by BoJenn
“Eleanor? May I talk to you, please?”, she said. Both women went into the living room with Eleanor leading the way. Making herself at home and being comfortable was easy for Eleanor. She was on a mission and had confidence that everything would be alright.
Catherine rekindled the fire, still sensitive to the changing temperatures in the drafty mansion. Silence was golden. Communication with words wasn’t necessary. In quietness, much could be seen and understood. And, Eleanor was an expert at reading body language. From her, Catherine could hide no secrets. Eleanor knew that Catherine wanted her to leave. She knew this would happen.
“I will put clean towels out for you,” Catherine said, at last. She couldn’t open her mouth to say anything else. She couldn’t ask her to leave, there were no words. Everything she wanted to say was forgotten when sitting beside Eleanor. Just being beside the older woman gave her a sense of comfort. Everything she planned to say was dumb. Nothing came out as planned. “Setting towels out” came out, unexpected. But, truly, Cat was also fine. She realized that she actually felt comfortable in her own home, now, with Eleanor.
“Yes, that is a good idea. I would like to tidy up. Then I must walk to the bridge to see about the rental car. Oh, I must call the rental company. Yes, I best do that first.”
“The rental company?”, Cat repeated. “Did you buy insurance?”
“Yes, thank God, I did,” Eleanor answered. “It may still be too slippery and icy. I haven't heard the snowplow yet.”
Cat stood up and looked outside the front window of the living room. Eleanor followed her to have a look, as well.
“Oh, by the way, how did you make the coffee? And, the muffins—where did you find the ingredients to make muffins?”, Catherine asked.
“The coffee? Oh, it’s not quite coffee, dear. It's made with coffee, a 1/4 teaspoon of chocolate and mint from the herbs. As for the muffins, well, I come prepared,” Eleanor said.
“Prepared?” Catherine was at a loss for words. “Well, I guess you did!”
But…she thought again, Eleanor had entered with nothing but a tote bag, which Cat didn't remember being such a large tote bag when she first entered the manor. Now, it was a tote bag that carried flour, coffee, and overnight toiletries? That must be one unusual bag. It apparently had an endless supply of bounty, including all-purpose flour, baking soda, and baking powder—all the necessary ingredients for the muffins. “How can this be?”, she rhetorically asked herself. “It just doesn't add up. And, the coffee—the way my mother prepared coffee. Oh, she's good. A real magician. A charlatan, more likely.”
“You fret too much, dear,” Eleanor said, rising from her stooped position, holding a handful of twig bark collected from the floor. A look of frustration settled on her face as she looked at Catherine. Her frustration was reflected from hearing Catherine’s thoughts. Catherine was easy to read and she held no secrets. Her face said it all. Eleanor expelled a deep breath and gave a sigh before she rolled her eyes, asking for divine intervention in the case of Elizabeth Catherine Dubois.
“You are a bad liar, dear.” She raised a questioning eyebrow at her. The twigs and bark continued to have snippets fall on the floor here and there. There was silence. Cat swept up the mess. She had poor eye contact due to the fact she was annoyed with the childish guest. Eleanor stood at the kitchen sink. While putting the dried dishes away she asked, “Catherine, who is the little boy?”
“What little boy?” Cat’s eyebrows raised as she looked at Eleanor inquisitively.
“The little boy I see peeking around the corners.”
“What? I don’t know what you’re talking about. What little boy?” Again, Cat looked at Eleanor with a questioning brow. Cat didn’t want anyone to know she knew there was a boy apparition. Certainly, she would be certified as crazy if anyone knew she saw a mostly invisible apparition.
“Hmm,” Eleanor hesitated, understanding that Catherine was deliberately lying about the little boy. “I thought you knew?” Eleanor was implying that Cat knew about the child but gave her an out for untruths she might be concealing.
“No, I don’t have any children, if that is what your asking?”, Catherine stated, furthering her foray into the lion’s den of lies.
There was a silent moment between them. Eleanor chose not to place pressure on Catherine’s emotions too quickly. There was a certain amount of time that her emotions would surface. Eleanor knew this as a fact. She would back off for now. The identity of the young male apparition could wait, although the young boy was quite demanding and was unsure of who Eleanor was to Catherine. “Ghosts aren’t all knowing. Well, the earthbound ghosts aren’t,” Eleanor reminded herself.
“Never mind,” Eleanor said, stopping short of any further investigation into the boy, and also because Tadhg popped into their scenario, unseen by Catherine, gave Eleanor a jab with his elbow in the ribs and persuaded her to stop with the questioning. “Alright!”, Eleanor said, unable to stifle her cry of “Ooo!” with the rib poke.
Cat stared at Eleanor in puzzlement. Of course, she couldn’t see Tadhg, she could only tell that Eleanor had suddenly changed her mind—and the conversation. “Are you alright?”
“Yes, just an ache from the accident. That’s all.” Eleanor spoke, mind to mind, with Tadhg who had disappeared overnight. “Where have you been?”
Tadhg whispered to Eleanor as he stood by to her side. “Snooping around the house and property last night and this morning,” Tadhg informed Eleanor.
“Oh,.” Eleanor said, looking his direction where he was hovering on the kitchen ceiling.
Meanwhile, Cat noticed Eleanor’s nods directed toward the ceiling, and her verbal response of ‘Oh.’ She assessed the situation and asked, “Is someone here other than you? Who are you talking to?”
Tadhg ignored Catherine's question to Eleanor, continuing on his report of findings, “I found out quite a bit. First and foremost, while you were outside picking flowers, the house was active. The ghost lad was frightened. I tried to chat with the boy, but he wouldn’t manifest long enough to encourage him to speak.”
Eleanor replied back to Catherine, “Well, dear, I do talk and reason with myself. Don’t be alarmed.” She smiled with a twinkle in her eye.
Cat knew Eleanor was lying. “Do you take medication for hallucinations?”
“What, for? I rather enjoy a full and healthy life, dear. Medications are for sick people.” Eleanor popped back her response with a coy, endearing smile, and laughed out loud at her amusing answer.
“Eleanor please. Will you go somewhere alone where we can chat without suspicions?”
Tadhg tried to direct the conversation with immediate action.
“Of course.” Eleanor responded to Tadhg who was growing impatient by the second.
“Oh, dear; Catherine, I must use your facilities. Breakfast has gone through me. Excuse me, dear.” She went rapidly from the kitchen to her upstairs loo.
“Yeah, sure,” Catherine responded, knowing this was another untruth from Eleanor, who seems to lie all the time.
Tadhg met Eleanor upstairs, floating with ease. “The house spirits are mad we’re here. It knows.”
“What exactly do you mean?” Eleanor raised an eyebrow. “It knows we’re here?”
“Yes. And, the house is not happy we are present,” Tadhg added.
“How so? Who is the boy?”, Eleanor probed Tadhg for clues.
“The boy won’t talk. He hides, and he is frightened. While you were picking flowers, the door upstairs slammed not once but four times—hard slams. When Catherine was in the kitchen, the temperature dropped immediately. Then, the doors started.” Tadhg’s tone was serious.
“What else?’ Eleanor asked, adding, “And, hurry. Catherine listens, and she’s coming. Speak in your thoughts, only, from now on.”
At that moment, Cat moved upstairs to try to hear Eleanor. She knew she was talking to someone.
Tadhg added, “The music box on the dresser in your bedroom started p
laying ‘The 1812 Overture’.”
“Oh, dear. The French are involved here.” Eleanor explained, “That would make since as her father was a pure blood Frenchman. But, the doors slamming? Was that the boy doing that?”
“No, I don’t think so. He was downstairs trying to hold Catherine’s hand in the kitchen when the doors were going open and shut,” Tadhg continued explaining.
“Well, the kitchen turning freezing would make sense. He was scared and trying to hold her hand. Was he able to communicate with Catherine?” Inquisitively, Eleanor figured the scene.
“No, there are other spirits here. Not good ones, I’m assuming,” Tadhg summed up.
“Oh, I see. The big boys are here to war. They want a fight, and they’re about to get one.”
Cat stood close to the bathroom door; however, Eleanor knew this and she and Tadhg agreed to talk, mind to mind.
“Shh…” Her index finger gave Tadhg the hush warning, and Eleanor placed a gentle muffled singing spell near Catherine. It was Eleanor’s voice singing softly. That way Catherine would be forced to think that Eleanor was getting ready for the day and was simply singing.
Cat turned away as fast as she could. Cat was satisfied when hearing the song. It seemed to be a Celtic prayer tune she thought she recognized. Her mother sang the same melody many years ago. That too, was odd.
The Verification
The insurance company was notified that the rental Jeep went over the cliff without Eleanor, as Eleanor had called them to report the accident. “Thank God, you called early to report the mishap,” Tadhg echoed. Only Eleanor could hear him, as he hung out in the corner of the room in the den overhearing the situation.
Eleanor gave him a look to signal that he needed to be quiet. He was confusing her as she talked on the phone, and Catherine could figure out that he was present, or else think that Eleanor was crazy to be talking to the ceiling.
Cat did watch her, listening to her phone conversation, with the insurance agent. “What is she doing? She looks like she’s communicating with another person in the room while she’s talking on the phone?”, she asked herself. Cat looked in the direction of Eleanor’s pointed look, but there was nothing there. “Eleanor must have dementia,” Cat concluded. “Or the head injury from the crash was really very serious.” Then, Cat realized, “The phone isn’t working. At least last night it didn’t work when I tried to call the police department. What’s up with this?”
“Oh, I see,” Eleanor said, nodding in agreement with the representative speaking on the other end of the line.
Catherine agreed, by nodding “Yes”, as if to agree with a crazy, little English woman on a broken phone with a make-believe insurance company. Cat would play Eleanor’s game for the time being. She nodded “Yes” to keep Eleanor believing that she truly thought she was having a real conversation with a person on the other end. Cat did glance at Eleanor, too, honestly wondering how she had really made it from the site of the accident, when she heard Eleanor describe it to the imaginary person on the other end of a dead phone. “If Eleanor was telling the truth, then how did she make it from the crash site to my home during the blizzard? It is at least a mile and a half from the bridge to here. And, why, most importantly, is this woman going through all this trouble to make up such a story. Once again, something is not right,” Cat continued to explore any possibility she could muster.
Eleanor hung up the phone, turning to Catherine. “The insurance company will come to take pictures from an aerial view; they should arrive very soon. The roads are still too dangerous to travel.”
Both women looked out the windows at that moment, to confirm that there were, indeed, overcast grey clouds dominating the sky. But, thankfully, the blizzard had passed for now.
“That’s odd?”, Cat added.
“What is, dear?”, Eleanor questioned.
“The phone. It was dead last night. Now, it’s suddenly working?” Cat moved to the phone, she picked it up, and, when she put it to her ear, there was a dial tone. Puzzled, she put the receiver down.
“Really dear?”, so sweetly, and like a sugary sweet, honest grandmother, Eleanor asked.
Cat left abruptly, feeling ashamed of her accusatory line of questioning, and went upstairs to shower. When she came down and hour later, they sat in the front living room where the windows were. Eleanor asked if she wanted red tea.
Cat said, “Yes, thank you; that sounds good.”
Eleanor had prepared tea and poured it into an old tea pot with old cups and saucers her mother used. She put it all on the coffee table in the living area, with finger sandwiches made with fresh cucumber and cream cheese. “Would you like a sandwich, dear?” Eleanor was bending over the tray. Her bottom was round as it displayed itself from under the brown, twill trousers.
“Yes. thank you. Where did you get cucumbers and cream cheese?” Catherine couldn’t help herself from asking the obvious question since those two items were not stored in her kitchen.
“You worry too much, dear. Just say your prayers of thanks, and be grateful. Sometimes asking too many questions ruins the blessings.” Eleanor graciously smiled at Catherine.
Soon, thereafter, the choppers were heard. They appeared, flying overhead, visible from the front windows as they approached from the north and moved low enough for their vibrations to be felt from inside the manor. They disappeared over the tree line, heading southeast and from the downward slope of the hillside.
“Look, that must be the investigators,” Catherine said as they watched the helicopters flying low, about a mile and a half west of the Dubois Manor. The engines echoed faintly throughout the area. About five minutes later, they flew out of sight. The insurance company asked Eleanor more questions over the phone, as they soon made another call to Cat’s house.
“Mrs. Harding, please,” the man asked when Cat picked up the phone.
Cat handed the phone to Eleanor. It seemed that the adjusters believed her when she explained that a man had pulled her from the car and brought her in a snowplow to Catherine's home. They never questioned her story as it must have made perfect sense to them. Eleanor just answered with a simple “Yes” or “No” to most of their numerous questions.
But, then, the insurance adjuster must have asked, “Were you drinking alcohol?”, as Eleanor had become visibly ruffled. She straightened up and stood as though she were a giant force to be reckoned with, and, for him to tamper with her character, was obviously intrusive and she did not like it…at all.
Eleanor answered, indignantly, “Of course not. I don’t drink and drive, sir!”
Then, the adjuster must have asked her if she was an inexperienced driver, because she barked back into the phone, “Well, heavens, no. I’m well over a hundred and a few days!”
“A hundred or more? Are you fit to drive at your age?”, the man asked.
Eleanor had held the phone away from her ear so Catherine could hear. Little did she know it was Tadhg acting as the adjuster. He had disguised his voice as an American male. He didn’t want the sound of his foreign accent to kindle her curiosity and raise any more questions, should she have grown more suspicious.
“What does it matter what age a person is?”, Eleanor huffed, even more upset by what she thought was rude questioning.
“Did you know the weather was going to be bad?”, Tadhg, as the investigator, continued.
“Did I know the weather would be bad? What a question to ask. I’m not a weatherman, you know. I heard that it could get bad, but I left before it was barreling down on us.” Then, Eleanor started to sob. “I feel like you’re interrogating me. Do I need a lawyer?”
There were many pauses in Eleanor’s responses; and, most of the time, she nodded in agreement with a murmur. Finally, she said, “Oh, yes, you may use Miss Dubois’ phone number for my contact number.”
Eleanor looked up at Catherine. “Is that alright, dear?”, she asked, worriedly.
Cat thought, “You’re older than one hundred? Huh?” Thou
gh aggravated that Eleanor's story might be substantiated, Cat nodded, and replied, “Yes, you can use my number—by all means.”
Sobbing, Eleanor hung up the phone, and continued filling Catherine in. “He suggested that I hire an attorney. He said, ‘You’re going to need one if you’re older than a hundred.’ Then, he laughed at me. He was so mean—he asked if he could call me back on this number. I said yes. I hope you don’t mind.”
But Catherine also knew the adjusters were all wrong by believing such a tale. Eleanor’s concoction of facts didn’t hold water; but the insurance company seemed to be playing into her manufactured events. For all she knew, Eleanor could be a crazed psychopath who escaped from a mental institution or worse—jail. Even though those places were at least fifty miles away or more, it was possible Eleanor, and whomever, were planning a heist or something. There simply hadn’t been a man escorting Eleanor to the manor; and the evidence clearly showed that there were no snow tracks left from a snowplow. The only noise at that moment of Eleanor’s arrival was the sound of a winter blizzard—not the loud rumble of a snowplow.
After Eleanor hung up, Cat started to set the record straight with her observations and questions regarding Eleanor’s confabulated story. “Eleanor, there was no man at the door. You came alone!” Catherine felt like screaming at the inconsistency of her tall tale. But, she held her tongue as it was obvious Eleanor must have dementia, memory loss or a concussion. Still, how did Eleanor walk the distance? After all, the accident was quite a distance, uphill, and in a blizzard. Cat stared at her and slightly shook her head as if to say, “No, no, this isn’t right. You’re hiding something from me.”
Eleanor was at least eighty, if not older, but one hundred? Something didn't add up. “What is it?”, Cat wondered. Oh, she wasn't going to argue with crazy people. But, facts couldn't be denied—not even by Elizabeth Catherine Dubois. The insurance company simply bought into Eleanor’s crazy story, or so it seemed.
