Ghosts, Monsters and Madmen

by D. Nathan Hilliard

  “It’s not that simple.”

  “It’s exactly that simple. People like to believe it’s complicated to feel better about what they do. Anybody who thinks it’s complicated is just avoiding what that one simple principle tells them about themselves.”

  “Fine, Alan! I was young, selfish, and stupid. Can’t your simple criteria settle for that?”

  “And twenty years later you finally show up when you want something from me. It doesn’t appear that youth had much to do with it. You made your decisions, now live with them.”

  “And Adrian has to die with them?”

  “He made his own decisions. Same principle applies. At least he had the sense not to come shame himself.”

  “I don’t care what you think. I’m not shaming myself. I’m doing whatever it takes to save the man I love.”

  “Get out, Laura. If you leave now, I’ll let you leave with that illusion.”

  “It’s not an illusion.”

  “Last chance.”

  “It’s not an illusion. I mean it.”

  “Okay,” he shrugged, “I warned you.”

  He walked out of the room, leaving her with nothing but the photo for company. A few seconds passed, and she heard him opening a drawer in the kitchen and sliding things around. Then a minute later he returned…

  …with a small automatic pistol in his hand. He held it with a handkerchief she had spotted sticking out of his back pocket earlier.

  “Holy shit, Alan!” she gasped and backed away. “So now you’re going to kill me too?”

  “Nope,” He pulled the slide back and chambered a round, while being careful not to touch the gun himself. “I’m going to do something even worse.”

  “What do you mean?” She eyed the firearm with obvious fear.

  “I’m going to show you…who…you…are,” He leaned forward and emphasized each of the last three words just a few inches from her face.

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “You will,” he growled and held out his hand, the pistol lying on the handkerchief. “Take this.”

  “I don’t want it!”

  “Do you want to save Adrian?”

  “Yes!”

  “Then take it!” he roared.

  Laura snatched it with a startled squeak and jumped back. She turned it over in her hand, staring at it like it could come alive and bite her at any second.

  Alan shoved the handkerchief into his pocket. He walked over to the coffee table, picked up the wireless receiver to his telephone, and returned. Holding it out where she could see, he carefully pushed the nine and then the one twice. Then he laid it on the little table beside them.

  “All you have to do is push the dial button and the call goes out.”

  “What are you doing?”

  “Shut up and listen. Now put your finger on the trigger. Yeah, right in there.”

  “Alan, stop this!”

  “Do you want to save Adrian, or not?”

  “Yes!” she wailed, “but what are you doing?”

  He pulled her hand with the gun up, and placed the muzzle against his forehead.

  “Alan, NO!” She yanked free and stumbled back.

  “C’mon, Laura.” He stood there, arms folded again. “It’s nitty-gritty time. Time to show what’s real and what’s talk.”

  “You’re insane.”

  “You’re the one dressed up like something you’re not. The time has come to face the real Laura.” He moved over and sat down in a recliner. “Now, come here.”

  “Alan, I’m not doing this.”

  “You’re killing him, Laura. I’m giving you a chance to save his life and you’re killing him. Do you love him, or not?”

  She tottered forward without saying a word, tears streaming down her face and smearing the thick eyeliner she had put on for this encounter.

  “Alan, don’t make me do this. This is crazy!”

  “We’re past the point of talk, Laura. Now we discover the real you. Point the gun where I showed you.”

  “Alan, please!” She raised the pistol as directed.

  “Now,” he regarded her calmly, “first you pull the trigger. Then take a quick step over to the phone and push the dial button. They’ll get the address automatically so all you have to do is yell for them to bring an ambulance while you’re getting back to my body. Then you perform CPR until the police and ambulance arrive. That will keep my kidneys viable until they can get the body to the hospital and prepare them for transplant.”

  “But…but the…police.”

  “Yes, they will arrest you. You will be found guilty of first degree murder and probably spend the rest of your life in a Texas penitentiary. But Adrian will live.”

  “I’m not a murderer.”

  “Yes, you are. As of this moment you are going to kill somebody…either me or Adrian.”

  “Alan, please stop this!”

  “No,” he said with flat finality. “Now you choose. Now you define yourself. You can save Adrian, but it won’t be with some silly gesture or meaningless tumble in a bed. You will have to make a real sacrifice to do it, and pay a real price for it. Or you can lay down that gun, walk out that door, and watch him die with the knowledge of the choice you made.

  “Alan…”

  “Either way,” he continued with relentless intensity, “whether you spend the night in handcuffs or next to Adrian’s deathbed, you will know who you are.”

  She sobbed helplessly, but held the gun pointed at his head. Twice she started to lower it, but then pulled it sharply back up and aimed it between his eyes. He neither flinched nor reacted in any other way…he just waited. She took a step forward, glaring at him through the tears, and keeping the gun aimed at his forehead.

  “Don’t make me do this, Alan.”

  He shook his head.

  “You are who you are,” he replied. “Now let’s find out who that is.”

  She looked him long and hard in the face, as if searching for something. Their gazes locked, her eyes teary and red… and his calm and unyielding. For a frozen moment in time, neither moved. At long last she moved her thumb and snapped the safety off.

  “Alan, you are an unbelievable son of a bitch.”

  Then she squeezed her eyes closed, put the gun to her own temple, and pulled the trigger.

  It was over that quick.

  The flat crack of the pistol snapped the silence, and her body hit the floor with a muffled set of thumps. Then silence returned. Only the ticking of a cheap wall clock disturbed the restored quiet in the room. The smell of cordite filled the air, and a layer of smoke hung about five feet off the floor.

  Allen sat still in the recliner, gazing at the body on the floor. He rested his chin in his hand and stared at the face that resembled the one he knew so long ago. The small caliber of the bullet had spared her the massive head injuries so often associated with this type of wound. One eye was half open, staring into another world beyond this, but other than that and the small hole in her temple, she could have been asleep on the floor.

  “Well, Laura,” he finally sighed. “I guess that’s an answer too. The truth is a hell of a thing, isn’t it.”

  He pushed himself to his feet, and carefully stepped around the body on the floor. He stopped on the other side and stood there a moment longer, looking down on the still form as if searching for some meaning in it. Then he shook his head and moved over to the phone. He pushed the dial button and put the receiver to his ear.

  “Yes,” he answered the query, “I need to report a suicide. My name is Alan Carpenter, the owner of the house, and the body is in the front living room.”

  He listened again then spoke.

  “No. I will leave the door open but I will not be here. The police may contact me at Dallas Memorial Hospital.”

  Alan laid down the receiver and walked to the door.

  He pulled it open, but stopped to look once again at the body on the floor. He tilted his head and regarded it with a last thoughtf
ul pause. A frown creased his features as his gaze moved from the garishly made up remains, to the smiling photo on the fireplace, and back again.

  “A hell of a thing,” he mused aloud. “Now I guess I find out who Adrian is too.”

  Then he turned and left the house.

  Rite of Passage

  Bobby Ogden skidded his bicycle to a stop in front of the decrepit wrought iron gate. Trey, Stevie, and Vern pulled up behind him on the leaf cluttered street, and now watched him expectantly. They would follow him through the gate and up to Mercy House, but after that their sole job would be to witness his act of courage…or his failure of nerve.

  “Why are you stopping here?” Trey pressed, “Thinking of calling it off?” The challenge in his words hung in the lonely leafy tunnel of Myrtle Street.

  “I’m thinking,” Bobby responded coolly, “you oughta roll up those hippie pants before they catch in your chain and put you on your butt again.”

  Stevie and Vern laughed while the chubby boy rolled up his bellbottoms. One just needed to see Stevie’s ratty old “Nixon Now” t-shirt, handed down from his Dad, to know where he stood on all things “hippie”…while Vern’s sleeveless football jersey showed his aspirations for higher realms than mere political factions. In a small, 1970’s Texas town, jocks transcended all other cliques. Vern still liked his mood ring though.

  Bobby leaned back against the sissy bar on his Schwinn and surveyed the gang with his best Dirty Harry squint. Now that he had reached thirteen, the first true teenager of the little group, he held himself and them to a higher standard. He couldn’t be seen riding with just anybody.

  Satisfied that they measured up to the minimum requirements of cool, Bobby decided to give the signal to get things going.

  “Let’s roll.” He gritted in his best spaghetti western voice, and gave a nod of his head toward the entrance. The boys pushed through the hanging gate, and pedaled down the brush lined driveway. Dodging potholes and whipping through the leaves, they rounded a corner and the hulking pile of Mercy House came into view.

  The Cole County Mercy Memorial Hospice and Retirement Home towered over them, a great four story pile of red brick and weathered wood trim. Abandoned before they were born, it loomed before the boys as an ancient, hulking embodiment of every horror movie they had ever watched at the Saturday afternoon matinee. Each floor of the derelict featured a recessed balcony that ran almost the entire length of the building. Stevie pointed at the top balcony with a fat wooden dowel rod wrapped in white cloth.

  “There’s a socket they used to put their flags on that fourth floor balcony,” he mumbled around the wad of tobacco he had stolen from his dad. “You can see it right there in the middle. If you go that high, you can just put this there and not worry about tying it to nothin’. But I got some twine, if you wanna settle for tying it on one of the lower ones.” He gave Bobby a sly look from the corner of his eye.

  “I won’t be needin’ no twine,” Bobby grunted in the most dismissive tone he could muster.

  “You sure won’t,” stated an authoritative voice behind them. “This is county property, boys…and you’re trespassing.”

  The four whirled as one, bikes falling to the ground beside them. One shocked look behind them and their worst fears were confirmed.

  Sheriff Les Patterson leaned against the old carport that sat half surrounded by the trees opposite the building. Unfolding his arms, he strode towards the boys. A lean hard-eyed man in his late forties, Les Patterson’s stern visage represented the very essence of law in the eyes of the four frightened youngsters that he approached. At that moment, one of the storied haunts of Mercy House would have been more welcome.

  “Which one of you boys was intending to make this little climb?”

  Bobby considered the odds of the other three holding their silence, and decided they would last about ten seconds. Might as well stand up and take it like a man, then.

  “I was, sir,” Bobby tried not to squeak. Whenever the Sheriff got around to letting him out of jail for this, his dad would be waiting with murder in his eye and a leather belt in his hand. And after he got murdered, he would be grounded until judgment day.

  “Son,” Les bent over and looked Bobby square in the eyes, “there are three reasons what you were thinking of doing is stupid as hell. One, it’s against the law. Two, that building was built way back at the turn of the century. It’s a rotting old stack of brick and lumber and there are a thousand ways of getting your butt hurt or killed in there.”

  “And last,” he continued, his voice dropping almost to a whisper, “I ain’t gonna try and sell you a bunch of ghostly nonsense, boy, and I know you probably ain’t sure what you heard is real or not…but a lot of the history you’ve heard about that place is true. Some real ugly things happened in there, and people died. Died badly, too. Anna Krager was real. So were those people she tortured, and they never found those two kids she caught. Just found her where she hung herself on the fourth floor, once she realized they were coming for her. And that’s just one of the horrors that place has seen. Real people, son. Real lives ruined or ended. And as far as I’m concerned, with all the things those walls have witnessed, the sooner this place is torn down the better. That building is bad luck, and it ain’t stopped being bad luck just because it’s closed. Am I being crystal clear to you, son?”

  “Yes, sir,” Bobby gulped.

  “Good. Then stay out of there,” Sheriff Patterson finished, “and we’ll both be a lot happier. Now scoot! The bunch of you! Before I change my mind and…”

  The boys were on the bikes and peddling for all they were worth before he could even finish the threat about changing his mind

  .

  ###

  Fifteen minutes later, Sheriff Patterson’s patrol car eased out through the wrought iron gate and glided up Myrtle Street.

  “That is one quiet car.” Bobby whispered, as he watched it disappear around a distant corner of the tree lined tunnel. The four boys lifted their heads above the weeds of the nearby vacant lot. Their bicycles lay beside them, concealed in the brush. Thousands of hours playing Cowboys and Indians taught some useful lessons. “Give it fifteen minutes,” he continued, “just in case he circles back.”

  After the allotted time passed, and no sign of the sheriff, the four emerged from the weeds with their bikes and slunk back through the gate. This time they slowly made their way down the brushy lane, then took extraordinary care to make sure the grounds of the building were empty before venturing out into the open. Once again they stood before the old structure, contemplating its grim visage.

  “You still gonna do this?” Stevie whispered. He didn’t sound near as cocky as earlier. If Bobby didn’t know better, it sounded like Stevie might be trying to give him a way out. And that is what decided it for Bobby.

  “Yeah, I’m still game.”

  “How about just tying it to the third floor balcony?” Trey added, “I think you ought to stay away from the fourth floor. That’s where Anna Krager worked…and died too. That’s also where they found that guy’s body about 10 years back, locked in that trunk. I bet he went up there to take the dare too.”

  “Shut up!” Bobby whispered fiercely, as they walked through the weeds around the building. Sheriff Patterson’s warning gave him the creeps, probably just like he had intended, and Bobby didn’t need any spook talk from his friends making things worse. He wanted to find a way in and get this over with as fast as possible, but the building didn’t seem inclined to accommodate them in that effort. The front doors were boarded shut, and as they came around the back they found the same barrier there.

  Most of the windows were boarded over with plywood, and the ones that weren’t were locked and still had their glass intact. A tree grew near one corner of the building, and he considered climbing that and trying to reach the second floor balcony. The thought crossed his mind though that the balcony might not be very safe after seventy plus years in the weather. His friends followed him in
silence as he kept circling and considering his options.

  “Okay,” he ordered, “let’s go around again and everybody check the plywood covering those windows. See if anything is loose.” It was still early afternoon, but Bobby didn’t want this taking much longer. Soon parents might start to wonder where they were.

  Within minutes, Vern called from around the back corner of the building, announcing success. Coming around the corner, they found him standing there with one corner of a plywood cover pulled away from the window. There would be just enough room to squeeze through.

  “Hold it open a little wider, Vern.” Bobby muttered while easing his head and shoulders into the gap. The window behind the plywood stood half open and was missing most of its panes of glass. Beyond the window, Bobby could make out the dim outlines of a small room. Perhaps an office, with a frosted paned door that stood a little ajar. Dust and old ceiling tiles covered the floor.

  Pulling his head back out, Bobby scanned the faces of his friends. They were all serious now, their expressions bearing no macho pretensions or bluffs. The moment of truth had arrived, and they all stared at him solemn-eyed. He sensed he could back out now, and not another word would be said…and for a moment, he almost did. But the sight of that flag wrapped dowel rod in Stevie’s hands, snapped him back. The thought of that white banner with his initials on it, hanging from that fourth floor balcony, filled him with resolve. It would be a conquest few could claim, and would set him apart from the herd.

  He took the dowel rod from Stevie and, with a firm nod to the others, pulled himself up into the gap.

  ###

  A quarter mile away, Les Patterson cracked a wry smile behind his binoculars as he watched Bobby’s legs disappear behind the plywood. He figured they might come back, and decided it would be better to let them get it out of their system while he was around to keep an eye on them, and come to the rescue if one of the kids got trapped or hurt. From his vantage, parked on Cedar Hill, he could just see over the low trees behind Mercy House and watch the boys. He noted with approval Bobby’s choice of going behind the loose plywood, as opposed to breaking a window or prying loose the boards covering one of the doors. It demonstrated that his adventuresome nature was tempered with an unconscious respect for certain proprieties.