Hauntings of the Heart

by Joselyn Vaughn

  Minnie was ready to mutter something and shuffle him down the hall, but Edith piped up. “We’re raising money for a new security system at the library.”

  “Security system?” Gordon stepped into the parlor. “I didn’t know Carterville was so dangerous.”

  Minnie stood behind him, glaring at Edith and slicing her finger across her throat. Edith spared Minnie a glance, then spoke to Gordon. “It’s a security and inventory system, actually,” Edith explained. “They put little RFID tags in all the books and an alarm goes off if the book leaves the library without being checked out.”

  “They can do inventory by waving a wand by the shelves,” Dinah added. “It will flag items shelved in the wrong spot. Very helpful for finding lost books.”

  “Yes, it’s all very complicated,” Minnie said, debating whether or not to grab Gordon’s sleeve and yank him out of the room. A quicker exit, for sure, but it also required touching him—too risky a prospect.

  “Interesting. I’d like to hear more about it sometime,” he said. “But I’d best get these to Mark.” He headed down the hall and disappeared into her apartment.

  The committee will never get anything done now, Minnie thought. Helping the library would be forgotten in favor of discussing Gordon. They’d probably want to know when she’d be explaining the security system to him.

  She didn’t have time to sit around and talk to him. The other morning didn’t count. She wasn’t sure what she’d attribute the lapse in judgment to—his charm? Her curiosity? Anything but realizing how much she missed him.

  It was as if they had fallen into their old routine. Same banter, same jokes. She’d forgotten the fun they’d had as little kids. Climbing trees, eating ice cream, swimming at the park. They’d kept their conversation to safe topics, not venturing into anything too touchy like high school, college, or Minnie’s time in the Peace Corps.

  “Have you learned why he’s here yet?” Dinah asked.

  Edith shrugged. “I tried talking to Maybelle about Gordon’s visit, but she thinks she’s guarding the Manhattan Project. I could barely get her to say she’d seen him, and I was there when he was in her office. She’ll gossip about anything else, though.” Edith rolled her eyes. “I think I heard about every case of poison ivy she got this summer.”

  Minnie saw a couple heading up the front walkway from the corner of her eye. She didn’t want to interrupt Edith’s story, hoping she would have actually found out something about Gordon’s inquiries. But a moment later the doorbell rang, and Minnie hurried over to answer it.

  “We’re looking for the haunted house,” a woman in a purple sweater and Coke-bottle glasses announced. Minnie welcomed them into the foyer. The man, who appeared slightly older than Mark, studied a map on his phone.

  “Haunted house?” Edith and Dinah both looked over, their attention diverted. Minnie wouldn’t have bet anything would draw their fire, but was thankful to her potential guests.

  The woman peered over the man’s shoulder. He pointed to the display on the phone. “I had the address programmed in here, but when you played with it, I lost it.”

  She huffed and reached for the phone. “I didn’t do anything with the mapping function. I only—oh, never mind. Did you try the haunted house register?”

  The man grunted and tapped away at his telephone screen.

  “We’re looking for this place.” She pulled a creased paper from her satchel. She unfolded it and held it toward Minnie. “We’ve heard there are abnormally high levels of paranormal activity there.”

  Edith and Dinah had followed her over. Edith grabbed the paper. “Well, if you’re looking for the Lilac Bower, you’re here.”

  “I didn’t know this place was haunted,” Dinah said.

  Minnie wished her friends would keep their mouths shut for once. She loved their forthrightness, but…

  “We’d like to determine that for inclusion in our register,” the woman said. “Our equipment is out in the van.”

  This couple wasn’t quite what Minnie had expected when she’d developed the advertising, but they must be the ones who had called yesterday. She thought she had targeted people who would get goosebumps at the creaks and groans of an old house. These two appeared a bit more serious about paranormal activity.

  Would they ruin her advertising by telling everyone there weren’t any ghosts? She needed to keep business steady. Resurfacing the driveway and parking lot had zeroed out her reserve fund. She needed the haunted house to succeed to build it back up.

  “I don’t know what’s here,” she replied carefully, “but I’ve been hearing some strange noises.”

  A square cartridge on the man’s belt beeped. He twisted it so he could see the display, then shrugged.

  “What’s that?” Minnie asked.

  “You’ve been seeing actual ghosts at the Lilac Bower? You didn’t say anything.” Edith peered at the man’s gadget.

  Minnie gave her a look. Edith had better not blow this.

  Edith’s eyes widened and she gasped. “Oh. Oh. Yes! I heard those noises too.” She nodded emphatically. “Ve-e-e-e-ry creepy.”

  Her performance wouldn’t win Edith an Oscar, but the ghost hunters didn’t seem to notice. The man unhooked the thing from his belt and rotated it so Minnie could see the flashing LED lights on the panel. The light blinked in an even pattern, switching from red to green every fourth flash. “I developed this myself.” The man grinned. “It monitors the psychic presence in this room.”

  He shook the device, then slapped it against his palm. It made the same rattling noise as Minnie’s television remote after she’d dropped it down the stairs. He handed the gadget to Minnie. “The readout is confused right now because of the presence of animated humans,” he explained.

  Minnie glanced around the parlor. She supposed the fundraising committee would be less productive if it was made up of unanimated humans. Although today’s meeting might have gone better with zombies. Give them some brains to munch on and maybe they’d stay focused.

  “I don’t know if there are ghosts,” Minnie hedged. “I’ve heard some strange sounds.” Minnie handed the monitor back to the man. “I’m Minnie Schultz. I believe we spoke yesterday on the phone.”

  “Elmer Derecho, and this is my wife Barbara.” They each shook Minnie’s hand.

  “We’d like to document the paranormal activity here,” Barbara said. “If we find a significant presence, we’ll list the Lilac Bower with our organization. We get over a thousand hits a day on our haunted sites register.”

  Minnie raised her eyebrows, mentally calculating the free advertising. Her reserve fund could be restored in no time. “I don’t have a problem with that. I’d sure like to know what’s making all those noises. Let’s get you settled in before you start your investigation.” Minnie waved them toward the stairs. “I’ll show you your room.”

  At the bottom of the stairs, she turned to Edith and mouthed, “Seven-thirty tonight.” Hopefully their tricks would be enough to deceive whatever equipment Barbara and Elmer had brought.

  * * *

  Gordon stepped over a tangle of cords as he made his way down the hallway to his room. He had to hop on one foot to avoid the couple responsible for the mess. A man and a woman crouched along the baseboard, straightening extension cords and securing them to the floor with duct tape.

  “I can’t believe you forgot the extra battery packs,” the woman mumbled, tearing another strip off the roll and smoothing it against the floor.

  Gordon winced, thinking about the gooey residue it would leave on the hardwood floor. “Does the owner know you’re doing that?” he demanded.

  “She suggested the duct tape.” The man wound a strip around a bunch of wires and duck-walked through the door next to Gordon’s room. “Don’t want anyone to trip over these.”

  That room had been his sisters’ playroom, and it seemed strange to watch a man enter it. Gordon peered through the doorway, almost surprised not to see their rag dolls piled on the
window seat next to a stack of Nancy Drew books.

  Instead, he saw hard-sided suitcases with various monitors and speakers inside them. If Gordon didn’t know better, he’d think Minnie was having a security system installed. Crime had never been a worry, especially in this neighborhood. A security system this complicated in Carterville seemed like overkill. As far as he knew people still left their keys in their cars at night.

  He didn’t know much about Minnie’s plans. He would think the plumbing would be her first priority, but maybe things were going well enough she could do both. But would security installers duct-tape wires to the floor? Wouldn’t they run them through the walls?

  Gordon shoved his hands in his pockets and decided to play nosey neighbor. “What are you installing?”

  “Microphones and motion sensors.” The woman placed a small black device outside the doorjamb and connected it to the wires. A light blinked.

  “Are you spies, or something?” Gordon laughed. If they were, they should be a little more discreet about installing their equipment.

  “No.” The woman stood and adjusted her glasses. “We’re investigators.” She checked her watch and called to the man. “Elmer, I need to go to Radio Shack for more connectors and extension cords. This place is a lot bigger than we thought. I’ll get batteries too.”

  Elmer sat back on his heels. “I said I was sorry.”

  “I know, sweetheart.” She kissed the top of his head.

  “What do you need all the batteries for if you’re plugging all this stuff in?” Gordon asked.

  “When something manifests, it draws energy from the batteries. Sometimes we’re trying to get pictures to document our investigation and pow—dead batteries.”

  Gordon nodded and shoved his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket. He supposed there was English in Elmer’s answer somewhere.

  Elmer smoothed the tape over the cords going under the door. The woman stepped around him and scurried down the stairs. She reminded him of Ann, nit-picky and exacting. And yet she and Elmer seemed to have an amicable working relationship. Completely different from what he and Ann had had. They’d opposed each other on everything, including his mother’s care. He hadn’t realized how problematic their differences would be until it was too late.

  “Investigators, huh?” Gordon waited. Elmer was too intent on his taping. “Like PI’s? What are you investigating?” Or maybe he should ask who.

  “We’re looking into the presence of EVPs. Ms. Schultz has some suspected activity and we’d like to document it for our organization.”

  Gordon shifted and leaned against the doorway. “EVPs? I’m not sure I’ve heard of those.”

  “Electronic voice phenomenon.” Elmer stood and dug in his back pocket. He pulled out a worn leather wallet and extracted a black business card with silver lettering. Gordon took the card and examined the names: Elmer and Barbara Derecho, Paranormal Investigations.

  “Ghost hunters?” Gordon asked. He handed the card back.

  “In layman’s terms, yes. We study all sorts of paranormal activities. Voices, orbs, imprints, ghosts, sometimes UFOs.”

  Ghosts? What was Minnie up to? Was she trying to scare him away? He’d lived here for twenty years and never seen or heard anything that couldn’t be explained by one of his sisters dancing around.

  “There aren’t any ghosts here,” Gordon said. Then again, after his family’s tumultuous departure, maybe they had stirred something up. Neither of his parents had left this house at peace with it. Would his father’s spirit return to the location of his darkest hour?

  “Ghosts are really quite rare,” Elmer interrupted his thought. “Most of what people refer to as ghosts are actually imprints.”

  “Imprints?” Gordon felt like a parrot, repeating the last word of whatever Elmer said.

  “Nature recording an event. Happens mostly at traumatic events. Gettysburg is famous for it—battlefield sounds, glimpses of soldiers.”

  Gordon nodded. So his father wouldn’t be haunting him in the strictest sense of the word. Well, that was a relief. He’d have some choice words for Bernard Anderson’s ghost. Although lacking a physical presence would make the punch in his father’s nose much less satisfying.

  “Listen, if you’re interested, you can watch our investigation,” Elmer added. “We’re going to start at eight tonight. Love to chat more, but I’ve got to finish setting everything up. There are so many rooms to monitor. We’ve pulled out all our old-school equipment and we still might have to split the initial investigations into two nights.”

  Now Gordon understood the need for the reel-to-reel recorder on the bed. He confirmed the time and headed down the hall to his room. He had his hand on the door when something Elmer had said jarred him. He’d referred to Minnie as ‘Ms. Schultz.’ It hadn’t occurred to Gordon until now, but wouldn’t she have changed her name when she married Mark’s father?

  Well, some women didn’t, and Minnie would be the type that might not. Or had she divorced and gone back to her maiden name?

  He didn’t like how either alternative sat in his chest. It shouldn’t bother him as much as it did. They’d both had to make choices in the intervening years. Some to survive, some to make do.

  He couldn’t fault her for decisions she’d had to make, any more than he could stew over his own regrets. He’d have chosen differently over the years after the benefit of hindsight. The only choice he could hold against her was the one that hurt the most, the one where she’d shunned him and his family over what his father had done.

  His mother had gently reminded him each time he traversed the path to the mailbox and didn’t find an airmail letter. Her voice would sadden and she would lament how some people didn’t want to associate with those who had gone through financial ruin. He hadn’t believed Minnie would put any stock into such things, but the empty mailbox proved otherwise. As the weeks passed with no letter from Minnie, Gordon had acquiesced to his mother’s explanation.

  He couldn’t blame anyone but himself, though. He’d never explained it all to Minnie. He’d allowed the gossip to twist and distort her opinion because he couldn’t find the courage to put down on paper how his father had betrayed them. If Minnie had been in Carterville with them instead of the Philippines, she’d have understood. She’d always understood what he needed simply by looking into his eyes.

  Minnie had encouraged his dreams and pushed him to try the new and exciting. But she’d never forced them on him. She’d tempted him with challenges that stretched him beyond his current horizons. Adventures they could share—to travel, to experience new cultures and new foods. To see the sunset in Tahiti, to walk on the Great Wall of China, to dance the tango in Buenos Aires.

  His grief over her rejection had mellowed over the years. He had forgiven her long ago. If only he could convince her to forget about his father’s actions. They’d never changed his feelings for her.

  8

  His mother’s caretaker, Marie, answered the phone and gave Gordon a rundown of Helen’s condition that day. Not improved, not deteriorated; only one episode in the morning, but she’d rested after and was more herself again.

  “I’ll put her on the phone,” Marie said. Marie had been with his mother for several years. He hired her as soon as his income allowed it. It had taken him out of the middle of one tug of war. Ann couldn’t keep up with his mother’s demands and their small children.

  Marie had been a perfect fit, willing to indulge Helen’s whims without upsetting her fragile state of mind. She always kept Gordon apprised of any changes in Helen’s condition. He knew he could trust her judgment.

  After a moment, his mother came on the phone, sounding stronger than she had since he’d arrived in Carterville. Maybe the doctor’s estimation had been wrong and he didn’t need to move so quickly.

  “When can I come?” She didn’t fuss around with the niceties of conversation, and that concerned him. He remembered how well she could charm a room, drawing out the pens and checkb
ooks for whatever fundraiser she’d been hosting. But this mission, this quest had brought out a different side. She was anxious, sometimes frantic, and always insistent. She wouldn’t listen to any other solution. She had to move back to Carterville and she had to move now.

  “It’s become more complicated,” he hedged, wondering how to tell his mother about Minnie. While she hadn’t objected to having Minnie as a daughter-in-law, he wasn’t sure how she would react to Minnie running a bed and breakfast out of her house. “There weren’t any discrepancies at the title office.” Gordon had known there wouldn’t be. He’d taken care of that transaction, making sure no mention of the foreclosure was available to the public. No way for the gossip to gain a foothold.

  “Well, use your bank account and persuade the owner. Money talks, son.” She paused. “Everyone has a price.”

  Gordon sighed to himself. He didn’t understand where her sudden urge to return to Carterville had come from. She’d insisted on it ever since the doctor had said her heart was failing. She’d been so troubled, especially since Ann had died. Marie said she’d become fidgety and would pace the halls at night, as though trying to solve a complex problem.

  Her determination had increased once she’d decided on a goal: moving. The first time Marie had caught her packing her clothes, she’d quietly returned them to the closet while Mother had her afternoon tea. The second time, she’d called Gordon. He’d arrived to find his mother comparing two blouses. She’d raised one hanger. “Would this blouse be appropriate for meeting with the Ladies’ Aid Society? The details on the pink one are prettier, but this one travels so much better.”

  Marie had followed him up to her room. “She’s been packing all morning. She seems perfectly coherent, but you and I both know she hasn’t met with any organization in years. I wanted to get your opinion before I called her doctor.”

  “Gordon, you know how those ladies are. Would they frown on the green? It’s only cotton and doesn’t have any lace trim. I don’t want them to think I’ve been gone so long because I’ve fallen on hard times.”