by Stuart Jaffe
Jam answered in a thick, Southern accent. “Hey, are we all gonna sit around and shoot names, or are we gonna talk money?”
“No problem,” Max said. “I’ll pay you each one hundred and fifty dollars, but you have to do a very specific task, today, exactly as I tell you.”
Both boys snapped to attention. PB wiped at his mouth. “Did you say a hundred fifty?”
“Yup. That is if you don’t mind breaking a few laws.”
The boys grinned.
Max gave them money to buy a cell phone and then told them what he needed. Once PB and J had left the office — Max decided he would call them the Sandwich Boys — he called out for Drummond. It took a few tries, but eventually the ghost appeared. He asked Drummond to get Sandra, Libby, Shawnee, and the others together, and to have them meet at Little Richard’s BBQ for lunch.
Drummond frowned. “What about the thing you had Leed and me looking into?”
“Did you find it?”
“No. Looks like somebody took those blueprints a long time ago. But Leed wants to keep trying.”
Max paused to think it over. “Forget that. Please, do what I’m asking. Get everyone together. I’ve got a different tactic to try, and I’ll finish it by lunch. I’ll meet you all there, and I’ll explain everything.”
“I like the look in your eye. Don’t you worry, I’ll get everybody together. Leed won’t be happy about it, but I got no problem stopping — if I had to look at one more registry, I’d have lost it. So, what are you going to do?”
“I’m going to visit a brothel.”
Max paced the sidewalk, snatching glances up at the brothel house. It was a white building on a short incline with a gray stone retaining wall and similar stone stairs leading up. To the right, an overhang covered the concrete drive, and a BMW had been parked underneath — Max stared at that overhang. He had noticed it before, when walking this street with Libby.
Of course, I saw it. It’s only two houses up from the Darians.
But still it struck Max as odd that this particular house had garnered his attention during that walk while others had been ignored. Down the street, the Darians’ blue house appeared unoccupied. But Max knew Wayne was in there. He could practically feel the man staring out, watching him like a sniper choosing targets.
“Careful. Don’t let your imagination get you.”
Wasting the morning on the sidewalk would help no one. Max climbed the stairs and rang the brothel’s doorbell.
A woman with a healthy countenance cracked the door open. “May I help you?”
Max attempted his most-easing smile. “Hi. My name’s Max, and I’m writing a book on famous homes in the South. Are you aware of the unique history of this place?”
Her cautious stare relaxed. “You mean the brothel?”
“You know?”
“There was an article written recently on it. Would you like to come in and see?” She held the door open wider, and Max entered. He couldn’t believe it had been so easy, that the cautious face had become so trusting, which oddly made him feel more cautious. “I’m Denise Williamson. Feel free to look around.”
“Thank you, Ms. Williamson.”
“Most of the woodwork and moldings are original. Do you know much about the place, yet?”
“Some.” On the right, he saw a wooden staircase with a black banister. The risers had been painted white with finished wood on top. It led to a second-floor landing. To the left of the staircase, a hall led to the back, and further left, Max saw a wide open room. It appeared the woman used it as a living room with its large windows and a rather open plan by today’s standards — nine foot ceilings, old moldings around every door, a beautiful airy place.
Ms. Williamson stepped into the living room. “I think this was originally the sitting area. Maybe where the girls were put on display.”
Max pulled out his phone. “Mind if I take pictures?”
“Be my guest.”
As he walked through the house, he felt a strange dichotomy developing between the old and new. In each room, he could feel the nearly-hundred year old occurrences. He could hear the jazz music. He could smell the cigar smoke and flowing whiskey. The pleasurable moans and boisterous laughter — it echoed around him. Yet he also saw modern furniture and decorations, the latest magazines, an ereader, a cell phone, a laptop, a flatscreen, a dishwasher, and a microwave.
As they moved upstairs, he asked the woman about her life. She remained tight-lipped, though she did say that like many in the neighborhood, she worked up the road at the hospital. The upstairs consisted of a narrow hall with rooms attached along the way. Like below, the floors were all polished hardwood. A slight curve near the end led to the master bedroom on the left.
On a king-sized bed, Max noticed an open suitcase and neatly ordered piles of clothing next to it. He paused to stare at the bedroom’s ceiling lamp with its ornately-designed molding connecting it all together. “This is a beautiful home.”
“Thank you.”
Walking back, he glanced through a window into the backyard. It stretched out a small ways with a wooden fence traveling the perimeter. She had a little garden off to the side and a large shed in the back.
“Is that shed original, too?” Max asked.
“I don’t think so. If you go in, it certainly doesn’t look like it’s from the twenties. More like the fifties or sixties, if I had to guess. But I could be wrong.”
“Do you mind if I take a look?”
“I’m sorry. I am a bit pressed for time, and I’d have to fish out the key and all.”
“It’s okay. I don’t want to trouble you.”
When they reached the front door, she added, “I hope you saw enough. Got what you needed to.”
“There is one more thing. If it’s okay, I’d like to check out the basement.”
“The basement?”
“Yes, if that’s okay.”
Her cautious eyes returned. At that moment, it might have been dawning upon her that she had admitted a complete stranger into her home based on nothing more than his word. Yet, she led the way to the entrance underneath the stairs. Flicking on a switch, she let him go down the creaking wood stairs. The stairs were simplistic with a single strip of one-by used for a handrail. She did not follow.
Even before he had gone halfway down, the smell of wet earth crept into the air. As he suspected, he found an unfinished basement in the truest sense — dirt floor with an old brick foundation and a low ceiling. It was a narrow, dank, rather creepy place. Duct work hung below, as did loose wires, while pipes went off in different directions. An old wash basin stood in the middle next to a modern water heater, both perched on a brick slab. The basement was lit by a single, bare bulb and two half-covered windows. Black tarps had been used to cover a large number of objects — presumably the things Ms. Williamson wanted to keep dry in this dank section of the house.
Max walked the length of the narrow basement, taking pictures every few steps — far more pictures than he had taken while pretending to be an author upstairs. No matter where he looked, he did not see anything that resembled a door to a tunnel. But there had to be one. If not, if Freddie Robertson had been lying or if he had remembered a different house from somewhere else, then all of this would fail.
“You almost done down there?”
Max took one last picture before returning upstairs. “Sorry if I was taking too long.”
Ms. Williamson opened the front door. “Not trying to be rude, but I have a trip ahead of me. I need to finish packing, if I’m going to catch my flight. If you want to come by next week, I’d be happy to let you take your time and really get a good look around. I’ll even fish out the key to the shed.”
“That would be wonderful.”
As he walked down the stone stairs toward his car, Max could feel her eyes on his back — every bit as dark and penetrating as those he felt upon him from the Darian house. He had to drive a full block before he could shake the feeling and think c
learly.
He needed that tunnel for the plan to work — no other safe way into the house with Wayne guarding it — and he had already set the Sandwich Boys on their task. The plan was in motion. He had to check himself — was it only his desire, his need, for the tunnel to be there that made him think it was there? No. It had to be there. His gut knew it. Besides, for Sandra and him, the only way ever was through.
As he pulled out of the neighborhood and drove toward the highway, he crossed his fingers. Never before had he relied on his gut with so much riding on that decision. But Drummond believed in such intuitions, and though he would never let the ghost hear it, he had come to respect his partner on such matters.
“Then my gut it is. We’ll find that tunnel.”
Chapter 26
Max delved into his big, chopped sandwich, closed his eyes, and let his tongue enjoy the delicate flavor of the vinegar-based barbecue sauce as it blended with coleslaw and pulled pork to form an exquisite bite. Sandra and Drummond sat next to him. On the opposite side of the table, Libby, Carl, and Jack poked at their lunch.
Little Richard’s was busy, as usual, but Max’s group managed to push together a few tables and run them parallel to the windows. They left enough room for the waitresses and the other customers to get by, but not by much. The 1950s décor and the constant bustle warmed Max like a comforter in the winter. This place was a good place, and he needed that at the moment.
Max indulged in another mouthful. He knew everybody waited to hear why he had brought them together, but his plan would be dangerous — possibly life-threatening. If he was going to die before another day arrived, he wanted his last meal to be his favorite. As he savored each bite, Sandra explained that Shawnee had left that morning.
“We couldn’t keep her,” Sandra told Max. “She seemed fine for a few hours, but shortly after sunrise, she said that she had to go back. She had to try to convince Wayne to leave the house with her.”
Libby offered vigorous agreement. “Don’t think we were going to let her go by herself. We insisted that we tag along to protect her, and she said that would be fine. But then she went into the bathroom, and while we waited, she slipped out the window. We were going to follow her — we assume she went back to the house — but Sandra said we’d only make the situation worse. Wayne doesn’t like us very much.”
Carl wiped ketchup off his mouth. “It’s a good thing you didn’t go after her. You ladies would have gotten yourselves killed.”
Sandra turned a cold eye upon him. “I think I’ve faced far worse things than you’ve ever peed your pants about.”
Like a casino dealer ending bets at roulette, Jack waved his hands over the table. “Hey, guys, can we just chill? Stop all this arguing.”
“Oh, there’s a voice of authority,” Drummond said with a snort.
Max cleaned his fingers on a paper napkin and sipped his soda. He sighed with the mixed pleasure and disappointment of swallowing the final bite. “It’s okay, everybody. First, we know where Shawnee went. We’ll get her back.”
Libby snapped her fingers at him. “You don’t know that.”
“I do. I think I know everything about this case now.”
“Well, are you going to enlighten us or would you rather order more food and keep packing it away like there’s no tomorrow?”
“That is my fear.”
Libby clamped her mouth shut as her ears digested his words.
Max hoped they heard a voice as tough and confident as he tried to sound. Despite his bravado, he found the last bits of his barbecue sandwich binding up in his stomach. He winked at Sandra. In a flash, he saw that she knew the truth. Her hand went onto his knee with a slight squeeze, and her eyes glistened even as she forced on a brave face.
“How bad is this?” she asked.
“At the moment, I’m having fond memories of Dr. Connor.”
“That bad?”
Libby blurted in, “Will someone tell us what’s going on?”
Drummond said, “Yeah, if you’re going to make me sit here and look at all this wonderful food that I can’t eat, you better have something to show for it.”
Max slid aside his basket of fries before lacing his fingers on the table. He knew how he must have looked, but he wasn’t trying to be overly dramatic. Nor was he trying to keep them out of the loop. Rather, he knew once he spoke, once he told them the whole story, everything would move fast. The longer he took to speak, the longer he could cling to this simple, pleasurable moment of having lunch with his wife, his partner, and some fine people who simply wanted to help others. But even as he thought about it, he knew the moment had gone.
“In the late 1800s, Jeremiah Unger opened up a general store here in Winston-Salem. It was on Trade, north of 12th Street, not far from our office. An all-wood building that serviced the entire community in that area. The northern section of the city was not flush with money. In fact, the majority of the populace there were former slaves or the first generation of former slaves struggling to survive in a new world that did not welcome them. But Unger’s store did well, and survived for close to a decade.
“This next part, I discovered in my notes from early on but never knew its importance. Turns out, this is the key to everything. On November 2, 1902 at 5:20 in the morning, Winston’s reservoir collapsed. Over one million gallons of water thrust down upon that northern section of Winston. Shoddily-made, one-story rental homes of black families were wiped clean from the ground in the flood. Nine people were confirmed dead, but many reports suggested that number had to be a lot higher — the white police officers didn’t feel it necessary to count all the black bodies.
“Unger lived above his store along with his wife and two daughters. At first, they must have thought they would survive the flood by holing up on the second story. It could have worked out that way, too, had the surrounding buildings also been multi-story. There might have been enough material blocking the rushing waters to lessen their impact. But Unger’s was alone in this way. Couple that with cheap construction and they didn’t stand a chance.”
With a hand on her chest, Libby said, “So, they drowned?”
“Some. We can hope that’s the case. But according to various reports and eyewitness accounts, it appears that the building shattered into pieces. As it washed away, much of Unger’s General Store got clogged up against other homes and debris. Unfortunately, screams could be heard for a long time. For some of them, it was a slow, agonizing death.”
Max’s words hung in the air until Sandra said, “This building, this wood, it was used to build the Darians’ house.”
Max nodded. “I think the Unger family haunts that wood.”
Libby, Carl, and Jack exchanged glances. “That’s good news,” she said. “That means we know exactly who we’re dealing with, and we can help them get to rest.”
Max’s chair groaned as he shifted. “There’s more to this. See, the flood also killed Floyd Johnson and Milton Hull while they were in those woods making whiskey.”
“Let me guess,” Drummond said. “Their stills were located exactly where Skinner Warehousing now sits.”
“It’s possible their stills were where we found Floyd’s ghost. Or maybe the flood washed him to that location to die. Either way, he has no grave today because nobody found a body — that is, nobody identified his body. Now, this next part I have no proof of, but I suspect that Milton Hull was in the process of making his bottles when he died.”
Sandra’s face lit up as she connected the dots. “Milton Hull put magic on those bottles to make his horrible whiskey taste better. What if as a last ditch effort to survive, or more likely as a result of his poor magic skills — what if he transferred himself into the bottle? His soul?”
“That’s what I’m thinking. And these two events, the Unger’s tragic horror being imprinted onto the wood of their building and Milton Hull either willfully or accidentally transferring himself into a bottle, combined in one location — the Darian house. The wood w
as used to build the house, and Hull’s bottles, which by the 1920s were highly sought after, were stored in the tunnel that connected to the brothel. So, the house itself became like a ghost.”
Drummond tipped his hat to Max. “I like that. It explains why Sandra and I couldn’t find a ghost because it was the house.”
Jack appeared to like the idea as well. “The arrival of a baby must have awoken the house.”
Libby sat forward. “No. It’s worse. The coming baby awoke Milton Hull. That’s why the house revealed the bottle.” Her eyes widened as she rose to her feet. “The house is trying to protect the Darians because Milton Hull’s spirit wants a body. The baby.”
Max said, “That’s my fear. Wayne is succumbing to Milton Hull’s influence. The Hull magic has driven away Wayne’s own sanity, but I don’t see why Milton doesn’t just take over Wayne.”
“It’s harder. Taking over an adult brain is difficult. The adult will fight back.”
Max recalled when a witch had taken over Sandra. In many ways, it was Sandra’s fighting spirit that had saved her life. “Then he’s after the baby because a baby won’t fight back.”
“A baby’s brain is still developing, and its spirit is completely innocent. Much easier for Milton to step in and take over.”
Max gestured for Libby to sit back down. “This is all in line with my thinking, and that’s why I have a plan.”
Drummond moved around the table, his excitement daring to create warmth around his dead soul. “Max, I like what you’ve done here. Not only did you put all the pieces together, but you’ve come with a plan. That’s the kind of partner I want. You’re making me happy.”
Max suppressed a grin. “I think we can defeat this somewhat the same way we would break a binding curse. Except instead of cutting through a circle to break the curse, this curse is in the wood itself. Once the spirits have been let loose from the wood, they can move on and will no longer empower the house.”
Carl cleared his throat. “I thought the house was keeping Hull at bay. If you release those spirits, won’t he have free reign to do what he wants?”
