“The spirits in town seem to be stirred up. Even afraid. Do you know what’s wrong with them?”
Brick frowned, but I kept my focus on Da’s craggy, semi-transparent face.
Da poked a thumb over his shoulder. “Do you want me to answer so he’ll hear me on that gadget?”
For the sake of the gadget, I responded in full. “Yes, speak into the recorder.”
Da half turned. Considering he hadn’t been a tall man but Brick was easily six-five, that put Da’s mouth right about at recorder level.
“All I’ve heard,” he said, carefully enunciating, “is that there’s a raid afoot. An attack, girl. An attack targeting spirits.”
“What could possibly hurt ghosts?”
“There are dead who feed on earthbound souls. Not many of the dastards, but this one must be a doozey.”
I reached for his aura. “Are you afraid, Da?”
“Not me. I’m safe with family. That’s what most of the others are missing.”
“Family, huh? Okay.” I shifted my gaze to Brick. “You can turn off the recorder now.”
“What’s this about ghosts being threatened?”
“Go on back to Martha’s and listen to the message with your team.”
“You aren’t coming with me?”
He stepped nearer, close enough smell a hint of his cologne and a lot of clean, virile man. My pulse stuttered, then sped.
“Brick, I’m tired. I want to clean up, change clothes, and grab a bite of dinner. I’ll meet you in thirty minutes.”
The muscle in his jaw ticked again, but he gave me a short nod, turned and left the house. I collapsed on the sofa to still my erratic heartbeat.
o0o
My right foot had no sooner hit the bottom porch step when Martha Harrison opened the door of her magnificent Victorian home.
“About time, young woman. You must speak to Zavier and get him to leave altogether.”
“Mrs. Harrison,” I said carefully as I reached the porch, “I explained to you that Zavier is tied to the old Spanish coins and snuff box you inherited. I can’t expel him if he doesn’t want to leave, and I refuse to lie to you about that.”
Her arthritic hand gripped the cane she’d begun using after her fall. “Even if it would be kinder to fib?”
“Even then.”
For a moment, Martha looked every one of her years and more. Then she sighed, straightened her shoulders, and stepped aside to let me enter.
“Then come in and tell him to cease making that racket upstairs.”
Right off the foyer to the left, I spotted Brick and his crew crowded in the formal dining room entrance. What? Had they expected to catch me scamming the old lady? The thought made my temper simmer, but I flashed a smile.
“You remember my team?” Brick asked.
“I remember,” I said, hoping I didn’t sound as grim as I felt.
Who could forget Dan, Don, Deidre and Melody? None of them had shown a lick of respect for my sensitivity any more than Brick had. More, blond, bossy Melody had given off jealous vibes the last and only time I’d worked with Brick’s team.
“Ghost woman! You must help us!”
The urgent male voice made me whirl toward the wide doorway on the opposite side of the foyer. The parlor lay beyond, but Martha’s ghost Zavier loomed on the threshold.
“He’s here, isn’t he?” Martha demanded from her stance at my elbow.
I met her troubled gaze. “Yes, ma’am.”
“Speak with me, ghost woman!”
I held up a finger to indicate Zavier needed to hold his horses, then I looked over my shoulder at Brick.
“I’m not going to talk to him before you have a chance to document with your equipment, but you might want to get an electromagnetic field meter over here. Now.”
Brick looked at Martha. “Mrs. Harrison, may we proceed?”
She waved a hand. “Yes, yes. Do your setup, and be quick about it. I want this investigation completed and my home quiet again.”
She went off in the direction of the kitchen, her cane punctuating her footsteps, while Brick quietly gave the order to set up. I kept my eyes on Zavier’s husky form floating three feet off the floor.
As on the day I’d done Martha’s intervention, Zavier presented himself in dark knee breeches, a light shirt with lace at the neck, a long dark coat and boots. I vaguely recalled he’d lived in St. Augustine even before the Castillo de San Marcos had been constructed, and that was in the 1700s. Or was it earlier? I did a mental shrug. Hey, being born and raised here didn’t mean I stored historical dates and events on the front burner of my brain.
“Colleen?”
I startled at Brick’s voice, and he laid a warm hand on my shoulder that zinged a shiver of awareness from the top of my head to my toes.
“You want to tell me where the ghost is?”
“And mess with your objectivity?” I shook my head and stepped back. “Find him yourself.”
Brick spared me a probing glance, then moved toward the parlor with the EMF meter. In seconds, the lights on the device danced and Brick called to his team. They came, they saw, they murmured in subdued but excited voices. Then they scattered to set up video cameras and digital recorders, stringing cables in their wake.
Zavier retreated to the ornate fireplace where he paced, shot me the occasional glower, and then paced again. Since the spirit showed no sign of leaving the parlor, I could’ve told Brick to set up there alone. But Martha had reported noises in the attic, so I kept my mouth firmly closed on that score. However, I did have a quiet word with Zavier asking for his patience. He didn’t like the ghost investigation activity, but he agreed to wait. I then cooled my own heels by the front door to be out of the way.
oOo
Twenty minutes later, Brick motioned me into the tech-littered dining room. Three flat screens shared space on Martha’s carved dark walnut table, again wires running helter-skelter. I recognized most of the ghost hunting toys arrayed on the table, including the EMF meters, digital thermometers, and recorders. Heck, I used them in my interventions when I ran into ghosts that wouldn’t communicate with me directly. A tidbit about my work I doubted Brick knew.
“Dan and Melody will watch the monitors first,” Brick said. “Don and Deirdre, bring the usual equipment with you. The two of you, and Colleen and I will start in the parlor. Anything else we need, Colleen?”
Whoa. Did Brick know about my ghost hunting tools after all?
Stunned as the question left me, I had an answer ready. “An infrared thermal scanner and a 35mm camera, if you have them. Old school black and white film sometimes catches what digital doesn’t.”
Brick looked to Don. “You still have your camera?”
“In the car. I’ll get it.”
Don scooted past me with a shy smile that might’ve conveyed a smidge of respect. I wondered if Brick had already played the recording of Da for his team. Intuition said no. He’d analyze my chat with Da as part of the entire body of evidence he collected tonight. I hoped there’d be a lot of it.
When Don returned, he handed the camera to Brick. “Loaded and ready.”
“Good deal. Let’s get the lights out upstairs. Colleen, would you let Mrs. Harrison know we need to go dark? We’ll close the dining room pocket doors to block out ambient light and noise from the command post.”
I found Martha having tea in her compact breakfast nook, but she refused to be left out of the conversation with Zavier. In the end, Brick led her to the settee parallel to the fireplace, where, yes, her ghost still waited.
With the lamps off and only soft ambient light from the street filtering through the drapes, Don and Deidre did sweeps with the EMF meter and the thermometer. They reported no EMF spikes or temperature dips except where Zavier stood.
Brick fired up a yellow and gray hand-held infrared scanner with a small screen built in and began slowly panning the FLIR around the parlor. I stood beside him, curious to see if Zavier would show up in therm
al lights.
“Son of a gun,” Brick muttered in awe.
I peered at the screen that was maybe three and a half inches square. Sure enough, Zavier appeared as a cold spot. A human shaped violet blob in the middle of a larger turquoise oval standing at the right side of the fireplace. When he planted his fists on his hips, the FLIR picked up both the movement and the new body position. I admit it fascinated me to see a ghost in more or less a human form live on camera. So to speak.
“Okay, let’s do an EVP session. Colleen, take the FLIR.”
Again, Brick surprised me with his request. I fumbled the camera handoff in the dark, but he wrapped my hands firmly around the handle. His innocent touch seemed more sensual in the darkened room, as did his rumbling voice instructing me to keep the camera aimed at the ghost.
“Don, Deidre, we’re going to turn our recorders on together so they’re all running at the same time.”
Brick did the one-two-three count and confirmed all three recorders were activated.
“This is October 30 at the home of Martha Harrison,” Brick said loudly enough to register on the equipment. “Team members present are Brick, Deidre, Don, and consultant Colleen Cotton.”
Consultant? I glanced at Brick, caught the white flash of a smile before he suggested that his team move away to triangulate the fireplace.
“Colleen, why don’t you start the session? You know the initial questions to ask.”
I did know and I complied, no matter how idiotic the queries would sound to Zavier.
“Who is present with us? Please speak loudly enough for the devices to hear you.”
“It is I, Zavier.”
I nodded at him and asked the next routine question. “Will you give us a sign of your presence?”
Through the lens of the FLIR, I saw Zavier turn first to his left then right as if looking for something to move. Since I didn’t trust him not to break one of Martha’s treasures, I quickly revised the question.
“Can you knock on the mantle three times?”
I swear the ghost gave me the evil eye for requesting such an easy task, but he complied with three distinct knocks.
“Ask him to do it again louder,” Brick said.
Zavier immediately pounded on the mantle three times, hard enough to rattle the framed photos displayed.
“Enough of your games, ghost woman. I must speak with you.”
“All right.”
“All right what?” Brick asked.
I blew out a frustrated breath. “Brick, I want you to come away from tonight with documentation, but this spirit Zavier needs something and he’s not going to play Twenty Questions first.”
“Will he talk so the recorders can pick up his voice?”
I cut my eyes to the nodding ghost. “He’ll do his best.”
“Go for it.”
“Can I stop the FLIR?”
“I’ll take it.”
I heard him plunk the voice recorder on the oval coffee table before he removed the camera from my hands. Free of that responsibility, I eyed Zavier.
“Okay, what’s up?”
“He is coming to take our souls.”
That tidbit matched what Da had told me, but I needed details. “Who’s coming?”
“The pirate, Robert Searle.”
“Who’s Robert Searle?”
“I don’t know why Zavier is speaking of Robert Searle,” Martha barked from the settee, “but surely you know of him.”
I’d forgotten Martha was with us; she’d been so quiet and hidden in the shadows of the dark room.
“The scoundrel,” she continued, “attacked this town in May of 1668. The city held a re-enactment a few years ago. He’s featured in the new pirate museum on the bay front.”
I skipped past my apparently appalling lack of knowledge and pressed Martha for the scoop. “What else do you know about Robert Searle?”
“The information varies from source to source, even down to the date of the raid, but it was May 29, 1668 according to the historical society library records.”
“Searle and his pirates,” Brick inserted, “sailed in on one or two captured Spanish ships, didn’t they?”
“Indeed,” Martha said, her voice taking on a teacher tone. “Searle meant to loot the St. Augustine Royal Treasury of silver ingots. He and his men began the attack and ransacking of the town between midnight and one in the morning. Some reports indicate that Searle slaughtered sixty men, women, and children, and left the bodies lying in the streets.”
“That’s where some of the ghost stories I’ve heard came from,” said another female voice in the dark room. Deidre. She cleared her throat. “I have a friend in the ghost tour business. I don’t know how much the stories are embellished, of course.”
“A good bit, I’d wager,” Martha said. “According to historical library records, five Spanish soldiers were killed, but those sixty or so men, women, and children were taken hostage and ransomed for firewood, meat, cloth, water, and the like.”
“The ladies are each partly correct,” Zavier said, and I turned to face his gray-white form.
“You were there?” I asked.
He stood taller, puffed out his chest. “I served as the under-secretary to the overseer of the Royal Treasury.”
“Tell us what happened.”
“Ask him to speak up for the equipment,” Brick said.
Zavier floated almost to the middle of the triangulated voice recorders, presumably to be better heard. “The attack began in the Plaza. The villagers were rousted from their beds and marched through the streets. Some men with muskets and swords attempted to fight back. Villagers were killed in the crossfire. One small girl was just six or seven years old.”
Zavier’s voice trailed off, a look of deep sadness on his semi-transparent face. When his eyes met mine again, though, they held urgency.
“You must find that girl, ghost woman.”
“The little girl who was killed?”
“Only she can save us.”
“How can she do that?”
“It is said that she haunted Searle until he sailed away. She rid us of him once. She has the power to do it again.”
“Didn’t she go to the Light?”
Zavier shook his head, but more in frustration than denial. “Find the girl, ghost woman. She is our hope.”
“All right, calm yourself. What’s her name.”
“I know not, but you must find her by tomorrow night. Searle will come when the veil is at its thinnest.”
A loud crash from above made all of us jump. Even Zavier. He looked toward the ceiling, his milky white brow furrowed. Worried.
“Those are the noises coming from the attic,” Martha said. “That’s why I called you people.”
“Zavier, are other spirits here?” I asked.
“All over town, we are banding together for safety,” he admitted, “but we are not safe unless you find the girl.”
Another crash, a bang, and a thud sounded.
“I must go, ghost woman. Tell Martha we mean no harm.”
With that, Zavier zoomed up and through the twelve-foot ceiling.
“Well, Colleen?” Martha demanded. “What did my ghost have to say for himself?”
Since I didn’t want to taint Brick’s evidence, I suggested he and his team regroup to do a preliminary EVP review and analysis. If they had caught Zavier’s voice—and Da’s for that matter—then the ghost investigators would know of the situation first hand. No need for me to recap.
While the team set to work, Martha commanded I come along to the kitchen to help her set out refreshments—a gesture of pure Southern hospitality. Homemade chocolate chip and oatmeal cookies, soft drinks, and water with a side stack of napkins soon filled the round table top.
“Now tell me, Colleen, and don’t hold back. What did Zavier say? What is happening?”
I related my conversation with the ghost, highlighting that the additional spooks were temporary visitors, and that none wish
ed her harm. When I finished, she arched a fine brow at me.
“So the ghosts will leave if you find the murdered girl?”
“All except Zavier,” I confirmed. “But it sounds to me like he’ll be gone along with most of the spirits in the entire city if this Searle character comes back to consume their souls.”
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