A Haunting at Hensley Hall (A Ravynne Sisters Paranormal Mystery)

by Merabeth James

  She remembered the first time she’d met her two half-sisters. She was five years old and Allyn only three, when they went to the airport to meet their plane. With a parent gripping each of her hands, Allyn in her mother’s arms, they had waited for the passengers to debark. She looked up at her dad and saw tears in his eyes. Her mother was smiling. She didn’t know what she was supposed to do, then she saw them and they were not at all what she had expected. Somehow, she had thought they would be children still, like her, someone to play with not grownups almost as old as her mother!

  Of course, they had only been teenagers…Meg shorter and rounder with a riot of dark blonde curls, while Charlie had been taller…much taller…with straight, silver blonde hair that spilled down her back. She looked like she’d stepped straight out of a storybook! Hunkering down, she had met her at eye level, and smiled. She always remembered her words. “Looks like I have another baby sister to look after” and she always had. She was the first one she’d called, when she’s got into trouble last year.

  She frowned as she slipped into that memory. She had reported Jared for harassing her and they’d blown her off with, “That’s not the story we heard!” She could just imagine what they’d ‘heard’. Jealous, possessive, unable to believe her ‘no’ meant just that, he had followed her for weeks, but he was a cop, one of their own, and she wouldn’t be allowed to smear his name or hurt his family with her ‘unsubstantiated’ accusations. Never mind that she wasn’t his first victim. The others were local women who had withdrawn their complaints for undisclosed reasons.

  They had said she ‘stalked and killed’ Jared, because that was what they wanted to believe. The stalked part was where they got it wrong. She had killed him. Blown a hole in his manly chest as he forced her up against the kitchen counter. She had spent many nights, trying to forget his look of surprise.

  It had been Charlie who had made them look at the forensic evidence: the broken pane in her kitchen door, the bits of glass the coroner had dug out of Jared’s lacerated elbow, the size twelve work boot prints found outside all her windows, which had matched Jared’s exactly.

  Charlie made them do their jobs with a quiet force that pushed everything out of its way. Then she had made a call to someone, an important someone, that stirred up everyone and set her free…all charges dropped.

  Now she was here. The Big Apple. Exactly where she had thought she wanted to be…a new recruit to the trendy crowd of the smart upwardly mobile. She had joined the wolf pack of 'in control', independent, savvy women from her office, as they trolled the clubs, looking for? She didn’t think they’d quite figured that out yet. Nor worried about it. They were having fun. It had been her kind of fun once, but now it all seemed rather flat, like warm stale champagne. She smiled wryly. At twenty-five she was beginning to have growing pains? God, how had that happened?

  The cab skittered to the curb and she slid out. Hugging her shoulder bag tightly against her body, (something she did religiously since coming to New York), she looked up at the brownstone apartment building butted up against a row of look alikes in a neighborhood that was straddling the line between newly improved and sadly worn out.

  She had answered the ad for a roommate almost a year ago. There was no way she could have afforded a place of her own then and, even now, with a good job at the ad agency, it would still be an impossible stretch. Especially the way she liked to spend money. Besides, she had the place to herself most of the time, when Amanda of the colorful ‘body art’ was either working her two jobs, or staying with her boyfriend.

  Time to move on, she asked herself? She could go back home for a visit. Her mother would be getting ready for the summer solstice right about now. She was a Wiccan, not a witch, she often told her, though, in her opinion, the distinction was negligible. She smiled. Sage Farley Ravynne, witch or not, was a wonderful mother. The life they had all shared in the little adobe ranch house had always been a happy one.

  As she climbed the three flights of stairs to her apartment, she found herself thinking about her dad. He was old enough to be her grandfather and had always seemed, to her, perpetually surprised, as though he had just looked around and couldn't figure out where he was or how he’d got there! But it was a good kind of surprise, of that she was certain.

  They got on well, her parents. He now wrote children's’ books and she illustrated them. They had achieved a good deal of success together. Something, she suspected, that didn’t mean much to either of them.

  She shook her head. No, she really wasn’t like any of them. She didn’t have Charlie’s courage or strength, Meg’s generous heart, her father’s sense of wonder, or her earth mother’s nurturing nature. She was Rayne and maybe she needed to find out who that really was.

  Turning her key in the door, she smiled. Maybe she'd check in on Charlie and Meg. If they won this contest thing, they would need help. Not that she could hammer, saw or do all that hard sweaty stuff, but she knew a thing or two about marketing and, if they were serious about a B&B, that could be very helpful. Yes, maybe it was time to chuck the job and go see what those sisters of her's were up to. But it wouldn't hurt to do a little shopping first. Maybe stock up on a few wardrobe essentials? The likelihood of finding any good labels in…Mericksville?…was slim to impossible. And then there was the opening at the gallery next week that she'd promised to attend. Claymore's first showing of whatever it was he did. But she had promised she'd be there for him. And Friday night, Samantha and Cyndi were going to club something or other and "positively" wouldn't go without her. Maybe she wasn't quite ready to make any major changes…at least not yet.

  ***

  Meg peeled an extra potato and threw it in the pot, sucking in her belly as Charlie squeezed past on her third trip to the fridge in less than an hour. It was the picture of the house she had printed from the Internet, that Charlie obsessively visited. She had taped it, and a cellophane wrapped four-leaf clover, to the refrigerator door. “For good luck,” she had told her, but Meg didn’t know how much luck they needed. Who in their right minds would want the place? The renovation alone would be a nightmare! The location was the only thing it had going for it. Merritsville was close enough to a large metropolitan area, the mountains, and the seashore, that their B&B plans stood some chance of being a success.

  And then there was the ghost thing. The possibility, she should say certainty that the old place was haunted had quite charmed her, but it wouldn’t be everyone’s idea of a good time. She could just imagine herself saying, “Breakfast is between 7 and 9. Don’t mind the unspeakable horror at the foot of your bed. It seldom bites.” She found herself laughing out loud…something she’d quite forgotten how to do until Charlie rescued her.

  Ignoring the lingering doubts that raised their heads like hungry baby birds, she walked over to her sister and studied the photo. “See that dormered window on the far right? If you squint, you can see a face peering out. Looks like an old woman in a white cap.”

  Charlie leaned closer and tried squinting. “Looks like a reflection to me, but you’re the expert on ‘ghosts’. Might be better if we downplayed all that if we’re going to have people actually stay with us.”

  Meg smiled and decided not to tell her sister that she had just been thinking the very same thing, but then, to her surprise, she found herself saying, “Or maybe not. There are plenty of would be ghost hunters, who would die for a chance to stay there. Well, maybe ‘die’ is not a good choice of words, but you know what I mean?”

  Charlie gave her a pointed look and returned to her laptop, so Meg returned to the potatoes. Since Charlie seemed to be doing more staring at her keyboard than typing, she called, “Why don’t you email Rayne, while you’re sitting there. I’ll bet she’d love to hear from you!”

  “I did email her. Right after you got here,” Charlie muttered, tugging at the end of her ponytail distractedly in a gesture Meg knew only too well.

  “Sure…one of your cryptic monosyllabic emails with no meat to th
e bones. Which always surprised me since you and Dad are the writers in the family.”

  Charlie groaned. “I leave that up to you. You’re the one that likes that kind of thing.”

  Meg smiled. She loved staying in touch with all the family. Of course, Allyn seldom, if ever, wrote back, and their mother hadn’t answered her letters in years, but there was still her dad, mom and Rayne. She pried everything she could out of them and let them know only what she wanted them to know. Especially during her married life…if you could call it a life! It hadn't felt like much of one at the time!

  She had married the first man who’d asked her. To this day, she wasn’t sure why he had proposed. If he’d ever loved her, it came and went so fast she didn’t even get a chance to enjoy it. But she had loved him the moment she’d looked into his eyes…beautiful eyes… the windows into a beautiful soul, right? It hadn’t taken her long to realize her mistake.

  But she was free at last! High time, too! Maybe she would drop Rayne a line and update her on how things were developing. She already suspected they were both crazy so why not confirm it?

  ***

  The official announcement came by way of registered letter. They had won and were now the owners of the Hensley’s haunted estate soon to be a fabulous B&B. Well, maybe not soon, but one day, when they had thrown enough cash, sweat and tears at it.

  Their winning hadn’t surprised Charlie at all. She had known from the first moment she’s seen the old place that somehow her destiny and Meg’s were tied to it. It needed them. And not just to fix it up and make it beautiful again…the grand dame of Merritsville…it needed something else she couldn’t name. She was beginning to believe in fate after all.

  The apartment had been furnished, so there wasn’t much to pack, just their clothes, laptop, a few boxes of books, family photos and those special mementoes that one was forced to carry through life, largely because of the guilt involved if they dumped them.

  Everything fitted quite easily in the back of her truck. Maybe too easily, Charlie thought, as she slammed the tailgate shut. At almost forty years old, shouldn’t there be more to her life than this? She shook her head and snapped the tonneau cover in place. In a very real sense they were all starting over…a brand new life in a brand new place. One with infinite possibilities. Good ones, she hoped. The kind she and Meg both needed.

  “Time to saddle up and get moving,” she called to a smiling Meg, who was taking Freddie for his last walk along their landlord’s prized peonies. She knew what Meg was thinking. She would rather have him ‘pee-on’ Mr. Scully, who had been really ugly over Freddie and made them pay dearly. Admittedly, she was rather surprised that Meg of the green thumbs would do such a thing, but supposed even her sister should be allowed her dark side.

  Meg was still smiling, when she shoved Freddie across the seat and climbed in after him. “I’m ready Charlie. Are you scared? This is an awful big chance we’re taking.”

  “Do I look scared?” she asked evasively. “Besides, it's about time we had a little adventure in our lives. It’s been three years for me and probably never for you,” Charlie told her with a wry grin.

  “You don’t know everything, Charlotte Ravynne. You might just be surprised,” Meg replied with a wink.

  ***

  With his harness securely fastened to the seatbelt, Freddie rode shotgun most of the first morning, while Meg slept…mouth open and snoring loudly. Apparently, she hadn’t slept too well either, Charlie thought, as she glanced at her sister. It would be nice if she’d keep her company, while she drove. Freddie was a help, but his conversational talents were rather limited.

  And then there was the other problem with Freddie. Meg had fed him the leftovers she'd emptied from the fridge that morning and he had been leaking noxious fumes for the past fifty miles, until she’d been forced to hold the pine tree scent thingie, that usually hung from the rearview mirror, under her nose.

  With Meg continuing to sleep, Charlie found herself with too much time to think. Was she doing the right thing? Not that it mattered so much if it was just her, but it wasn’t. There was Meg to consider. Did Meg need more upheaval right now? Nothing was final yet, was it? Not till they signed the papers. She could still turn the truck around and head…head where?

  She looked at her sister and thought about waking her. She needed her to tell her they were doing the right thing. But then she changed her mind. No… they had made their decision. Meg could always tell her “I told you so” about a million times, if it proved to be the wrong one. Nothing had changed. She still felt the same about the house. No matter how worried or scared she was, she still knew, bone deep, that they were supposed to go there. “‘Damn the torpedoes’, Freddie. We’re headed for our brand new home and I know we’re all going to just love it!” Freddie looked at her and ‘woofed’, though she wasn’t sure if it was a ‘yes’ woof or a ‘time for a pee’ woof.

  ***

  Days later, Charlie was almost ready to strangle her little sister. Meg had loaded up on snacks at the last gas station and had been babbling and crunching non-stop ever since, which meant Meg was just as scared and worried as she was.

  By the time they took the last turn leading into Merritsville, it was already quite late and they were both tired and grumpy. Searching the lighted billboards that flashed past, they looked for a motel without much luck, and then, as if an evil genie had conjured it up, the Ramble Inn’s “vacancy” sign beckoned from the dark. It looked seedy, maybe even ‘Bates-like’, but Charlie had driven the last mile she could squeeze out that day.

  Leaving Meg and Freddie in the truck, she slid out, flexed her cramped legs and headed to the office…or 'off'…since half the blinking neon sign above the door wasn’t lit. A bell jangled, discordantly, as she opened the door and stepped inside. A large sized woman with arms like a stevedore, wearing a purple flowered dress, appeared from behind a curtain and eyed Charlie, slowly, up and down. “Mite late to be checkin’ in don’t ya think, missy?”

  Missy? “I really hadn’t noticed. That was a ’vacancy' sign I saw out there?” Charlie murmured tiredly.

  “Yep, guess it is. How many stayin?” she asked as she lit a cigarette and took a long draw.

  “Two…my sister and me. Now about that room?”

  “Just sign here and fill in the blanks,” she said, as she leaned forward and plucked a strand of dog hair off her sleeve. Her gimlet eyes narrowed, as she gestured with her cigarette to the “Absolutely No Pets Allowed” sign half hidden behind her.

  Charlie swore under her breath, then looked straight into her pale blue eyes that had narrowed to mere slits. "That’s my sister’s. She had a bad fright as a child and her hair turned snow white over night,” she told her solemnly.

  To her surprise, the woman laughed. “Now that’s a good one. Number 12 down at the end just in case you want to take your sister for a walk before bedtime.”

  Charlie smiled and took the keys. .Maybe, they'd just had their first bit of good luck! If the room was clean, they would have their second, but it probably wasn't wise to expect too much'!

  CHAPTER FOUR

  It was a dark, overcast morning when they all met at the Town Hall at 10AM sharp. All included a reporter from the weekly newspaper, with her photographer trailing behind, and the town notables headed by the mayor, Joe Griggs, a large man with an equally large opinion of himself. Mrs. Brown was there, too, and turned out to be all that Charlie had imagined…razor thin right up to the lips that made a mockery of smiling. Apparently, she was the mayor’s sister as well as assistant tax assessor.

  There were others, of course, a blur of faces and handshakes and questions Charlie couldn’t answer. What would they do next? Did they know this and that? All she could do was smile and nod and saw Meg was doing pretty much the same thing.

  They posed for the requisite photos, though Meg worried that Mitch might see them, if they made more than the local papers. He had been less than amiable at the divorce proceedings (thoug
h she had written Rayne that things had gone smoothly) and now, with time to brood over his supposed injustices, he could make unpleasant sound like a good thing.

  Though they tried to speed things along, the townspeople were clearly enjoying themselves way too much to wrap things up. It was nearly noon before they declined the invitation to lunch and took possession of the keys, after signing a stack of papers, they both knew a lawyer should have looked at first.

  Finally, it was time to go have a look at their future. Charlie smiled at Meg and Meg smiled back, as they both tried to ignore the butterflies doing somersaults in their nether regions. They climbed back in the truck, and Charlie handed Meg the map someone had given her as they left the Town Hall. “You’re the navigator,” she told her. “I could say it’s not too late, but we both know I’d be lying. Ready?”

  Meg gave her a slightly tremulous smile. “Lead on! Or should I say, drive on! The adventure begins!”

  They were both quiet after that, except for Meg’s directions. They drove past clumps of small housing developments, past open fields, farmhouses and over a single lane bridge.

  “Elderberry Drive. Okay turn right here and go down about… Well, I don’t know how far. I’ll have to tell you when we get there,” Meg told her, worrying her lower lip, as she traced their route with her forefinger.

  As Charlie drove, she found herself silently chanting, “Please be all right…please be all right.” It just had to be, didn’t it?

  “Myrtle Road! Turn right!” Meg shouted suddenly. So, tires squealing, she did.

  They must have been driving on ‘Hensley’ land for some time now, Charlie thought. Mrs. Brown had told them that the house had, originally, been surrounded by 3000 acres of rolling woods and meadows, but one cash strapped Hensley after another had sold off all but the ten acres that now belonged to them.