She needed to find his military records.
She went back to the archives and searched on Mayhill’s name and found an obituary dated a few days later.
Gerald Brandt Mayhill is survived by his wife, Elaine, and his two small children, Hazel and Gerald, Jr.
It was possible that his wife was still alive, although she’d be close to a hundred years old. His children would be more likely sources. Lacey would have to see if she could run them down.
Before she left the archives, however, she searched for the other lost soul, the five-year-old girl. She searched on every term she could think of: murder, rape, five-year-old, sexual assault. At least now she’d figured out she needed to search on one term, then cross-reference it with others, but still, nothing came together. There were plenty of reasons why not. The girl had died before 1946 or after 1960; her body had never been found; she didn’t live in Malibu or her body had been dumped elsewhere. Again Lacey wished Sam could give her more to go on—a name, a date. Anything.
Her eyes bleary from reading the old newspaper articles online, Lacey took a break. She got up and stretched, prowled the kitchen for lunch ideas, and stared at the boxes that still hadn’t been completely unpacked. She was beginning to think Sam was right; they needed a bigger place. His bachelor pad had been stretched to the limit with the kids on the weekends, but now, with her, too, it was jammed. They needed more space.
She barely had room to pace.
She fixed herself a sandwich and thought about just taking a walk. But her eyes kept straying back to her laptop; she hated to break away from a trail when she had leads to follow. For a moment, she considered the fact that she could call in the cavalry—the resources at the Unexplained Channel—and let their people do the grunt work. But then what would she do? Twiddle her thumbs? No, she needed to do this work. It was a source of pride, as well as sanity. She took her sandwich and a glass of iced tea back to the kitchen table and started back in.
She switched to a genealogy site that had military records. Typing in Gerald’s name, she was able to pull up a brief summation of his service. Enlisted April of 1942; posted in an engineering company; location: London. Discharged April of 1946.
He was posted in London? In an engineering company? That sure didn’t sound like combat. Considering the alternatives, that sounded pretty cushy.
She needed more.
She turned to a hunt for his children. They’d both be around seventy years old. The girl, no doubt, grew up and married and changed her name, so Lacey searched on Gerald, Jr.
And got a hit right away. An obituary.
Gerald Brandt Mayhill, Jr., born January 17, 1949, died August 5, 2011. Preceded in death by his parents; survived by his wife, three kids and his sister, Hazel McDowell of Ventura, California.
“Perfect,” Lacey said to herself. Still alive and not far away. She looked up McDowells in Ventura; there were a handful. She got addresses and phone numbers and cross-referenced them to property records. The second name on her list, Earl, owned his home as a joint tenant with Hazel.
Lacey was on a roll.
She sat back and nibbled her sandwich as she formulated what she would say to the woman. These phone calls were never easy. Not many people expected to receive calls from strangers claiming their dead relatives were haunting a building unknown to them. Hazel may or may not know how her father died—some families were very tight-lipped about suicide—but even if she did, she probably didn’t know the location. Generally speaking, that wasn’t the kind of detail that would be preserved through the years.
Lacey finished her sandwich and chased it with a swallow of iced tea. No time like the present.
She dialed the number. Two rings. Three.
“Hello?” A woman’s voice, high and warbly.
“Is this Hazel McDowell?”
“Yes.”
“My name is Lacey Fitzpatrick. I’m a private investigator and I’m researching a death in a building in Malibu. From what I understand, your father, Gerald Mayhill, died at this location, and I was hoping I could talk with you about it for a few minutes.”
There was a moment of surprised silence. No doubt trying to wrap her head around that last sentence, Lacey thought.
“Uh, all right,” Hazel said slowly. “I’m not sure I understand what you need.”
“Thank you, Mrs. McDowell. I know this is unexpected, and I appreciate your willingness to help. Do you know how your father died?”
More silence, then a faint intake of breath. “Yes, I do.” The short answer, the lack of additional information, told Lacey all she needed to know.
“You know it was a suicide,” she said gently.
“Yes.”
“I’m very sorry. I hope this isn’t too difficult for you to talk about.”
“Actually, no,” Hazel sighed. “I was only three at the time, and it was almost seventy years ago. I remember nothing about it, only what I’ve been told.”
“I understand,” Lacey said. “I’m wondering if you knew the circumstances—how and where he died?”
“He hung himself at some hotel. That’s all I know. Tell me again what you’re investigating?”
Lacey took a breath. “My partner and I were called in to clear some ghostly tenants. The hotel is now a B&B, and the ghosts are making things difficult. My partner, Sam Firecloud, is a medium, and he identified a male ghost in one room as a man who hanged himself. That led me to you.”
“Sam Firecloud…” Hazel’s voice trailed off. “I think I’ve seen you on TV. That murder case of that jogger in Griffith Park?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Lacey said. “That’s us.”
“I see. All right. So what do you need from me?”
“I don’t know how familiar you are with ghosts, but when they get tied to a place like this, it’s generally because of some trauma, some unresolved emotion. Sam felt a heavy guilt around your father, a guilt over lives lost. I’ve researched his military record, thinking that might be where the guilt comes from, but I didn’t find evidence of combat. Do you know if he ever fought? If he ever killed anyone?”
“Hmm, no, I actually don’t. Again, I was very small, and my mother didn’t talk about the war much. I do know he was a cartographer. He made maps from reconnaissance photographs. As far as I know, he never saw combat.”
“That’s as much as I found, also,” Lacey said. “He was apparently stationed in London, and obviously there was no combat there, although there were the bombings by the Germans. I did find a reference to shellshock, so wondered if your mother ever mentioned that.”
“No, not that I remember. But even shellshock wouldn’t correspond to guilt. It wasn’t his fault the Germans were bombing London.”
“Exactly,” Lacey said. She sighed. “Well, I guess I need to look further to find out where it comes from. Records from that far back are sketchy, though.”
“I can’t think of anything I’ve ever heard about him that’s bad. My mother always said he was a good man, a very sensitive man. I do think the war was hard on him, but he came home, they started their family and were good people. He volunteered at their church until the bus accident. After that, his injuries and the pain kept him at home more.”
“Bus accident?”
“Yes. He was thrown out of a bus when it went off the road. He broke his collarbone, both legs and was in a coma for a while. I don’t know how long. It was a long, slow recovery.”
“Oh,” Lacey said. “How unfortunate. He survived four years during the war and came home to have that happen? That’s tragic.”
“It was. Mom said those last couple of years were very difficult for him. But she certainly never thought he’d commit suicide. Why would he want to leave her with two little kids? My brother was just a baby.”
“Why, indeed,” Lacey said. “Well, I’ll see if I can find out more about him. But if you should think of anything later, will you give me a call?”
“Certainly. This same number you’re calling
from?”
“Yes, that’s right. Oh, and I was wondering, would you care to know what I find, and what happens when we finally release him?”
Thoughtful silence. “Yes. Yes, I would. I’ve never thought of him like that, trapped here. Yes, I would like to know that he’s free.”
“All right. I’ll be happy to let you know. It may take a while, but as soon as we figure out how to release him, I’ll call you.”
“Thank you, Ms. Fitzpatrick.”
“Lacey,” she said with a smile. “Thank you for your time, Mrs. McDowell. I appreciate all your insight into this.”
“Please, Hazel,” she said. “And thank you—and your partner—for what you’re doing. It’s rather… amazing.”
Lacey laughed softly. “Yes, it is. And highly satisfying. Have a good day, Hazel.”
She hung up the phone and sat back in her chair. That was a good news-bad news thing. Good that Hazel was so forthcoming, bad that nothing matched up with Sam’s impressions. Could she be wrong about who the hanging man was? That was highly unlikely. How many hanging men could one building hold? No, she thought, shaking her head. This had to be him. She just needed to dig deeper into his life.
~~~
ELEVEN
That evening over dinner, she told Sam all about her progress, and the final brick wall.
“There’s a part of me that wonders if this is our guy,” she finally admitted.
Sam had listened quietly while eating his steak and baked potato. He speared a broccoli floret with his fork and pointed it at her.
“No, this is him,” he said. “I feel it. You did good, Lace.” He munched the broccoli, then chased it with iced tea. “Maybe we’ll need to go back again. See if I can pick up any more information.”
“About him and about the little girl,” Lacey said. “I’ve drawn a big fat zero on her. If we had a name or a date, just something to get me in the ballpark…”
Sam’s gaze drifted off to the ceiling. Lacey recognized the look he got when he tried to access that ethereal place where ghosts abide. She pushed a piece of broccoli around her plate and waited quietly.
“No,” he said at last, pulling himself back into the real world. “We’ll have to go back. The nice thing about a second walk is that I can concentrate on specific things. The first time through, I don’t always know what’s going to lead us to the answers.”
“Right,” she said. “So, that obviously means I need to let Diana know, both about what I found and about doing a second walk. I’m sure they’ll want to film it.”
Sam frowned. “Yeah, probably.”
She reached out and touched his hand. “Having second thoughts?”
He turned his hand under hers, threaded his fingers through hers and smiled grimly. “Sort of, but not really. I do believe we can do good work with this, but as you said before, it’s a pain to have to go through others to get it done.” He squeezed her hand. “We’ll just keep going. See where it leads.”
“I’ll call her tomorrow. I seem to remember something about a short window for filming there. I’m guessing the studio has to pay for the rooms that are not being rented out.”
“More red tape,” he said. Returning to his dinner, he added, “Much easier when it was just the two of us.”
Silently Lacey seconded that.
~~~
Although Lacey called Diane early the next morning—just after seven—she got the definite impression that a second walk was going to be a scramble for them.
“Can you walk tonight?” Diana asked in a mild state of panic.
“Absolutely,” Lacey said. “We’re ready whenever you are.”
“Okay. Let me lean on a few people and see what I can do. In the meantime, can you shoot me an email with the information you have about the hanging man? We can start looking at the best way to present that.”
“I’ll have it to you within the hour,” Lacey said.
She felt marginally sorry for the production assistant. Lacey was sure the TV team was used to having a longer lead time, but for her and Sam, this was better. They both liked to keep going on a case until it was solved.
She wrote up an email about Mayhill, sent that off to Diana and pondered her next thread.
Her search for the girl got her nowhere, simply because she had no identifying facts to go on. With luck, Sam could glean a bit more information tonight. In the meantime, she knew that Malibu did not have its own police department, but contracted law enforcement services with the LA County Sheriff’s office. She pulled up the contacts on her phone and found a name she hadn’t used in many months. Wouldn’t he be surprised to hear from her?
She called the number and sat back in her chair.
“Sheriff’s office, Avila,” a brusque voice answered.
“Paul, hi. It’s Lacey Fitzpatrick. How the heck are you?”
“Lacey? Hey, long time no talk. I’m doing great. How are you? No, don’t tell me. I saw you on the news, you and your new partner. Putting the LAPD to shame, I noticed.”
Lacey laughed. “No, not really. We just had… resources that the PD didn’t.”
“I guess so,” he said. “So you’re doing well? Life is good?”
“It is,” she said. “But we’ve got a case now that I’m stuck on. It’s in Malibu, your territory. I wonder if I could get a little help from you.”
“Sure, what do you need?”
Briefly, Lacey explained the situation—leaving out the part about the TV show—and her lack of success running down the little girl. “I don’t have a name or a time frame, just that she was five years old, raped and strangled. This could go back as far as 1928, so of course I’m limited by how many old records are available online.”
“Hmm, yeah, I see that,” Paul said thoughtfully. “That’s a lot of ground to cover. Let me do some digging. Once I find something that fits in with your case, then we can work up a request for information to cover it.”
“That would be fabulous,” Lacey said. “I owe you big time. Maybe after we solve this, my partner and I can take you out for a steak dinner.”
“That works for me,” Paul said. “I’d like to meet this guy, anyway. He seems like a straight-shooter, I mean except for this medium nonsense.”
Lacey laughed, recognizing Paul’s joking banter. “He is,” she said. “You’ll like him.”
“He treating you better than Derrick, I hope?”
“Oh, yeah,” Lacey said. “Much better.” She hadn’t even thought about her ex in ages, probably because he couldn’t hold a candle to Sam.
“Good. Glad to hear it. Okay, let me work on this and see what I can find, and I’ll call you back.”
“Thanks, Paul. You’re a sweetheart.”
Having set that ball in motion, she had nothing else to do on the case until Sam walked tonight. She turned her attention to more earthly matters, namely unpacking and putting away the last of her relocated items. It was abundantly clear to her that this apartment was just too small. They definitely needed more space.
And thinking about Paul mentioning Derrick, Lacey realized that Sam was everything her ex was not. Where Derrick had lied to her, actually engaged in criminal behavior behind her back and had mangled her self-esteem and her career, Sam had, over these past many months, helped her to rebuild her life. And she hadn’t even noticed. It took thinking back to where she’d been two years ago to make her realize how far she’d come.
They’d come. She couldn’t have done it without Sam.
Glowing with a quiet warmth, she puttered around the apartment for the rest of the day, waiting for Sam to come home.
~~~
TWELVE
Filming was set for eight p.m. Sam and Lacey pulled up in front of the B&B at seven-thirty and parked behind the familiar Unexplained van.
It was easier, this time, knowing the routine. Diana herded them into the van where they were fitted with mics, then the inevitable sound checks were made. By that time, Kevin and his crew were ready for t
hem upstairs, and Sam and Lacey climbed the steps. She had her phone out and set it to video before Sam gained the upper landing.
He went to the front right room—Mayhill’s room. He didn’t bother with the main room, but went immediately to the closet door. As he stood before it, Lacey turned the knob and pulled it gently open.
Sam stood there a moment, breathing in the feelings. Then he surprised everyone, including Lacey, by speaking to the ghost.
“Gerald,” he said in a hushed tone, “we know who you are. We’re here to help. Tell me where your guilt comes from. Show me.”
Lacey watched on her screen, biting her lip. Sam made no sign that he was getting anything, feeling anything. Was Gerald gone? Had Sam’s acknowledgment alone been enough?
Sam shook his head once. He stared down at the floor and frowned.
“The guilt is… crushing,” he said. “No relief. Doesn’t feel… deserving. Too many small lives. All his fault. The pain was never enough, not for what he did.” Sam pulled in a breath. “He wants us to go away. Leave him in his misery.”
Lacey took a chance. “Was it the war?” she barely whispered.
“No war,” Sam said. “There are worse things than war.” He stood a moment longer, his head down, the only sign of movement the slight rise and fall of his chest. Finally he sighed and looked up. “That’s all.”
He very gently pulled the closet door closed. The click of the latch sounded like a gunshot in the silence.
Lacey, still filming, stepped back. Sam turned toward her, his eyes meeting hers through the screen for only a second. But she recognized the sadness there.
He headed out into the hall, the two cameramen scrambling to get out of the way. Lacey followed him to the back left room, but here he stopped in the doorway. He surveyed the room, his eyes just slits. Lacey moved up as close behind him as she dared; she knew this was going to be hard on him and hoped her presence could offer some kind of intangible support.
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