As she sat in a local coffee bar on the edge of the French Quarter, sipping a delightful chicory coffee and relishing the beignets as faint strains from a faraway jazz club floated in the air, Myranda’s fortunes turned on a dime. For reasons unknown to her, Myranda came across a website on her laptop from a realtor, Debra Williams, owner of New Orleans Relocation LLC, Realtors. Debra seemed to focus on working with new arrivals in town and as Myranda paged though Debra’s listings and read some personal information about her, she became intrigued. Williams seemed to have a number of older homes in and around the Tulane Center for rent, all of which appealed to Myranda’s sense of style and taste. As well, Debra had photos of her dogs with her on her website. The smiling woman sitting in a shaded garden with her trio of dachshunds made Myranda think this might help as well.
She gave Debra a quick call, giving her a broad overview of her situation and what she was looking for…as well as the fact that time was of the essence as her new position at The Tulane Medical Center was to begin in just a few weeks. It was perhaps an unfair ploy, but Myranda had found letting people know you were an MD often opened doors that otherwise might remain closed. At this point, she was willing to use all the tools available to her. Myranda met Debra at her office and she looked over what she had to offer. As they perused the listings, Debra chatted up Myranda as she did any other potential client and found her to be a delightful person. Their common love of dogs made the conversation easy and relaxed and Myranda was sure she had found just the right person to help her out. After an hour or so, Myranda had picked out half a dozen or so places that appealed to her as well as providing some good space for the dogs and the two of them set off to take a look.
All of the places were to Myranda’s liking, but one, in particular, caught her eye. Like many of the houses in Debra’s portfolio, it was an attractive 2-story brick home with pleasant gardens in the rear and had a façade that made Myranda feel the real flavor of New Orleans. Debra felt her pulse quicken and her mouth go dry as she realized Myranda had her heart set on the old Ashley Mansion. None of the potential homes seemed to be out of Myranda’s comfort zone, either financially nor aesthetically, but Debra knew once they had talked about the old Ashley place that she had made up her mind. Debra had purposely priced the mansion a bit under what she normally would have, just to try and get some interest as it had sat empty for just over seven years.
She briefly considered giving Myranda the low down on the house, but she did not want to take a chance on letting this opportunity slip through her fingers, as there was no one within a fifty-mile radius that would touch it based on the history. She had connected with Myranda so well that Debra was a bit chagrined and ashamed at doing this, but she remembered that in their conversations that Myranda had expressed her lack of belief in the darker side of New Orleans…in places like the Lalaurie House. In the end, she let her practical business side overwhelm her conscience justifying to herself that it probably would not matter to the young doctor anyway. Myranda beamed as she strolled through the large brick structure, marveling at the great attention to detail that the Ashleys had made.
It might have been a bit more house than she and Blondie and Scout and Violet really needed, but there was just something about the place that pulled on her as she compared it to the other options she had.
“If there is no one else really interested, I’m ready to sign a lease, Debra.”
“Nope. No one else.” Debra replied hoping her underlying deceit was not apparent. “We can go back to my office and get the paperwork done and you can move in whenever it is convenient.”
And with that, Myranda and her clan became the first occupants of Ashley Mansion since the murder/suicide of Ellen and Brandon. Myranda had little in the way of furnishings—considering she was moving from a small townhouse to a full home. But she picked up a few more items that she felt would at least make the place not look so cavernous with her sparse belongings and as her first night fell in her new place, it was just enough for her to call it home. Violet was scarce, off exploring as cats are want to do. It was after all two floors of many rooms and Myranda assumed she would reappear when she got hungry or when they all turned in for bed. Blondie and Scout, on the other hand, seemed reluctant to leave her side. She supposed it was the same thing for them, but that they were coping with it differently. Myranda had no clear information on what the two dogs had been through before she had adopted them, which might have been part of it, she guessed. And if she thought back, they really had been attached to her since they had come to live with her…very devoted and clingy. She thought no more of it.
As the next few days went by, Myranda took a quick inventory of some minor TLC that the interior needed as well as a larger list of flowers and plants that she wanted to get around the exterior before she had to report for her first day at Tulane. As she sat under an arbor out back and sipped at her coffee, Violet pranced around the various gardens chasing after butterflies and moths that Myranda knew the poor cat would never catch. She just hoped so anyway. If Violet was this much of a “predator”, she hoped her presence would deter any possible mouse issues that could arise in an old house. At least that had been a problem in her childhood home outside of Portland.
Both Blondie and Scout seemed to be relaxing more each day, but she still sensed some unease in them as they lay at her feet snoozing away. As she wiped at her brow, Myranda realized it would take some time to get used to the humidity, something that had been virtually nonexistent in Arizona…for both her and the dogs. Maybe that was what was making them so sedate. Neither had thick coats, but Myranda was pretty sure she might be as still and quiet as well if she were sporting their fur. As she was finalizing her shopping list for the day, Violet came back into view…with no prey, to Myranda’s relief. The cat slowed her walk and then collapsed on the bricks of the small patio, apparently also trying to adjust to the new climate. Myranda chuckled as she looked at the three of them, flat out and not moving.
“I know the feeling, guys….”
After locking everyone up in the house, Myranda set off to find both a good hardware store as well as a nursery. As she locked her front door and headed for the car, she spied a couple of her neighbors. Some were out for an early morning stroll, while others were engaged in light yard work. She smiled and waved as she walked, but all she got in return were a few weak, forced smiles and only one woman returned her wave. The looks on all their faces, though, was the same: a bit of concern and maybe even caution as she came closer. It was an odd thing, Myranda thought, as she started her car up and moved down the street. She had always heard of the naturally outgoing and warm and welcoming charm of people in the south, but what she had just seen was hardly what she had expected.
Maybe they were just standoffish with strangers? Or maybe she was reading something into the scenario that was not really there. She was the new kid on the block, so to speak, and certainly, the culture and style here would be an adjustment. Only time would tell. Taking Blondie and Scout for walks around the neighborhood might help, Myranda considered, as she pulled into the hardware store. Dogs had this amazing way to break the ice with almost anyone. She had seen this back in Oregon and both Blondie and Scout had performed admirably with her neighbors back in Chandler as well. After consulting with a few of the employees at the hardware store and picking up what she needed to spruce up the interior of the house, Myranda headed off to a nursery that the manager of the hardware store had recommended.
She relied on the advice and pointers a nice woman at the nursery offered, as she had no idea what might do well and what might not thrive in a climate that was unknown to her. With her car loaded with fresh flowers and other plants, Myranda headed back home to get started. She had just a little over a week of free time on her hands until she had to report for work, and she wanted to make the most of it, knowing the demands at Tulane would most likely be at least as consuming of her time as they had been in Chandler. And she wanted to dive right in
, making sure to prove to the staff and administrators that their hiring her had been correct. Myranda worked inside most of the day, wanting to avoid the full heat of the day before tackling the landscaping projects around the exterior. Perhaps it would not be significantly cooler in the late afternoon and early evening, but Myranda figured it would be more tolerable than in the full sun.
Myranda was certainly no carpenter nor contractor, but all those days of tagging along with her Dad as he touched up and updated their Oregon home were now paying off. The repairs were minor and Myranda did only what she knew she was capable of, knowing she could always get Debra’s recommendation on a good handyman if anything over her head came up. She was still mulling over the odd reactions she had gotten from her neighbors as she put away the few tools she had been using to head toward the back of the house to design her planting scheme. As she moved through the front entryway she spied both Scout and Violet sacked out on the tiles of the kitchen where they had been ever since she had returned home. Blondie, however, was sitting obediently at the foot of the wide flight of stairs that led up to the bedrooms…not moving, not wagging…just sitting and staring up the stairs.
Myranda stopped in her tracks and looked over at her. She stepped in behind Blondie and looked in the direction that the dog was seemingly mesmerized by, but as far as she could see, it was just an empty flight of stairs. Each step had been painstakingly covered with pretty oriental rug remnants and the banister was polished to a highly reflective sheen. Even as Myranda moved in behind Blondie, the dog’s focus and concentration did not waver. It was like she had not heard Myranda’s approach at all. It was only when Myranda bent down to pet her that she detected a small whine. It was hardly noticeable until you got close to her, but Blondie was definitely whining. Myranda reached out slowly and carefully so as not to startle her and letting the dog know she was there as she kneeled down beside her.
“Everything OK, girl?”
Blondie looked over at Myranda and stopped whining, but her gaze returned to the stairs, her tail just barely flitting back and forth in response to Myranda’s touch. Myranda looked again up the stairs, squinting her eyes into the growing dim of the late afternoon light. But still, all she could see was an empty flight of stairs. Blondie looked on intently as if trying to convince Myranda to look closer. She had heard of such things in animals…the staring into space at nothing…but until now Myranda had never actually experienced it herself. She remembered reading somewhere along the way about the belief that animals could sometimes sense or even see energies, or if you were so inclined to believe it, spirits, that were invisible to the human eye. She even recalled an old movie where there was a scene where a cat in a house was the only one who could see a ghost of someone who had died but was still attached to the family living there, unable to move on. The cat would go and sit and stare at a chair where the recently deceased person was sitting, giving the impression that it was staring at empty space…regrettably, she had seen this kind of thing as a child from her own pets. This was not giving her “warm fuzzies”…
The reputation of spooky New Orleans was getting to her, Myranda told herself. But then again, even though this house was not that old, who knew what might have been here before. Who was she to discount anything, especially something along this line of thought? She was not a true believer in such subjects, but what if? Blondie continued to stare until Myranda ruffled her fur along her neck which seemed to break the spell. And just like that, Blondie seemed her old self again and came trotting along beside Myranda as she moved out back to begin her planting.
The clicking of Blondie’s nails on the hardwood floors of the corridor next to the stairs brought Scout to wakefulness as well, and both he and Violet popped up to join the procession as Myranda walked around setting out plants and then standing back to see if her initial design was to be the final version. The interior touch ups and this unsettling episode with Blondie had taken more of the day from Myranda than she had planned on, and once her plants were arranged, she decided to let this sit until the next day. The light was now not ideal for all that had to be done, so she watered down everything and hooked up both Blondie and Scout for a tour around the neighborhood. Time to see if the odd responses she had gotten earlier from her new neighbors were all in her mind or if there was truly something odd going on. Taking the dogs on a walk with her would tell her what was what…she hoped…
Blondie’s Intuition
New Orleans, Louisiana
28th October, 1977
Unfortunately, Myranda and the dogs did not encounter anyone on their evening stroll. Whatever had been going on earlier with Blondie seemed to have passed with no lingering consequences as she and Scout bobbed along with Myranda just as they always did when out for a walk. Though still a bit puzzled over Blondie’s episode earlier, Myranda finally just let it go, grateful that whatever it had been it was forgotten. It was one of the many qualities that Myranda wished she could inherit from her dogs…or any dog for that matter: the ability to live in the moment. They did not hold grudges, they lived to please, and they were always utterly trusting and accepting of everyone until they were given a reason not to…and even then it might take multiple incidents to truly make a dog not love you.
They returned to the house to find Violet sitting on the kitchen counter giving Myranda a look of definite indignation as she sat in front of an empty food bowl. This was her first real go-around with a cat of her own, but Myranda was rapidly warming to the species based on the antics of Violet. She laughed as she unclipped leashes from the dogs and hung them by the rear door. Though patient in this regard, the dogs were wondering where dinner was as well, so Myranda got to work so as not to be subjected to some sort of animal coup d'état. She was too tired at this point to have defended herself. After eating, the trio wandered out back for their normal bathroom break while Myranda tried her hand at her first real New Orleans-style meal: shrimp creole. She had all the right ingredients and followed her recipe religiously, but as she looked into the bowl where she served it up, she was sure it would never be mistaken for the actual thing in any of the world-class restaurants that lined the French Quarter.
However, it tasted great…at least to her uninitiated, virgin Cajun palate, and that was all Myranda cared about. She was sure as time went by and she got more practice, her presentation would improve as well. She topped off the spicy entrée with an icy cold Ambita Amber, a Munich-style lager that everyone in town praised. As the beer passed over her palate, Myranda felt her eyes drooping and soon she was as ready as her brood to call it a day. It had been long and successful…she was thrilled with all that she had accomplished that day and was looking forward to a full day in the garden in the morning so she could have a few days to decompress before beginning at the Tulane Center.
She followed the slow slog of Blondie and Scout up the long staircase as Violet raced by them in a flash of fur. Myranda settled into her bed, as Violet staked out her territory near her feet, while Blondie and Scout piled into their own beds between the en-suite bath and the bedroom door, each with a contented sigh. Myranda tried to get through a few more pages of a new book by Dean Koontz, “The Whispering Room”, the 2nd of a trilogy about a rogue FBI agent, Jane Hawk, fighting corruption in the government, but despite his excellent storyline, Myranda gave up after she found herself re-reading the same page over and over. She stopped trying to fight her fatigue and reached over dousing the light on her bedside table. Soon she was fast asleep, her slow regular breathing matching that of her creatures.
……….
Myranda was normally a light sleeper, a trait that had served her well in her internship and residency, as she had needed to be able to come to full functioning consciousness quickly when on call back in Arizona. But as a growing thunderstorm rumbled off in the distance across Lake Pontchartrain, Myranda remained oblivious. Large banks of clouds were illuminated from behind by bolt after bolt of lightning, but it was not until the first sheets of rain b
egan to slash against her window that Myranda’s slumber was interrupted. Having come most recently from Arizona, where storms of this magnitude were rare, Myranda sat up watching in fascination as the thunder began to really boom, shaking the frame of her house, while the jagged shards of lightning broke around the heavy banks of clouds to illuminate her bedroom vividly.
The last crack of thunder caused Violet to jump up suddenly and dash away as if a terror unseen before in her lifetime had been unleashed on her personally. The dogs, however, just raised their heads a few inched off their beds, giving the storm little if any consideration. They were soon back asleep, as if nothing had happened, as Myranda propped up her pillow to get a better view of the fireworks. She had not seen such a show since she had been a little girl in the Pacific Northwest, and even now as an adult, she was mesmerized by the display. The storm pounded away for just a few minutes and then disappeared just as quickly as it had come on. With nothing more to watch, Myranda lowered her pillow and lay back down.
The rain continued to patter pleasantly against the tin roof, but otherwise, the brunt of the storm seemed over. It was a nice sound to her ear, reminding her of nights on her grandmother’s farm just outside Lukarilla, near the Oregon coast. It was soothing and soon Myranda was fast asleep. The house fell silent as well, the only detectable noise the soft snores from Blondie and Scout and the runoff of rain through the gutters. However, despite the relative calm and serenity of the night, Myranda awoke as she thought she had heard something in the hallway—footsteps? —outside the bedroom. She sat up and listened carefully, but nothing more seemed to be audible. A dream, maybe, she thought as she lay back…but just as she turned to her side, Myranda caught the distinctive form of Blondie facing the closed bedroom door, her light coat easily visible in the dark of the room.
Haunted House Tales Page 73
