“Not in this life he didn’t,” Nyx says. “But the story doesn’t end there. Many years later when he was sick and dying himself, he and his wife, Bess, came up with a secret password. He told her to offer that same ten thousand dollars to any spiritualist who could tell her the password once he died.”
“Did anyone know it?” Mags asks.
“Bess went from spiritualist to spiritualist who claimed they had made contact with the great Harry Houdini. But no one could tell her the password.”
“Mmm-hmm,” Mags says knowingly. “No television fuzz. No portal.”
“What about the toilet portal?” I ask her.
“There were only outhouses back then,” she informs me. “That’s not a portal.”
“Do I want to know how we got on toilets?” Nyx says.
I wave the words away with my hand. “No,” I say. “It’s a whole thing.”
“Anyway, he died on Halloween,” Nyx goes on. “And for ten years afterward, Bess did a séance each Halloween to try to reach him. But no one could ever tell her the password.”
“That’s horrible,” I say. “Did she keep trying?”
“She conducted her last séance on Halloween night 1936. Ten years after his death. And declared it would be the last time she would try. Her last words to him after the séance were ‘Good night, Harry.’ ”
I hold my chin in my hand and stare at him.
“How do you know all this?” I ask.
“There’s an actual audiotape of the last séance,” he tells me. “You can Google it…or, if you want, I can play it for you sometime.”
I smile at him. “I’d like that,” I say.
“People still conduct séances on Halloween to try to reach him,” Nyx tells us. “But no one knows the password. It died with Bess.”
“Why don’t you think they could reach each other?” I ask him.
“Maybe they didn’t have a Ouija board from Toy Mountain.” Mags snorts.
I sigh and shake my head at her. “Raise your hand if your best friend’s channels are as fogged up as pea soup,” I tell her.
“I belong to a group of illusionists from Denver who come up to the Stanley Hotel every year in October to conduct the same séance, trying to make contact with Harry Houdini.”
“Why do you do it here?”
“Because this hotel is one of the places he performed,” Nyx says. “It was in 1915. Two years after his mother died.”
I gasp. “He did his show here?”
He nods. “And Bess even traveled here with him.”
“Bess was here too?”
“Yep, that’s what makes an actual connection with the great Harry Houdini at the Stanley…a real possibility.”
“Wow,” I say. “That’s all really interesting. I can see why you’re so into magic.”
Mags mumbles something under her breath. But I don’t even care because me and Nyx are having a moment and as far as I’m concerned, she and her closed channels can just take a flying leap.
“All right,” Nyx says. “You guys ready? Cameras on?”
Both me and Mags turn our phones to camera.
“Check,” I say.
“Check,” says Mags.
“Everyone put your fingertips on the message indicator,” Nyx tells us.
When I put mine next to Nyx’s, the edges of our pinky fingers touch.
It feels electric. Kind of like the spark you can get from a carpet shock in the wintertime.
But, you know…in a good way.
“Now let us close our eyes and we will call to the spirits,” Nyx says.
We close our eyes.
“We are here to send any uninvited spirits away from the Stanley Hotel,” Nyx calls out. “We believe that the Honeycutts were called forward, and of course the Houdinis are always welcome here, but no one else. If you are an uninvited phantasm or evil entity, please leave the premises immediately.”
I peek one eye open.
Nothing is happening.
“Do you think they’re leaving?” I whisper.
“Shh,” he hisses. “Close your eyes.”
I close them.
“If there are unwanted spirits present,” Nyx goes on, “please make yourselves known as you depart so that we know you are leaving the premises.”
That’s when the sound of footsteps races somewhere above us.
I peek another eye open, and Mags does the same.
“Did you hear that?” Nyx asks.
“It’s just the dag gum hooligans,” I tell him.
He opens his eyes. “The what?” he asks.
“Mr. Plum told us there are a bunch of kids who like to sneak into the hotel to race on the fourth floor,” I tell him.
“Maybe it’s the unwanted spirits letting us know they are departing,” Nyx says.
“I suppose it could be,” I say.
“Has he ever caught one?” Nyx asks.
“An unwanted spirit?” I ask.
“A hooligan,” he says.
“No,” I tell him. “He said when he finally makes it up there, they’re always gone.”
“Hmm” is all Nyx says.
“What?” I ask.
“I’ve read up on the Stanley Hotel history,” he says. “And what I learned is that when guests came in the early 1900s, they stayed in rooms on floors one, two and three and all the children stayed on the fourth floor with teachers, nannies and caregivers.”
“So?” I say.
He shrugs. “It’s just curious is all,” he says. “That he’s never caught the kids.”
“You mean…there are spirits of the children from the early 1900s running around on the fourth floor?” Mags asks, and then she looks at me. “Whoa.”
“Whoa is right,” I say.
Nyx shrugs again. “I told you this place is highly active. It could be…” But he doesn’t say another word about it.
He doesn’t get the chance.
At that very moment the bathroom light starts to flicker.
Mags stands up from the floor, pointing a shaky finger toward the light.
“I knew it,” she whispers. “It’s Bloody Mary. She’s been here all along. She’s here, just like Daisy Chang said. Showing herself in the bathroom mirror…her energy transported from the in-between to our very plane of existence…through the toilet plumbing.”
Nyx leans closer to me. “What is it with her and toilets?” he asks.
“She thinks it’s a portal to the afterlife,” I tell him.
He shakes his head and blows air out of his mouth. “A paranormal plumbing portal?”
I shrug.
“Where’d she get that?”
“Daisy Chang,” I say.
“Is Daisy Chang some kind of psychic?” he asks.
“Um, not exactly,” I say.
“Bloody Mary,” Mags is calling out in the doorway of the bathroom. “Are you here with us now?”
Nyx just shakes his head at me and says, “Oh, brother.”
The Ouija board is officially closed.
At least that’s what Nyx thinks.
We stayed in room 217 until Nyx was good and sure every last evil phantasm had departed the Stanley Hotel for good.
But I’m not so sure.
And Mags and Nyx may be two peas in a pod when it comes to Poltergeist being a blueprint of all things haunted, but the toilet plumbing portal theory is a whole different story. It remains the fuel of a raging controversy.
Bloody Mary is mixed somewhere in there too.
The controversy, I mean, not the toilet.
But someone or something flickered the lights in room 217, no matter where they came from or how they got here.
That’s one thing we can all agree on.
As far as the whole Rid o’ Ghost salt-and-smudge party, Nyx thought it was a success and the only ghosts that were invited to stay were Mr. and Mrs. Honeycutt.
And of course the Houdinis.
The thing is, I remain unconvinced the dag gum hooligan footsteps were really a herd of mass-exiting uninvited phantasms. But I kept that what-if to myself.
WHAT-IFS
Angry ghost residue is a definite possibility.
After Nyx goes home and me and Mags have successfully returned the key card to the front desk in stealthlike, sleuthing fashion, Mags sets up a two-person viewing party of the blueprint itself.
Poltergeist.
And that’s only after warning me that Dr. Finkelman wouldn’t think it was a very good idea and making me cross-my-heart promise not to blame her for the aftermath of it all. But she still won’t tell me what happens at the eleven-minute, fifty-second mark in The Shining.
And as it turns out, Mags is right about everything.
I mean everything.
The television fuzz taking the girl.
The dining hall chairs defying gravity.
The in-between.
All of it.
And now I’m staring at the ceiling tiles instead of sleeping.
The digital alarm clock on the night table between our beds reads 2:05 a.m. and I’ve just come to the conclusion that there are exactly two hundred thirty-seven square tiles affixed to the ceiling of room 332. Mags is drooling away in the bed she called dibs on by the window, her stupid ring glowing a blue beacon in the night.
Mine is still mud.
Nyx even said he didn’t know a mood ring could get that brown.
Alfred Hitchcock is snoring at the bottom of the bed, his chin on my right foot. And I’ll bet you a million dollars if he had a doggie mood ring, his would be bright blue too.
By three o’clock, I conclude there are two hundred forty-two ceiling tiles and not two hundred thirty-seven. But instead of doing it a third time, I turn over and watch the digital numbers on the clock, counting the seconds between the minutes to see how close I can get.
After the seventh time, I reach over and pull Crystal Mystic off the night table and give it a shake.
“Will I ever sleep again?” I whisper to it and wait for the spirits to conjure up an answer.
CRYSTAL MYSTIC
SEEKER, BEWARE! SPIRIT HAS GRAVE DOUBTS.
At three-thirty, I wake up Alfred Hitchcock and together we sneak out of bed and go looking for Dad and the others to help with their nighttime investigation. Tonight they’re supposed to be set up in the Music Room off the lobby. But when I make it down there, the doors to the room are closed and I can hear Dad, Big John and The Faz arguing inside.
I tiptoe toward the doors and wedge my ear against the wood.
Dad: I don’t know, okay? I don’t know.
The Faz: The Tupperman wedding got called off, so we’re going to be short again this month.
Dad: Are you serious? What happened?
Big John: The groom got cold feet. He’s MIA.
Dad: (Blowing air out of his mouth) Oh, man. This is bad. Mr. Drago is saying he needs last month’s rent for sure by a week from Friday.
The Faz: Last month’s rent?
Dad: Yes.
The Faz: So? When is the Netflix check going to come?
Dad: It was a contingent thing.
Big John: Contingent?
The Faz: Contingent on what?
Dad: On getting a ghost on film.
The Faz: Dude, that is not cool.
Dad: I know. I know. I just agreed to everything they were saying. I didn’t realize it would be such a challenge in a place that’s so rampant with paranormal activity.
Big John: Have we got anything? Anything at all?
Dad: Nothing on film. T. S. Phoenix definitely believes the place is highly active, but I haven’t captured an image yet.
Big John: Maybe it’s time to…make it happen. If you know what I mean.
The Faz: Agreed. It’ll be our secret. Just get some footage and we’ll add our own ghost.
Big John: Right, it’s easy enough to do. I’ll create some images and sounds and we’ll just dub them in.
Dad: I’m not faking anything.
Big John: Do you really have a choice?
Dad: Yes. I’m not doing that. I’ll never do that. Totally Rad is a legit documentary company. I will never cave for any contract. It’s unethical. I won’t do it.
The Faz: Even a contract with Netflix?
Silence.
Dad: No, I can’t do it. It goes against everything I believe. Totally Rad does what’s right. Period.
Big John: You have to weigh what’s worse…swallowing your pride or the reality of you and your daughter getting kicked out of the only home she’s ever known.
Silence.
I look down at Alfred Hitchcock and he looks up at me. “This is not good for my what-ifs,” I tell him.
He gives me a snuff in agreement.
That’s when we hear the voices of T. S. Phoenix and Tally heading down the grand staircase. Me and Hitchy make a beeline across the lobby to the kitchen. I’m not saying it’s right to eavesdrop, but one thing I know for sure, if you’re going to do it, you’d better not get caught.
* * *
Ms. Lettie told me that Mrs. Honeycutt used to play the piano for Mr. Honeycutt and other guests in the hotel on the stage in the Music Room. Ms. Lettie also said that sometimes you can still hear her playing. Which is exactly why the crew is set up in the Music Room tonight.
After Alfred Hitchcock and I get a drink of water from the kitchen, I creep back across the lobby and peek my head in the doorway. This time Dad is crouched behind his camera with Big John holding the boom and The Faz directing Tally at the keys of an ancient grand piano that’s set on a small stage at the front of the room.
“Okay, we’ve only got a couple of hours left before the staff comes in for morning shift. Let’s get something on film,” Dad says.
“Places, people,” The Fazz calls out. “Annnd action!”
Silence while Dad films Tally busy being sensitive at the grand piano and T. S. Phoenix using his machine to measure the air for ghosts.
Big John holds the boom above Tally. The boom is basically this very fuzzy microphone on a long bar. The microphone picks up the sound better for the camera. And The Faz stands behind Dad, gnawing on his thumbnail.
I watch through the crack from behind the door while Alfred Hitchcock scratches an itch, sniffs his paw and then scratches again in the same exact spot.
Tally’s eyes are closed and her hands hover above the yellowing keys as she breathes in and out.
“I’m feeling a tightness in my chest,” she says. “There is something here. Unmistakably, there is a presence. And there is heartbreak. Sadness at these keys. In this very spot a heart has felt pain…sorrow…and loss. It feels it now as well. I sense it…I feel it myself. Inside my chest, I can feel the heartbreak—”
Alfred Hitchcock snorts and then woofs.
“Cut!” The Faz shouts.
T. S. Phoenix looks up from his Geiger counter and Tally opens her eyes.
They’re all staring at me and Hitchy.
“What are you doing up?” Dad asks. “You should be in bed.”
His usual grin is gone.
“I—I couldn’t sleep,” I say. “I thought maybe I could help you—”
“Yeah, yeah, sure, but we’ve got to get this shot done, Snooks,” he tells me, wiping sweat beads off his temple. “It’s the end of day four, and we don’t have any kind of image on film or voice on tape yet. If we don’t get something in the next six days, the Netflix people will…not be happy. So we need to get back to work—”
“I jus
t thought, um, m-maybe I can help with that,” I say. “Ms. Lettie told me once that Seraphina Honeycutt played that very piano while she was here.”
Tally reaches a hand out toward me. “Come here, dear, and tell us what Ms. Lettie told you,” she says.
Dad sighs, looks at his watch and then gives me a nod. “Sure, yeah, go ahead, hon.”
He sounds out of breath.
I hurry across the worn floorboards, my bare feet slapping against the wood. I pass all the crisply painted, perfectly lined-up rows of old-fashioned wooden chairs. Upright seats, patiently waiting for an audience to fill them.
“Hello, sweetheart,” Tally says, patting the piano bench.
I slip in next to her.
“Put your hands on the keys, like this.” She gently places her fingertips on the keys. “Then close your eyes and breathe.”
I blink at her and say, “You want me to touch it?”
She nods.
“Okay,” I say. “But I don’t know how that’s going to help anything.”
“Try,” she says, closing her eyes and taking a deep breath in, just like Madame Drusilla did in the garden.
I close my eyes and breathe in and out too.
In and out.
Listening to the sounds around me.
The lights.
Buzz.
The clock.
Ticks.
Scampering on the grand staircase.
The dag gum hooligans or maybe exiting phantasms. The possibility remains that we left the board open so long we let way more spirits in than we could smudge out.
Then Tally’s voice. “Now,” she says in almost a whisper. “Open your eyes.”
I open them.
“What does your gut tell you?” she asks me.
I concentrate real hard.
Gut: I got nothing.
“Ah…my gut isn’t really…what I mean to say is…it’s not really good at listening per se. It more just churns and feels tight and is especially sensitive to cheddar cheeses.”
“Don’t judge it,” Tally says. “Just listen to it.”
I concentrate again.
Gut: Gurgle.
“I’m being totally serious right now, it really doesn’t have anything important to say,” I tell her.
Karma Moon—Ghost Hunter Page 13
