by Karine Green
To her right was the living room. Against the far wall of the room was a fire place, with a period mantle still in place, she could stand inside the fireplace. A small, but once elegant parlor was located at the rear of room, with a set of grand oak sliding doors that much to Kathy's shock, still worked. She noticed that the wallpaper was also off the walls in here, exposing a once delicate paint job of what reminded Kathy of a bayou scene. It was terribly faded.
"How strange, it seems like they could just sit upstairs, and look out the front to get the bayou scene?" she said, to herself. She was referring to the edge of the bayou across the street. If she went to all of the trouble of painting something on the wall, she would think that it would be different from the one that could be viewed out the window.
She strolled slowly back out into the foyer. At the back was a set of double pocket doors that opened into what should have been an enormous kitchen. It was strange to look at, there was nothing in there. Even the plaster had been stripped from the walls. Compared to all of the other rooms she'd seen so far, this was just a big brown money-pit of a room.
"Well, at least I know for sure now that the kitchen is the first thing that needs to be bought," she said, closing the doors. She smiled as her eyes took in the bones of what this room could be, with all these gorgeous door-windows at the backside of the house it would be the perfect place to have breakfast in the mornings.
She smirked at herself, "Marconi, you're already living here." People looking to flip a house, didn't daydream about sitting in the kitchen while eating breakfast in the morning. They planned for other people to be able to do so.
This was a bittersweet find. Kitchens are expensive, but right now she still had a large budget for it, and with the room being a large blank slate, she could make it any way she wanted it. She was aware she was still smiling, any way she wanted it. She shook her head, the idea of simply flipping the house was getting further and further from her mind.
She thought she heard steps behind her. Startled, she turned to face...nothing. She looked around, and back in the kitchen, but nothing was there. She dismissed it as normal old house noises, and headed back into the foyer.
She had no idea that she couldn't see the gruesome sight of the Dark Lady's image in front of her, screaming. The next quilt is red, you must leave. But the warning would go unheeded.
The stairway of disappointment, as Kathy couldn't help but call it, was to the immediate right of the pocket doors. As she got a better glance at them she was thankful to see that they were in good shape and only needed resurfacing.
Kathy went up the stairs, stopping on the landing, and looked up the remaining six steps. The upstairs mezzanine was a mirror-image of the foyer downstairs, including the only set of double doors that opened to the upstairs wraparound balcony. The other door-windows were just single doors, and not double. She couldn't wait to enjoy a coffee out there!
To the right was the smallest guest bedroom Kathy had seen in a house this size. It was obvious the room size had been changed at some point. To her, it appeared it had some footage cut off to incorporate a full size modern bathroom. The original house plans had included a traditional water-closet and then a separate room for the tub. It was the tub-room that now acted as the bathroom, with about three feet of what used to be the guest room. The water-closet was now a linen closet.
She quickly looked over the rest of the rooms that were upstairs. The library would be a perfect office once the old, dusty law books of the former owners were removed. There were three normal mansion sized bedrooms on this level. The master bedroom on the other hand took the entire south side of the house, and had its own sitting room, and large linen closet that could easily be converted into a walk-in closet.
She looked at the two smaller rooms toward the rear of the house and smiled. They would be the perfect gateway to inviting her mother down for a visit. Kathy didn't like her mother's historical-Victorian taste, but in the grand scheme of things, who cared what the guest rooms looked like? She could give her mother these two rooms to restore, and she would have a field day. And as a bonus she would probably do the time period justice.
"I hereby dub you the rooms of Restored Hope," she said, crossing herself, again unaware that 'restored hope' meant something else to the spirits here.
The one toward the front of the house was more like a mini-master bedroom that Kathy thought of it as the 'real' second bedroom. She found herself smirking as she gazed into it. It was just a bit smaller than her entire apartment. Again, the wallpaper had suffered the same fate as the rest of the modern wallpaper throughout the house. She opened the door-windows, smiling as the warm air bathed her face.
She closed her eyes, still smiling. A black fog filled the room behind her.
"I could really get used to this," she thought out loud. There was something unreal about the calm of the place. She never wanted to leave here.
She opened her eyes slowly and went out on the porch, never seeing the fog behind her as she stepped away from it. She walked back toward the master bedroom, and looked in the windows. She glanced around, noting that the wrap around balcony was wider than it had looked from below. She was sure she could fit an entire patio set out here, and still have enough room for her to take a morning run around the 'upper track' as she renamed it in her mind. She gingerly leaned on the railing, glad to see that it was still very solid. The view of the trees lining the drive to the gate would be enough to tempt her away from her Starbucks! Perhaps she could buy some coffee online and make it here? She decided she needed to buy a lawn chair this afternoon, so she could have dinner this evening, right here on this spot.
She took out her skeleton key and went in the porch door that led to the master bedroom.
She figured that the small sitting room in the master bedroom would make an excellent master bath, especially since the sitting room also connected to the library. One wall had a built-in bookcase along the entire length of the room, with a fireplace dividing it in the center. It was the only room that still had the 1970's office decor intact.
"Yuck!" She walked out the single pane door in the sitting room and looked out at the backyard. It seemed to stretch on for a long way. The roof tops of the subdivision at the back could be seen toward the rear of the property.
Beyond the missing kitchen, the ad was dead-on. It was true that the house had good bones. She was certain it wouldn't be long before she could actually stay here, of course, if she decided to.
"Hello! Police!" a male voice came from downstairs.
"Oh my! The alarm! I am so sorry. I completely forgot to shut it off," Kathy said startled.
She raced down the stairs feeling really stupid. How many false alarms had she answered, and then cursed the owner under her breath! A dark haired, very young officer stood at the bottom of the stairs, smiling.
"I have the codes right here." She punched in the codes, and the alarm reset. "Gosh! Again, I am so sorry officer. I must have let the beauty and potential of this old place go to my head." She pointed to her head, and then fanned her arms out.
"They said someone bought this ol' spook house," the officer said, extending a hand, "I am Mike Rose. Did anyone tell you about the deaths and ghosts in this place?"
"Kathy Marconi," she smiled, shaking his hand. He had a firm, but polite grip. "And I am a retired homicide detective. If the spirits I've crossed paths with on the job haven't spooked or spoken to me yet, they aren't going to start now," she said, still smiling.
She tried to remember all the times she had stood in the middle of a homicide scene and tried to spiritual contact the victim, to ask what had happened. She knew it seemed like a stupid thing to do, but when a person is stretched out dead in front of you, and you have no idea what happened, it didn't seem so odd to ask the only person in the room who was there. If she had been able to actually see beyond this worldly realm she would have been astounded to know how many spirits had, literally, screamed answers in her face, only to be
unheard.
"You don't look old enough to be retired," he said, looking her up and down. She was a fit, pretty woman, and didn't look a day over thirty five. Her dark, red hair and dark, green eyes still suggested there was a lot of youth left in them. He would have to introduce her to his older brother, Jason. He could use a decent girl for once; after all he had been through with the crazy ones he seemed to attract.
"It's one of the benefits of starting young in a twenty and out profession. You are still young enough to have the luxury of a whole second career when you retire." She maintained a pleasant tone, but the whole point of moving here was to start over. Maybe she shouldn’t have introduced herself as a retired detective. She would have to work on that. If she was going to move on, then she needed to move on.
He smiled, and nodded, all the while looking around. "I haven't been in here, properly, since I was sixteen. My brother dared me to sleep overnight in the slave's quarters up on the third floor." He pointed up.
"Really?" Kathy was shocked to hear the words slaves' quarters, but she was not sure why. It had been a sugar cane plantation that was two hundred years old, and in the Deep South. "What did you see that night? Perhaps the ghosts you mentioned earlier are just pissed off slaves."
"Probably, Lord knows I would have been one pissed off puppy. The Caine family has a mixed history of heroes and villains. Modern day, soap-opera writers would have a field day with their family history."
She hadn't thought about the windows along the roof line being a third floor. She turned, and looked up the stairs to the second floor. She hadn't remembered even seeing a staircase that led to the third floor.
"If it's alright I can show you the way," he said, pointing to the kitchen. He had noticed her looking around and was certain she was looking for a way to the third floor, and figured he would just point it out.
"Lead the way," she said smiling. She was quickly realizing that she would have to find out more about what the locals believed about this place. Beat officers were the best sources of useful local information about a neighborhood. He would know all the local legends of this place, including who started them, which ones were most likely true, and which ones were just meant to scare people.
He went through the double slider doors and into the kitchen, rounded the corner, and proceeded directly to a tiny pantry closet. At the back of the closet was a steep, narrow staircase.
"This is the only way to the third floor," he said, starting up the narrow steps, having to walk up them sideways in order to avoid bumping his gun belt along the wall.
"Yes, heaven forbid the slaves were able to use the main staircase, and free up the square footage," she said, thinking this staircase was really constricted. She was a size six, and still had to turn sideways to avoid the cobwebs. It was funny, she could work horrific crime scenes, but if a simple cobweb touched her, she wasn't sure she could keep herself from climbing over Mike's shoulders, screaming the whole way.
He smiled. "That's middle-class Yankee talk. Think about it, even the houses of the ultra-rich, in modern times, have their own servant's entrances, in both the northern and the southern states. Race has a lot to do with a lot of things, but certainly not that. That's a class issue. The staff, black or white, uses the staff staircase."
She wanted to huff, but didn't. She knew he was right. Her parents had a maid she didn’t entire through the front door either. She wasn’t sure why it was giving her a ‘feeling’, maybe she hadn’t given much thought to the Old South, but now it was staring her in the face.
The stairs finally opened up to the third floor. The attic was an open expanse of rafters. In between the rafters were rows of built-in beds and foot lockers. The mattresses and personal belongings were long gone, of course. By the condition of the place it was clear that no one had been up here in a long while, probably since Officer Rose had stayed here as a kid. Still, even without the impact of a human touch, the attic was impressive! It would be easy to turn it into living space, perhaps even an apartment.
"This is where the women slaves, the ones who ran the house, lived. The kitchen had six, the downstairs had three, and the upstairs had five," he said, making a presenting motion. The Caine history was part of the local history class in elementary school.
Kathy smiled and nodded. Perhaps Mike would tell her what Lauren had left off in her assessment of the property. "Were there any ghosts on your over-nighter?"
"Yup, I call him Ethan. I don't know what his name is. He just looks like an Ethan to me." Mike shrugged. He had no way to know the boy's name was Stable Boy.
"Ethan?"
He nodded, and walked to the other end of the attic looking out the tall narrow dormer window. "He was standing right here, staring out the window, looking at the stable. He said, 'Massa bought a razor whip, and he's coming for Granny.' He was really creepy looking too. He had these white, dead looking eyes." His eyes widened as he recalled the scene from his memory.
"What did you do?" Kathy had to smile. She bet Mike could accidentally talk secret information out of priests. He was easy to talk to, and listen to with his pleasant Southern accent.
He laughed, "Got beat up by my brother, after I ran home screaming."
"It doesn't bother you to be here now?"
He shook his head no. "I don't mind. I have been back many times since then, but I have never seen Ethan again. The local teens do the same thing I did...sneak in, from time to time" He shrugged. "Of course, now it's my job to run them off. There is even a weird YouTube video. Ethan isn't in the picture frame, but I am sure that is who the boys in the video are referencing. It was strange though, they were carrying on about quilts."
"Probably, he was offended you made up a name for him?" Kathy said, smiling.
He shrugged, also smiling "Probably, but when I saw him he wouldn't tell me his name or even talk directly to me. It was like he was stuck in a moment of time. So I figured, I can't very well call him ghost-slave-kid. Something about Hey-Little-Anonymous-Ghost-Slave-Dude, seemed more disrespectful than making up my own name for him. The name Ethan, actually acknowledges his presence as a being, or at the least having once been a being."
She smiled and nodded, "Any other stories I should know about?"
"None of mine," he gazed out the window, "But I do know several other stories. The one that I have the most reports on is the Dark Lady."
"Dark Lady?" What sort of name was that?
"A slave name? Rumor has it that she picked the name herself." He shrugged, again. "Based on the description of her, I would guess she was a house slave here, possibly something like a house manager, or governess. You know, the only blacks that could get away with kicking the white kid's ass at the time." He snapped his fingers, like he was trying to remember something. "The Mammy, I think, most folks called them Mammies. I have only had reports on her in the surrounding subdivision, though. And, the only ones on Ethan are from in the house." He pointed at the subdivision, and then the floor of the house.
Kathy smiled. If Mike was ever handcuffed, he would be speechless.
"That whole neighborhood over there was part of the sugar cane fields back in the day." He pointed, and wagged his finger back and forth to indicate the entire area in the distance. "There is only ten acres of the original property left, with a small patch of cane over there. It's strange too; sometimes, it actually comes up wild over there." He shifted to point at the other end of the property. "The rumor is that Ridely, a murdered field hand, plants it, because cane isn't known to grow wild. Well, not very well anyway. It is truly a cultivated crop, if you want the best results. But, once it's in the ground the way you want it, it's practically effortless to grow. Still, working on a sugar cane plantation was a real threat to the life and limb for the slaves, especially this one. The biggest threats here were poisonous snakes, and spiders. Well, that takes into consideration the biggest non-human threats. Of course it could be argued that the humans who owned the plantation were worse than hungry gators."
Mike shrugged. "Left to die was more to the point, if I remember correctly."
"Aside from the poor slaves, were there any other deaths?"
He nodded, "The four lawyer fella's that used the house for an office, all died on the property back in the 1980's. Some say the Dark Lady scared them to death, because they reminded her too much of the original Caine family," he frowned like something didn't make sense to him, "Although, it is said The Underground Railroad had a rest stop here. The Caine's were instrumental in running it, so they couldn't have been too bad."
He smiled, shrugged, and continued, "According to Lauren, at the Historical Society, the runaway slaves were moved at least twenty miles up state every day. It took a bit over a month and a half to walk from here to north of the Mason Dixon line. Lauren and some of the local activists walked it once. Most folks believe the Caine family would hide the runaway slaves in the caves, at the back of the property, before sneaking them out at night in freight wagons headed north. Sometimes they even used to hide the slaves in whiskey barrels." He didn't like Lauren, and hated to recommend her, but decided to keep his opinion to himself for now.
"Really?" Kathy was intrigued by the way the Underground Railroad would have operated. It seemed awfully dangerous to just start walking. A network would be needed to make things safer, but networks had their own problems. She would have to go check out the caves he mentioned later. However, the area seemed a bit swampy for caves, and with a bayou so close, wouldn't it just fill up during a heavy rainstorm? Perhaps her definition of a cave was different than his.
He nodded, "Yes, I am not sure of the whole history. Lauren Grayson would be able to tell you more. I think some of the runaways were killed by hunters back in the day, and that is why the subdivision gets reports of ghosts. It's the area that is haunted, not the houses. You know, like that movie Poltergeist, where the houses were built on the graveyard."
