“I’m not touching those,” Jake said.
“Me either.”
We left the small room, closing the door gently.
“This way,” Jake said.
On the other side of the lobby was another open space, like a foyer. At its far end was a staircase that led both up and down.
“Which way shall we go first?” I asked.
“Up, but let me lead the way.”
“My hero.”
“Not really. Cliff would shoot me if I let you get hurt. So would Jerome, probably, but since he could never aim well, I’m not as worried about him.”
My laugh bounced off the walls and echoed slightly.
Every step that Jake took was accompanied by squeaking wood, but nothing seemed dangerously rotted.
The stairs were both narrow and steep, but there weren’t many. We reached the next floor quickly and without any problems.
We were greeted by more dust and more things, though the things weren’t as organized as those on the first floor. Packed together were what looked like a dentist’s chair, some shelving, some old file cabinets, and more, but less impressive, chairs.
The area was open and fairly spacious, but the ceilings were sloped so that there wasn’t much headroom. There were three windows on the front wall, and four windows on the back wall.
“Was this a dentist’s office? I thought you said the Broken Rope station had a salon and barber shop,” I said, trying to put together the idea of a train station and a dentist’s office.
“I don’t know, I guess. I’d say it might have been one after it was a train station, but that’s an old dentist’s chair and at the time it was used I bet trains were still running. I just don’t know.”
The chair was brown, looked uncomfortable and wicked.
“Any ghosts present?” Jake whispered.
“No,” I said. But I was creeped out. I rubbed the goose bumps on my arms. “The ghosts aren’t as creepy as the mere idea of ghosts. Well, they haven’t been up to now. This place is weird, Jake. I feel like we’re missing something here, but I have no idea why I feel that way.”
“I know. Let’s check the basement quickly and then get out of here,” he said.
He led the way again as we climbed down the two flights of stairs that took us only somewhat below ground.
“This is more like it,” Jake said as we stopped on the fifth step up from the basement floor. We couldn’t go any farther or we’d have stepped into a dirty lake that had become the basement. The entire back wall was missing, which was a reason, I suppose, to question the integrity of the building, but we ignored that as we looked at the dilapidation.
“It’s stinky down here—old, dirty water,” I said.
“Look at the fish.” He pointed.
A school of small fish was in the dirty water, swimming together in a nonsensical but interesting pattern.
“And,” Jake continued, “look at everything else down here. The wood in the ceiling is completely rotted. The walls are barely walls. I don’t understand how this foundation is holding up the rest of the building.”
Jake’s vocalized observations must have been some sort of cue. A snap that was louder than any tree branch breaking sounded from somewhere above us.
“What the . . . ?” Jake said.
“Let’s get out of here,” I said as I grabbed his hand, turned, and led us both back up the stairs.
But the way up was suddenly missing. The three top stairs had disappeared; perhaps fallen away into the murky indoor lake below. And yet, we were still able to stand on the step, but I thought that was about to change.
“What’s going on?” I said.
“I don’t know, Betts, but we can still get out over there.” He nodded to the back of the basement where the wall was missing. “We have to swim through the water. Maybe walk—it can’t be too deep.”
“Jake, we’ll die from some sort of bacteria in there.”
One of the rotten pieces of wood that had been part of the basement ceiling fell off into the filthy water, causing it to splash up and all over us.
“Too late, and there’s no other option, Betts. Come on.” Jake pulled my hand the other direction.
Isabelle, stay still for a moment.
“Jerome?” I said as I stopped hard enough to pull Jake toward me again.
“Is he here?” Jake said.
“I don’t see him or smell him, but I heard him. I heard his voice. He told me to stay still for a moment.”
Another rotten rafter fell into the water.
“You’re imagining things,” Jake said. “We’ve got to go, Betts.”
Stay still!
“Jake, seriously, don’t move. I know it sounds crazy, but I know we’ll be okay if we just stay still,” I said. I didn’t know, but I was one hundred percent sure I heard Jerome’s voice.
Jake looked at me—in the flash of an instant I saw fear, confusion, and disbelief cross his face, and then I saw acceptance.
“You’d better be right,” he said. He turned toward the disappearing basement. “Jerome! Get it in gear, buddy. Get us out of here.”
For the longest few seconds of my life, the only thing that happened was more destruction. The ceiling fell, one piece at a time, the walls crumbled, several pieces at a time. It wasn’t long before Jake and I were crouched next to each other on the remaining step, the space for us becoming smaller and smaller.
“We have only a few more seconds,” Jake said. “Let’s swim.”
On each side of us, more cracks sounded and the stair frame started to give way.
“We’re going in, Betts. Hold my hand and we’ll get out of here,” Jake said breathlessly.
But then the opening across the bacteria-filled-and-small-fish-riddled lake became totally blocked. The wall from the above level collapsed, closing the space.
“Oh no,” I said.
“Just hold tight,” Jake said as he pulled my hand close to his chest. “We’ll be okay if Jerome said we’d be okay.”
I remembered that Jerome hadn’t visited me in person on this trip, that the ghosts actually seemed to be possessing each other as well as live people. The voice I’d heard that had sounded so much like Jerome’s might have been someone else pretending to be Jerome.
“Oh, Jake,” I said. “I’m sorry.”
“Hold tight.”
It was only about an instant before the entire building came down that invisible hands reached from above and grabbed both me and Jake and pulled us up. The storm of flying debris was even stronger on the higher level. I couldn’t see much of anything or anyone.
What felt like an eternity later, we were deposited on the ground in front of the building, or where the building had been a few minutes earlier.
“You okay?” Jake said to me as he grabbed my arms. We were both on our knees.
He was windblown but he didn’t look injured. I figured I looked the same.
“I’m fine, Jake. You?”
“Fine,” Jake said, but I could tell he wasn’t so sure.
“Betts,” another voice said.
I looked up. It was so bright and sunny that the ghost was barely distinguishable.
“Robert?” I said. I turned to Jake and stood, feeling okay but a little noodle-limbed. “Robert’s here. Hang on a second.”
Jake nodded and sat back again on his heels, seemingly relieved to have a moment to recover.
“Robert, what’s going on?” I said.
“I’m not sure. I was sent here by some cowboy. He couldn’t get here, but he knew I could so he told me to come and get you two out of there.”
“How’d you grab us? There’s too much light out here for you to be solid.” I caught a slight whiff of his old cologne-like scent, making me sure I wasn’t imagining him.
He shrugged. “Cowboy told me I could. I guess I just believed him.”
“Was that the Broken Rope station?”
“I do believe so.”
“How’d it get here?”
“I don’t know.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
“Why couldn’t Jerome get here?”
“I don’t know.”
“Robert, this is going to seem terribly ungrateful, but you’re here. I have to ask, did you kill Grace?”
“No!” He said the word adamantly, but then he looked back at the space where the building had been. The building wasn’t there anymore. The tracks remained, but in their overgrown state. “I did not kill her, but she died here, or at the Broken Rope station, I think. That’s what I’m remembering. That’s why I could get here, to this building, I guess. But I did not kill her. I couldn’t have.”
“I don’t understand. Why was the building even here? We’re not in Broken Rope.”
Jake stood up and walked toward where the structure had been. In its place, there was only a deep hole in the ground and the school of tiny fish swimming around.
“Why, Robert? Why here?”
“I don’t know.”
Jake looked at me. “The whole thing was an apparition?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “You saw it. You aren’t supposed to see the ghost stuff.”
“I more than saw it. I felt it.”
“Robert said he didn’t kill Grace, and that he doesn’t know why the Broken Rope station was here, in the middle of nowhere.”
“Huh. It’s all so . . .”
“Scary?” I said.
“Interesting.”
“Oh.”
“Hurry up and finish with Robert. I want to get to Frankland,” Jake said.
“Still? I mean . . .”
“We’re going, and we’re going to figure out how Justice Adams played a part in Robert and Grace’s history. The sooner, the better.” Jake turned and walked to his Bug. He moved directly through Robert.
“Wanna come with us?” I said to the ghost.
“No, I have to go for now. I’m a little tired of all this, Betts. I’d like to go back to where I was, even if Grace isn’t there. I’m not supposed to be bothered by anything anymore. This bothers me.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, because I didn’t know what else to say.
Robert shook his head. “Well, the cowboy will be happy that you’re okay.”
“It wasn’t real. Could we have truly been hurt?”
Robert shrugged. “Don’t know, but it wasn’t worth the risk.”
“Thanks, Robert. And thank Jerome, too.”
“Of course,” he said before he disappeared.
We drove out of the clearing that had seemed like the perfect setting for a train station, one that might not ever have really been there.
“Thank Robert and Jerome for me next time you see them,” Jake said, repeating my gratitude. “If we’d swam through the water, we might have been crushed by the crumbling wall. If it was real, they saved us, Betts.”
I wondered. “Well, someone did.”
Chapter 15
The current Frankland train station was similar to the ghostly version I’d visited. Present day, it was still simple but welcoming, still pretty and somewhat primitive. But that was just from the outside.
Inside were walls packed with posters, pictures, and placards—some things framed, some not, most everything somewhat tilted and off-center. There were no benches, but two card tables, each with four chairs, took up the waiting area. There were decks of cards and backgammon boards on each table, but no one was currently sitting around them.
“Help you?” a crackled voice said from the direction of the ticket counter, but it was located behind a floor-to-ceiling wooden beam, so we couldn’t see the person attached to the voice.
“That’s Mariah,” Jake said before he stepped purposefully forward.
I followed behind and tried not to show my surprise when we came upon the only other person in the building.
“Jake, my love,” she said as she stood from the rocking chair and stretched her arms out toward him.
I was surprised because Mariah was either in costume or she was like the building—almost authentic, in the ways of an old Missouri backwoods woman. She was short, definitely old, hunched over, and wrinkled like an apple-head doll whose apple had been left to dry for far too long. She smoked a pipe, or at least held one in her mouth; I didn’t smell any smoke. She wore a long skirt with an apron and a bonnet, which only covered most of her wiry gray hair. She might have been a hundred years old. At least.
“Mariah, it’s lovely to see you.” Jake pulled her into a genuine and sweet hug. “I have missed you.”
“Well, you don’t have to miss me. Come visit me anytime; I’m here until I die. I know, I know, you’ve got your shows. How’re they going this summer?”
“Very well.”
“So many crowds there in Broken Rope. Too much of a big city for my tastes.”
“I understand and I will come visit more often.” He didn’t make such promises unless he intended to keep them. “This is my friend Isabelle Winston. Betts. And this is Mariah,” Jake said as he stepped to the side so that Mariah and I could shake hands. Jake didn’t move too far away, though, probably just in case her small body wouldn’t for whatever reason stay upright.
“Oh, Betts. Winston? Wait, are you related to Missouri?” she said.
“She’s my grandmother,” I said.
“Sweet young lady,” she said.
Gram was almost eighty, but I said, “Thanks, I think so, too.”
“What are the two of you doing here in Frankland? Something I can do for you?” Mariah said.
“We’re here to talk about Justice, if you’re up for it,” Jake said.
“If I’m up for it? It’s all I do anymore. It’s all I really remember how to do.” She laughed, her scratchy throat making a distinct but kind of adorable frog croak.
“Thanks, Mariah. We can sit while we chat.” Jake guided her as she sat back down in the rocking chair. She placed her pipe on a skinny table to her side, next to a worn paperback, the title of which I couldn’t see.
Jake and I took seats on barrels with tops covered in old, worn leather, the torn edges riveted into the side of the barrels. A shiny gold spittoon sat next to the rocking chair, but I didn’t see any sign of chew anywhere. The floor was made up of wood planks that probably hadn’t seen better days, but were put there in their ragged shape on purpose. I understood. I was from Broken Rope; I knew all about atmosphere.
“What do you want to know, Jake? You know lots about Justice already.”
“I know Justice created jobs for many people, right?”
“Because of him, folks who might have gone hungry or without a roof over their heads were able to eat and have shelter. Yes, he helped a bunch of people,” Mariah said.
“Other than his amazingness—and I agree, he was amazing, Mariah.” He paused and his face became serious. “Do you have any idea if he had any bad traits?”
“Like what, dear?”
Jake shrugged. “I don’t know. I’ve come across some little information that puts him in a less-than-favorable light, Mariah. I hesitate to share the details because I want to make sure the information is one hundred percent accurate before I breathe a word about it to anyone, especially you. Even Betts doesn’t know. She’s just here because I wanted company on the trip.” Jake paused again but continued quickly. “Did Justice maybe have a quick fuse, impatience that couldn’t be controlled well?”
I saw how Jake was trying to maneuver around the thing we really wanted to know. Had Justice killed Grace? It wasn’t something that could be easily asked.
Mariah stopped rockin
g and sat forward in the chair resting her elbows on her knees. “Love, what is it that you want to know? There’s no need to warm me up or beat around the bush. I will answer whatever you want me to answer to the best of my ability, which is simply my limited knowledge of my ancestor, but I know more about him than anyone. Tell me what you want to know. He’s long gone. You’re a friend, Jake.”
Jake looked at Mariah a moment. “I don’t want to hurt your feelings, Mariah, but the questions I have are about something bad, something dark. Are you really okay with that?”
“Of course I’m okay with that, Jake. I’m old enough to know that no one can be good all the time. We all have some darkness inside us.”
“All right, then.” Jake looked at me. He still didn’t want to say anything that might offend his friend, but I nodded supportively.
“Mariah, I’ve found some old information about a woman named Grace. She was a black woman who was originally from Mississippi and was, allegedly, killed on her way to Broken Rope, or perhaps in or just past Broken Rope—no one knows for sure. Does the name Grace mean anything to you? In the way of being associated with Justice, I mean.” Jake swallowed and looked at Mariah both apologetically and expectantly.
Mariah’s mouth came together in a wrinkled pucker. She looked at Jake, blinked, looked at me, and then back at Jake. “Maybe.”
Jake nodded and waited. I think I held my breath.
“As we’ve already discussed, love, Justice was a good man. He helped a lot of people. But he was still, from his very core to the skin over his bones, a man who loved women. He was married twice, and from the stories I’ve heard he never behaved monogamously. He loved women—all woman, all skin colors.”
“I see,” Jake said when she paused.
Mariah rubbed her chin. When she pulled her fingers away from her face they made a fan movement until they reached her lap again. It was something I might expect a hypnotist to use to focus a subject’s attention on a specific spot.
“Well, there was a Grace I heard about,” Mariah said. “A lovely woman. A beauty that Justice couldn’t ignore, I heard. It’s a story we don’t tell much because it sounds made up and it ends badly.”
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