Town Haunts

by Cathy Spencer

  “Plenty of room,” her captor said, turning to look at her just as she darted away. “Hey!” he shouted, putting down the lantern and racing after her.

  He caught up with her in seconds, grabbing her hair from behind. Anna screamed in pain and tried to kick him. Cabrero lugged her off her feet and carried her back under one arm, writhing and kicking, to the mausoleum. He slammed her up against the wall again, trapping her body beneath his.

  “I don’t like to shoot people,” he said, reaching into his pocket as she squirmed. “It’s messy, and it leaves too much evidence for the forensics police. This is much neater.”

  He pulled a length of wire from his pocket and, kneeing Anna in the back, wrapped it around her throat. Anna gasped as she felt it tighten. She tried to head-butt Cabrero, who jerked backward, tripped, and fell. Anna jumped sideways out of his reach. As Cabrero scrambled to his feet, swearing, Sherman Mason charged out of the darkness. Anna screamed, Cabrero turned, and Sherman bashed him in the head with a shovel. It made a sickening clang. As Anna watched, Cabrero staggered backward and collapsed onto the ground.

  There was a moment of silence as Anna became aware of the howling wind. She stared at Cabrero, lying motionless on the ground with his eyes closed, and then at Sherman. He was gasping for breath, his face grey and clammy with sweat.

  “Sherman, thank God,” she said, but the caretaker groaned, clutched his chest, and tumbled to the ground.

  “Sherman!” Anna shouted, dropping to her knees beside him. He was grimacing with pain and his eyes were screwed shut. “Sherman, no!” With her hands tied behind her back, Anna was helpless. She peered around frantically.

  “Help!” she screamed. “Can anybody hear me? Help!” But when she looked at Sherman again, he was staring up at her, his eyes glazed with pain.

  “Sherman, I’m so sorry,” she said. “Can you untie me? Do you have any medication with you?”

  “No,” he said with a gasp. “It’s at home beside my bed.”

  Overcome with shock and frustration, Anna started to cry, slumping into a sitting position on the ground beside him.

  “Don’t, Anna.” His hand fluttered upward and rested on her knee. “I want to die. Maybe Evie will forgive me now.”

  “Forgive you?” Anna sobbed. “Wh-what for? You’re a hero. You saved my life.”

  “No, I’m not,” he said, gazing at her. “I’m a murderer. I killed my Evie.” Incredulous, she stopped crying to stare down into his face.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Anna was still trying to absorb Sherman’s words when she heard someone shouting her name.

  “I’m over here!” she screamed, struggling to her knees. Flashes of light came zigzagging toward her through the darkness. She staggered to her feet. “Over here! Hurry!” she screamed, jumping up and down. The light came closer until it blinded her, and she had to close her eyes.

  “Anna!” Steve shouted, grabbing her waist and hoisting her off her feet. “You’re all right,” he said in a hoarse voice, putting her down again and hugging her tightly.

  More lights converged, and Anna saw John Fox Child and two other men running toward them. Their guns were drawn, and they were wearing protective vests.

  “I-I’m okay,” she stuttered as Steve cut the wire from her wrists. “Help Sherman.”

  “Sherman?”

  She turned Steve around and pointed to the caretaker on the grass. Steve knelt beside him and began checking his vital signs.

  “Anna!” John shouted, blinding her again with his light. She averted her eyes, shaking with cold and shock, and felt his arms around her shoulders. “Over there,” he said with a nod, leading her out of the way while the other men stalked forward, their guns trained on Cabrero’s inert form. Anna heard Steve radio that it was all right to send in the paramedics.

  “What happened to you?” John asked, lifting her chin to examine the swelling on her face. He inhaled sharply. “What’s this?” His fingers brushed the ugly red line on her throat.

  “Cabrero ‒ Greg’s partner ‒ tried to strangle me. He’s the one on the ground over there,” she said through chattering teeth.

  “Emmanuel Cabrero. We know him. He was the one Henry was staying with in Calgary, the friend who bailed him out of jail.” John drew her back into his arms, and she collapsed against him, his arms feeling so warm and safe.

  “How did you find me?” she mumbled.

  “Tiernay Rae called us.”

  “Tiernay called you?” Anna asked, her head jolting up in surprise.

  “Yes. She told us Cabrero had you captive in the old part of the cemetery. It just took us a while to find you.”

  Anna shook her head. “I can’t believe that Tiernay did that for me. What about Greg?”

  “He’s gone. Don’t worry, we’re looking for him.” John turned to speak to his men. “How’s Cabrero?” he asked.

  “Not good,” one of the constables answered. “I haven’t got much of a pulse.”

  “Sherman stopped him. With a shovel,” Anna said. John stared at her for a moment before turning to Steve. “How’s Sherman doing?” he asked.

  The young man looked up. “He’s going to need a stretcher.” Anna started to cry again, and John rubbed her back.

  “I’d be dead if it weren’t for Sherman,” she moaned.

  A team of paramedics converged on the scene and went to work on the two men lying on the ground. They were quick and efficient; one of the teams pushed Sherman out on a gurney a few minutes later. Anna saw him go past with an oxygen mask clamped over his grey face. When the gurney carrying Cabrero left a short time later, however, there was a blanket drawn over his head. Anna stared after him, rubbing her sore shoulder.

  John returned to drape a blanket around her. “You look as if you’re ready to collapse. I’m going to have Steve take you over to one of the ambulances to check you out. He’ll ask you a few questions, and then he’ll drive you home, unless you want to stay at a neighbour’s house?”

  Anna nodded wearily. “I’ll think about it. Thanks, John. I really owe you.”

  He shook his head. “I hate to say it, but maybe you’ll listen to me next time I tell you to butt out of an investigation.” She stared at him wordlessly, her face dirty and bruised, the angry red mark circling her throat. Steve joined them and glanced from John to Anna.

  “Ah, take her to the ambulance,” John said, dismissing her with a wave.

  “Come on, Anna,” Steve said, putting an arm around her shoulders and leading her away.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  It was late Sunday afternoon. Anna had just arrived at Erna’s house and was sitting cross-legged on the couch with a mug of hot chocolate in her hands. Erna sat beside her with one of May’s homemade afghans draped over her shoulders and a cup of tea, while May sipped her glass of red wine from the recliner. A fire burned brightly in the hearth, and the house smelled enticingly of beef roasting in the oven. Anna still felt limp from her near-death experience and her muscles ached, but she felt surprisingly well, otherwise.

  Erna tsked as she examined Anna’s face and throat. “That animal. Look what he did to her, May.”

  “If he weren’t already dead, I’d take my crutch to him,” May said, lifting it up from beside her chair. She let it drop back to the floor and took another swallow of wine.

  “You look tired, May. How’s Sherman doing?” Anna asked.

  “Not bad. They only let me see him for five minutes today. He was kind of dopey from the pain killers, but they said the heart attack was mild. He should be out of the hospital in a few days if he behaves himself. No more running around the cemetery at night for him.”

  “Thank God he did,” Erna said. She turned to Anna. “So, you got the rest of the story today from Steve?”

  “Yes, when I went to the station to make my statement. I saw Tiernay from a distance. She had been brought in for questioning and was just leaving. She looked like the stuffing had been knocked out of her. Actually, I felt
sorry for her.”

  “Never mind her, start at the beginning,” May said. “Greg was a counterfeiter . . .”

  “Yes. When he left the cemetery last night with Tiernay, he went straight to the basement of their house. He kept his counterfeiting supplies there, hidden in his art studio. He grabbed them and left ‒ didn’t take anything else. He tried to talk Tiernay into leaving with him, but she refused to go. Instead, she called Steve as soon as Greg was gone.”

  “What was he counterfeiting?” Erna asked.

  “Passports, driver’s licenses, credit cards, and ten-dollar bills. He told Tiernay that he’d been doing it for eight years, using his graphic design business as a front. He’d had some trouble with a crime gang hassling him when they were living in Vancouver, though, so when he and his sister left, he was finished with big cities. Tiernay wanted to try Alberta, and as it turned out, a contact of Greg’s was just finishing his sentence in the same prison as Henry. The contact told Greg that Henry had a storefront for sale in Crane, and Greg thought it was a great opportunity to start over again. That’s how he and Tiernay ended up here.”

  “Did he already know this Emmanuel Cabrero before they came?” Erna asked.

  “No. His contact made the introduction. The police already knew about Cabrero ‒ he’d had a record. But Greg didn’t have one, and that’s why Steve couldn’t find anything on him. Greg’s been lucky, up until now.”

  “So, why were he and Cabrero meeting in the cemetery?” May asked.

  “Steve said that it was an ideal location. Cabrero could use the back roads to get into the rear entrance of the cemetery and avoid being seen in town altogether. He and Greg met in the old part of the cemetery where it was nice and private, and no one would see their lights.”

  “Except Sherman,” May said.

  “Yes.” Anna gave her friend a sympathetic look. “The only drawback to the cemetery location was Sherman. Obviously, Greg would have asked Henry about the caretaker living next door to the cemetery, and Henry would have told him all about Sherman and Evelyn. Sherman must have seen Greg and Cabrero’s lights when they were meeting on Thanksgiving night, but they must have heard him coming. Tiernay and I opened the side gate last night, and it made a horrible squeak. Greg told his sister that he pretended to be Evelyn to scare Sherman off, and that’s how all this business started with Evelyn’s ghost coming back. Greg used the séance to frighten Sherman out of his house, and kept up the pressure with the ghost sightings around town.”

  “That was Greg who frightened me on my apartment stairs?” May asked.

  “Yes, but he meant to scare Sherman, not you.”

  May’s face darkened, and Anna couldn’t tell if she was angrier about Greg wanting to frighten Sherman, or about the attack on herself.

  “Tell us about Henry,” Erna coaxed.

  “After Henry threatened Frank at The Diner, he ran across the street to his old store, still angry about the cleansing ritual. Tiernay wasn’t there ‒ she told Steve that she never knew Greg was helping Henry ‒ but Greg was. Henry told Greg that if he didn’t help, he would tell the police about meeting him through his jailbird friend. It might not seem very incriminating to us, but Greg didn’t want any attention from the local police. Flying under the radar was critical to his operation. So he agreed to hide Henry in his basement until he could smuggle him out of town and into Calgary. Remember, the police were searching for Henry after he attacked Frank. But then Henry found out about the counterfeiting business and made things worse by wanting to be cut in. Greg kept him happy showing him how to counterfeit ten-dollar bills, but they were unusable, so Greg salted a couple of them at the store to incriminate Sherman. He figured that the police were already suspicious of Sherman with his old trouble at the bank, so if Sherman got arrested, well, that would keep him away from the cemetery permanently.”

  “Let me get this straight,” May said. “Greg was on my stairs hoping to scare Sherman?”

  “That’s right.”

  “And on your front lawn?”

  “Yes, that was Greg and his computerized special effects. That, and the recorded music from Evelyn’s box.” Anna shivered, remembering how effective Greg’s ghostly show had been. “You see, Greg and I had just spoken that day concerning how worried Tiernay was over not holding another séance. Stupidly, I told him that I thought the key to the ghost mystery was in the cemetery, that maybe someone was using it to sell drugs and keeping Sherman away by frightening him. Greg offered to talk to Steve about it, but of course he never did. Instead, he decided to keep me away from the cemetery by giving me a healthy fear of ghosts.”

  “Diabolical,” Erna said.

  Anna nodded. “By then, Henry had abandoned his car outside of Calgary, and Greg had driven him to Cabrero’s house. Cabrero bailed Henry out of jail after he turned himself in, and brought Henry back to Crane in time to help with the summoning ritual in the cemetery.”

  “That was Henry dressed up as Evelyn’s ghost?” May asked.

  “Partly. The ghost’s appearance on Evelyn’s grave was more of Greg’s special effects, but the ghost who ran after me was Henry. He was hiding nearby and took off after me when I ran. Everyone was so distracted, they didn’t realize that they hadn’t seen Evelyn’s ghost actually leave the circle.”

  “How did Henry stop Steve?” May asked.

  “Taser. It brought him down when Steve was getting too close, but the blow to his head from falling into the tree was the icing on the cake. It affected Steve’s memory enough that he didn’t realize he’d been tasered.”

  “Did Henry taser Greg, too?” Erna asked.

  “No, Greg faked his reaction. All he had to do was fall down when Henry pointed at him and pretend to be unconscious. When the doctor couldn’t find a medical reason for Greg’s condition, we were supposed to chalk it up to Evelyn’s evil powers.”

  “And Tiernay didn’t know anything about this?” Erna asked.

  Anna shook her head. “No, she thought it was all real. That’s why this is so difficult for her to take in. She truly believed that Evelyn’s ghost talked to her at the séance, although Greg had her convinced beforehand that Evelyn had been murdered, and that her ghost was looking for revenge. It was all part of his scheme.”

  Erna shook her head and sighed. “His own sister.”

  “Hey, what about the attack on Judy?” May asked.

  “That was Henry again,” Anna replied. “And that was the beginning of the end for him. He enjoyed playing the ghost in the cemetery so much that he took it upon himself to frighten Judy to take his revenge upon Frank. But Cabrero thought Henry had gone too far. Up until then, the ghostly scares could pass as Halloween pranks, but going after someone with an axe draws police attention. Plus, Cabrero thought Henry was emotionally unstable and worthless as a counterfeiter, so he decided to get rid of him. Henry came along with Greg for a meeting with Cabrero on Friday night, and Cabrero garrotted him. Greg swore that he didn’t know Cabrero’s intentions ahead of time, but who can say?” She shrugged. “But it was Greg’s idea to hang the ‘murderer’ sign on Henry’s body afterward to further confuse things. It was all smoke and mirrors with Greg. He saw himself as a gentlemen thief, and counterfeiting as just another art form, but being an accessory to Henry’s murder was too real for him. He realized how dangerous Cabrero was, and when things came to a head last night in the cemetery, he decided it was time to get out. But Tiernay wouldn’t go with him, so he had to risk her going to the police.”

  “And Greg left you there to be murdered,” Erna said with a forbidding look in her eyes. “Gentleman thief or not, he dammed himself to eternal hellfire when he left you there to die.”

  Anna looked at her friend and knew that Erna truly believed what she had just said. Erna had a fundamental faith in right versus wrong, good versus evil, and justice for justice’s sake, and she was passionate about her values.

  The ridiculous thing in all of this was that part of Anna felt sorry for Greg. Greg
had some grandiose illusion about himself that didn’t include anyone getting hurt, but Cabrero had forced him to leave her in the graveyard to die. On the other hand, Anna vividly remembered her absolute terror as the wire had slipped around her neck and tightened. If it hadn’t been for Sherman, she knew that she would not have survived her encounter with Cabrero. Aside from that, there was a callous indifference in Greg’s treatment of Sherman, terrifying the poor, tormented soul just so that he wouldn’t witness Greg’s criminal activities, that was difficult to forgive.

  But, maybe Sherman wasn’t such an innocent victim after all? Was it true that he had he murdered Evelyn? Since he had been in the middle of a heart attack, his admission in the cemetery was the equivalent of a death-bed confession, wasn’t it? She would have to find out the truth before she could close the book on this ordeal.

  “What are you thinking, Anna?” Erna asked, studying her friend. “You have the most peculiar expression on your face.”

  Anna smiled and turned to Erna. “Probably just a trick of the firelight. I’m starving. When will supper be ready?”

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  It was Wednesday, Halloween night. Anna welcomed the trick-or-treaters who arrived at her door at six and handed out candy for a half-hour after that, but she turned out the lights and locked the door at six-thirty. She was going to the hospital for visiting hours. It was time for a talk with Sherman.

  After parking her car in the visitor’s lot, she hurried down the hospital corridor to his room, wondering what she would do if May were there. Erna had told her that May had visited Sherman every day for the four days he had been in the hospital, but she usually came during the day and was back at Erna’s house in time for supper, so it probably wouldn’t be a problem. All the same, when Anna rounded the corner and peeked into Sherman’s double room, she sighed with relief. Sherman’s roommate was engrossed with two little girls in fairy costumes while a young woman, probably their mother, smiled from her chair. The chair beside Sherman’s bed was vacant, and he was smiling at his roommate’s adorable visitors. The smile faltered when Anna stepped through the door.