The Good, The Bad and The Ghostly ((Paranromal Western Romance))

by Keta Diablo

  A decade of neglect has stripped the main street of any semblance of a nice, quaint town. The wood of each of the false fronts is splintered and faded, and weeds sprout from the ground, covering the street in them.

  I shiver and direct Betsy to the town.

  For lack of a better word, the town is dead. I don’t see a living soul. I don’t see any souls, really, which I’m not sure is better.

  I’ve been living here for two weeks and never realized that I was in a ghost town.

  "What did everyone die of?" I whisper.

  "Whatever got Maude and Charlotte sick," Grant says, appearing next to me. He frowns, distractedly. "I can’t remember exactly, only that it swept through the town like wildfire."

  Maude. Charlotte. Doc Strom. Stephen. Virgil the saloon owner. They’re all dead. I feel sick just thinking of all those lives lost.

  I close my eyes and try to sense them, but I can’t feel anything. Only the cool breeze of the desert at night.

  "Where do I start?" I ask. "Where do I start looking for evidence that you’re the missing marshal?"

  Grant clears his throat. "The jailhouse. I imagine if I was here on orders, I would have stopped there first."

  Makes the most sense.

  The jail is at the end of the street, and I lead Betsy to a canter to get there as fast as possible. The eerie stillness of Carolina City is starting to seep into my bones. No matter how many times I think about it, I can’t reconcile this skeleton of a town with the pleasant place that I stayed at for so long.

  The jail looks like it’s held up remarkably well for being in a derelict ghost town. There’s no door to it, so I go right in.

  "No lantern," I mutter, glancing at the walls where one should be. Then again, I don’t even know if kerosene works after ten years.

  I see the jail cell where Grant kept me after that fight broke out in the saloon. The desk is still there, dusty, along with the chair where Grant watched me from his spot on the other side of the bars.

  It’s dusty. But it does look like someone’s been here recently.

  Grant.

  I pull at the drawers, looking through the musty, yellowed papers. I don’t know what I’m looking for. A telegram, handwritten orders, a license, a badge—anything.

  "Hattie," Grant’s voice comes from the doorway.

  "Do you have orders or anything?" I ask, absorbed in what I’m looking at.

  "Hattie."

  My hands splay over all of the documents, old wanted posters, everything. Whoever was marshal here was a messy person.

  "Hattie."

  My gaze falls on a yellowed piece of paper, folded twice. There. I pick it up and squint at it. In scrawled, haphazard letters, I read the beginnings of a letter. A request.

  "I think I found it!" I cry to him. I scan it, spotting the request for one Grant Madsen to investigate the last known stronghold of the John Douglas Gang: Carolina City. It’s signed by a Kurt Bonneville in Virginia City. My eyes widen at that. "Grant, it’s—"

  The sound of twin guns cocking cut me off, and I freeze.

  "I don’t know who or what this Grant is, but you’re talking like a loon," a low voice sneers.

  I keep my mouth shut and close my eyes. It’s a living voice—at least I think so, which means that it’s one of the John Douglas gang. After everything, it’s all coming down to this.

  I’m going to be killed in a jail cell in a ghost town, where no one will know what happened to me. Even worse, no one would be looking for me, too. Not for a while when Nat realizes that I’m gone.

  "Turn around slowly," the voice says, and I oblige him, moving as slowly and non-threateningly as possible. My heart pounds in my ears as I look at him. It’s the big one from the square my second day here. The man that I think is John Douglas.

  And he’s pointing two pistols at me.

  He gives me a gaping grin. "Well, you’d be purdy if you didn’t have that scar on your face."

  That strikes me to my core, and I bite back my retort. I know from being in these situations that the best thing to do is to lay low and hope that he doesn’t decide to try to kill me. No room for heroics. They will only result in death, and I know that I can handle anything else he and his men might do to me.

  I just need to live. So I keep my mouth shut.

  "Boss, it’s the haint from earlier," another voice says to him. He’s obscured by the exterior wall, so I can’t tell what he looks like or how many other members of the gang there are here.

  "She ain’t a haint, Joseph," John says. "Just look at her. Why don’t you come out here and join us, purdy lady?"

  I hesitate and surreptitiously stuff the letter into my breast pocket for safe keeping. Oh, how I wish my revolver wasn’t back in my room at the boarding house.

  "Now," John says, gesturing with the guns.

  I get up and walk slowly out, giving him a dirty glare as I walk out into the night air. I realize with a sinking heart that there is a group of men surrounding Betsy. I don’t want her to get to hurt. Not at my expense.

  "Look at me, darlin’," John says.

  I snap my eyes back to him.

  "What’s she doing here, boss?" a shorter man asks John. "She’s the one who’s been in town for the last two weeks?"

  John sizes me up. I boldly meet his gaze. I guess my movements in town would have scared them. If they thought it was haunted before, my presence here would have made it seem like the ghosts were stirring up trouble.

  Hopefully, it terrified them.

  "Well?" John asks. "Was it you?"

  "Was what me?" I ask, my voice low.

  John smiles, amused. "Were you the ghost we been seeing?"

  "Oh yes," I lie. "All two hundred and fifty of them."

  "We should kill her," one of the other gang members says. "She killed Edgar here yesterday—"

  "I did not!" I retort, looking at him, knowing that he meant the man who died in the street during the town festival. "He said that one of you shot him, thinking he was a ghost!"

  The man’s eyes widen at my accusation. "We’d’a never killed him!"

  "Quiet, she’s just trying to get a rise outta you," John snarls. "She’s a feisty one, that." He stalks over to me, sizing me up and down. "And I s’pose you were the one at the mine earlier? When it caved in with Bud in it?"

  "He shot at me and caused that," I said.

  "And is he dead now?" John asks. I suck in a deep breath, but he understands my meaning. His eyes fall on the bandaged wound on my arm. "And I s’pose that’s from his shot?"

  "He was a bad shot," I say coldly.

  He blinks, then throws his head back and gives a full belly laugh. Taking their cue from their leader, the rest of the gang joins in.

  It sets my teeth on edge. Where’s Grant right now? And the rest of the townsfolk? Were they all busy reliving their deaths? I haven’t seen any sign of other ghosts since I realized that Grant was a ghost himself.

  "So tell me, what’re you doing here, little lady?" John says.

  That one I will answer. "I’m investigating a missing US Marshal."

  "Oh, now are you?" John says. "Which marshal? We’ve seen our fair share of them. Even killed one ‘bout—what?—six months ago?"

  "Something like that, boss," a man chimes in.

  I shiver, realizing that they’re talking about Grant. True to the letter I found, he was stationed here.

  Why, when there was no one living here?

  I got my answer just as quickly as I thought it.

  "He was snooping around our work here," John says. "Wanted to arrest us. And we couldn’t have that, little lady."

  I grit my teeth, hearing the callous way they were talking about Grant. The man I love.

  "What work were you doing here?" I manage.

  "Silver minin’!" a more dim-witted member of the gang says.

  John snarls at him. "Hush, you!"

  But I latch onto that, hoping for some sort of resolution about all of this craziness. "Si
lver mining? But I thought that the silver mine was played out a decade ago. That’s why there’s nobody here, right?"

  "No, they all died," the dim-witted man giggles.

  Again, I cringe.

  "Hush, Jeb!" John says.

  "But she ain’ goin’ do nothin’, boss," Jeb says. "We goin’ shoot her and going back to minin’!"

  "I said quiet!" John says, diverting his attention from me to stalk toward Jeb, who cowers under his scrutiny. "You don’t go spouting off all that to a random lady!"

  "What’s she gonna do?" another member asks. "Tell someone?"

  "She can’t if she has a bullet in her skull." Another one sniggers. "Like that marshal."

  I feel like I’m going to be sick if they keep talking about Grant.

  "Well, we’ll have to kill her now, won’t we?" John says. "We can’t have her telling people about us." He turns back to me, aims his revolver, and shrugs. "It ain’t personal, darlin’."

  Staring down the barrel of a gun, I close my eyes, waiting for my inevitable end. Now I’d get to see how my impure soul impacts my afterlife. If I get to see Mary Ellen sooner than expected. Or never again.

  The gun never goes off.

  Screams make me jump, inhuman and terrified. As if the very fabric of their beings are torn apart.

  It’s a horrific sound that’s joined by something else.

  The shrieks and howls of the dead.

  My eyes snap open to see that Grant’s ghostly form has subdued John, who looks terrified, his jaw slack as he looks up at the dead US Marshal. He’s on his back on the ground, backing away from Grant.

  The screams are coming from the rest of the gang members. I see the ghostly forms of Charlotte, Maude, Doc Strom, Mr. and Mrs. McLaughlin, and all of the other townsfolk terrorizing the living. They’re actually physically moving their bodies. The ghosts force the bandits to point at each other, then pull the triggers. A man is ripped apart by four ghosts. Another backs into a window, where a ghost pulls him down on the broken glass. I turn my head away when I see the glass shard explode from his chest.

  All this and more. All horrible ways to die. The residents of Carolina City were inflicting ten years of death and misery on these bandits. I vomit up the last of what was in my stomach. I can’t believe what I’m seeing.

  Carolina City isn’t a ghost town.

  It’s Hell.

  Grant seems to sense my horror and turns to look back at me. His eyes are apologetic, pleading with me to agree. There’s nothing for me to agree with. I can’t understand what’s happening here.

  I shake my head, furiously, silently begging with him not to turn into a killer. Not to stoop this low. He’s too good for this. At least, I think he is.

  Suddenly, I’m afraid of him.

  "Hattie," he whispers, looking back at me.

  Through him, I see John raise his pistol, his eyes wide, and aim. He’s aiming for Grant, but the bullet is going to kill me.

  Grant sees my wide eyes, and his face darkens as he whips around back to John, who shrieks. The former marshal grabs the bandit, and the bullet goes wild. I hear the shatter of glass somewhere off in the distance. I hear a further crash behind me, and I glance back, curiosity getting the better of me.

  John has shot the window out at the General Store. From my vantage point, I can see the hot orange of fire licking the wood.

  Oh, no.

  There’s no fire brigade to stop it.

  With wide eyes, I realize that the whole of Carolina City is about to go up in flames.

  "Get out of here, Hattie!" Grant yells. He holds John to him, who is screaming his lungs out. Most of the John Douglas Gang is dead. Save for him. And I get the feeling that, while it may not be at Grant’s hand, John will be joining the ranks of the dead soon.

  I hesitate once again, torn between wanting to take Grant with me, wanting to stop the fire, and wanting to run to the boarding house to grab my things.

  Another crash directs my attention to the General Store. In mere moments, the store has caught fire and it’s spreading.

  "Get out of here!" Grant yells again.

  I hesitate. Can fire even hurt the dead? I can’t help but wonder if this is the last time I’ll ever see him.

  "I love you," I whisper as a tear falls down my cheek.

  I don’t know if he heard me, but I run to Betsy, who is rearing against her restraints, her milky-white eyes wild. I untie her and pull myself up into the saddle.

  "Come on, girl," I whisper to her, hoping that she has enough sense to run.

  She does.

  We speed out of the remains of Carolina City, and I catch the eye of Charlotte as I pass. My friend even in death, she gives me a demure smile. I know that, despite everything, I’m going to miss her.

  Up until this point, I’d been enjoying my stay here. Not anymore.

  When we get to the outskirts of Carolina City, I turn Betsy back to look back at the smoldering town. The entire main strip is orange in the night sky. A ghost town no more. Just Hell incarnate.

  I lick my lips.

  "All right, girl," I whisper to the mule, "let’s see if you know the way back to Virginia City."

  I’m going to have a long night ahead of me.

  Chapter Eleven

  The old man at the desk blinks up at me as I come in. He looks shocked at my appearance, but he composes himself enough to remember his manners.

  "May I help you, Miss?"

  "Yes sir," I say. "My name is Hattie Hart. And I was wondering if you could have a look at this?"

  I take out the letter that I found at the jailhouse and lay it on the desk. The old man picks up the letter and reads it. I’ve memorized it now, after reading it so many times on my lonesome ride back to Virginia City, making sure that I was reading what was truly there and not what I wanted.

  That seems to be a common theme for me. I’ll never touch laudanum again.

  Requests for US Marshal Grant Madsen from Sheriff Kurt Bonneville.

  Go to Carolina City to investigate the last-known whereabouts of John Douglas and his gang. Report any suspicious activity.

  Godspeed.

  The last part got me, the "Godspeed." Grant had died investigating those last-known whereabouts, and I had nearly, unknowingly, followed in his footsteps.

  The old man reads it, his face wrinkling deeper the more he frowns.

  "Are you Sheriff Bonneville?" I ask.

  "I am," the man answers softly.

  I close my eyes and exhale through my nose. The mysterious Kurt Bonneville. In Virginia City this entire time. I would have asked around when I first arrived had my telegram expressly said that my contact was in Virginia City, not Carolina City.

  But if that had happened, I never would have met Grant.

  I clear my throat, ready for the speech that I’ve had for the last three weeks. "My name is Hattie Hart. I’m a detective with the Tremayne Psychic Specters Investigations Agency in St. Louis. You had contacted my agency about a missing US Marshal?"

  The old man looks up at me. "You were supposed to be here weeks ago."

  I pull out a chair to sit down. "I was. I got a partial telegram that told me to go to Carolina City. Where I’ve been for the last two weeks."

  Kurt looks at me, mouth agape. "In a ghost town?"

  I shrug nonchalantly. "I’m a ghost hunter," I say. "I was with people who would take care of me."

  Including Grant.

  I take out the telegram, the one that started this whole debacle, and hand it to the sheriff. He reads it silently and sets it down before sitting back and passing a hand over his face.

  "Well, that told you nothing, now did it?" he says.

  "I had very little to go on, yes," I say amusedly. "I found your missing marshal."

  "Really?" Kurt looks at me with new eyes now. "Is he—?"

  "He died. The bandits killed him." I sigh. "The ones that he was sent to investigate."

  For a wizened sheriff, Kurt takes this news hard. H
is eyes immediately fill with tears, and he wipes at them. "Grant was such a young, promising marshal."

  "He is."

  "You saw him?"

  I nod. "His ghost, at least."

  The old man sighs and combs a hand through what little hair he has. "I...wanted to deny it, but I had a feeling that he was dead. Came to me in a dream. Saying that he had to be saved."

  "Ah." So there is the ghostly connection. That’s why I was sent on this assignment to find a missing US Marshal. Grant apparently travels through dreams to communicate messages. Kurt would have been wondering what happened to his marshal, possibly even sent out a posse to find him. And found nothing. A dream, even one with a ghost, could have provided him closure.

  And then I arrived with half a telegram and destroyed a town and fell in love with that missing US Marshal.

  All in a day’s work for Hattie Hart.

  "I just wanted to let you know, sir," I say carefully, "that my assignment is done. I’ve located Marshal Madsen. And the John Douglas Gang is...out of commission."

  I don’t want to elaborate further. Those mental images of the bandits being killed by the ghosts will forever be burned in my mind.

  Kurt sighs. "I suppose that’s why you’re here then? To collect payment?"

  I smirk. "Because this assignment was a deviation from my usual kind of work, I’ll decline your payment, sir, though my employer may send a bill" At twelve dollars a day, my services were expensive, but had I located Kurt in the first place, I would have made contact with Grant far faster and easier.

  But I wouldn’t have fallen in love with him. And that feeling, even if it was just for a few days, is worth its weight in gold. I only hoped the Tremayne P.S.I Agency agreed.

  I rise from my seat, and Kurt gets to his feet as well. I give him a curt nod. "I’m sure my employer will be in contact with you, sir, but I do have a train to catch."

  I turn to leave.

  "Miss...Hart, is it?" Kurt asks softly, causing me to glance back at him.

  "Sir?"

  "Can you tell me one thing?" Kurt pauses, as if searching for the right way to phrase it. "Is Grant at peace?"

  I close my eyes.

  "I think so," I say. Even if only for a short time, I add silently.