by Morgana Best
Scotty looked at me blankly.
I pressed on. “I’m a journalist and I’m writing a story about the ghosts of Morpeth. My editor thinks the readers would like to know about the treasure you mentioned on the tour and the connection to the ghost of Baxter Morgan.”
That got Scotty’s interest. “You’re a journalist?”
“Yes. I already said that earlier.” Perhaps he’d forgotten.
“You will help me find the treasure?”
I nodded. “I’ll try. I haven’t found out much.” I sipped the drink. It tasted a little strange. I wondered if Mr. Suspected Fake Ghost Man had spat in it. “I did have a bit of luck with my own research today, though. I found out that Baxter Morgan’s old place is for sale, and it’s owned by the descendants of his good friend Joe Crawley.” I scratched my chin. “I wonder if Joe Crawley was the one who falsely accused Baxter Morgan which led to his hanging. After all, he had a reason to murder him, given that he inherited that wealthy property.”
Scotty gasped. His face turned a ghastly hue and he erupted from his seat. He reached the door in just a few strides. I followed him outside, but by the time I got there, he was gone.
What was that all about?
I pondered his strange behavior all the way to Maitland, which was only a twenty minute drive. The question of the treasure intrigued me. Scotty had been of no use in that regard; I figured the rest of my night would be more pleasant. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
David Crawley and I sat in uncomfortable silence in the Maitland restaurant. I glanced at David while he was studying the menu, and decided to break the ice. “If there’s no treasure, why does Scotty the tour guide guy insist that there is? He seems convinced. Do you know him?”
David slammed the menu down on the table, dislodging a fork. He caught it in mid-air and set it back on the table. “I know that he’s a bit of a nut case. Take everything he says with a grain of salt.”
I was taken aback by David’s strong reaction, so tried to make my voice extra calm. “I researched what he said on his ghost tour and it seemed accurate.”
David looked up from his menu. “That might be the case, but there is no treasure. What did he say about it?”
I thought about it. “He did know a lot of details about the Jewboy Gang. I checked up on everything he said and it all checked out, like I said, except I couldn’t find any record of Baxter Morgan being executed. However, I couldn’t find any death records for some of the gang members, so that in itself means nothing.”
At this point, the waitress took our orders. When she left, David waved at me. “Go on.”
I tried to remember the last thing I’d said. “That’s about it, only on the tour he took us to a small house in town and said that the occupant was a woman who was widowed because the treasure hadn’t been found, and also that when his accuser was named, the ghost of Baxter Morgan would tell everyone where the treasure is.”
David looked shocked and was about to speak but was prevented by the timely arrival of herb bread. I ate a piece hungrily, and washed it down with a large mouthful of water. I had no intention of drinking wine as I had to drive back to my motel.
I continued. “In fact, I drove to Morpeth before I came here, to the River Royal Hotel to try to find Scotty.”
David looked interested then. “And did you?”
“Yes. When I told him about your place being for sale and that your ancestor was rumored to be the one who accused Baxter Morgan, he took off like a bat out of hell, without so much as a word.”
That seemed to surprise him, but he changed the subject. “Is yours a big magazine? How many journalists are there?”
“Not many. It’s a small magazine, really. We’re all overworked.”
“Why did they give this story to you in particular?”
I shrugged. “They always give me the stories that need a lot of research. I always get to the bottom of things. No one else could be bothered.” I felt unusually tired, so I rubbed my eyes, a habit of mine. The only thing is, I don’t usually wear mascara as I have my eyelashes tinted once a month when I have my eyebrows waxed and tinted. I had, however, worn mascara tonight, so now I wondered if I had black streaks down my face.
I excused myself and went to the bathroom. The lighting in there was no better than the rest of the restaurant, but to my relief the mirror revealed only slight smudges under my eyes. I dabbed at them with a damp tissue, and then applied some if the concealer that I always had in my purse.
When I returned to the table, my meal was sitting waiting for me. “Fast service in this place.”
David nodded. “Yes, we’re just about the only ones here.”
I looked around the restaurant and the only other patrons were a young couple tucked away in the far corner. Hopefully, this was not because the food was bad. There had been only one vegetarian meal offered on the menu. It did, however, prove delicious, if my sampling of the layered stack of char-grilled vegetables, olive tapenade, and basil pesto was anything to go by. I was about to have another mouthful but was forestalled by David’s phone ringing. David checked the caller I.D. and did not answer.
“My brother, Des.”
“Is he the one who wants to sell the place?”
“You do know a lot.”
I laughed. “I’m a good researcher.”
“Clearly. Des and I have never seen eye to eye. He’s my younger brother, and you’d think two brothers even five years apart in age would be close, but we’re chalk and cheese. Always have been. He lives in Sydney now, and he’s newly married, which is why he wants to sell the family property. I think it’s a terrible shame, but there’s nothing I can do about it. Morgan Hall was left to me in the will, but he contested it.”
“Goodness, that would have been hard.”
“You don’t know the half of it. He has a temper on him too. I’d say he’s calling to criticize me about interrupting your viewing today. He’s the one who engaged the services of the realtor. He’s in town at the moment too, but I only found out this afternoon.”
I was about to comment further but the room revolved slightly. I excused myself again and went to the bathroom. Migraine headaches have this effect on me, but I wasn’t getting the typical flashing zigzag lights of a migraine, and I felt quite nauseous. I splashed my face with cold water, and then returned to the table. Something was up; my stomach was churning and cramping and I thought I was about to be sick. I only managed to return to the table with some difficulty.
“Are you all right? You’ve gone green.”
“No, I think I’m getting a migraine. I’d better get back to the motel before it gets worse.” Without waiting for his reply, I headed for the door, speeding up as I went. I only just made it to the car park when I vomited violently all over the pavement. That brought a slight relief and I managed to drive back to my motel, although my vision was swimming and the headache was pounding.
By the time I got inside my motel room, I felt like I was going to die. I dropped to my knees inside the door and vomited violently again. I crawled to the bathroom and hoisted myself up over the toilet bowl. After another round of violent vomiting, I stuck my hand through the bathroom wall, into another realm. Perhaps I was dreaming. I thought I was awake. I tried to wash my face but my way was barred by a huge gray cat. It was evil, malevolent, hateful. Waves of pure terror washed over me. The cat did not move, but paralyzed me by some form of psychic attack. I was unable to move or speak.
The rest of the night was a haze. Sometime in the night I managed to crawl back near the bed and pull a blanket over me. I was freezing but my skin was burning to the touch.
At some point I must have fallen asleep. I awoke on the floor, weak, headachy, and fuzzy, but with the relief that the vomiting seemed to have stopped. My stomach muscles ached; they felt as if I had done thousands of crunches.
I didn’t think I could stand, so I crawled on my hands and knees back to the bathroom, pulled myself up at the basin, and poured
a glass of water. I managed to get back to the bed with the glass of water and I opened my laptop.
A search for ‘food poisoning treatment’ brought up a lot of pages. I clicked on the third one down and it said that it was important not to get dehydrated. I was horribly thirsty but the website cautioned only to have a few little sips of water at a time. It also suggested a sachet of electrolytes, but failing that, a sports drink, but said to have it in conjunction with plain water.
I had a half-emptied bottle of a sports drink already on the bedside table, so poured some of it into the glass of water then lay down in bed, reminding myself to sip the water every few minutes. It must have been food poisoning, but I wouldn’t have thought a vegetarian meal would cause that. At that point, I fell asleep.
The phone call woke me. It was not my iPhone, but the motel landline. I answered, but no one was on the line. At any rate, I was less groggy and relieved that I was on the mend, although weak.
A check of my iPhone revealed that it was almost midday. I lay in bed debating whether to lie there longer or venture out to buy some dry, salty crackers. The website had said I needed salt and dry crackers. The thunderous stomach rumblings convinced me. The crackers won. I managed to have a shower and get dressed but I had to move slowly and carefully. I felt awful.
The car parking area was a cramped affair. I reversed, turned the car a few times, and then ventured out onto the laneway which ran between two major Maitland roads.
The midday glare was too much for my weakened sensibilities, so I felt around the passenger seat for my sunglasses and found them. Just as I pulled into the lane, I realized I’d left my purse back in the motel room. Oh no. I hit reverse, and then rammed the accelerator with a little too much force. Luckily no one was behind me. At that point, a speeding truck appeared from out of nowhere and grazed the front of my car.
The jolt and the fright did not help my headache. I staggered out of the car and to my dismay, I saw broken glass. More expense. A broken headlight cover and, no doubt, a broken light. My car was insured, but I’d have to pay a $500 excess. If only the driver had stopped, or I had been fast enough to get his license plate. I figured the drivers around here must be pretty bad, as that was the second close shave I’d had in as many days, give or take a day or two. Lucky I had reversed when I did, or I would be toast.
The thought of food turned my stomach again, but that’s when it dawned on me. If I hadn’t been forgetful, I could have been killed twice. The researcher in me told me that I could only have been killed once. I tried to snap myself out of my digression and bring myself back to the matter at hand. I needed salt and more water, and then I would be able to think. One thing was clear: this was a matter for Alfred.
Chapter 12
After retrieving my purse, I gingerly edged the car onto the street, but there was no sign of a speeding truck. I headed for a store only a few blocks away that I had noticed previously, and purchased five packets of crackers, three packets of headache tablets, two bottles of water and three bottles of a sports drink. As an afterthought, I bought a small packet of sea salt.
Back at the motel, I opened one of the cracker packets and poured the salt inside it, then swallowed two headache tablets with a glass of diluted sports water. The trembling had stopped. The headache on the other hand was crashing, but whether that was from the food poisoning or the caffeine withdrawal was anyone’s guess.
To be on the safe side, I opened two instant coffee packets, the sort that come with motel rooms, and licked the contents of the wrappers. Instant coffee is against my religion, but this was a health issue. I lay back on the bed and propped myself up with two pillows. I was starting to feel slightly human again. Then I texted Alfred.
Was nearly wiped out by 2 vehicles, also severe food poisoning.
Short and to the point. I licked some salt off one of the crackers, and then ate it slowly, in tiny little pieces. I turned on the free-to-air TV with the remote, surfed the channels but found nothing even barely worth watching, so I settled back into the pillows to sleep and await Alfred’s reply.
A few months ago when I was in England, I met Jamie Smith, a man who worked for an undisclosed government organization. At the same time, I had become the Keeper of an occult society, having inherited the title upon the occasion of my Great Aunt Beth’s death. I still had no idea what this entailed, and I had not as yet been contacted by any members of the Society. I had flippantly asked Jamie if he worked for MI6, and he had laughed that off but had not enlightened me.
It was clear to me that Jamie worked for a Torchwood-like government agency, minus the aliens and plus the paranormal. I figured it must be something like a cross between Secret Agent 86 of Get Smart and Ghostbusters. Jamie had worked with my aunt, although he had not told me in what capacity. In the event of an emergency, Jamie had given me a cell phone number which I was to put in my contacts as Alfred, along with instructions never to call Alfred, only to text.
I was in a state of half-sleep when the ringtone alerted me to an sms. I checked my phone. Alfred.
Send list of symptoms. Send dates, times, locations of vehicle incidents. What are you working on? Send list of names of significant persons. Have you contacted authorities? Had medical help? Stay in motel. Do not answer the door under any circumstances.
How did they know where I was? My brain was too fogged to figure that out. I felt I should be surprised. And was this Jamie, or the agency for which he worked?
I formulated my reply. I texted the location, date, and approximate time of when I was nearly knocked over by the car in the main street of Morpeth. Ditto for when I was nearly crushed by the truck in Maitland. I added:
Ni authority or medium help. Violent committee, nausea, stomach pins, headscarf, dizziness, Dhaka. Working om article re ghosts in Morpeth, researching treasury in 1840s. Gavin King, Scpty (surname unknown), Daviod Crwaley. Suspicion of man who worn in River Royal botch and seamy 2 work 4 Gsvib King.
I then spent another five minutes correcting all my typos, and changing words that the auto correct had altered. It came out like this:
No authorities or medical help. Violent vomiting, nausea, stomach pains, headache, dizziness, visions. Working on article re ghosts in Morpeth, researching treasure in 1840s. Gavin King, Scotty (surname unknown), David Crawley. Suspicious of man who works in River Royal Hotel and seems 2 work 4 Gavin King.
I pressed ‘send’, and then licked some more coffee out of another packet. This reply was much faster.
Overheated? Blurred vision? Hallucinations? Your current state?
I texted back, “Yes. Yes. yes. Mich better now. It happens Ist ight.”
Unfortunately I sent that without correcting. The answer again was prompt.
Drink fluids slowly. Avoid dehydration. Eat toast or crackers. Send times of eating-drinking and persons present within 1 hour of symptoms onset.
It hurt to think. I just wanted to sleep. The act of remembering hurt my head, all that reaching through the haze that was my mind. I’d skipped lunch. What had happened next? I’d had dinner with David. Had I eaten anything prior to that? I’d had a lime soda at the hotel, served to me by Fake Ghost Man.
I wanted to figure out time frames, but my brain did not wish to cooperate. I’d had dinner with David and had gotten sick after I’d eaten one mouthful. It was a short drive to the restaurant from the River Royal, where I’d only had one mouthful of the drink.
One mouthful lime soda at River Royal Hotel served by suspicious man who works for Gavin King. About 30 mins later, one mouthful vegetarian meal, with David Crawley. Symptoms 5 minutes later.
That was typed very slowly.
No reply. I waited ten or so minutes, staring at the phone, then propped myself up in the bed with my laptop, and googled ‘poisons’. My first hit was the U.S. Food and Drug Administration website which had a helpful table entitled, ‘Onset, duration, and symptoms of foodborne illness’.
I didn’t have an unusual taste in my mouth or a
burning feeling, so that ruled out metallic salts. Besides, I’d read all of Agatha Christie’s books and watched every episode of Miss Marple, so I was quite au fait with the effects of metallic salts poisoning.
Nitrate poisoning didn’t sound quite right, although the symptoms included dyspnea, whatever that was. I opened another tab and discovered that dyspnea referred to shortness of breath. I hadn’t experienced that. By the time I got to ‘yessotoxin’ on the bottom of the page, I was cringing. The lists of symptoms were fairly gross.
It was only then, in my highly confused fog, that I realized I had been poisoned deliberately. Disorientation was a symptom of Amnesic Shellfish Poisoning. I noted that, found it irrelevant, then tried to concentrate. Perhaps I’d been given a recreational drug, although why anyone would consider violent vomiting and seeing a giant, gray, aggressive cat the size of a Labrador as recreational was beyond me.
Back to the FDA website table. Alfred had said ‘one hour’. The table was helpful. Poisons with an onset of one hour were metallic salts—ruled out—plus shellfish toxin, organic phosphate, muscaria-type mushrooms, tetradon toxins, paralytic shellfish poisoning, and an allergic reaction to histamine, monosodium glutamate, nicotinic acid. I ruled out allergic reactions in the context of deliberate poisoning.
The minuet sms tone again, and a reply from Alfred.
Probable amphetamine or methylphenidate overdose, likely intended to be fatal given yr small consumption and vehicle incidents.
I’d pretty much come to the same conclusion, but I felt too weak to be horribly concerned. I ate half a cracker in one go and googled ‘amphetamine overdose symptoms’, and then promptly fell asleep.
The laptop falling to the floor startled me awake. I retrieved it and checked it, and to my relief it appeared none the worse for wear although the mouse took a while to get going. I always have a mouse plugged into my laptop. I couldn’t remember if I’d read about amphetamine symptoms or not. I googled ‘methylphenidate’. Turns out it was just a long name for Ritalin. I didn’t know that. I did have some of the symptoms, according to the first website I read.
