Witch Hunt

by Morgana Best

  That last problem had worked itself out, however, because I actually had landed another job. A secret job, a job so strange and thrilling that it almost made me feel as though I were living in a movie. I was paid a monthly stipend by a covert British government organization on the condition that I would investigate various paranormal happenings. I had only been given one job so far, but the money kept on coming.

  And then there was The Orpheans. I was the Keeper of The Orpheans, despite the fact I had no idea what they were, or even what The Keeper did. I figured that The Orpheans were a shady organization with their fingers firmly in the occult and paranormal worlds. No one from The Orpheans had as yet contacted me.

  “Misty, if it’s not too hard for you to stand up, come in here. Bring Tweedle Dum, too,” a strident voice called out. The voice was high-pitched and grating. Skinny. My storage cupboard, or ‘office’ as Skinny liked to call it, was close to her office, too close.

  “Coming,” I said, careful not to sound too upset. I needed my job, if only to serve as a cover for my work with SI7, the secret, paranormal-investigating government agency. I knew how crazy that sounded, but it was my new life and I had quickly adapted to it. The money helped.

  Besides, I worked at a paranormal magazine, and a sensationalist one at that. Skinny’s motto was, “Never let the truth get in the way of a good story.” Skinny once sent me to write a whole article about a dog who had saved her owner from drowning in a flash flood. A pretty remarkable thing in and of itself, but Skinny had been determined to turn it into a paranormal news flash. “Surely it was a case of possession,” she had said in the newsroom. “A dog wouldn’t do that, but a dog possessed by someone’s grandfather, or dead lover—now that’s the real story.”

  And so it had been written that way and Skinny had loved the article. I had no idea of the mag’s readership. Who could be that gullible? Still, I thought of the shared post I’d seen all over Facebook that morning, warning people not to eat bread any more as it contained H2O. Sigh.

  Cordelia was my best friend and co-worker. Skinny had taken to calling us Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee, and that was when she was in a good mood.

  I stopped in the doorway to Cordelia’s cubicle. “Hey, the evil witch wants us.”

  “What now?” Cordelia sighed as she pushed back from her desk. “This computer solitaire isn’t going to play itself.”

  “Must be nice to be back here in the corner, with an office to yourself.” My voice held an unmistakable note of jealousy.

  “Oh, it is,” Cordelia said as she smiled and stood. “It’s so wonderful.”

  “I don’t know why I’m not Skinny’s favourite.”

  “You’re my favourite,” Cordelia said. “Why should you be anyone else’s?”

  “Well then, because I might get an office that isn’t a tiny storage room with a desk crammed in behind the door,” I said, as we made our way towards our boss’s office.

  Skinny sat behind her desk, as she usually did all day. She was a busy woman, being the editor of the magazine, and so while we had a lot of complaints about her, being lazy wasn’t one of them. Skinny worked. She worked a lot. Her hours were long, and she expected everyone else to work just as long despite the fact she didn’t pay overtime.

  Her office was filled with ridiculous looking knick knacks. Little figurines of unicorns were scattered on one shelf of the bookcase that sat by the door, and a corner of her desk was taken up with old Troll dolls, with colourful, long hair and fearsome expressions.

  As much as I hated to admit it, Skinny herself was pretty, although Skinny was the first to admit that she’d had a huge amount of work done. She was stick thin and a bit on the tall side. She was unmarried, though there was a rumour that she had once been so, although no one had ever been able to prove this. Her nails were long and red to match her hair, her make up a bit thick, and her eyes piercing with malice.

  “I thought I heard you two thumping your way down the corridor,” Skinny said, never mind that the space outside Skinny’s office was large and open and there was no corridor.

  Cordelia and I said nothing. We were used to Skinny’s insults.

  I often wondered what Keith, the owner of the magazine, had been thinking with Skinny. He had hired her years ago and despite the numerous complaints and the number of people who had quit because of her, he never fired her. Maybe being good at your job was enough. And Skinny was very good at her job.

  “Sit!” Skinny barked, pointing to two chairs. “But be careful. The last thing I need is a broken chair in here.”

  I bit my lip and sat in one of the two chairs across the oak desk from Skinny. Cordelia sat in the other. Skinny continued. “Lucas Wallace.” She lifted a stack of papers from in front of her and tossed them across the desk.

  I picked up the first page and held it out for Cordelia to see. It was a black and white photo of a man.

  “Politician,” Skinny barked. “Wealthy. Has a boat, three homes in Sydney, five in Melbourne, a yacht, the usual.”

  I wondered what a politician had to do with the paranormal.

  Skinny pressed on. “He went to a hotel. I’m not sure yet what he was doing there. No word on whether or not it was business or pleasure, if his family was there, that sort of thing. All I have right now is that he went to the Hydro Majestic. And now he’s missing.”

  It all fell into place. I took the next few pages from the stack. They were print outs from the Hydro Majestic’s webpage. I had never been to the Hydro Majestic, but of course I knew its reputation. It was a magnificent hotel with a rich history, perched dramatically on the edge of a cliff in the Blue Mountains. I also knew that Australia’s first Prime Minister had died in the hotel back in the day, and that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle had stayed in the hotel, but that was the extent of my knowledge.

  “He’s missing?” I asked.

  “Yes,” Skinny said loudly and angrily, as if I had been too slow to understand. “He checked in and did not check out. But get this, and this is where it gets interesting.”

  I knew what was coming before Skinny even said it.

  “The place is haunted,” Skinny said, a smile growing on her red lips. “Ghosts. People see them all the time there.”

  Cordelia snickered. I shot her a warning look. “The ghosts kidnap people?” I asked.

  “Well, I don’t know what ghosts do,” Skinny said, her voice filled with sarcasm. “I’m not one.”

  “Maybe it’s vampires,” Cordelia said with a chuckle, “not ghosts.”

  I gasped. I wouldn’t dare say such a thing to Skinny, but I suppose Cordelia felt safe as she was dating the Big Boss, Keith.

  “Maybe you should try drinking blood. As skinny as all the vampires I see in movies are, it might be a good diet for you both,” Skinny shot back.

  Cordelia didn’t say anything else.

  “I have train tickets for the two of you.” Skinny rummaged in a drawer to her right. She pulled out a large white envelope and handed it to me. “While I was away, I had brochures sent to you. You received them?”

  I nodded. “When does the train leave?”

  “First thing tomorrow morning,” Skinny said.

  “That’s kind of short notice, isn’t it?” Cordelia asked.

  Skinny snorted. “Oh, I’m sorry. Did either one of you have anything going on? Like maybe a life?”

  Cordelia shifted in her chair but remained silent.

  “I’ve booked rooms,” Skinny said. “See if you can dig anything up, and remember, ghosts. That’s our focus here. Ghosts, girls, ghosts. If they’re not there, invent them! Take it to the next level.”

  “All right.” I stood and slid the tickets into my pocket.

  “Do a good job and you might get some more hours,” Skinny said to me. She was a firm believer in the method of dangling things she thought others wanted in front of their noses. The problem was that she never gave anything up, so no one believed her anymore.

  Cordelia and I stepped out of her o
ffice. “Shut the door,” Skinny said.

  I reached back and pushed it shut. It slammed shut more loudly than I had planned.

  Chapter 3

  I packed for a few days, without really knowing what I would need. Summer was rapidly becoming autumn. The air was growing chill, especially during the evenings and nights. I didn’t know if it would be similar weather in the Blue Mountains, but I packed jeans and a few sweatshirts, along with a pair of shorts and some tees. I threw in some heels and three nice dresses, and then all the maximum strength shapewear I owned.

  I packed one pair of sensible shoes, the ones I would wear at the beginning of the trip, a pair of well-worn sneakers. I had bought them with the idea of taking up running, but they had simply become shoes to wear around while gardening, going to the shops, or anything else, when it turned out that I would rather jump off a cliff than go for a run.

  Merlin jumped up on the bed and shot me a dirty look. She shook herself, releasing cat hair all over my shapewear. I glared back, but Merlin’s gaze was unblinking. She was clearly furious that I would dare go somewhere without her. Her face always showcased a look of annoyance. I tried to push down the guilty feelings.

  She would be okay of course, for only a few days in the cat motel.

  As Merlin turned to look away, I reached out to stroke her, but she hissed at me and leapt from the bed, her tail fanned out like a toilet brush. I finally managed to catch her and get her into the travel basket, several scratches and three packets of cat treats later.

  “Goodbye, you ungrateful furball,” I said, as I handed the cat motel lady the basket. The lady reached in and brought out a purring Merlin.

  “Lovely, lovely kitty,” she said, stroking a purring and now-polite Merlin under the chin, while I swiped my card for a princely sum.

  I shook my head and headed for Cordelia’s.

  “I gotta say, free vacations are a nice perk,” Cordelia said, as she climbed into my car. “It almost makes up for having to deal with Skinny.”

  “Almost,” I said, “but it doesn’t count as a holiday if we have to work, and we do have to work.”

  Cordelia laughed as she pulled her phone out of her handbag and thumbed it to life. “Did you get Skinny’s email?” she asked.

  I shook my head.

  Cordelia read from her phone. “‘Try to learn to count for this one,’ the old witch says, and she goes on, ‘You have a reasonable expense account for normal meals, so none of your usual binge eating at the magazine’s expense.’”

  I shook my head. “She really pushes my buttons.”

  “And mine,” Cordelia said.

  I parked the car at the train station. We got out and lugged our bags the short distance to the building. It was small, with one window to buy tickets and a doorway in the back opening onto the two train platforms. Since we had tickets, we skipped the window and went outside once more. A chill wind picked up and blew its way along the platform. I shivered and moved closer to the brick wall.

  “Track three,” I said as I handed Cordelia her ticket. “I can only see two tracks.”

  Cordelia pointed. “There’s only one track here by the station, but see that sign down there? I expect it blinks when the tracks further up from the station switch over. That would mean that four or so tracks are able to stop at the station.”

  “Here it comes,” I said, mercifully interrupting Cordelia’s train lesson.

  As the train approached, my mouth fell open. I had been expecting the sort of trains that people rode these days, sleek, silver, and fast. Instead, this train was an old red one that had seen better days. It rattled and shook.

  “No way,” Cordelia said. “Have we died and fallen into a Harry Potter afterlife?”

  I looked at the train again as it approached the platform, the brakes squealing as it slowed. “Why is this thing even still running?”

  Cordelia shrugged.

  The train pulled in front of the small group gathered on the platform, and everyone rushed for the doors. We did too, trying to find a good seat. The carriage we entered was filled with screaming children, so we walked briskly through it, only to find ourselves briefly outside and between carriages before going in again and ending up in a dusty, worn car.

  The train lurched without warning just as we were getting settled. We had chosen an empty carriage, but two women immediately entered and sat opposite us. I wondered why, when all the other seats were vacant. I studiously avoided eye contact, as one does in these situations, despite the fact our knees were nearly touching.

  “Where are you two headed?” one of them asked us.

  “The Hydro Majestic,” I said.

  “Wonderful!” The other woman clapped her hands. “You’ll love it there.” She gestured to her friend. “We’ve been there many times.”

  Her friend spoke up. “My name’s Margaret, and this is Doris.”

  “I’m Misty, and this is Cordelia,” I said.

  “First time going to the Hydro Majestic?” Doris asked.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “Oh, it’s a wonderful hotel,” Margaret said. “We love the Hydro.”

  “How long have you been going there?” Cordelia asked.

  “More than fifty years by now,” Doris said.

  “Sixty soon,” Margaret added.

  “Wow,” I said. “Do you go every year?”

  Doris nodded so hard her glasses nearly fell off. “We do. We used to come with our husbands, the four of us, but they’ve both passed, over ten years ago for mine, and hers two years after, and when hers passed we started going again, though we missed two years there, just because I didn’t want to feel like the third wheel.”

  “Which was silly,” Margaret said as soon as Doris paused for breath. “I told her that but she wouldn’t listen.”

  I smiled.

  “Nobody likes to go around with a woman and her husband,” Doris insisted.

  Margaret clucked her tongue against the roof of her mouth and rolled her eyes.

  “Anyway, we didn’t go every year,” Doris continued, shooting a glare at Margaret. “The Hydro was shut for ages for renovations. It’s only reopened a few years ago.”

  “So what do you think about the place? The atmosphere?” Cordelia asked.

  “It’s beautiful there at the Hydro,” Doris said.

  Her friend nodded. “Absolutely. Though sometimes it feels, well, strange. It’s a wonderful place, but anyone who’s been there enough—well, they have one of their stories. One of their ghost stories.”

  “Oh, now really, Doris!” Margaret crinkled her nose.

  Doris pouted. “No, Margaret, really and you know it! I remember you, twenty years ago, talking about the man on the roof.”

  “It was nothing. I was seeing things.”

  “You insisted you saw him,” Doris said, “until you got boring.”

  “What man on the roof?” I asked.

  “I was walking back with Richard, my husband, from a hike. This was thirty or so years ago like Doris said,” Margaret recounted with obvious reluctance. “And I looked up as we came out of the bush and saw the hotel, and I saw a man standing on the roof. The roof isn’t somewhere where guests can go. I don’t even know if there’s a door up there. The roof slopes in places; someone could get hurt. But I saw a man, clear as day, wearing a suit, and I was a bit of a space away, but I could tell it was a suit, and I could tell his hands were in his pockets, but by the time I turned and got Richard looking in the right spot, he was gone.”

  Doris took up the story. “She’s not the only one who’s seen this fella on the roof. Lots of people see him as the years go on. Different decades but same man, in a suit, hands in his pockets.”

  “And no one knows who he is?” I asked, trying not to sound too eager.

  “No,” Doris said with a shrug. “Just some ghost. Who knows, maybe he fell off the roof.”

  “Ghosts can’t fall off a roof,” Margaret snapped. “I could have heard about it and wanted to
see it, and you know how your brain can get going.”

  “That’s not my brain getting going! You saw the ghost,” Doris argued.

  Margaret shrugged. “Maybe.”

  The two friends soon forgot we were there and bickered softly with each other. Cordelia fell asleep, while I looked out the window at the scenery. It was magnificent as we climbed higher into the mountains.

  The blaring sound of death metal music startled me. I looked up as a teenager staggered to the carriage and sat across the aisle from me, his music blaring.

  At that point, Margaret and Doris became semi-transparent and then vanished.

  I grabbed Cordelia’s arm. “What is it?” she asked, rubbing her eyes.

  “Those two women just vanished!”

  She glared at the teenager. “Can you blame them?”

  “No, I mean they disappeared—literally vanished, right before my eyes.”

  “It must’ve been the noise,” Cordelia said drowsily before dropping back off to sleep.

  A cold chill descended upon me. Margaret and Doris had been ghosts.

  I was still entirely creeped out when the train finally pulled up to Medlow Bath station. It was a tiny but pretty station, a white wooden building with boxed-off clumps of pink roses along the platform.

  We got off the train. I grunted as a small child knocked me into a green railway bench. I rubbed my shin and turned to Cordelia to complain, but she was already half way across the Great Western Highway, pointing to the Hydro Majestic, which was across the road and just down a little.

  “Wow,” she kept saying. “Wow!”

  Chapter 4

  This was a dream. It had to be. The interior was just as impressive as the outside, perhaps even more so.

  The lobby screamed opulence. Cordelia and I stood under a huge vaulted ceiling, reminiscent of the cathedrals of Europe. “Are we in the right place?” Cordelia asked in disbelief. She nodded to an enormous vase of exquisite fresh cut flowers almost as tall as she was. “Can the magazine afford this place? I feel like I should be paying admission just to peek in the lobby.”