no use. Sterling was already marching straight over grass and graves to reach his love’s resting place.
The inscription on the tombstone had faded so much that Michael couldn’t make out any of the dates. The name Hall, however, was clearly legible across the top of the stone. Below it, he saw the faint tracings of her name, Joanna Elizabeth.
“God, I wish I had my camera,” Luke lamented. “If I’d known this was here, I’d have definitely gotten some shots of -”
But before he could finish his sentence, Kate - or Sterling - dropped to her knees and clutched the ground with her fingers. Michael was beside her in an instant.
“Kate!” he cried.
Frantically, she reached out and grabbed his shoulder, digging her fingernails so hard into his shirt that it ripped. Michael barely even noticed. He called her name again.
“Kate! Look at me! Can you hear me?”
She took several deep, labored breaths before slowly turning her hazel gaze upward. His eyes held hers, and in that brief moment, Michael knew she was seeing him. It was Kate. Sterling had let her go.
“Michael?” she whispered. Then, she seized up again as her eyes faded and then closed. She leaned her head forward, hunching over like some strange animal.
“NO!” Michael yelled. “Sterling! Sterling, let her go! Don’t do this!” he pleaded, but it was no use.
By now, Luke was next to him, trying to pull him away from Kate. “Mikey, give her some air. Don’t upset him,” he advised. But Michael was in no mood to listen.
“Kate! Kate, fight him! I know you can! Please!”
It was no use. Kate was already straightening herself back up. But it wasn’t Kate anymore. Sterling brushed the grass and dirt off of Kate’s jeans and said, “She caught me off guard.”
In that moment, Michael felt a vile contempt unlike any he’d ever known he was capable of experiencing. The only thing keeping him from pummeling Sterling to the ground was the fact that he was using Kate as a shield. It was brilliant, really. Sterling knew that neither Luke nor Michael could do him any harm without hurting Kate more.
“I think it’s time we seek answers elsewhere,” Luke suggested lightly, pulling out his cell phone and Beth’s business card.
Michael glared at Sterling.
“Agreed.”
~*~
Beth offered to meet them at the public library. She explained that in high school, she’d been able to access information on Joanna and Sterling Hall through the town’s public records.
“Everything there is to know about Sterling and Joanna, you’ll find here in these databases,” Beth said, leading them to a computer.
“Probably not everything,” Brink muttered.
Luke sat down at the desk and began browsing.
“So, are you looking for anything specific or are you just researching?” Beth asked.
“We’re trying to learn as much as we can about Joanna, specifically her life with Sterling,” Luke told her. “We were hoping we might make contact with her during our investigation, but we only got through to Sterling.”
“You really think it was him?” Beth asked.
“Oh, we’re pretty positive,” Luke remarked lightly.
“What did he say?”
Michael could have sworn he saw Luke cast a grim look up at Kate before he replied, “That he didn’t like people in his house, and that he misses Joanna desperately. He’s been hurting a lot this last century, but I’m hoping that maybe, if we can piece together a little bit more about what happened to Joanna, then we might be able to help him find some peace.”
“Wow. That’s just so cool what you do. Have you ever actually seen a ghost?”
“A couple of times,” Luke said without tearing his eyes away from the computer screen.
“How about you?” Beth asked Michael. He guessed she hadn’t seen any of his interviews.
“Umm, I’ve seen a few,” he said. Behind him, Brink scoffed. Fortunately, Michael was the only one who heard it.
“Hey, I think I may have found something,” Luke announced. Sterling was hovering over his shoulder in an instant. Luke pointed to the screen. “Look at this. It’s your marriage license.”
“Whose marriage license?” Beth asked.
But Luke was too distracted to answer.
“Sterling Samuel Hall and Joanna Elizabeth Stanton. Married January 21, 1834.”
“You’ll probably find some other records there, also,” Beth said.
“A death certificate maybe?” Michael asked. “They could have written down the cause of death.”
“It was an illness. Probably pneumonia,” Beth said.
“If that’s the case, and she was sick for a long time, then that could explain why we haven’t found her,” Luke said. “She may have felt that she’d made her peace with the world.”
“No. I don’t believe that,” Sterling said. “She was too young. She had too much to live for. There was no reason for her to die.”
Beth glanced at Sterling with alarm. Michael didn’t blame her. It must seem odd for a beautiful young woman to react so strongly to the passing of a woman who’d died years before even her great-grandparents were born.
“Kate, it’s okay,” he tried to assure Sterling.
“No. It’s not okay. She didn’t deserve this.”
“No one deserves to die young but sometimes things happen,” Luke muttered through clenched teeth, clearly hoping that Sterling would take the hint. “Now you need to calm down or I’m calling this whole thing off, because frankly, at this point, I don’t know how much more there is to find.”
Michael was beginning to think the same thing, when all of a sudden, the word journals jumped off the screen at him.
“Wait a minute,” he said leaning forward. “Scroll down.” Luke did. “There have been reports that Joanna Stanton Hall chronicled her life through a series of journals, though no such artifact has ever been recovered from the extravagant home she shared with husband, Sterling.”
“Then that’s where w
e’ll find them,” Luke announced, standing abruptly. “Beth, I want to thank you so much for your time and your assistance.”
“Oh, it was my pleasure,” she announced. Michael got the feeling that she suspected that there was a little more to their quest than simple research, and that was exactly why Luke was so forwardly dismissing her.
“Tell you what. When you get home, go to our website and shoot me an email to the address under our contact information. I’ll send you something autographed.”
Once Beth was gone, Michael asked Sterling, “Do you remember Joanna keeping a journal?”
“Not a journal. She was constantly writing, but she claimed that they were poems, sketches,” Sterling responded.
“Did she ever let you see them?” Luke asked.
“No.”
“Then they weren’t poetry. Trust me, I’ve dated enough poets and would-be artists and there is nothing that they love more than showing off their work.”
“Really?” Michael asked. He’d always figured that they’d be the exact opposite. In high school, he’d had a crush on a girl who enjoyed poetry and she never showed her work to anyone.
Maybe Luke just dated different kinds of poets.
“Oh yeah. If Joanna was writing poetry and drawing flowers, she’d at least show her husband. If she wasn’t showing you, it was because she was writing things that she didn’t want anybody to read.”
“You think she had a secret?” Michael asked.
“No. We were always completely honest with one another,” Sterling insisted.
“Sterling, I hate to tell you, but you answered that far too quickly and too adamantly for me to fully believe you,” Luke said.
“What are you saying? That you doubt her?” Sterling demanded.
“No. I’m saying that you do.”
Michael waited anxiously for Sterling to retaliate, to yell or lash out, but it never happened. He just stared at Luke with a strange mixture of insult and contempt. But there was something else there, too. Something that Michael had never before seen in Sterling’s cold and bitter eyes.
Fear.
Chapter 29
If there was one thing Luke had learned about great ideas, it was that they were just that: ideas. And just because the idea was great in theory, it in no way guaranteed that the execution of said idea would be great, or even feasible.
Between Worlds (Cemetery Tours Book 2) Page 21