“Doesn’t matter. The item’s owner found it in the sinkhole that opened up behind that empty big box store.”
Mrs. Morrissey motioned for me to follow her into the next room, where several computers were set up for browsing the Archive’s collection. She sat down at one of the stations and her fingers flew across the keys as she searched for what she was looking for in pages of old documents that had been imaged.
“Here,” she said, pointing at the screen. I saw a photo of the plaza in better days, before its tenants had deserted it. “Is this the place?”
I nodded. “That’s it.”
Mrs. Morrissey called up several old newspaper clippings and scanned down through them until she found just what she wanted. “That area’s had more than its share of bad luck,” she said finally. “The plaza was quite the place when it first opened, but one thing after another went wrong. Electrical fires, burst water pipes, a couple of muggings in the parking lot—they just couldn’t seem to get a break.”
That kind of bad luck didn’t usually happen by accident. Often, some kind of unresolved supernatural power created havoc on that scale, and when the ill-fortune lasted for decades, I started wondering about curses.
“What about before the plaza was built?” I asked. “Do you have any records about what used to be on that location?”
Again, Mrs. Morrissey played the computer keyboard like a concert pianist, coaxing details from the Archive’s database. More old newspaper clippings appeared on screen, along with grainy photos from the past. “As I recall, Palmetto View Plaza was an attempt by some of the city’s developers to reclaim that area from decline and turn some of the real estate values around,” she said, tapping a pencil against the desktop as she thought.
“Lots of areas have their ups and downs,” she said, “but that area never really took off. Back in the 1700s, there were taverns and brothels and barracks for soldiers.” She scrolled down through articles too quickly for me to read them. “In the 1800s, the brothels were there, along with cheap rooming houses and more taverns. Later on, there were piecework shops and cotton mills—deplorable conditions—until it all washed away in the Hurricane of 1885.”
“Piecework shops?” I questioned. “You mean, places with seamstresses?”
Mrs. Morrissey nodded. “Nowadays they call it ‘vertical integration’. Some of the big cotton farmers also owned the mills that turned the cotton into thread and the thread into cloth. Then a few enterprising folks went a step further and brought over hundreds of indentured servants from Ireland and England to use the new-fangled sewing machines and turn out off-the-rack clothing working people could afford,” she said.
Interesting, considering that I had a piece of one of those antique sewing machines back at the shop. “What happened in the Hurricane of 1885?” I asked.
This time, Mrs. Morrissey called up old photographs. Charleston is near the coast, so it’s been slammed by its share of hurricanes and storms. People still talk about what happened when Hurricane Hugo came to town. New tragedies happen, and old ones slip out of memory. As I looked over Mrs. Morrissey’s shoulder at the images of flattened homes and buildings, I got a chill down the back of my neck.
“The high winds pushed the flood waters pretty far into the city,” Mrs. Morrissey said. “All the way to the area around where Palmetto View stands now. The land rose a little there, and the flood tide carried all the debris to that part of town, and then dumped them as the water receded.”
“What did they do about it?” I asked, my skin tingling with the certainty that I was onto something.
Mrs. Morrissey shook her head. “Not much they could do about it, with how bad the damage was everywhere. Most of the folks in that neighborhood were too poor to rebuild, and a lot of them died in the flooding or just left and didn’t come back. From what I’ve read, the city just covered up the debris with dirt and built over them.”
“So when the sinkhole opened behind the plaza, it might have exposed some of those debris, if it went deep enough?”
Mrs. Morrissey nodded. “I guess that’s possible. Assuming anything was left—it’s been more than one hundred years.”
I acted on a hunch, although I wasn’t entirely sure why. “Do you know if there are any lists of the people who died in that hurricane?”
“Probably—although they’re likely to be incomplete,” she replied. “There are always folks who don’t get counted when things like that happen—transients, homeless people, you know what I mean.”
Indentured servants, I mentally added to the list, resolved to find out more. “I realize that,” I said. “But if you can find a list—if it’s not too much trouble—I think it might help with provenance for the piece.”
Fifteen minutes later, I left with an invitation to the Archive’s next gala and a print-out of the known dead from the Hurricane of 1885.
* * *
The shop was busier than I would have expected for an autumn afternoon when I got back, so I didn’t get a chance to talk with Teag until we closed up. “Blair dropped off another piece of a sewing machine,” he said, pushing a lock of dark hair out of his eyes. “If you want to take a look at it, I’ve got a fresh pitcher of iced tea in the break room.”
I mock-glared at him. “Very funny.” Unfortunately, Teag was right. The iced tea helped me recover from strong readings, and I had the feeling that the sinkhole behind Palmetto View Plaza was a supernatural hotspot. But I couldn’t shake the feeling that there was more to it than that. I wagered that the ‘debris’ Mrs. Morrissey said were jumbled up and built on top of probably included bodies of flood victims that were never found. If so, that kind of improper burial and restless dead might account for some of the problems the plaza and the surrounding area had experienced over the years. But intuition was telling me to look deeper, although I had the suspicion that I wouldn’t like what I found if I did.
“Before we get to that,” I said, stalling, “let me fill you in on what I found out at the Archive.” Teag listened as we finished putting things in the front of the store away for the night, and then followed me to the break room.
“I think you’re onto something,” Teag said, pouring a glass of iced tea for each of us. “I talked to Ryan Alexander—the urban explorer guy you met a while back?”
I nodded, remembering. Teag and I had gone out with Ryan’s team when we were trying to stop a dangerous ghost, and just for fun a few times since then. Urban explorers like to go through old buildings, abandoned factories and institutions, even old storm drains and forgotten subway tunnels, for the thrill of finding the ruins civilization leaves behind. Teag, Sorren, and I often found ourselves poking around the same kind of places for entirely different purposes. That’s why Teag and I figured that going along with the UrbExers was good exercise, and we might get a look at odd places that could come in handy later on. “What does he have to do with this?” I asked, taking a sip of my tea.
“That plaza has been abandoned for a while now,” Teag said. “I figured if anyone had been inside lately—anyone who would talk to me—it would be Ryan’s folks. And I was right.”
“And?” I reached for a couple of cookies, too.
“Ryan said they did go poking around there about six months ago, and got into the big box store on the end. He said that they cut the exploration short because something didn’t feel right.”
“Interesting,” I said with a mouthful of Oreos.
“Interesting enough that Ryan got in touch with his friends at the Southern Paranormal Observation and Outreach Klub—that’s ‘club’ with a ‘k’,” he replied.
I rolled my eyes. “Seriously? They go by SPOOK?”
Teag chuckled and nodded. “Yeah. But according to Ryan, they know their stuff, at least the core members do. That’s why we’re meeting him for pizza in an hour.” He reached for a lumpy parcel wrapped in cloth that was in the center of the table and slid it toward me. “So you’d probably better see what you make of this, so you can get you
r second wind before we connect with the SPOOK guy.”
I nodded and took a deep breath, preparing myself. Teag unwrapped the bundle, and I saw the battered body of an antique Singer sewing machine. Time and exposure to the elements had badly scratched the black and gold paint. All of the smaller pieces were missing. But considering that the machine had probably been at the bottom of those flood debris for a very long time, it wasn’t in bad shape.
I rested my hand on its cold, smooth main arm. Time shifted. I saw what the last owner of the sewing machine had seen, rows of tables, all outfitted with similar machines, in a large, stifling room. Women sat at the machines, eyes downcast on their work, guiding fabric beneath the click-clack of the needles and bobbins, feet pumping the treadles in steady rhythm. They were dressed in neat but plain clothing like household staff in a manor or hotel. All of the women looked very young, teens and twenties, and most had a gaunt, underfed appearance.
“Clara—watch that hem, it’s not straight! Mary, adjust the bobbin. Your thread is puckering. Bess, pick up the pace, girl. You haven’t finished anything all day.” A stern-looking, older woman walked up and down the rows. She stopped now and then to chide the workers. No one looked up at her, and I could feel myself tense with fear as she walked by.
High overhead, a few windows were cranked open, not enough to combat the heat. One of the other seamstresses collapsed at her machine, slipping bonelessly out of her chair. Two of her co-workers stood to go to her aid.
“Leave her!” the matron snapped. “She’ll wake up. Stay at your machines.” The others left the girl where she lay, glowering at the matron, who brought the girl a glass of water and helped her back to her seat.
Outside, the wind had picked up. Now and again, the young women dared to glance up from their work toward the small windows up above. The sky was gunmetal gray, and gusts of wind rattled the doors. “Keep your eyes on your seams!” the matron said, but I could hear an edge of nervousness in her voice. “Storm’ll likely be over by the time the workday’s done.”
I heard the distant sound of church bells ringing the hour. Another blast of wind shrieked as it tore past the building’s roof, and one of the other girls cried out in alarm. Several of the women bowed their heads, and I heard voices whispering the Hail Mary with a distinct Irish accent. Some of the others quickly crossed themselves without slowing their machines.
Rain began to fall, loud on the tin roof. It grew louder, hammering like a blacksmith, as the wind slammed against the building’s brick walls, rattling the panes of glass high above. Inside, the temperature fell as cold wind blasted through the open windows overhead. The vision blurred, and time passed. When my sight cleared again, the rain lashed the building so hard it had broken out some of the panes of glass in the windows near the roofline, and water was running down the walls in rivulets.
I pricked my finger on a pin and drew a bead of blood. “Emily! Be careful. Don’t stain the fabric, or it comes out of your wages!” the matron warned me. I thought her voice was sharper than usual, and I wondered if she was afraid, too.
The sky outside was dark, and it was too early in the day for the gas lamps to be lit. I blinked, trying to see the stitches in the dim light. My hands were shaking, and my heart skipped a beat every time the wind battered the building. But I knew better than to ask if we could go home. A full day’s work for a day’s wages; that was the contract. I listened to the wind howl, and shivered. Truth be told, the brick-walled factory was sturdier built than the ramshackle rooming house where we all stayed.
Outside, there was a crash, booming like cannon fire. I jumped, and my fabric veered crazily, but I wasn’t the only one. Another crash, and then another echoed nearby. The matron shouted for order, but it was too late for that. The sewing machines stopped their clicking, but the sounds of the storm filled the large room.
“Get back to work! It’s just rain,” the matron ordered, but she didn’t sound certain.
Just then, a sheet of metal from the roof tore loose with the screaming sound of ripping steel. Water poured into the center of the room, soaking us and our machines. The wind snatched at the remaining roof panels, and the huge pieces of metal wobbled and groaned.
Work was forgotten as we ran screaming toward the far end of the building, and the matron ran with us. The sky was dumping water down so fast that the rain fell like a waterfall. We ran toward the doors, pulling and pushing, but chains on the outside held them fast.
“The key! Please open it! Use the key!” We shouted, but the matron shook her head, and I read our doom in her face.
“I don’t have a key, girls. We’ll have to make the best of it.”
The rear wall had begun to bow, and then as we watched in horror, the bricks gave way and tumbled to the ground, bringing the sagging roof down with it. We screamed, but the wind and rain hid the sound, and the rising water weighed down our heavy dresses until it could take our breath. I flailed, but I never had learned how to swim…
“Cassidy! Cassidy! Come back.” Teag urged. He was watching me with concern as I came back to myself, shaking my head as the terrified screams of the drowning women faded in my memory.
I lifted my head to meet his gaze. “They drowned,” I said quietly. “They were locked in, and a hurricane destroyed the building. Indentured servants. No one cared. Her name was Emily.”
Teag pushed the sweet iced tea toward me, and I sipped it to recover my strength, but I grieved for those long-ago lost women. Locking workers into factories was a common practice until a devastating fire in the 1920s forced changes, almost forty years after the Hurricane of 1885 hit Charleston and killed Emily. My hands stopped shaking, but I knew I would grieve Emily’s death for a long time.
Teag was already scanning down the list of the hurricane’s victims. “Emily O’Connor. Indentured servant, age twenty-two. Lost, presumed dead,” he said. “There are about fifteen girls, all with Irish surnames, all marked as indentured servants, near the same age,” he added.
I shook my head. “There were double that many, at least,” I said. “They never found them all, or didn’t think it was important enough to update the records.” I sighed. To the city’s wealthy and powerful, poor immigrant seamstresses were nobodies, far from home and without family nearby to make a fuss. Whoever had owned the sweatshop probably just sent over for more and started again in a different building. I looked at the battered sewing machine. Whatever happened, I wanted to do right by Emily’s memory.
“Let’s go meet the SPOOK guy,” I said, draining my iced tea. “Maybe dinner will make me feel better.” I doubted it.
Charleston loves Halloween. We’re not as over-the-top as New Orleans, or as understated as Savannah. Charleston knows how to put on a party with class, even if it’s for All Hallow’s Eve. Pumpkins and decorative pots full of golden mums adorned the more sedate entranceways, peeking from behind wrought iron gates. Door wreaths of colored leaves and rainbow-hued small gourds added a touch of seasonal zing to other homes and businesses. Jack-o-lanterns glowed from windows and porches. Folks from up North might still think it was warm, but for us, the nights had gotten downright chilly.
Still, I couldn’t avoid a shiver that was more to do with fear than temperature as Teag and I headed for Jocko’s Pizzeria, our favorite place. Something unsettling was in the air, a vibe that felt like discordant music to my magic. Even without touching anything, I felt uneasy, like a storm was brewing.
Two men were waiting for us when we arrived. One I recognized as Anthony Benton, a young lawyer who was Teag’s long-time steady romantic partner. The other man I didn’t know. Both Anthony and the stranger rose when we approached.
“Figured you wouldn’t mind us getting a table, since it gets crowded fast,” Anthony said with a grin, greeting me with a hug and Teag with a quick peck on the cheek when he thought no one would notice.
“Cassidy, this is Kell Winston, founder of SPOOK,” Teag said, introducing the newcomer.
Kell was as tall
as Anthony, with blue eyes, light-brown hair and a tan that looked like he had been out on a sailboat all summer. Anthony was GQ to Teag’s hoodie and jeans, and Kell’s style was somewhere in the middle, not quite the up-and-coming-young-lawyer look that Anthony rocked, or the insouciant grad student look Teag pulled off. Kell wore a tweed jacket in an updated cut over a black t-shirt and jeans over sneakers. Professional, but not stuffy.
“Hi, Cassidy,” Kell said, as Teag joined Anthony on one side of the booth. “Nice to meet you.” He slid across the booth seat to let me have the outside. “Anthony’s said a lot of nice things about both of you.”
I glanced from Anthony to Kell. “You know each other?”
Anthony grinned. “We went to University of South Carolina together. Pledged the same fraternity. I went to law school, and Kell went into TV production.”
“Gadgets,” Kell confessed. “It’s my weakness. And it’s a passion that crossed over from my day job to all the paranormal investigations we do at SPOOK.” He slid two business cards over to me, one for SPOOK, and one from a local video production company.
“Let’s order, then talk,” Teag said. “I’m starving.” My stomach growled, and I blamed it on the delicious aroma of the pizzas. Giacomo Rossi—Jocko—is a friend of ours, and he waved from his spot behind the counter as I looked up. Teag and I ate there so often Jocko knew what we wanted without us needing to order, but the server stopped by anyhow.
“I hear you’re interested in the old Palmetto View Plaza,” Kell said, cutting a glance my way.
“It keeps coming up,” I replied. “Have you been out there?”
Kell sat back and took a sip of his Coke. “A couple of times.”
“No activity?” I probed.
Kell shook his head. “No. Too much going on. We were just out there a couple of weeks ago, and the whole feel of the place had changed. Juiced up.”
“How?” Teag asked, leaning across the table.
Kell paused, as if searching for the right words. “Look, I know that most people think we’re loony for going through old buildings looking for ghosts. Then again, Charleston promises the tourists more ghosts per square foot than just about any city in the US, so if believing in ghosts make you crazy, my team and I have a lot of company.”
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