by JL Bryan
“But she went pretty far out of her way to reveal these notes she sent Stanley.” I tapped my pocket. “Maybe we’ve been on the wrong trail. And of course, maybe it wasn’t really Adaire Fontaine’s ghost. Ghosts can take on different appearances. Some specialize in it.”
“Like the aufhocker from that necromancer’s library.”
“Right.”
“Only this would be a ghost acting like it was a famous actress,” Stacey said. “Disguises within disguises. An actor turducken. An actorducken.”
“Possibly. Then again, maybe she really is here, because of her attachment to the man who built and operated the drive-in. We’ll find out more when we read her letter.”
“Which we’re doing right now. Right?”
“Shouldn’t you shut down the projector?”
Stacey sighed. “Fine.” She opened her door, then hesitated. “You know, after hearing that ghost’s voice… and considering how it threw a foosball table at you… I’m not super wild about going in there alone. Even if I could meet Adaire Fontaine.”
“Yeah, of course, I’ll come with you.” I jumped out with her.
“And maybe you can read that letter while I do it,” Stacey added as I followed her toward the concession stand.
Inside, I couldn’t help glancing toward the game room to see if Adaire was back, but I didn’t see any sign of her, nor feel a cold spot anymore.
Stacey led the way to the EMPLOYEES ONLY – DO NOT ENTER door, which she unlocked. “It locks from the outside automatically,” she told me.
The door opened onto stairs that led up to the concession stand’s second floor, which had a rough, unfinished look, with lots of bare particle board and sheetrock. It was a smaller space than the first level, added years after the drive-in opened, when Stanley had upgraded from the 1955 fire-hazard projector of the old sunken building to the 1970 projector that was still up there.
Metal cabinets held assorted equipment, repair tools, and a number of film reels. The creaky thirty-five-millimeter projector was still turning its wheels, the loose tail end of the Pocketful of Aces reel flopping again with each rotation until Stacey turned it off.
“How did you like the movie?” Stacey removed the decades-old film reel, handling it like fragile crystal. “Are you an Adaire Fontaine fan yet?”
“I can see the star quality.”
“Then why don’t we look at the big secret letter, already?”
“Oh, are you still interested in that?” I pretended to search my pockets. “Where did I even put that letter? Didn’t we put it away somewhere?”
“It’s in your jacket, that big inside pocket.”
“Right.” I drew it out and carefully unfolded the stationery full of Adaire’s large and loopy handwriting. The return address was an apartment building or hotel in New York City. “Are you sure you want to hear this?”
“Why? Have you read it already? Is it bad?”
“I haven’t read it. Just wondering whether you’d changed your mind about being interested in this letter—”
“Ellie, quit it! That could be a major historical document, revealing new secrets the world will want to know.”
“Maybe it’s not totally the world’s business,” I said.
“Fine, but I want to know, so get reading or I’m grabbing it out of your hands and running away.”
“Okay. As long as you’re sure you want to hear this.”
She glared at me.
I took a breath and began to read.
Chapter Fifteen
My dearest Stanley,
I hope this finds you well, along with all the old gang back home. It’s been a non-stop hoot of a time up here, despite the unnatural cold. I am warmed by the lights of Broadway, of the coffee houses of the Village, the worlds of art and culture in this grand and dazzling metropolis. I finally feel like I belong here, not least because audiences have been so kind, despite the ridiculous nature of this latest play. I swear the writer must have been lost in the clouds half the time, and spent the rest wallowing in the gutter.
But never mind the script, the performance fooled the audience well enough. They simply believed it to be a witting comedy, as opposed to an unwitting one, and you know how I love the chance to overdo it all—it is my specialty!
I continue to wish for your visit, as I am now prepared to show you many sights (and sites!) and introduce you to the most interesting people. I know you hesitate, but fear need not be a leash or a prison, dear Stanley—it can indeed be a stimulant, even an intoxicant, particularly when mixed with fine and colorful liquors as they do at the Stonewall. My neighborhood is most lively; creativity is a lifestyle here.
So, come! Do come. Treat these recent years of despair as an opportunity, leave behind that dreadful scene that no longer appreciates you, and make your way here, to flourish among like-minded souls!
You say your face, your childhood scars, limit you, but I believe it gives you character, and something unique, and I have never found it to be a face to push out of bed, not even at sunrise, at which time the necessity of such measures most often becomes suddenly apparent.
On that inappropriate note, I shall end. I sense destiny in you. I wish only for you to sense it in yourself! All will be well in the end.
Yours most ravishingly,
Adaire Fontaine
“Okay, so now I’m almost getting a reverse stalker scenario,” Stacey said. “Beautiful Hollywood starlet stalks homely former acquaintance from back home? Has that been done before? On Lifetime, maybe?”
“Probably on Lifetime, yeah. Anyway, they were clearly friendly with each other, not just acquaintances or passing members of the same cast. And she came back from the grave to let us know about it.”
“Why us?” Stacey asked.
“Maybe the movie did it. Also, I reached out and offered her my help during that EVP session. I hope I didn’t promise something I can’t deliver.”
“Which means we should screen more of the old movies, right?”
“If there are more with Chance Chadwick, or Adaire Fontaine, or both…”
“‘Both’ would be Hotel Island, but I didn’t see that in here earlier…” Stacey peered into the steel cabinet holding the film reels. “We should probably watch anything directed by Antonio Mazzanti, right?”
“True.”
“Ha!” She gave me a wicked smile. “You just agreed to watch Body in the Basement.”
“You can screen it, but I don’t have to watch it. I’ll find other work to do.”
“Oh, come on!” Her face fell.
“They aren’t paying us to just sit around watching movies, Stacey.”
“I mean, they’re paying us in gift certificates and popcorn and pizza—”
“That was your idea.”
“I have no regrets. Maybe I’ll have my birthday party here.”
“And I’ll just pay my rent with pizza,” I said.
“If your landlord tries this pizza, that could possibly work.”
“Good point. Is there anything else we could screen?”
“Oh. Wow.” Stacey took in a sharp breath as she lifted another reel. “This is really interesting. You know, his whole collection of films here is pretty impressive. The studios don’t like leaving these out in the wild. Usually, you lease them and return them.”
“What’s that one?”
“This is the one that really earned Mazzanti his reputation. The Heart of Man.”
“With the shapeshifting devil in Venice?”
“Oh, yeah. But here’s the problem…” She unspooled a long stretch of it, showing me lots of lumps and bumps. “It’s totally worn down. It’s been repaired a bunch of times, which means it’s been watched a bunch of times. This one probably won’t survive another spin through the projector.”
“It might be worn down because Stanley watched it again and again?”
“Possibly.”
“So he might be emotionally connected to it.”
“I see where you’re going. I’d save it as a last resort, though.” She put it back delicately. “How about Bootlegger Boulevard? It’s a later Chance Chadwick film.”
“Okay. Got anything with her, though?” I couldn’t help wondering if Adaire might reach out to me again, or if that moment had been my imagination. It certainly didn’t match the video evidence Stacey had taken, and when in doubt, I’d been trained to go with the evidence. Otherwise, the world of ghosts and the supernatural grows murky and confusing fast.
Stacey gave me a half-grin. “You’re turning into a fan, aren’t you?”
“We have to follow up The Body in the Basement with something less awful.”
“Okay. Legend of the South it is. Our double feature for tomorrow night is set. Jacob’s going to freak.”
“I’m glad he’s coming. Maybe he can help us figure out why this place is overrun with dead celebrities. Plus, he can watch that horror movie with you.”
“Come on, you might enjoy it! You can sit in my car with us if you’re scared.”
“Pass,” I said. “I’m not third-wheeling it with you and your boyfriend at the drive-in.”
“You could fourth-wheel it and invite Michael, too.”
I hesitated. “Nah. I still try to keep him away from all this. After his sister and everything.”
Stacey nodded. We’d barely managed to save his sister from possession by the murderous ghost of Anton Clay. Who was now gone and buried at last, I could reasonably hope. The drive to protect the living against the dead was still ingrained in me, though, a life’s purpose, a calling I could never shake, because not enough people out there know the dangers of the paranormal realm, or how to combat them. And those who know are still wise to avoid some of those entities rather than face them.
We returned to the van, settling in the back to watch and listen to the monitors.
It had been an extraordinarily active night, between the farmhouse and the ghost of Adaire—or the one who’d chosen to look like Adaire, I reminded myself.
After the movie, the drive-in went quiet again. No thumps from the farmhouse, no ghost movies on the screen.
With just a preliminary look at the night’s recordings from the sunken projection house, Stacey found ice-cold spots and giant spikes of electromagnetic activity while Pocketful of Aces had played on the screen. It looked like Cigar Man—Stanley Preston himself, by my guess—had been up and around the previous night but hadn’t been moved to come out and haunt us. Maybe he’d gotten absorbed in watching the movie, too.
An hour passed with no further activity. Then another. Stacey and I walked out to do EVP sessions, asking questions around the areas we suspected of being most haunted, including the projection house, the game room in the concession stand, and the farmhouse, but the entities seemed to have gone to ground after the night’s excitement.
Eventually, we broke camp and headed home relatively early. We left the van there, collecting data from the various cameras and microphones for us to study later. Stacey dropped me off at my apartment at about two in the morning. I was exhausted, an aftereffect of the adrenaline spikes from encountering ghosts and dodging foosball tables.
I barely managed to text Callie and Benny to explain the situation, in case they wondered why the picture frame from the game room was now in a garbage bag, waiting to be repaired or tossed out.
When I stretched out on my bed and closed my eyes, I could still see Adaire Fontaine’s immense gray eyes regarding me from up on the big screen.
Calvin called early the next morning. Okay, it was almost eleven, but it felt early because I was still asleep. My blackout curtains kept the time a mystery until I checked my phone.
“As requested,” Calvin said. “Police reports, fast-tracked to your inbox. I hope you like badly slanted PDFs.”
“Who doesn’t? Thanks. Maybe I can finally start to make sense of all this.”
“Case is going that well, huh?”
“It’s a strange, weird mess. Especially…” I caught him up briefly, mainly emphasizing my two apparent encounters with the dead movie star.
“You’re sure it was her?”
“I’m only sure it looked like her. It definitely had her eyes.”
“She did have famous eyes, didn’t she?”
“When the big screen darkened and she just looked out at me, it was clearly different from what Stacey recorded on her camera. Yet I was watching the same projection at the same time. It wasn’t like one of us was watching the edited for TV version.”
“I do have a thought, but I’m not sure if it’s a useful one.”
“It can’t hurt to try.”
“You’ve heard of sympathetic magic, right?”
“I was a weird goth teen obsessed with ghosts, so yes. It’s how voodoo dolls are supposed to work. You make an image of someone, and attack the image, or do whatever you want to do to that person.”
“Yes, but a popkin or ‘voodoo doll’ might include magic by contagion, like hairs taken from the original subject. Think instead about images. That could be some of the oldest human attempts at magic, painting prey animals on cave walls. Making sculptures of animals and attacking them, or even dressing up like an animal in a sacred dance. All to prepare for the hunt, the hunt that provided sustenance and life.”
“Okay. And I can apply this information by…?”
“The idea is that an image of a thing contains some mystical connection to it, and affecting the image can affect the reality.”
“But it can’t. Can it?”
“I only bring it up because it might be a factor when you’re talking about people obsessed with images. Or with films.”
“Like Stan Preston. Or Adaire Fontaine, or any of them, really. The crazy director, Mazzanti. They all had some deep personal relationship to the world of the movies.”
“Adaire Fontaine may have put quite a bit of her soul into her films along the way,” he said. “When you played that old movie, it gave her an opening to reach out to you.”
“So, is Adaire haunting the drive-in or not, do you think? Or did she just drop down off the screen to show me her letter and postcards?”
“Either way, we can assume she had a reason for contacting you.”
“Yeah, I’ve got a couple of ideas about that. I call one Stanley the Psycho Killer. I call the other Maybe Something Else.”
“You might work on clarifying that second one,” he said. “Sometimes the obvious answer isn’t the correct one. But then, sometimes it is.”
“Okay. I’ll just keep kind of driving around in circles and getting attacked by dead movie-star ghosts until something comes up, then.”
“That’s the spirit. I have to run. I’m at my daughter’s house. My grandson is crawling now. He likes to stick his foot in his mouth. I’ll send you a picture.”
“Sounds great,” I said. It was a little weird to hear the formerly gruff and distant homicide detective say anything like that. Maybe the Florida and family life was softening him up a little. That was probably the best thing for him.
When he hung up, I opened my laptop to read about the dead.
Chapter Sixteen
Later, after looking at police reports, my private investigator data-fusion database, and assorted publicly available information, I called Stacey to give her the rundown.
“Anything suspicious?” she asked. “Murders at the drive-in?”
“No murders there, but some deaths. Starting with Stanley’s mother-in-law, Ruby Jackson.”
“The cane lady.”
“Yes. She had emphysema—that device we found in her room was an old-timey nebulizer, meant to blow medicine into her lungs. And it was her cause of death in 1955. You’ll remember she opposed her daughter’s marriage to Stanley, thought he wasn’t up to the standards of Nancy’s first husband who died.”
“Are we suspecting Stanley for causing the tractor accident?” Stacey asked. “If he’s maybe a murderer?”
“It sounds like Nanc
y met Stanley later, in her wild-widow phase, spending late nights with the arts and theater crowd, so I’m not sure about that. But we know Ruby went on to oppose Stanley’s idea of turning the farm into a drive-in.”
“But conveniently for him, she died.”
“Exactly. If she was near death anyway, maybe it wouldn’t have taken much to push her over the edge. And if the 1950s local police don’t look too closely, on account of her known multiple medical conditions—”
“Old Stan Preston could have gotten away with it,” Stacey said.
“Then in 1959, Adaire Fontaine was strangled to death. It’s not the exact same, but it’s similar, isn’t it?”
“Well, if he got away with it the first time, he might do something similar the second time. Are we thinking he murdered his mother-in-law, then later went to Los Angeles and murdered Adaire Fontaine?”
“It’s possible. And usually, a murder or tragic death is behind a haunting. So far, we don’t have any obvious murders except Adaire’s. Okay, jumping ahead to 1998, Nancy died of cardiac arrest while sitting in the passenger side of Preston’s car, watching a movie on the big screen. They were alone, the theater was closed that night. I think the drive-in was sputtering pretty badly as a business by then, anyway.”
“Do we know which movie?” Stacey asked.
“We do not. They were in his 1984 Buick Riviera convertible, which the police report describes in detail more than anything, like the policeman who wrote it was thinking of buying one for himself. Preston said they were watching a movie together and she just passed away. Seventy-one years old. Preston went on to live here on his own for about fifteen more years, then died of hypothermia.”
“What? How?”
“Apparently out here watching a movie on a freezing cold night. They found him in front of the screen, the projector still running like nobody had been around to turn it off.”
“Screening Pocketful of Aces. That’s the one Benny found on the projector when he bought the drive-in, and it had been closed since Preston’s death.”
