Before long, the new gambler had made the rounds at all the popular saloons, theaters and brothels on Utah Street and become one of the top five Faro players in El Paso. Crouse no longer blended in with the crowd. A dandy now, he wore expensive, black suits with starched white shirts and brocaded vests. Large, gold rings decorated his fingers and a jewel-encrusted stick pin adorned his jacket. Even his pocket watch was made of gold with a thick, heavy, gold chain that ran across his chest. Like any gambler worth his salt, he was an excellent shot with the pistols slung low on his hips.
Crouse rocked himself back onto two legs of his chair as he pondered over the cards spread out between the dealer and himself. He’d alternately placed bets on his card being the winner, loser, odd, even, and any combination stringed together in a ‘square.’ He loved this gambling game the most because of its fast pace, easy odds, and the ability to bet all his winnings on a single turn of a card.
Faro was a game of chance and tended to favor the player. Saloons made up for this by using crooked dealers, dealing boxes and cards. None of this fazed Crouse, who kept winning his way closer to the number one Faro gambler spot in El Paso.
His chair hit the floor with a thud as a petite, fiery, redhead plopped herself down in his lap. “Mary Ann,” he gestured toward the table. “I’m working here.”
“I know. I love a man who works at whiskey drinking, wagering, and whoring as hard as you do.” Mary Ann grinned. He forgave her when she slid a shot glass full of whiskey into his hand and squirmed her bottom in his lap.
Crouse fingered her side as he laid down his chip, betting everything on the last turn of the card. Choronzon’s power had helped Crouse in every way imaginable. He was winning at the gaming table, enjoying fine clothes, good food, and Mary Ann who owned one of the most luxurious brothels in town. She was ruthless and ruled her girls with an iron fist, making them virtual slaves by letting them run up charges for basic necessities and then deducting those charges, plus interest, from their wages. Choronzon had picked a perfect partner for him.
Mary Ann let out an excited yelp when he won, bringing his mind back to the Faro table. He downed the whiskey, dropped her off his lap and gathered up his winnings.
“So what put you in a fine mood today: my whiskey drinking, winning, or whoring?” he said.
“You didn’t. I did it all by myself!” she laughed. “I spread a rumor up and down Utah Street that Alice’s whores are infected. Unless customers want to suffer through their dicks swelling up and falling off, they’d better stay away.” Crouse laughed as they made their way back to the whorehouse to wile away the rest of the afternoon in her bedroom.
They were awakened by a thunderous pounding on the door and a woman shouting, “Mary Ann! Open this door and face me, you bitch!”
Crouse propped himself up on the pillows to watch as Mary Ann threw on a nightgown, marched over to the door and flung it open.
“Take it back!” yelled a six-foot tall, blond, blue-eyed woman, her face purple with rage.
“Take what back, Alice?” asked Mary Ann feigning innocence.
“Take back what you said about my girls!”
“But your whores are diseased. That’s why I threw Lucy out.”
“Lucy left because you were stealing her money like you do with all the girls here.”
“Now look who’s telling lies.”
Alice reached back and cold cocked Mary Ann in the face. Mary Ann crumpled backwards, then sat up screaming, “I will kill you, you fat, ugly whore!” Alice grinned, turned on her heel and marched down the stairs and out of the brothel.
Too stunned to move, Crouse sat, as Mary Ann scrambled to her feet, pulled a pistol from his holster and stormed out of the room. He scrambled outside in time to gawk with the rest of Utah street at her kicking Alice’s front door. When Alice appeared, her tall frame filling the doorway, Mary Ann raised the pistol and fired.
***
At first, his weekly sojourns to the basement of the Franciscan Hotel to honor Choronzon, were consistent. Once the winnings poured in, he’d slacked off. The money bought comfortable living and complacency.
As Crouse made his way down the stairs, he realized how distracted he had become. Mary Ann’s shooting of Alice was ruled as self-defense and miraculously, Alice survived. Mary Ann, on the other hand, became increasingly violent with her girls and customers until almost all were gone. She was depending more and more on Crouse’s financial support.
Violence dogged Crouse. Lately, gamblers challenged him at gunpoint. He narrowly avoided a shoot out this afternoon with a wild, drunken gambler. The other night, a man charged him with a knife. The man's incoherent ranting had sent pinpricks rippling across his skin.
He cursed himself for being lax and not following through with his original plan - mastering the dark arts. With his cloak draped around him, he took out his ceremonial knife and wand and carved the familiar circles and triangles. It’s time to break the pact with Choronzon. Far away from Utah Street, in a house on Sunset Heights, he would resume his studies in comfort.
Crouse began the ceremony as usual. No actual words were spoken by the demon, instead a rush of power flowed through his body. He recited the Release of the Spirit: “O Choronzon, because thou hast diligently answered my demands, I do hereby license thee to depart… .”
As he finished the verse, the air around him grew dense. Fingertips danced across his scalp. The figure of Choronzon on horseback towered over him. Then the skin cape of the demon billowed wide. For the first time Crouse took in the jaws filled with sharp teeth. His own rattled as a screech echoed and rolled through the basement.
A black mass formed, gained substance, then rushed at him from the left, knocking the wind out of him. He scrambled to his feet and stared. There was a smear where he had disturbed the meticulously drawn circle. His eyes traveled upwards to witness the skeletal horse take a tentative step out of the middle of the intersecting triangles.
With a raw gasp of air, he gripped his knife and wand and leaped as the horse set its haunches and sprang forward.
They met in mid-air with the horse and Choronzon materializing as they passed out of the edge of the circle. Crouse clubbed the side of the horse’s head with his wand and swept his knife up and into the chest of Choronzon. The whole apparition vanished in a smoky cloud. Crouse plunged to the floor.
Crouse pulled himself to his feet as the black mass attacked and plowed through him again. He slashed with his knife. Nothing phased this new entity. What is this? Crouse's mind raced as he turned on his heel and ran up the stairs. When he flung himself through the front door, his ears popped so hard he cried out. Sweat ran through his hair and dripped from his face as he knelt, trying to breathe. People passing by gave him a wide berth and some snickered.
Crouse recovered and headed in the direction of Mary Ann’s whorehouse. He would collect his money and leave tonight. A cold chill wormed its way deep under his skin. The air turned to waves of clear, clean water in front of him. The next words he understood perfectly, “Did you think it would be that easy? Fool!”
Present
“Let’s go get a drink,” Lynn suggested. After they escaped the Franciscan Hotel, Lee barely gave her time to say 'goodbye' to Hector before steering her towards the car. She hugged him around the waist. He seemed normal enough now, so maybe she'd just imagined the whole thing.
“Are you sure? It’s kind of late.”
“Sure, I’m sure. It's been a long time since we stayed downtown. The Dome Bar is beautiful.”
“With a six-dollar bottle of beer.”
“I want a rum and coke.”
“That’ll be eight dollars. Geesh, you’re expensive.”
“But worth it!” Lynn grinned up at him.
They strolled arm and arm across the San Jacinto Plaza to the Paso del Norte hotel and bar. On the way, they stopped to admire the alligator sculpture in the middle of the plaza. “OK, I’ll bite, why alligators?”
“You don�
��t know, Ms. I-Google-everything?”
“No, and obviously I don’t Google everything.”
“Live alligators used to be part of a downtown attraction. The alligators were here, for, I don't know, maybe, fifty years.”
“You’d think that would be a little dangerous.”
“Yea, for the alligators. Some college kids pulled a couple out of the pond one night. They put one in a professor’s office and another one in someone’s swimming pool as a prank.”
“You’re kidding!”
“Nope and after twelve, blissful years of marriage, you think you’d realize I don’t kid… much.”
“Right!” Lynn gave him a squeeze around the waist as he opened the big, wooden door that lead to a room, two stories high.
Over the bar, in the middle of the room, hung a Tiffany stained glass ceiling. Dramatic lighting brought out the blue, green and white shades of the floral design. The brown speckled walls and gold-plated moldings glowed with the light from the hanging chandeliers.
“I think this is the most beautiful place to relax and unwind. There are a lot of fluer de lis decorations too. What did Hector say about them?”
“I thought they used them to brand prisoners who were marked for death.”
They ordered and settled back in the comfortable, cushioned chairs. Lynn frowned as Lee fiddled with his iPhone.
“Don’t play games on that thing now.”
“What? No, I’m checking out the pictures I took.”
“Of the empty building?”
“Yea… wait. Whoa! Check this out. There were no windows in that building, right?”
“Yea, let me see,” Lynn took the iPhone from Lee. “OK, first one - big, empty building. Second one - big, empty building. Third one - big, empty building. I’m beginning to detect a pattern here. Fourth one - big… Holy shrimp!” Her eyes met Lee's, “There’s a light in one of the windows!”
“Look at the next one.”
“There’s a light. Sixth one, there’s a light. Last one, no light.”
“I took those pictures one right after the other.”
“So it’s like someone turned a light on and then off.”
“Yea,” she grinned, “This is awesome, honey. We’ve got to show these to Hector and Marcos.”
“Sure. Here, let’s check the audio.”
“Were you recording the session?”
“Some of it when we were down in the basement.”
Lynn took one of the ear buds as the waiter brought their drinks and set them down. “I thought you didn't believe in this stuff?”
“Well everyone else had something to use and the iPhone has a voice recorder. I figured, what the heck.”
After a few minutes, Lynn said, “Stop. I heard something there.”
“So did I.”
After several minutes, Lynn pulled the ear bud out shaking her head. “I don’t know what it’s saying. There’s a garbled sentence and then a word. Let’s send this to Hector and Marcos and see what they think.”
“Good idea. A toast, to a devil of a ghost hunting team.”
***
A week later, Lynn had a ‘girl’s night out’ planned. Lee elected to stay home rather than go out with his friends. Guilt nibbled at her conscience about leaving him behind, but he told her to go on and enjoy herself.
She returned early, around ten, to find Lee drunk and playing on-line poker. Lee was an affectionate, 'I love you, man' drunk, so finding him like this didn’t bother her. As she leaned in to give him a ‘hello’ kiss, he flinched and glared at her, “What?”
“Nothing, just giving you a ‘Hi, honey, I’m home kiss.’”
“Humph.”
“You winning?” she said glancing over his shoulder.
“Not really. I win some, then I lose it all.”
“I thought you hated gambling? You told me it was basically throwing money away.”
“I'm just changing my mind. You know, like a woman.”
“Don't get smart. Well, its play money anyway. It is play money, right?”
“Maybe.”
“Lee!”
“What? I've spent a couple of bucks. No big deal.”
“Come on, hustler, let's call it a night.”
“Nah, you go on, don’t wait up for me.”
“Lee, how long have you sat here? How many bucks have you lost?”
“What the hell? You go out and have a good time. I stay here and have a good time, and now you’re jumping my ass?”
“Lee, I’m not jumping you,” she held up her hands backing away. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” he shouted.
She left him and closed the door behind her. What the hell indeed, she thought.
***
Sunday morning they usually slept in before going to the corner bakery to pick up some menudo with pan bolillo and pan dulce. Lee brushed his nose as Lynn tried tickling him. Her lips brushed his ear. “Come on, menudo is good for a hangover.”
“I'm not hungover. Much,” he groaned. “Go without me, you know which kind of sweet bread I like.”
“Oh, all right. Hey, you were grumpy last night.”
“I was?”
“Yeees.”
“I don’t remember. I don’t remember much of anything. Can you put some coffee on?”
He snuggled back down under the covers as Lynn ruffled his hair. “Sure.”
“And hey,” Lee said poking his head up from under the covers. “I’m sorry if I said anything stupid last night.”
“It’s OK,” she said from the doorway. “I love you.”
“I love you more.”
***
As they were slurping up the spicy, hominy and tripe soup with hunks of white bread for dipping, Lynn’s phone rang. “It’s Hector,” she said, “Hey, Hector, what’s up?”
Lee raised his eyebrows when her eyes widened and waited for her to hang up, then asked, “And?”
“He got something on the EVP. He wants to meet me down at Kipps Cheesesteaks to pick up the pictures and recording. Want to come?”
“No, that's OK. What was on the EVP?”
“He heard the word - fool.”
“Nice, even the ghosts think we’re stupid,” Lee said.
I’m going to jump in the shower.” Lynn winked, “Race ya!”
Lee fumbled with his coffee cup as she raced out of the kitchen and up the stairs. “No fair! I’m still handicapped.”
About half-way, he glimpsed Lynn flash him before ducking into the bathroom. Lee smiled and then froze as he envisioned himself dragging her by the hair and throwing her down the stairs. He stumbled backwards to dodge her body and caught himself by gripping the railing so hard his hands turned white.
“My God, Lee, are you all right?”
Lee forced a smile. “I, uh, yea, I’m fine. I must be hungover still.”
“Are you sure you’re okay?”
“Yea, yea, I’m coming. Get the water warm.” Peeking over his shoulder, he caught a glimpse of Lynn, bloody and broken, at the bottom of the stairs. He raced the rest of the way to the bathroom and shut the door.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” Lynn asked him for the hundredth time. “Why don’t you come with me?”
“No, you go on ahead. I need to get ready for work on Monday.”
“All right, love you.” Lee accepted a kiss and waved as she backed out of the driveway.
As he closed the door, he heard the creak of footsteps on the second floor. He swung around, but saw nothing. The footsteps continued to the top of the stairs, then started down the stairs. A distinct footfall landed on each step. A gauzy black mist gathered together in the shape of a person.
Not believing what his senses were telling him, Lee rubbed his eyes with the heel of his palms. The footsteps stopped. When he opened his eyes, nothing was there.
1885
Crouse crashed through the front doors of Mary Ann’s house and ran up the stairs. He grabbed a large black satchel an
d ran from room to room collecting his money from their various hiding places.
When he reached the top floor, he examined Mary Ann passed out on the bed. Good, he thought, I can make a clean get away. He quieted down and moved around the room collecting what few belongings he wanted to take with him. The satchel was bulging when he knelt before the dresser to sweep Mary Ann’s jewelry into its maw.
Devil of a Ghost Tour Page 2