Vanessa

by David Howells

Chapter 7 – ANNIE

  Ryan stopped for a few moments, but no one spoke. Even those who had heard it before were still moved deeply, for they knew...

  “What I have spoken of was being repeated even as I said it. It happens every day, year, even century. After all had settled, a young woman came up to me and asked if I was all right. It was some time before I could speak, for I had witnessed Hades. For those poor souls in Hiroshima, their misery was for a moment, or for a shortened and miserable lifetime. For the children, soldiers, and Annie, it might as well be Hell, for it didn’t end.

  “I got a day job there, before it had been declared a historic landmark and was further developed. My hope was to be able to speak to Mrs. Edwards, but she was deep in her insanity. Each day, those men try to find either some way to avoid harming the children or to devise an escape. In the three years I worked there, Major Covington managed to sneak out six men, leaving fifty-five and their horses. One of the fifty-five, we found out, was Private Jed Patterson. Allen, I used a different company for the family histories of the members of the raiding party than you did for your family tree research. You would be surprised how many records of the Civil War survived. Jed didn’t start off bad. He had it hard as a kid with a father who died, and sisters being sent to an orphanage. He quit school to support his family by working in the same fishing industry that killed his father in an accident. Maybe those tragedies, the war and the shock of trampling the children conspired to make him lose control. Then, being rejected by Annie, who robbed him of his life in the process, was the straw on the camel’s back that fractured his own mind at the same time it did Annie’s. That seems to have created a connection between the two of them that she still uses to her advantage.”

  Allen shuddered. “If that place holds them there, what if it didn’t exist anymore? Blow the house up or something?”

  “Tried. The house is half stone and staffed year round. I managed an incendiary device a year later. Took out the roof and a fair amount of floorboards. Didn’t make a difference. The porch was ripped out and another was under construction. While it was gone, she stood in the air as if it was still there. I think she has the place so manufactured in what’s left of her mind that you could haul the whole place away and it wouldn’t make a bit of difference. I even took up horseback riding so that I could ride along with the troops. That was tricky as there were very few areas where real horses were allowed (I’ve since made some improvements there). The soldiers haven’t been able to unite their wills to oppose her and I haven’t a clue how you might be able to go about doing that. Annie has things pretty well locked down and for the Major to mount a resistance of any kind does him credit. He must have been quite a leader in his time. Frustrated, I got my position changed so that I could be on the night watch. The idea was to be able to talk to Annie when there weren’t so many people around to wonder at my sanity. The first night was interesting. I sat on one of the front porch chairs and she showed up sitting on the chair next to me.” Even the veteran listeners got the chills from that one. Ryan could recall that night very well...

  “Your name is Ryan, young man, is it not?”

  “Yes, Mrs. Edwards, Ryan David Fitzgalen.”

  “You’re a Yankee? There are lots of Irish and Scott in the Union ranks.”

  “No, ma’am, I’m from Galveston, Texas. Lots of Irish and Scott there, too. Served in the Navy for a few years till I was released on medical discharge. Mrs. Edwards, I have learned a lot about you here and, if it’s all right with you, I would like to learn more. Please, tell me about yourself?”

  “Maybe you’re from the Lone Star and maybe you aren’t. I don’t trust strangers, but you talk nice enough and respectful. I haven’t had many people talk to me lately. The help keeps the place nice, but they ignore me. It gets right lonely here, sometimes.”

  Ryan took that as a chance to get closer to her. Vanessa was in the shadows, listening. “Your children. Their names were, are, Rebecca and Jason. Good biblical names. I hear you and your husband, Col. Archibald, are Christians. Baptists, I believe. You were married at the First Baptist down the road to town and went on your honeymoon to Paris, France.” Annie’s eyes had lost all their flame and her voice was softer, saner.

  “That was a wonderful time in my life. It was just after we returned that Jason was born and, a year and a half later, Rebecca. Archibald was a good father, but he was called away to lead the Regulars. He had some training and they needed every man to push the Yanks back north. He looked so fine in his uniform, leading our boys. I still remember him and the last time he kissed me. Told me he would be back soon. That’s what he kept telling me in his letters, but the letters stopped one day. Another letter came, from Jeff Davis himself. You know, he was the reason we went to Paris for the honeymoon. Mr. Davis and Archibald knew and trusted each other and my husband was to meet with the French Minister of Defense to see what they could arrange to help the South.”

  It was a warm night. The crickets chirped and the fireflies were out. A few moths hung around the porch light and you could hear the traffic in the distance. Nothing was said for a minute. Ryan took a breath and pushed on. “What did that letter say, ma’am? Was it about your husband?” No answer. “Col. Edwards was under the command of General Hood. Hood was tasked by Davis to distract General Sherman from his mission, but failed to do more than pull a token force from Sherman’s main group. Col. Edwards took three hundred cavalry for a sprint to the north to create a diversion and cause confusion among Sherman’s ranks as to where the enemy was. That would slow them down long enough to make leaving their supply lines behind a critical mistake. They ran into a division from XX Corps by accident and, though outnumbered, the Regulars gave it all they had. There were no prisoners, no survivors. Your husband is dead, ma’am, and so are you.” Annie spoke no word and her face remained passive. Ryan kept on, not knowing when the land mine would go off.

  “The men that come every day? They were a foraging party under Sherman. Their job was to gather food for the Union troops, not to harm private citizens. One of them was a bad egg. You killed him and he took your own life while trying to force his intentions on you. Somehow, you’re the one that is keeping all those men from moving on to God’s Judgment. Isn’t that the truth ma’am?” Ryan held his breath.

  “You know a lot about things for a hired hand. Yes, you speak the truth, Ryan David Fitzgalen.” Ryan let out the breath. She seemed so rational. If she was as crazy as he thought she was, Annie should have either denied, smoke-screened or flew off the handle. Nothing! There was no reaction. Why? It didn’t make any sense from what he had learned from dealing with other entities. He went further, feeling the sweat from his hands make the chair handles slippery.

  “When they came upon your property, your children were playing next to the low hedges. The soldiers never saw your children until it was too late. It was an accident and wars are full of accidents, horrible ones. It was bad, but it isn’t reason for you to hold those men in daily damnation. Each day you put them through undeserved punishment and each day you cause your children to die again. They certainly don’t deserve this. Why are you doing this?” Vanessa edged closer. Annie took notice of her.

  “I remember you, young lady. You have been here before. We spoke, but I hardly remember what was said. You were here when the sun was up and things are different then. I’m different, then. Please, come up to the porch. I won’t bite.”

  Vanessa tentatively approached. She had good reason to be nervous, remembering what Annie had done to the soldiers and THAT soldier in particular. Ryan’s being alive may have been some protection against someone who could do that to entities, but Vanessa didn’t have that protection. Yet, Annie didn’t seem threatening. She seemed, nice.

  “I’ve seen you around the place. Are you his sweetheart, his wife maybe?” Vanessa turned her head away, embarrassed. Annie smiled kno
wingly. Ryan may be oblivious, but she could read Vanessa as only a woman can see through another woman. Annie was gracious enough to let it drop, but was delightfully amused. It had been a very long time since she had something to be happy about.

  “Never you mind, Vanessa, isn’t it? Master Ryan, you wanted to know more about me and why I do what I do. You ever say to someone you have a mind to do something, but another mind not to? It’s something like that. Your hands are sweating Master Ryan and you re getting paler the more you push things along. You can relax now. I’m not going to cook anyone’s goose. You see, its nighttime and things are calm at night. When the sun goes up, another Anita Edwards takes over. I vaguely know what she’s doing, but there’s nothing I can do about it. All she thinks about is punishing the Yankees for Archibald, for Jason and Rebecca, for the one who took my honor like a common beast, for invading our sovereign state and changing our way of life to suit them, for taking so many of our boys to the grave.”

  Ryan was shocked, never expecting this and not knowing quite what to do about it. Could Annie be cooperative?

  “Mrs. Edwards, I’m no Yankee, but I have been trying to help those men get free and to save your children. I’d like to free you, too. Let’s get you where you belong, where your kids and those men belong. We can do this together. Please, let your love as a Christian woman guide you. Your husband is waiting for you. Please.”

  “Ryan Fitzgalen, do you see my children or those men? Have you ever seen them at night? No, and you never will. I’ve looked, looked for years beyond count. They’re not here. I don’t know where they are. Only the Anita Edwards who comes out in the day has the power to bring them back from the oblivion she sends them to. Tried running away from here a couple of times, but come sunrise, I’m back again. I read Dante’s Inferno a long time ago (Ryan remembered seeing that book in the family library). Hell was a series of circles, rings sort of. You can run, but you come back to the same place eventually. There are worse circles than this one, but not by much. Those poor men can’t escape the punishment they don’t deserve, and my children die every day.”

  Vanessa could only look on, feeling the spiritual equivalent to heartache for a kindred, well, spirit. “Mrs. Edwards, is there any way you can discover where your ‘daytime’ self sends your children and the soldiers?”

  “I have tried, Dear. There is a barrier that separates my other self from me. My other self is mad, it seems, but, mad or not, she is far stronger and larger than I. Maybe they are in Hell or purgatory. I won’t leave here, even if I could go. That might condemn them all to be forever stuck wherever they are. At least here, I can pray at night for that officer you spoke of to be clever enough to get all his men by me. Once my other self no longer has a reason to stay, to punish those poor boys, maybe she’ll let her hatred go and set me and my children free. I have no doubt where I’ll be sent then, but my poor children will walk with Jesus, someday. If there is anything you can do to help that brave Major, please, do it, even if you have to destroy me in the process. You would be doing me a favor.”

  The coffee cups were cold. There was a background murmuring of patrons behind the door, but that seemed so far away. “I’ve brainstormed with Gustav, Vanessa and Marianne, but we’ve about come up dry. That leaves fifty-five men, last we heard, with one of them mad. Any ideas from the newbies?” That had taken Allen and Rachel by surprise. Was this the final test to see if they fit into the, what would you call it, team? They’d been able to solve problems before together, some pretty hard ones. Allen spoke first.

  “Can you find the spirit of her husband? She’s waiting for his return, which hasn’t happened yet. Could you make it happen, or even appear to happen? Maybe the surprise of finally seeing him would distract her long enough so that the others would have a shot at making it. Hire an actor that looks like him.”

  Rachel was next. “Maybe you’ve already tried it, but how about the religious angle? Baptists aren’t Catholic, but how about an exorcist? Get a Cardinal in there, or hire someone to play the part. It probably doesn’t matter, as long as Annie believes, and ‘what you believe so shall you perceive’.”

  “Distraction seems to have been the key in the past,” added Allen. “...but she’s gotten pretty wise to it and the fewer men there are the harder it will likely be to distract by sheer numbers. How about getting some re-enactors to stage a mock battle at the right time. She might not know who was who.”

  Seamlessly, Rachel went another direction, “Annie at night seems willing to cooperate. Could she be a resource, or is she a liability? If she contributes, will ‘mad’ Annie know about it and be prepared?”

  “Then again, Mom, that can be used to our advantage. If daytime Annie expects one thing and we come around with something entirely different, the surprise would be at least twice as effective.”

  “Hmmm, maybe, Allen. Hey, I recall reading somewhere that there are things that annoy the spirit world. Most of it is probably nothing, but maybe there’s something to it.”

  Ryan followed the interchange like trying to keep his eye on a ping-pong ball at the world championship games. “Hold it, wait a bit. Like what, I mean, Rachel, explain what you mean!”

  “Ryan, myth has basis in fact. Garlic is supposedly a bane to Dracula. That myth of sinister creatures that came out at night to do their dirty work was something used to explain the mystery of microbial nighttime deaths popular at the time. It was natural for people to reduce stress by putting even a mythic label on their fears.”

  Gustav, feeling slightly like a dinosaur, said, “Excuse me, Mrs. Gladstone? A reason for suffering is stress reducing? Suffering is suffering.”

  Rachel replied, “No. Walk into a dark bedroom that you are familiar with and at worst you might be a little careful to avoid a shoe you might have left on the floor. A walk into someone else’s bedroom with no light at all can almost paralyze you with increasing disorientation and imaginings from tacks on the floor to a hidden Doberman. It is actually less stressful to know you have a documented and diagnosed cancer than to have symptoms compatible with cancer but not know if it is cancer or not. Once you know, then the side of your brain that is action-step oriented will kick in, and that is not the side that plays on your emotions and fears. Can we use the unknown, or even fear of the unknown as a weapon? Keeping Annie from action steps sounds like a useful notion. Back to the sound idea, I read once that the sound of breaking glass was an anathema to ghosts. Perhaps sound waves might be found that have an irritating effect on spirits. The Bible commands us to make a joyful noise unto the Lord. Maybe some noises aren’t so joyful. Cats hate it when you turn on a vacuum, not because it’s unknown, but because their more sensitive ears are bothered by the high pitched motor noise that is beyond our own hearing.”

  Allen sat back and enjoyed it all to the full. There was his mother, whom he had every right to be proud of, leaving wizened and experienced people speechless, or nearly so. The tables were turned.

  “Hmmmm. Speaking of which,” he thought. Allen held his hand to his mouth, but was unable to contain the laugh, which forced itself between his hand and his mouth like an old style raspberry. That stopped the conversation, then all eyes watched as Allen walked over to the dessert tray to pick up a plate. He brought it to Ryan and placed the plate in front of him. “More (snort), sir?”

  Ryan could only look at Allen in confusion. Then he looked down at the plate. Everyone’s eyes watched as Ryan’s face was first muddled, and then the light of comprehension dawned upon it. Ryan howled. None of the others got the joke, but like yawns, laughter is infectious and soon all were having a needed release in humor. Ryan, through the tears, looked again at the plate to see a slice of (what else?) cake.

  It took Ryan a few tries to get the punch line understood by the others, but the responses were worth it. Marianne leaned over to Rachel and asked if she could adopt Allen as a nephew. Gustav glowe
d. Ryan couldn’t express in words his gratitude at these new and fresh points of view, ones that just might be the salvation for entities that he had come to know as friends, so he took a place mat and rolled it up into a cone, then wrote on it and placed it upon his head. It read ‘DUNCE’. Allen asked what that meant and got another chuckle when the old term was explained to him. Rachel asked what Vanessa thought of the whole thing.

  Ryan replied he would let her know when Vanessa stopped ‘laughing her ass off’. “OK, time for a change of scenery. There’s more I want to say before we call it a night. Gustav, have the limo meet us at the front and tell Roscoe we’re history.”

  “More ways than one,” thought Allen, smiling.

  Catching the look, Ryan said to Allen, “I heard that.”

  “Who, me?”

  Doors opened and farewells to Roscoe were followed with pit stops. The men were done first and, obedient to the ladies who had requested the men go on and they’ll be right behind, stepped outside to wait by the limo. It didn’t seem right to continue the conversation without all present, so, to pass the time, Allen checked his SatCom. He thumbed a switch and did a double take. There were six messages from the same ID. Melissa. With all that had happened tonight and, with the less than tender farewell yesterday, Allen had no guilty feelings when he deleted all the messages, without reading them, and thumbed the block button. “Ditch the bitch,” he recalled with a smile.