“So what do we have to do?”
“I was hoping you’d know that. It’s nice to see you Danielle, but I want to move on and be with my Emmett; he’s been waiting for me for such a long time.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
“Are they giving you a message to pass onto me?” Danielle asked Emma’s spirit.
“No, child. They’re telling me to show you. But show you what? I don’t know what they want.”
Danielle considered the possibilities and then asked, “This may seem obvious, but have you asked them what they want you to show me?”
Emma laughed. “Oh dear, if it were just that easy! No, they’re not answering my questions. I just know they want me to show you something, and until I do, I’ll be stuck here.”
Danielle stopped rocking and focused her attention on Emma. “If they’re telling you to show me something, maybe it’s something you saw, back then. Something they want me to see.”
Emma shook her head. “I don’t know what that would be. I really didn’t know any of those people.”
“But you knew about the Eva Aphrodite going down in the storm.”
“Sure, everyone knew about it. There were stories back then. How Walt would take those rich folks out to party or meet the big ship that came down from Canada. I can’t remember none of those folks, the ones that died that night, ever coming into the Bluebell Diner. Aside from my work at the diner, I kept away from the white folks back then.”
“Maybe it was something you saw happen with Walt Marlow. I know you ran into him from time to time.”
Emma considered the question. Finally, she shook her head, “No, girl. I can’t think of a single thing I ever saw Mr. Marlow do that’d shed light on any of this. From what I remember, he’d just come into the diner from time to time, was always polite.” Emma smiled softly. “I wonder if I’ll get to see Mr. Marlow when I pass over. I’d like to tell him thank you.”
“Thank you? For what?”
“He was always very respectful when I waited on him. Treated me just like he treated the white waitresses. But, I’ll tell you girl, some of those customers back then didn’t treat the white girls much better. Plenty of the men who came into the Bluebell didn’t think twice about giving one of the girls a smack on her backside. Felt it was their right. Mr. Marlow wasn’t like that. No siree, he was a gentleman, that one.”
Danielle smiled. “I can see Walt being a gentleman.”
Emma arched her brows. “Walt?”
Danielle shrugged. “Walt is sorta haunting Marlow House. Has been since he was killed there. By the way, he always appreciated your help in proving that his brother-in-law could’ve been responsible for his death, instead of it being a suicide.”
Tossing back her head, Emma let out a hoot of laugher. “Oh goodness child, he’s haunting your house? I remember, he was a fine looking man.”
Danielle blushed. “Well, he still is.”
“Goodness, gracious. I had no idea! I wonder if Emmett knows Mr. Marlow is haunting Marlow House.”
“I suppose you can ask him,” Danielle suggested.
“I will, once I move on.”
“If it wasn’t something you saw Walt do—and if you don’t recall meeting any of the people who died on the boat—”
“There is always that business partner of Walt Marlow’s,” Emma suddenly remembered.
“Jack?” Danielle asked.
Emma nodded. “I think that was his name. He disappeared right after the Eva Aphrodite went down. Heard he stole a bunch of money from Walt Marlow, which really never surprised me.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because those people were after him, threatened to kill him.”
“Umm Emma, I think maybe I know what you’re suppose to show me.”
“What’s that?”
“Whatever it is you know about Walt’s partner, Jack. Because you see, Jack didn’t run off with Walt’s money. He was murdered. They found his remains on the Eva Aphrodite.”
Danielle was no longer sitting on a front porch. Instead of a rocking chair, she sat with Emma at a table in what Danielle assumed was the Bluebell Diner. One clue was the menu on the adjacent table that said, “Bluebell Diner.”
Half of the tables were occupied, and by the dress and hairstyles of the customers sitting at those tables, Danielle was fairly confident the timeframe was the 1920s.
“If I did this right, they don’t see us,” Emma said as an attractive black waitress approached their table and began wiping down the tabletop before straightening the condiments.
Leaning toward the server, Danielle read her nametag. “Oh my gosh, it’s you!”
Emma smiled. “I forgot how young I was back then. Where did the time go?”
“You were gorgeous,” Danielle said in awe. “You look like a movie star.”
Emma laughed. “I’ll have to say, no one has ever compared me to a movie star.”
“I’m serious,” Danielle said with a convincing nod. “You were quite stunning...oh…not that I mean you don’t look nice now.”
Emma laughed again as her former self turned from the table and went on with her work. “Since I’m no longer attached to either flesh and blood body, I suppose those earthly tethers no longer apply.”
In the next moment, the Emma sitting next to Danielle transformed herself into the younger version of herself.
“Very nice,” Danielle said with a smile.
Emma shrugged. “I’m hoping that when all this is resolved, I’ll be able to move on to Emmett, and when I do, I’d rather come to him like this so he’ll recognize me.”
“When your husband used to visit you, how did you look in your dreams?”
Emma smiled at Danielle. “Like this. My mama always said I was vain.”
Danielle was about to respond when Emma quickly hushed her and said, “This is what I wanted you to hear. Listen up.”
Turning in the direction of Emma’s focused stare, Danielle watched as Jack entered the diner alone and headed for the table she and Emma sat at. He wore a gray suit, with a flap hat perched cockily on his head. She silently watched as he sat down with them, a folded newspaper under his arm. He unfurled the newspaper and began reading. Emma pointed to two men sitting across the room in a booth. One of them nodded in their direction. They stood up and approached their table.
When the two men suddenly appeared at his side and began to sit down, Jack startled, looking up from his paper. One of the men took Danielle’s seat, forcing her to stand abruptly and move out of his way.
“I’m sorry. I should have had you sit in the other chair, I forgot,” Emma apologized.
Now standing by the table, Danielle couldn’t help but think of all the times something like that had happened to Walt. Someone who couldn’t see him—which was everyone but her and Chris—would decide to sit down on the chair he was using. Just like Walt, she couldn’t actually feel the person claiming the chair, and theoretically, they could both use it simultaneously; but the thought of doing so was not only distracting, but also, to her, somewhat creepy.
Emma the waitress appeared by their table as the two men sat down. She glanced back to the booth they’d previously occupied, just as she started to hand Jack a menu. “Did you want to change tables?”
One of the men roughly pushed back the menu she was handing to Jack, shoving it into the front of her apron. “Go away girl, we have something to discuss with this boy.”
Visibly nervous, Emma gave a nod and stepped back, and when doing so, tripped, dropping the menu to the floor behind Jack’s chair. Emma bent down to pick the menu up off the floor when the second man told Jack, “You’ve a week to pay us, or we’re going to cut you up and sell you for bait. Understood?”
The room froze. Danielle glanced around. It reminded her of a movie stopping on a single frame. Across the room, a server had been in the process of filling a customer’s cup with coffee. The stream of coffee hung midair, arching from the spout of the coffee
pot to the mug sitting on a table.
“What just happened?” Danielle asked.
“That’s all I heard of the conversation,” Emma explained. “Back then, I didn’t want to hear more, so I hustled myself away from that table. Never a good idea to know too much.”
“Do you know who those men were?” Danielle studied the two men sitting at the table with Jack. She guessed they were in their forties. Yet she could be wrong. One thing she had noticed in the past was, when looking at photographs of people from Walt’s era, they always seemed older than their modern day counterparts did.
One of the two men sported a pencil mustache and a fedora hat atop his head. Proper etiquette dictated men remove hats when indoors, yet neither Jack nor this man had done that, Danielle noted. The third man was clean-shaven, and she could see his hat still sitting on the booth bench across the room where he had recently been sitting. What style of hat he wore, she couldn’t tell from this distance.
“Oh, I knew who they were all right. Local muscle. I never knew who they worked for exactly. Emmett always said it was best that way. The one with the hat, I heard him called Ballot Bob. Emmett said that was because he had a way of persuading people how to vote. The other one was called Reggie something. Never knew their last names, that I recall.”
“So, Jack owed them money?”
“I think he had a gambling problem. At least that’s what Emmett said after I told him what I overheard. When Jack disappeared the next week I figured he either ran off with Walt Marlow’s money to get away from those men, or they made good on their promise.”
“Did you ever say anything to anyone what you heard, after Jack disappeared?” Before Emma could answer, Danielle said, “I guess that was a stupid question. I don’t imagine you told anyone.”
“Just Emmett. He told me to keep my mouth shut.”
“Can you unfreeze this, so I can hear the rest of their conversation?”
“I told you, that’s all I heard,” Emma reminded.
“Let’s just try.” Danielle remembered the recent dream hop Walt had taken her on, where she was able to listen in on conversations, even ones Walt hadn’t overheard at the time they actually took place—providing his former self had been in the same room.
“Okay,” Emma said with a shrug. In the next moment, everyone around them came back to life.
Licking his lips nervously, Jack leaned forward and said under his breath, “I told you guys, I’ll have your money. I just need a little time. Give me another week and I’ll have it for you.”
“Time’s run out, Jack-o,” Ballot Bob said.
“But you’re in luck,” Reggie added. “We have a little favor to ask you. You do this for us, and you’ll be square.”
Jack frowned. “What do you want me to do?”
“Once we tell you what we need, you understand you can’t say nuthin’ to anyone. Got that?” Ballot Bob said.
Jack shook his head. “Don’t ask me to kill anyone. I’m not going to do it, so don’t ask. I don’t want to know who you want to get rid of. I don’t want to be involved.”
Ballot Bob laughed. “Don’t worry Jack-o. It’s nothing like that. We just need you to help us board the Eva Aphrodite.”
“What do you mean, board her?” Jack frowned.
“No one’s going to get hurt,” Reggie assured him. “We just need you to help us get on and off, without any problem.”
“And afterwards, you’ll be square with us,” Ballot Bob promised.
Once again the room froze. Danielle glanced around. “What happened?”
Emma frowned. “I don’t know.”
“Where are you, Emma?” Danielle asked.
“What do you mean, I’m right here.”
“No, you from back then, the waitress. I don’t see you anywhere,” Danielle told her.
Emma glanced around the room. “I think it was the end of my shift, so I went home.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Danielle opened her eyes. She was back in her bedroom, still in her clothes. Groggy, she sat up and looked around. She picked up her iPhone off the nightstand and looked at the time. It was 3:12 a.m.
Glancing up to the ceiling, she decided not to go see Walt and Jack right now, even though she was fairly certain Stella was asleep downstairs. She wanted time to process what she had learned from Emma. Had Jack been responsible for pirates boarding the Eva Aphrodite? Had it all been a home invasion at sea? Did they double cross Jack, killing all the witnesses, including the person who helped them board the ship?
Getting up, Danielle changed into her sleepwear and climbed back into bed. I’ll shower in the morning, she told herself.
“Does it really matter after all this time?” Lily asked Danielle the next morning. The two sat in the side yard drinking their morning coffee. Danielle had just told Lily about last night’s dream hop.
“That’s sort of what I asked myself when I woke up this morning. It’s pretty obvious to me what happened. Why else would they want to get onboard that boat? To steal from the wealthy passengers. Maybe something went wrong, and they were forced to kill everyone.”
“It would explain why Jack was on the boat. It might also explain why he doesn’t remember. It was probably all too traumatic.” Lily paused mid-sip and looked to Danielle. “You’re certain he doesn’t remember what happened, right?”
Danielle shrugged. “Unless he’s a really good actor. But no, I don’t think he remembers. While it may not matter after all this time, I’m curious about that old jewelry they found onboard.”
“Oh, I almost forgot about that. You’re certain it wasn’t there when the ship went down?”
“No way. For one thing, if the motive was robbery, I can’t imagine they’d leave those behind. But even if they were somehow overlooked, how do we explain the box they were in? Not to mention, Jack claims to have seen a diver leave the box, not long before he ended up here.”
“Okay, let me restate—maybe it doesn’t really matter after all this time who killed those poor people, because you’re probably right about what happened. But I’m curious about that old jewelry. Who put it there? Why? And where did they get it?” Lily asked.
“Plus, we can’t forget about Emma. Something kept her here. The spirits wanted her to show me something. If it was Jack’s encounter in the Bluebell, what now? Sometimes, spirits simply want someone from the living to know the truth. Me knowing may be enough, and Emma can move on. But if not, what then? What am I supposed to do with the information?”
“Maybe tell Walt?” Lily suggested.
“Walt…yeah, I’m sort of not looking forward to that. All these years he thought Jack stole from him, and now, well now it’s actually worse. His actions contributed to the deaths of all those people. Which will definitely put a damper on their reunion.”
“True. But they killed him too. And the poor guy has spent close to a hundred years stuck on the bottom of the ocean, all alone.”
“Aren’t you cold out there?” Stella called out from the kitchen door. Danielle and Lily looked to the now open door leading from the side yard to the kitchen, where Stella stood.
“It’s a little chilly, but nice,” Lily answered.
“Breakfast is on. You two are going to join us, aren’t you?” Stella asked. “We’ll be leaving this afternoon.”
“Certainly,” Danielle said with a forced smile as she stood up with her now empty cup of coffee. She glanced down at Lily, who hadn’t yet budged from her chair. “Lily? Breakfast?”
Lily looked up at Danielle and let out a sigh before standing up. They went into the house with Stella.
Jolene Carmichael stood at the front desk of the Frederickport Police Department. She had just demanded to see Chief MacDonald. The woman working at the front desk was newly hired to the department and had only lived in Frederickport a few months. She had no idea who Jolene Carmichael was, but she politely phoned through to the chief’s office telling him a Ms. Jolene Carmichael was at the front desk
, requesting to see him. She fully expected the chief to have her ask the woman what this was in regards to and then to direct her to one of the other officers. Yet the chief didn’t do that. Instead, he told her he would be right out.
“Jolene, this is an unexpected visit. If it’s about what the historical society wants to do with the Eva Aphrodite—”
“Edward, can we talk alone please?” Jolene asked stiffly.
The chief paused a moment, then shrugged and gave a little nod. “Let’s go to my office.”
After the chief led Jolene into his office, he gestured toward an empty chair facing his desk and closed the door behind them.
“What’s this about?” the chief asked as he took a seat behind his desk and faced Jolene.
“I understand you’ve recovered jewelry from the Eva Aphrodite.”
Picking up a pen from his desk, he leaned back in his office chair and began absently tapping the pen’s end against the tabletop. “I guess you read this morning’s newspaper.”
“Actually I haven’t. But this is a small town, and I know you spoke with Ben.”
He smiled. “I see you haven’t missed a beat. You’ve been gone all these years, you’ve been back just a couple months, and already you know what’s going on without having to read the local paper.”
“One thing I know: I don’t care for how my hometown’s changed since I’ve been gone.”
Dropping the pen, Edward MacDonald leaned forward, resting his elbows on the desktop. He studied Jolene. “How’s that?”
“All this attention on Marlow House, for example. Glorifying Walt Marlow. Someone who was nothing more than a bootlegger and murderer.”
“I’m not sure I’m following you. How is anyone glorifying Walt Marlow?”
“For one thing, Danielle Boatman is trying to rewrite history by all that murder nonsense. I understand she’s just trying to promote her bed and breakfast, but I don’t appreciate her doing it at the expense of the historical society’s integrity.”
The Ghost from the Sea Page 18