“I’m trying to find someone. A friend. I hope one of you can help me locate him.”
“Let’s you and me be friends,” one of the hungry ones says. The others laugh.
“He’s probably around sixty, black, thin, missing fingers on his left hand. Wears overalls. I need to find him. It’s important.”
“What’s his name?” The man who asks has stepped out of the dark. The others get out of his way. He’s huge and too well-fed to be a street person.
“Charlie. I need to talk to him. He knows who I am.”
“What’s your name?”
“Jack Raven.” I scan the group. “Do any of you know who I’m talking about? I need to find him soon. It’s important.”
“You already said that. Say what’s in it for us?”
“My eternal gratitude.” They laugh.
“Sounds like you’re looking for Mac the Night. Don’t ever go by Charlie that I know of. Guess he could.”
I didn’t notice that one in the group is a woman, though without hearing her voice, I might not have guessed.
“Where can I find Mac?”
“Let me think… let me think….” Everyone is laughing but me. A few are taking new positions. The energy they’re stirring up isn’t friendly.
“Thanks for your time.” I turn to go back to the jeep. Now that I might know what the man goes by, I can ask Radford if he knows of him.
“No, wait. Buy an old lady a bottle of wine, and I’ll show you where he lives.”
I look back. No one is moving, but all eyes are on me. The woman looks harmless enough, but I don’t want to go anywhere with her. Surviving out here on her own is cause enough to be weary of the woman.
“Walk with me and you can tell me where he lives,” I say over my shoulder and keep going.
I pass the tree where Josh isn’t waiting for me. Then I hear more than one set of footsteps behind me. No one is talking. I glance back and see several bodies moving fast in my direction. I’m prey now and prey moves even faster.
I cut over to the woods and away from the fire’s light. I move between the trees and kneel behind one to watch two of the younger men and the old woman looking around. She’s stomping and cursing me and the gods. The men are sniffing the air.
“There,” one yells, and points in my direction. Apparently, he can smell clean.
I start to run when a werewolf howl breaks the sound barrier. The wolfdog is standing a few feet in front of them, but not for long. They scream and rush back to their camp.
“Let’s get out of here,” I say, and we run to the jeep. Mojo is reluctant to get inside. He never considers himself anyone’s prey.
Alex is at the front desk when I walk into the hotel. He jumps when he sees me. I might too if I was alone in a haunted hotel at two in the morning and saw someone who just ran from a bunch of street people through the woods.
“How’s ghost hunting going?” He’s grinning from ear to ear now.
“The ghosts are winning. How are the rats?”
He laughs, but I’m not kidding. I’m tempted to go to Aubrey’s office to see if she has Rita, but I know the door will be bolted shut.
“I made sure the basement door is locked. I haven’t heard a sound from the hall all night. So far anyway.”
“You know anyone who goes by the name Mac the Night?”
“I don’t know anyone who has a the in their name. He a musician?”
“Could be. I think he’s the man I met at the fountain the first night I was here.”
He laughs, but it’s a nervous laugh. “You might want to check down the street at the Dirty Dog. A lot of old men hang out down there.”
I tell him I’ve already checked out the place then start in the direction of the elevator, but Aubrey is still on my mind. I ask him if he knows her.
“She’s Ms. Boshears’ assistant.”
“I know that. You look about her age. Do you know her outside of work?”
“Yeah, kind of. She was a senior when I was a freshman so she never spoke to me. I never saw her hanging out with anyone. She acts like she doesn’t even remember that we went to the same school. Who knows? Maybe she doesn’t.”
“Any idea how she got the job here?”
Alex shrugs.
“Okay, try to stay awake.”
“Do you think this Mac guy is getting in the basement?”
“Like the police said, the noise you heard the other night was probably a bunch of rats. Just keep the door locked and you’ll be fine.”
“Yeah. I don’t like them none, but I’m not afraid of rats. Thing is though, rats don’t laugh.”
Chapter Twenty Nine
§
A phone call wakes me the next morning. It’s Detective Radford and he sounds like he’s been up for hours.
He says he’s pulled records that he’ll let me review. He says to be at the station at eleven. I have no idea what time it is until we disconnect. Nice guy. He gave me forty minutes to get ready and get to the station.
When I get downstairs, the lobby is empty and the clerk is on the phone. I manage to get out the door without anyone noticing, unless Aubrey was peeking around the corner.
I barely have enough time to go through the drive-thru for coffee. I’m only five minutes late. A woman who looks too young to be a cop comes out to retrieve me from the waiting room. She’s adjusting her holster and looking bored until she sees Mojo. He’s still in his bad mood from last night and is stuck in assailant mode. Everyone is getting a double dose of his wolf attitude.
We pass the closed interrogation doors on the way to a conference room at the end of the hall. I count five banker boxes at the end of the table. There are more on the floor. Radford has stacks of files in front of him. He looks tired and irritated.
“Ms. Raven.” He nods to the cop who closes the door behind her then he points to a chair across from him. He does a double take in looking at the wolfdog.
“Sorry for the short notice.” He chuckles under his breath. I’ve looked better.
“Late night,” I say.
“Hazards of the profession?”
“Something like that.” He’s pushed a file across the table and is waiting for me to open it. I sip my coffee and retrieve my notepad before I do. My first thought is that the man’s got a sick side to him. The file is the autopsy photos and the term butchered is putting it mildly. The murderer had a thing against faces– all three of them.
My empty stomach is queasy, and I don’t think Radford’s game is funny. I’m about to say something not so funny myself. Before I do, Radford reaches for the file and says, “I’d sure haunt a place if someone did that to me.”
His words surprise me as much as his anger. “Yeah,” I say. “I’d want justice served on a platter if one of those faces was mine.” As soon as I hear my words, I realize I haven’t felt any of that anger on the thirteenth floor.
“So what can you share about the case? Anything on the crawl space?” I forgot to ask Boshears about the maintenance file.
Radford tells me he was curious about what I said. He and a couple of officers searched for something about it or other hidden corridors in the hotel. He looks disappointed when he says he thinks Seggren was just messing with me. I agree that’s possible.
The detective goes through my previous inquiries. He actually has a list, and I’m almost impressed.
The coroner estimated the murders occurred between one and two o’clock in the morning. Two female employees were on desk duty that night. They were never considered suspects. There were no signs of a break-in. The investigators concluded that the murderer used the stairs, brought a change of clothes, and wore gloves. DNA testing was done, but all was ruled out. The detective leans back in his chair. I can tell he’s not satisfied with the findings.
“DNA testing’s come a long way since 2002,” I suggest.
Radford nods. “It was determined early in the investigation that the murders were an inside job. Butch Seggren was l
ast seen by one of the clerks in the kitchen around seven that night. No one saw him leave.”
“I understand that a trail of dirt was found in the rooms?”
“Where’d you hear that? There was no dirt or any other evidence,” Radford says.
“Local gossip. Were the garden grounds ever searched?”
Radford laughs. “You sure you’re not a detective at heart? There’s reference to a cadaver dog. It’s hard to say if one was used.”
He pushes an envelope across the table and tells me it’s everything that was mentioned about the hotel’s security. “It’s for the new owner and your own review. She should probably hire a real security expert to check things out.” He catches himself and smiles.
“I’m sure a real security expert would be wise. I’ll suggest it to her. What about the personnel files and the hotel register for the night of the murders? They aren’t in the files that the previous owner left on site. I’d also like to read Miriam Dodd’s statement.”
“We confiscated those records. Sorry, I’ve given you all the information I can disclose on the case. No one except Seggren was ever a suspect. I suggest you pass that on to Ms. Boshears too.”
I ask why he thinks Seggren was found not guilty. He shakes his head. I remember what Carol said about her dreams. “Anything happen on the case three years ago?”
He jerks his head up and his eye shift. “Like what?”
“Like anything.”
“Can’t say it did.” He’s shuffling papers like he’s looking for something.
“Did the autopsies reveal drugs or medication?”
Radford flinches. “I can’t disclose the details of the autopsy findings.”
I know he just did.
“I may have a contact name for the man I met that first night at the hotel. Maybe you can help me with it. Ever hear of a street person who goes by Mac the Night?”
“Sounds familiar. I’ll have one of the officers check the database before you leave. You want to talk to him because he thinks someone is turning on the lights every night? Don’t you think someone would have noticed that by now?” Radford’s got a sideway smile.
I ignore the questions. “Anything you can tell me about the man would be appreciated.”
“Probably wouldn’t hurt to check him out. It’s a little curious what he said. Maybe you misunderstood what he meant. Of course, criminals do like to return to the scene of their crimes. How’d you find out his name?”
I tell him about my visit to Quincy Park last night. He shakes his head. “Street people used to be considered annoying because they were always asking for spare change. Those days are over. Now they’re vicious in demanding money for drugs. Do me a favor and stay out of the park at night.”
I start to tell him I’ll consider it, but the man’s mind is elsewhere and I’d be lying anyway. “Is there something else you want to tell me?”
He laughs and looks at the table. When he looks up, he looks weary. “There was a related file that got catalogued with the murder investigation. It was on the hotel’s owner.”
“Ellen Boshears?” I say, too loud.
“No. Abner Tollison.”
∞
I stop for fast food and head to the lake near the hotel in the hopes of getting Mojo in a better mood and clearing my own head.
Before I left the police station, an officer found Mac the Night aka Malachi Morris in their database. Several arrests for intoxication in public are the man’s only known crimes. If he was around the Herman Hotel on July 7, 2002, the cop didn’t share that information with me. Mac’s residence was listed as homeless. I’d still like to talk to the man again, but not as much as I had been.
I finish lunch and take out my laptop. I know I’ve already searched for the man, but I want to confirm what Radford told me I wouldn’t find– any write-up by the local paper on the suicide of Abner Tollison.
For some reason, I just assumed the man died of old age. I’d asked Radford why the cover-up on Tollison’s death. He didn’t like the term cover-up, so I asked him for a better explanation. Other than out of respect for a prominent member of the community, he didn’t have one.
It wasn’t the suicide that troubled me. From what Carol said, the murders devastated the man and they clearly destroyed his business. The hotel meant enough to Tollison to continue its upkeep while it set empty for another fifteen years. He cared enough to pass it on to a family member, even one who didn’t know of him. Those things were strange enough, but it was the man’s personal business to do whatever he wanted.
What troubled me was what Radford didn’t say. I’d felt a heaviness when I first walked in the conference room. Considering the burdens and stress of the profession, that was understandable. But Radford’s discomfort increased as soon as he disclosed the cause of Tollison’s death.
I’m sure the detective has seen the aftermath of a suicide or two, so I know that wasn’t the reason. It shouldn’t have clouded his mind the way it did, and I knew there was more he didn’t plan on revealing to me. I still wanted to know so I asked and asked again.
I turn off my laptop and watch Mojo sneaking up on some geese. I throw a rock to warn them, and he gives me the evil eye.
There wasn’t anything on the internet that I hadn’t already read about Tollison. As anticipated, I found nothing about his suicide. Clearly, the man had connections in this town, but it’s not his privacy that’s on my mind.
I’m thinking about the man I saw walking to the elevator when I was staying on the twelfth floor. I’m thinking about the entity that entered my room when I experienced sleep paralysis and who I saw walking past the fountain to the garden.
Mostly though, I’m thinking about the blow to my ankle and the whispered words when I got locked in the basement the other day. The same basement where Abner Tollison’s remains were found at the bottom of the stairs with a bullet in his decomposed head.
Chapter Thirty
§
I’ve spent so much time focused on the three women and their murderer that I missed the obvious. Abner Tollison has found it impossible to leave his beloved hotel.
Tonight I want to make absolutely certain the women’s spirits are no longer in their long ago rooms. Then I’m giving Tollison my full attention, which he’s obviously been trying to get all along. Maybe he’ll disclose who the murderer was. Maybe he’ll even tell me what happened to Rita.
I’m not looking forward to returning to the hotel. It’s occurred to me that Boshears’ and Aubrey’s dispositions aren’t helping matters. Tollison may be regretting his decision to pass his hotel on to his niece.
We head to Quincy Park and enjoy the air conditioner for a few minutes before braving the sweltering ninety degree heat. A few children are playing on the equipment while watchful adults look like they wish they were elsewhere.
The laughter fades as soon as I reach the camp I visited last night. It’s empty of the people I met here, but signs of them remain. The park closes at nine o’clock, and I’m debating on returning when my phone rings. I’m walking back to the jeep and almost trip over my feet. The call is from K. Lynch. It may be my first call ever from a ghost.
“Hello?”
The caller is male and the voice is hometown friendly. Carol Taine gave Kay Lynch’s son, Kyle, my number. I guess he’s that something I sensed she wasn’t telling me about. The ten year old kid is a man now, and he hasn’t stopped talking since I said hello.
Kyle is a real estate agent, and he just got done showing a house in town. He wants to buy me a cup of coffee. I agree to meet him, but I’m apprehensive. I feel more than friendliness in his voice. I feel fear disguised as hope.
I stop at the hotel to drop off Mojo. He’s thrilled to spread out on the bed in our air conditioned room. As soon as I get off the elevator, I hear Aubrey and she doesn’t sound happy. Apparently, a new desk clerk isn’t living up to her high standards. I linger in the lobby to eavesdrop.
Aubrey goes into barracuda mod
e. The woman’s latest victim is probably in her early twenties and is on the verge of tears. Aubrey has her back to me when I go to the desk. The young woman’s eyes are bulging at me. Aubrey turns around with her professional face glowing. When she sees it’s me, her jaw tightens.
“Is Ms. Boshears in this afternoon?” She’s about the last person I want to talk to, and I don’t have the time anyway, but I feel sorry for the clerk who’s about to bite through her bottom lip.
“No, she isn’t.” Aubrey says each word slowly and carefully.
I cross my arms and glare then mock her tone. “When. Will. She. Be?” She tells me after five and stomps away. The clerk smiles.
Fifteen minutes later, I walk into a diner near the interstate. Kyle Lynch is a salesman with a booming personality. He practically shakes my hand off my arm. Despite his age, I can still see a wounded little boy’s face.
Kyle insists we have the diner’s award winning jam Bundt cake with our coffee. He’s celebrating the sale of a house in town. He describes it in more detail than needed. He fills his coffee cup with sugar then looks up. “So tell me, Jack, have you learned anything about my mother’s murder?”
His voice is soft and warm. His mother would be proud. “I’m not here to solve the murders.”
He laughs. “I checked up on you. I don’t know anything about ghosts, but I know you’re looking into things and talking with folks about the murders, including Detective Radford.”
Before I can reply, he interrupts. “Don’t worry, I’m not stalking you. Neither me or Carol expect you to do what the police haven’t, but we’re not going to ignore what you’re doing for us.”
“Don’t misunderstand my purpose here. I’m doing work for the hotel and have nothing to offer—
“Don’t ever discount the power of hope. You gave both of us that and it’s plenty.”
I cringe and sip my coffee.
“Once a month, every month, I call whichever detective is assigned to the case and ask for an update. Until you came to town, it had been a long time since I had one. You got Detective Radford to dust off the boxes that are all that’s left of my mom– where the police are concerned anyway. For that I’m grateful and always will be, even if nothing comes of it.”
The Taw Ridge Haunting Page 15
