Scryer's Gulch

by MeiLin Miranda

  Mr Bonham himself had been watching the street from Mamzelle’s balcony, sipping his bourbon and surveying the town he believed to be his, if not in its entirety now, then soon. He often watched the street; he saw more than anyone, and more than anyone might suspect. He saw Annabelle Duniway sneaking around with the Sheriff. He saw an obviously overwrought Simon Prake buttonhole the Duniway woman and practically drag her into the ethergraph office--jealousy? Perhaps. And he saw the looks his son Tony gave the pretty blonde schoolteacher every time they passed on the street.

  All of it made him wonder exactly how upright this lady might actually be, especially her little rendezvous with Runnels. If Tony was interested in her, perhaps he might prove to his son who was in charge in this town. If Tony wanted her, and she appeared to be open to suggestion, Jed thought he might want to stake his claim first. Perhaps it was time to invite her to dinner. A little party, of which Tony might make the fourth.

  It’d also irk his shrewish wife, which tickled him more than a little. Making Cherry jealous always paid off in bed. Jedediah chuckled to himself, turned away from the balcony and called for Mamzelle. “Demon! Come rub my feet! I’m in an excellent mood! I won’t even make you clean them with your tongue!”

  Episode 33: Aloysius on the Town

  Halloween night came to Scryer’s Gulch, and many a party was planned. For most of the camp, they were not so much for celebrating; they were more about not being alone. Always tatty at best on top of the hermetauxite deposit, the veil between worlds got even thinner on Halloween.

  Plenty of folks had died under difficult circumstances up in the hills, down in the mines, in bar fights, hangings and accidents, but most of those who’d become spirits were too weak to manifest and all were nailed to their one spot--except for tonight. On this night, ghosts were free to walk the streets, bold as disembodied brass, and no one wanted to face one alone. Brother Fattipickel over at Our Lady and Pastor Billson at the Methodic Church each held services that night, so those without the inclination or opportunity to go carousing would still have some place to be at least for a few hours.

  Over at the jail, Halloween plans were being discussed in earnest. “Where you gonna go tonight, Aloysius?” said Jamie. “Wanna come with me? The Prakes is havin’ a party. You could come watch. Harry and Fanny Lockson’ll be there, and Lily Bonham, and Amelia and...and Georgie, too,” he finished glumly.

  “You an’ young Georgie still on the outs, I’d-a thunk,” said Aloysius.

  Jamie frowned. “We are. But Miz Prake invited me, so Mrs Smith has taken it that I should go. Come keep me comp’ny, Aloysius! It’ll be fun!”

  “I don’t think Aloysius had a children’s party in mind for his only night on the town, son,” said his father.

  “It is my one night outta this cell, Jamie, otherwise I would--and I might,” hastened the ghost at Jamie’s crestfallen face. “But you know, I got a passel of visitin’ to do. No promises, but I’ll try to poke my head in.”

  “You ain’t got a head,” grumbled Jamie.

  “No need to insult a feller! I cain’t rightly help that, now, can I?”

  “Speaking of heads, d’you intend to go out on the town in style, Aloysius?” said Rabbit. “All visible and such?”

  “Don’t reckon I’ll bother. More fun lookin’ in on folks when they cain’t see me.”

  “If you don’t stop jawin’ you won’t be lookin’ in on anyone till next year comes around,” said Rabbit.

  “Go on, Aloysius,” added John. “We’ll struggle along somehow without you.”

  “Waaal, if’n you say so! Sure feels good to get outta that cell!” A vague outline of a pot-bellied, rather greasy-looking man in suspendered trousers and a frock coat over long underwear flickered by the door. “If’n I had a hat to tip, boys, I’d tip it. An’ I’d say I’ll miss ya, but you know it ain’t true.” With that, Aloysius floated through the door and out of sight.

  The Prakes’ back parlor smelled of popped corn, doughnuts fresh from the fryer, hot cider and excited children. Harry Lockson had so much popcorn stuffed into his front pockets that he crackled when he sat, and the doughnut he’d carefully wrapped in his hanky and stuffed into his back pocket for later had mashed itself into a sticky mess that would have Mrs Lockson fretting to herself in the morning.

  Two apples on strings hung from the ceiling, just in front of Georgie and Jamie’s faces. The two boys were competing to see who could eat his apple down to the core first, hands behind backs; the other children cheered them on madly. The apples gyrated wildly on their strings with each bite. Georgie was this close to winning when suddenly a voice whispered in his ear: “BOO!”

  Georgie spewed apple all over the room; Jamie bit his apple through.

  “Jamie Runnels, you cheated!” shouted Georgie, bits of apple still dribbling from his lips.

  “Waddaya mean, I cheated? I was mindin’ my own business!”

  “Oh yeah? Something just said BOO in my ear, and I bet I know what!”

  “Who, Aloysius is a who, not a what!”

  “Oh, so you admit it!”

  “Boys!” said Mrs Prake in a firm voice that silenced the entire crowd. “Now. Aloysius, if you’re here, show yourself.”

  “Yes’m,” mumbled a voice, and the blurred outlines of the ghost appeared near the buffet. “Didn’t mean nothin’, just havin’ my yearly fun. Jamie didn’t have nothin’ to do with it, neither,” he added. “Beg pardon, Miz Prake, the kid askt me to tag along and I thought I’d make a quick stop. Ain’t like I take up space or eat or anythin’.”

  Georgie glared for a moment, but relented. “Aw, it’s all right, Aloysius. You an’ me, we’re pals. You stuck up for me when other people ought to have,” he said, renewing the glare in Jamie’s direction; Jamie’s ears turned pink but he didn’t look away.

  “It’s not a Halloween party without a ghost,” smiled Mrs Prake. “You’ve had your fun, Aloysius, and thank you. Now get along. I’m sure a friendly fellow like you has more folks to visit.”

  “Thank you, ma’am!” said Aloysius. His obligation to Jamie discharged, he vanished through the wall and floated toward the Hopewell Hotel.

  Just why he headed that way was unclear even to him. Habit, perhaps. Every year since his death he’d gone to the Hopewell on Halloween. He’d spent a fair bit of time there when he was alive, but that was when the goodtime girls were in residence. The only girl of that stripe left was Emmy, and she wasn’t in that line of work these days--much, anyway. Aloysius had just determined to leave when it occurred to him to do the Sheriff a kindness and look in on Miss Duniway. Besides, he reckoned he might see her in her underthings.

  Instead, he found her drowsing by the fire in her room, a giant black cat in her lap. No sooner had he entered when the cat opened one sour amber eye and growled, “Annie, we’ve got company.” It leaped from her lap, and before it hit the floor it was half-man half-cat.

  The schoolteacher was on her feet, too, holding out a funnel-shaped doohickey attached to a hose. It led to a bottle that filled the ghost with dread that only increased when she called, “Show yourself, whatever you are, or it’s into the spirit-bottle and onto a shelf--or worse!”

  Episode 34: The Ghostly Convocation

  “No need fer that, Miss Annie!” whined Aloysius as he apparated by the door. “Point that thang somewhar else! Bad enough to be stuck in the jail--a spirit bottle’s worse’n that, by a fair piece!”

  “You bet it is, so behave yourself,” said the cat-thing.

  “It’s all right, Misi, it’s just Aloysius. He’s a friend. Aren’t you, Aloysius?”

  “Yes’m!”

  “Hmf. Did Runnels send you to spy?” said Misi.

  “Waal, I never!” huffed the ghost. “I wuz a horse thief, sure, but I ain’t never been no kind of spy nor stool pigeon nor any sort’er feller like that. Now, please point that away from me afore it goes off!”

  “On one condition. Promise me you’ll say nothing about Misi
to anyone.”

  “He’s a demon, ain’t he?”

  “If you were still alive, I’d show you exactly how demonic I am,” hissed the half-cat.

  “No, you wouldn’t,” said his mistress. “Yes, he’s a demon. Promise me.”

  “I promise, right off the reel! People tell me all kindsa thing in the jail, y’know, and I ain’t never peached on a one, not even Jamie an’ his nugget.”

  “You just peached on him right now!” said Misi.

  “Naw, Miss Annie smoked him, I heared her tell the Sheriff. I won’t tell about yer kitty.”

  “All right, then,” she said, lowering the spirit-catcher.

  “Awww,” said Misi.

  “Back to cat, right now.” The demon grumbled and shrank down into his feline form.

  “Whar in tarnation did you get that spirit-catcher, if’n you don’t mind my askin’?” said Aloysius. “Pastor Bill has to fetch spirits the ol’-fashioned way.”

  “I’m a new-fashioned girl, I suppose,” sighed Annabelle, sinking back into her chair.

  “Sheriff’s right about you, Miss Annie, yer all right,” said the relieved spirit. “Pastor Bill, he ain’t never tried to put the whammy on me, mind, but I seen him do it. I shorely wouldn’t want to end up on his shelf--”

  “What do you want, spook?” she interrupted.

  “Oh!” he jumped. “Nothin’. Jest makin’ my annual stroll round the town.”

  Misi jumped back onto Annabelle’s lap. “Let me guess. Your first stop was the whorehouse.”

  “I’ll have you know my first stop was to see Jamie at the Prakes. I wuz invited-like,” huffed the ghost. “After this I’m goin’ to Mamzelle’s. Couldn’t afford to whilst I was livin’. Guess I’ll get along then, ma’am.” The former horse thief began to fade.

  “Wait,” said Annabelle, sitting up straight enough to dump the complaining cat from her lap; the ghost came back into hazy view. “Aloysius, you overheard Sheriff Runnels and me talking about the hermetauxite, didn’t you?”

  “Yes’m, an’ I do solemnly swear I ain’t gonna tell a soul, livin’ nor dead.”

  “Fine,” she said hurriedly, “but I need you to do something for me. Keep an ear...or whatever...out for news about the hermetauxite--anything anyone might say.”

  “I done tole ya, I don’t peach on nobody!”

  “I’m not asking you to ‘peach’ on anyone. If you should hear something, though, you might tell me or John about it without revealing its source, couldn’t you?”

  Aloysius paused, stroking what would have been a fairly greasy beard. “Waaall...reckon I might do that, specially fer you, Miss Annie. And I’m fond enough of Runnels, I s’pose, considerin’ he kilt me. But then, I wuz askin’ fer it, and that’s a fact.”

  “All right, then,” she sighed again, and settled into her chair. “You go on your way, Aloysius, and have yourself a good time on the town.”

  “Thankee, ma’am, that’s jest whut I intend on!” Aloysius did his hostess the favor of floating through the wall before disapparating.

  Annabelle rubbed her temples. “That was awkward. His knowing about you is a risk, but John seems to think he’s all right. I just don’t want John knowing about you quite yet.” She perked up and patted her lap. “C’mon up, kitty!”

  “Ohhh, no,” said Misi. “I don’t think so. Up, down, up, down. We’re done for the night!” Annabelle chuckled, turned up the lantern a fraction, and picked up her novel.

  Aloysius, meanwhile, floated over to Mamzelle’s, hoping to ruin a few card games and peer into a few more private rooms. But no sooner had he flowed into the place unseen--or so he thought--than Howard the bouncer came striding toward him, spirit-catcher in one hand, the spirit-bottle attached to it in the other. “You weren’t welcome here while you lived, horse thief!”

  “I’m a-goin’, I’m a-goin’! Whar did all these spirit-catchers come from!” He didn’t so much float through the wall as scurry.

  “No account horse thief ghost, messing up the joint’s aura,” said Howard, returning behind his bar. He put the spirit-catcher up on its rack beside his shotgun, picked up his bar rag, and polished the three spirit-jars lined up next to the whiskey bottles. “How you doing in there, boys?” he chuckled.

  The graveyard was always the last stop on Aloysius’s annual tour, to visit his own grave and to see the other dead of the Gulch; even those not buried in the graveyard came down out of the hills and mine shafts to commiserate with old friends--for the dead were all congenial one with the other--and greet the new spirits, passed on since the last Halloween. Not all the Gulch’s dead stayed on in spirit form, but plenty had, and the place was hopping.

  The graveyard had three sections: one for the Methodics; one for the Enthusiasts; and one for everyone else except the Chinese. The Chinese had their own place, where they’d bury their bodies until they were just bones. Chen Bing-wen, the most respected among the camp’s Chinese, would then oversee their removal to San Francisco, where they’d be put on a ship to make the sad return journey from the promised land to burial at home. But even the Chinese spirits would congregate in the main graveyard, mostly talking among themselves but still nodding and friendly to the dead folks, white and black and native, congregating among the tombstones.

  “Ralston Jones, how do you do!” cried Aloysius, approaching a man he never knew in life but who’d become a good friend since--at least on Halloween night, the only night they saw one another. “How’s ever little thang in the mine?”

  Ralston made a noncommittal noise. “Bout the same as always. Dark. Wish I’da got stuck some place interesting like you did.”

  “Anyone new this year?”

  “A whole passel!” said the miner’s ghost. “Bad year fer movin’ on, seems to be.” He shrugged a filmy shoulder toward a clump of confused men and a few women, standing a little ways apart. Toddling among them was a little child in a long burial gown that trailed behind her in a cascade of white lawn and lace.

  “Lookee thar,” said Aloysius. “Ain’t never seen one of us that wuz that much of a little’un.”

  “Her ma was here earlier,” said Ralston, shaking his head. “Miz Lockson. Seemed to know her girl’d come back tonight. Kept tryin’ to put her arms round the little thing until Becky came up and told her she’d look after her baby girl, if Miz Lockson didn’t mind she’d been a whore whilst she lived. Poor lady, she just about joined us--near cried herself to death. Dang near burst into tears myself, or woulda if I still had eyes.”

  “Did she take Becky up on it?”

  “Sure did. Said she’d be right honored. Miz Lockson’s okay.” The baby began to cry for her mama. Ralston and Aloysius watched as Becky picked her up and crooned to her that it was all right, they’d go back to sleep at the break of day for the rest of the year and to not be afraid; the little child settled against her, sniffling.

  “She’s right, you know,” said Ralston, nodding toward the lightening sky in the east. “Almost over for another year.” The two ghosts stood together watching the mountains where the sun hid, waiting to whisk Aloysius back to his cell and Ralston back to his mine shaft. “I could wish for the sun to stay down, I tell you.”

  “If’n I had a wish, it wouldn’t be fer that,” said Aloysius.

  “What, then?”

  The ghost sighed, and his voice was rough and gravely when he said, “I’d wish to be gone and moved on. Quit of this world altogether. That’s whut I’d wish fer.”

  They both stuck their wispy hands in their wispy pockets. “Me too, buddy, me too,” whispered Ralston, just before the first rays peeked out over the mountaintops and the ghostly convocation disappeared into the morning air.

  Episode 35: An Invitation

  Tony Bonham’s first thought when he woke the next morning was that he’d overslept. His watch, the treasured reminder of his mother, had not chimed the morning alarm as it usually did. He sat up, yawning; something furry had crawled into his mouth to whelp during the ni
ght, and he poured and drank a glass of water to drown it. The smell of coffee approached down the hall, probably on his man’s tray. Won’t he be surprised to see me still abed, Tony thought heavily.

  He swung his legs over the edge of the bed. No, he won’t be surprised. The morning fire had been lit in the grate, so Graham must have been in already. Disconcerting; the Bonham men had the habit of sleeping with one eye open, and yet Tony had slept through Graham’s entry. Had he really drunk so very much last night? But there on his dresser next to the water glass sat the near-empty cut crystal decanter of brandy; it had been full at the beginning of the night. He’d drunk more than he’d thought, apparently. At least it had served its purpose; he’d gone the night ghost-less, or if he hadn’t, he’d been too drunk to notice.

  His mother’s spirit had appeared to him twice before on Halloween, once in the city where she was buried, and once here in the LeFay. Thinking about it even now made him want to reach for the bottle, though the night was over and done for another year. He shuddered. To love her so much, miss her so much, and yet fear seeing her spirit every year...Tony often wondered why her spirit had followed him to the Gulch, at least on that one night.

  His man Graham appeared in the doorway, as expected, with a tray bearing coffee, toast, more water, and two carefully unbroken raw egg yolks, each in its glass and decorated with salt, pepper and Worcestershire sauce. Tony swallowed down the first egg, keeping the yolk intact by long if now infrequent experience. Coffee, bitter, rich and hot, followed along with the toast; the second egg was deemed unnecessary. “Give it to the bulldog,” he ordered.

  “You bet, boss,” nodded Graham, the street slang incongruous in his very British mouth. “Oh--and this came for you from the big house.” He handed over a folded, sealed envelope.

  “Mister Anthony Bonham, Hotel LeFay,” read the front, in Charity’s overly studied hand. “What does she want?” growled Tony.