Last Impressions (The Marnie Baranuik Files)

by A. J. Aalto

  Harry’s text read: Are you quite all right?

  I answered: Yup. Because really, when you’ve had your face whipped by your own Twizzlers, you don’t brag about that shit.

  After a pause, he texted: Lies. I should be happy to go to your tunnel, if you would but grace us with your presence tomorrow. I didn’t have to wonder who “us” was, or where I’d be doing said gracing. I supposed that seeing my parents was unavoidable, now that they’d let Harry visit. If I didn’t go, I’d forever hear how he came and their own daughter would not. I decided against suggesting a completely different tunnel he could happily grace again, and was struck with an idea.

  I dialed Father Scarrow to warn him that Harry would be joining us at the tunnel, and the invisible force clubbed me on the other side of the head, clipping me in the eye, knocking the phone clear across the room. I chased it across the floor and picked it up.

  “Hey, Scarrow. There's a really mean ghost in Barnaby Nowland’s pig sty,” I whispered into the phone, “what should I do?”

  “Play hard to get?” he suggested. “Wait, do you know how?”

  “If I wanted cold I've got the ghost for that, Captain Tightpants.”

  “Want me to come for a sleepover?”

  “Renfield!”

  “You can trust me. I'm a man of the cloth. Who’s with you?”

  “It’s just me, Schenk, and an elaborate bag of goodies.”

  “I meant the ghost. Which ghost is with you? Did you find the skull? The pictures?”

  “Skull, pictures, and some of your notes.”

  “Well, you’re doing something wrong. Stop tormenting the ghosts.”

  “I’m not!”

  “I know you better than that, Marnie,” he said, his tone that of a father chiding a wayward daughter.

  “You’re supposed to call me Miss Baranuik,” I corrected.

  “Did you just call to reap my sympathy, or do you want something?”

  I opened my mouth to inform him about Harry and decided against it, because fuck the exorcist and his cheek. He could just meet my immortal companion without warning on a dark and stormy night in the middle of nowhere. And then take a flying fuck at a rolling donut on a frozen gravel driveway.

  Like he read my mind, he said, “Whatever you’ve got up your sleeve, I’m ready for you, Marnie. I’m more than ready.” Then he hung up on me.

  “Douchecopter,” I exclaimed. Boy, I’m glad Mr. Merritt isn’t here.

  Schenk's head popped back into the doorway. “I'm still running a tally for the swear jar. And I wouldn't have taken you for a Browncoat. You're more of a Star Trek chick, aren't you?”

  “You arrange a threesome for me with Captain Picard and Jayne Cobb, and I will love you forever, Longshanks.”

  When he disappeared again, I texted Agent de Cabrera for emergency positivity. I got socked by a poltergeist. I wanna give up.

  Elian texted: Winston Churchill said, “Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.” He ended with a smiley face.

  I texted back: Probably, Churchill wasn’t being punched in the gob by eldritch spirits. Then, to add that pinch of positivity, I added, I’m positive his enthusiasm was a sign of mental instability.

  There was a thud from somewhere beyond the hall, and a shout of alarm.

  “Uh, Marnie?” Schenk’s voice rose to a bellow. “Marnie!”

  I heard reverberating female sobs growing to a wail before I got to the bedroom, and changed gears from a cautious, don't-trip-on-the-crap creep to an actual hurry, ignoring the throbbing in my face. I had no time to register the full horror of the room; there was too much, and it would have to wait. My eyes focused on Schenk, standing there with his arms out, as though to catch the black film floating around him, weeping pitifully.

  Schenk had the necklace hanging from his fingertips. “All I did was touch it.”

  “Put it down!” I shouted, looking for someplace he could do so. “Just there, on the bed.”

  He dropped the necklace onto the tangle of dirty bed sheets.

  The wailing stopped, like a song snatched away by a blizzard’s gale, and the shadowy mist swirled to the floor immediately and disappeared.

  We stared down at the necklace. Then we stared at each other. Then we stared up at Barnaby Nowland’s bed. Schenk had kindly kept what he’d discovered about Nowland’s hobbies to himself when he’d joined me in the kitchen to see the skull. I was grateful for that because it offered me fifteen minutes or so of blissful ignorance that he was not enjoying. Now, seeing it for the first time, I had to work to keep from bolting from the room; getting backhanded by a ghost had nothing on what my eyes showed me.

  The four-poster bed had been decorated on three sides with skulls, all human, and all undeniably authentic. The closest had teeth missing and a broken nasal bridge. It looked whiter than the others. I was betting Nowland had tried to bleach it and weakened the bone. His bedspread was black satin; what might have been sexy on another man’s bed was creepy and revolting here, under the watchful gaze of the desecrated dead. There were snake skins decoupaged across the upper curve of the cast iron headboard like Alice Cooper's worst holiday garland. There were five clusters of bones, perfect crib mobiles for a serial killer’s baby; long bones, short bones, lumpy bones, bones filed to points, all gathered with craft wire and strung with mini lights. I wondered how many had been taken from animals, and prayed he was just friendly with the local butcher. My biologist’s eye told me not to fool myself, and I had to look away.

  “This is why Barnaby had to fuck rubber vaginas,” I told Schenk very seriously. “And, to be perfectly honest with you, that was probably the best destination for his cock this side of a wood chipper.”

  “I’m afraid that’s not all he fucked,” Schenk said, but didn’t elaborate. I glanced at the night table. The drawer was open a little. I snuck a peek up at Schenk’s face for clues, and though he wouldn’t meet my eye, he shook his head minutely to advise against getting a better angle on the contents. The Blue Sense tickled me with Schenk’s revulsion. For once, I let someone else’s opinion trump my curiosity; I trusted the look on his face.

  “This guy’s on the flaming Slip ‘N’ Slide straight to Hell. Your M.E. is gonna need a month and a half-dozen interns to ID all these bones,” I said. I looked at the necklace, and held up my phone to take pictures of it. “Was that the necklace you entered into evidence from Britney’s purse?”

  “Looks like it.”

  “Thing fucking wanders like Sauron’s ring.”

  “The last time I saw it was Thursday when I interrogated Simon Hiscott. You were in my office with the box.”

  “And Father Scarrow,” I said. “I believe he lifted it from the evidence box.” I related, quickly, the Clumsy Coffee Caper. “Then, when Barnaby stole the skull and the photos from Scarrow, he took the necklace too.”

  “Is it getting colder in here?” Schenk asked, and I saw his words on the fog of his breath.

  It was, and not just a little colder; the temperature had taken a sudden and alarming drop. My own breath fogged out rapidly, though I was trying not to freak out. “That’s no ordinary necklace,” I said, “not that I think that comes as any surprise. Just a second.” I forwarded a few pictures to Harry’s phone, and he dialed me immediately.

  “What a lovely lachrymatory, darling,” Harry exclaimed. “Wherever did you find such a specimen?”

  My teeth started chattering, and I held my phone gingerly between shoulder and ear so I could zip up my parka. Then I put him on speakerphone. “A what, now?”

  “That is a tear vial, Dearheart. Also known as lacrimosa, or mourning vessels, or widow’s crystals. The one you have there is a later design, fashioned during the American Civil War.” He made a sound of discovery as he pieced two clues together. “Well, might one assume this has something to do with the carte-de-visite and the young lad in uniform who visited you the other night?”

  A tear vial. “Would these v
ials generally belong to a woman?”

  “Not necessarily, dove. I myself have owned one, though not on a necklace such as the one you have there. I believe it is in storage at home. I can show it to you someday, if you would like to see it. It’s quite lovely.”

  "Tears should always be kept in something necklace friendly," I proposed. I leaned over it and peered at the tiny plug in the top. “Whine cork."

  I handed Schenk the bundle of old, faded photographs. He began to sift through them quickly. The edges were worn soft by time, and some of them had crumbling folds. He took care not to rip them as he scanned again, stopping on one that he showed me, nudging me with his elbow.

  John Briggs-Adsit in the full-dress uniform of a union soldier, with his mother in black, beside an open coffin. Poppa Briggs-Adsit was in the casket, surrounded by flowers. Mother was wearing the lachrymatory vial on her necklace. It appeared as if John’s father’s eyes were open, but they looked goofy, and when I squinted at them, I could just make out that someone had painted fake eyes on his closed eyelids. “Uh, Harry? Still there?”

  “Mmhmm,” he said, lilting his murmur to make it a question.

  “What kind of weirdo paints eyes on a corpse’s closed eyelids?”

  “Funeral pictures, I am assuming. Is the family in the picture with the deceased? Are they dressed in mourning clothes?”

  “Yes,” I said. “And it’s friggin’ creepy.”

  “It was not uncommon in the late eighteen hundreds, love.”

  I flipped the picture over. John’s father’s name was also John. He passed on October third, 1866. Schenk passed me another. John Junior’s funeral, closed casket, only a few months later. Mother Briggs-Adsit wore the same dress to her son’s funeral as she had to her husband’s, with the addition of her son’s brimmed hat from his army days.

  I stared at that picture for a long moment, and the woman in the picture stared back at me accusingly from beneath that brim. Breath stolen, I felt the weight of her in the room.

  “Mama-Captain.”

  There were several other photographs of her, in formal wear, with the incongruous hat set upon her curls, first black, then grey, her face grimmer and sterner with the passing of years.

  “Did she ever take it off?” Schenk asked, and I wondered if he was thinking aloud.

  “I’m coming home,” I told Harry on the phone. “We’re done here.”

  “Ducky?”

  “Yes, Harry?” I said, handing Schenk back his pictures, watching him put them away in the envelope.

  “I should thank you not to bring home any visitors tonight,” he said, and then he was gone.

  I crooked my finger at Schenk and said, “Kitchen. Got more gloves?”

  He gave me a fresh pair from his pocket. I snapped them on. “Okay, Schenk. You got your skull, your pictures, your whine cork on a mope rope,” I shrugged. “Clearly, I suck at exorcisms, and I can’t do a thing if you don’t want me to get my herbs out before the forensics team has been over here. I’m confident that there’s no demon lingering in this apartment. Scarrow can banish the spirits from this place, if that's needed. Part of me would love to take all this haunted evidence with me on my big date with the freaky priest to the Blue Ghost Tunnel and watch the whole universe go polter-ghosty-kablooey, because clearly that’s what would happen. The other part of me wants nothing to do with this shit, especially not around my Harry, and would be on the next plane to the delightfully secluded tropical island of St. Fuck This if I thought it was an option.”

  Schenk nodded. “Way ahead of you.” He poked the necklace gingerly with a thick finger, experimentally. “Sure you don’t wanna take this with you? I hate to hear a woman cry.”

  “I don’t need it, I’ve got my own.”

  “Lying to a cop, now,” he said. “Tsk tsk.”

  “You don’t know,” I said. "I like to keep mine filled with herbs and spices, because the tears of widows are fucking bland otherwise."

  I went back through the maze of boxes to the filth-ridden kitchen, Schenk following, as I poked at light switches on my way. It seemed way too dark in the room, but the sun was fading early, and another storm was rolling in. The skull sat on the counter where we’d left it.

  He popped it into a large evidence bag without incident, gathered up all the bags he'd tucked this, that, and the other into, and then took a long, hard look at me, squinting. “Sure you’re okay, Cinderblock?” He cocked his head and very kindly did not voice that my upper lip was starting to puff up, though I’m sure it was a detail he didn’t miss.

  I touched my right eye gingerly and winced. “I need to go home and get face deep in a bag of ice. You tell no one about me getting my ass handed to me by what may be a little old lady ghost, got that?”

  “Oh, I’m going to tell everyone.” He smirked, walking me out of the apartment. “First on my list, journalistic genius Jerry Formick. I see the headline now: Ghost Granny Wales on Great White Dork of Psychic Investigations. That story would get that asshole off my back for a solid fucking month.”

  “Hey, stop swearing, twat-cracker.”

  “You stop swearing, hose-smoker,” he shot back.

  I gave his arm a playful shove, but I had as much chance of moving him off his feet as I did tipping a tractor trailer over. “Officer, he’s swearing!” I tattled to the uniform on the way out.

  “Sorry.” The officer cracked half a smile and shrugged a whaddya-gonna-do for me. We locked up and handed the keys off to the constable, who had gone back to checking replies to his undoubtedly witty Facebook status message and barely noticed our exit.

  Dear Diary: I shouldn't speak ill of the dead, but every dead person I met today, except Harry, was a complete fuckpocket. There's a whiny soldier, his abusive cunt of a mother, and a disrespectful pervert who should have been on an episode of Hoarders before he got locked up for life for desecrating corpses. I want to go home and watch Wesley fuck my slippers because it's less awful. Love, Marnie. PS: Longshanks is a geek.

  CHAPTER 22

  “TRY NOT TO show off too much, Harry,” I said from inside my ski mask.

  Harry had not dressed down for his big meeting with the priest. He had, if anything, gone overboard; under his heavy coat he wore a frilled silk poet's blouse that matched the thundercloud grey of his eyes, the high lace collar of which poked up around his pale throat. The coat nearly covered the long, lace cuffs at which he insisted on tugging. A black silk top hat rested on his lap. Immaculately shaved but for his upper lip, he’d switched fake mustaches to one that reminded me of Rhett Butler. His sandy brown hair smelled of pomade, and though he had neglected to refresh his 4711 cologne, I could still smell it on my own face from when he’d last hugged me.

  “Moi?” Harry’s eyes went wide with feigned indignation. “Show off? My brazen little sugarplum, do you presume to suggest that I am an ill-mannered braggart?”

  “No, not at all,” I drawled, dripping sarcasm. “Why, faced with a man of the cloth, I have no doubt you’ll be restrained to the point of being invisible. How will I ever draw you out of your shell?”

  Harry’s smile narrowed to a grim line, and he flashed fang. “Only, I should be the perfect gentleman-monster your lad expects me to be, love.”

  My lad? I sighed. “If you eat the priest, you’ll get a bellyache and a speckled tongue.”

  “We don’t know that for certain,” he retorted, making sure his coat was buttoned to the chin. He shot his cuff and glanced at his watch. His little fidgets weren’t fooling me; Harry was not interested in his appearance right now, or the time. Harry could think of nothing but the priest. It had been a while since Harry’s last encounter with a man of the cloth, and that had been on far friendlier, if sadder, terms, at the funeral of a young girl who hadn't deserved what happened to her. Tonight, Harry was spoiling for confrontation, and I felt decidedly like a prize to be won. Probably, that was his intention. Probably, I could have felt flattered that he wanted to fight over me. Probably, it shouldn
't have made me want to tell both Harry and Scarrow where to stick their territorial urges.

  So, it was definitely time for some people skills. “It’s too cold out here,” I said. “This was a bad idea, Harry. Sorry.”

  “Steady on, cricket.”

  “Mr. Merritt can drop me off at the café,” I said, “and then take you back home. How would that be, eh?”

  “I do so enjoy your expressing yourself in your mother tongue, eh?” He winked at me. “Must you wear that ridiculous balaclava?”

  I pouted; though it was hidden by the black fabric, I’m sure he knew it. “It hides my fat lip and makes me feel like a bank robber. And you can give me lip about this Canadian accent when you stop sounding like a Victorian dandy, Lord Highbrow McAntiquated.”

  Harry turned to me so that he could show me how grandly he was rolling his eyes. “The night’s weather is indeed quite unfriendly, but you must allow that I have braved much worse. Have you forgotten that I was in London for the terrible winter of 1715?”

  I played along, comfortable with not knowing what the hell he was talking about. “But of course I keep track of all your movements, Harry. All four hundred years of bopping around the planet.” I mimed licking a finger and cheerfully flipping through an imaginary logbook. “Oh, right, how could I have forgotten? That was the year the Thames froze over.”

  “The Thames has frozen over many times, Dearheart, but I cannot remember a time the ice heaved so high. Flood tide beneath the ice, a veritable wall of slow-moving destruction. Dreadful.” He smoothed the front of his jacket. “It ruined one of my favorite public houses, where a gentleman could find both a blazing hearth and warm drink of an evening. I’m positively chilled by the memory. ”

  Mr. Merritt’s liver-spotted hand automatically poked at the dash and the heat went up a notch. He put on the blinker at a stop sign; we were the only car on the road, but Mr. Merritt liked to do things by the book, I’d noticed. He came to a full stop, paused long enough for me to wonder what he was waiting for, and then turned left cautiously. Even with so much care the back of the hearse fishtailed slightly.