The Man in Black: A Gothic Romance (Crookshollow Ghosts)

by Steffanie Holmes

  “So we know she’s a bit unstable,” I said. “We’re going to have to think carefully about how we handle this.”

  “Should you not go to the police?” Eric asked. “I mean, this girl sounds nuts.”

  “What happened to her being sweet?”

  Eric jabbed his finger at the photograph of the blood vial. “That shit happened, is what.”

  “We can’t go to the police yet. We have no real evidence. Remember that as far as the police are concerned, you were done in by a random hit-and-run. Proving pre-meditated murder is an entirely different story, and I can’t do that with a ticket stub. All we know for certain is that Helen sent you some vaguely threatening letters—among many other people—and she happened to be at your concert.”

  “We have more than that,” Eric said. He was staring down at the sheet of contact details Heather had sent me.

  “What?”

  “Look at her phone number.”

  I did. There was something about it that seemed vaguely familiar.

  “The ticket.” Eric said.

  I picked it up and held it up to the light. He was right. The number scrawled across the top of the ticket stub was Helen Manning’s. That could not be a coincidence. She had been in the car that had run Eric off the road.

  We had found his murderer.

  Eric

  My murderer.

  Now that I knew the person in the car that ran me off the road had also been at the concert, there was no question in my mind—my death was cold-blooded, pre-meditated murder. The realisation hit me like the opening riff of a Slayer song. I felt as though the wind had been knocked out of me, and there wasn’t even any wind to knock out anymore.

  Elinor wanted to figure out a plan of action immediately, but I told her to do some of her actual work. She gave me a worried look, but let me go. I think she understood I needed to be alone. I floated up the stairs to my old bedroom, and through the locked closet door. As a boy I often hid in the darkness of the closet, away from my mother and father’s arguments. I’d pretend to be an archaeologist lost in a cave, or a vampire awakening in my tomb.

  I folded my legs and hovered in the stack of boxes that now occupied my special hiding spot. My fingers traced the drawings I’d made on the wallpaper—grinning skulls peeking out from the centre of flowers, black cats swiping at the fleurs-de-lis, little stick men dancing over the ivy. I couldn’t feel them, of course, but I could see them, memories of a sad childhood, the fuel that later became the music my murderer had so adored.

  My murderer.

  This girl had followed me from the concert, and driven me off the road. She had loved my music, and she’d killed me, taken my life away, robbed me of any chance to have a future, of any chance to be with—

  I buried my head in my hands, relieved to feel their solidness against my skin. My cheeks felt wet, and it was then I realised I was crying.

  It was a strange realisation, not just because I didn’t realise ghosts could cry. Eric Marshell didn’t cry. I hadn’t cried since I was a little boy. These tears felt odd; heavy and bitter against my non-existent skin. I wasn’t sad. I was angry. I’d been robbed of the most precious gift I had, and I could never have back what was taken.

  Time passed in a vacuum. I’m not certain how long I sat in that closet, hovering like a snake charmer and mourning my life. Some hours later, I heard Elinor on the staircase, calling my name. I floated into the wall and looked out at her.

  “Eric, I know you’re upset,” she called, looking all around the landing. She couldn’t see me. “I just wanted to see if I could help.”

  You can’t help me, not unless you can find a way to bring me back from the dead.

  Her eyes were red. She looked as if she’d been crying, too. Had she been crying for me? For some reason that made me even more angry. Elinor gulped, and shuffled back and forth on her feet.

  “I know why you’re upset,” Elinor began, staring at a spot on the wall two feet to my right.

  Oh, yeah? I bit back the urge to shout at her. You’ve never been dead. How could you possibly know?

  “You feel as though this whole thing is pretty unfair. If you’d just been able to reach out to this girl, you might have been able to save her, and yourself. But don’t you see? You did save her. Your music carried her through years of hell. It wasn’t you who twisted her into this horrible person, Eric. She did that herself. We’ve all gone through terrible things. We all have that darkness that wells up from within. But we …” she gulped again. “We don’t murder people. You channelled your darkness into your music. You created songs that spoke to thousands of people about heartache and loss and made them feel whole again. You gave the world a wonderful legacy.”

  That was actually a pretty insightful comment. But it didn’t help my foul mood. I stayed where I was. Elinor sighed, then walked slowly back down the stairs. I heard the door to the office click closed, and god-awful techno music thudded from within.

  I slunk back into the wall, into the safety of my closet. The darkness enveloped me, as it had as a child. But now I wasn’t in the darkness, I was part of it, empty and cold. For the first time since I had been a ghost, I wished not for life, but for oblivion to swallow me up, to take away this gnawing, crushing mixture of guilt and rage. The guilt was over the fact I hadn’t reached out to Helen or any of my other fans who’d needed me, and the rage was for the life she had stolen from me, the life I could have had with Elinor. But it was too late.

  Elinor

  I tried to talk to Eric on the stairs, but he wasn’t answering. I couldn’t blame him. Giving his potential murderer a name made the whole thing more real, more immediate. He’d been robbed of his life by this girl. He needed some time to digest that.

  I went back to the study, and tried to get some work done. But my eyes kept falling on the stack of letters, on that creepy image of the blood vial. Helen Manning. How would we find her? How would we get her to confess what she did, or find enough evidence to put forward a case to the police? My mind kept turning over ideas and schemes, but although any of them would’ve made a great movie plot, each was too ridiculous, too farcical to actually work in real life.

  My phone buzzed. It was a text from Cindy. WHERE U AT, BITCH? I realised I hadn’t even called her about Damon. I’d been so distracted with Eric’s … Ericness, that I’d completely forgotten about my previous crush. But that was silly, because Damon still had that one advantage over Eric, he was alive.

  I turned down my music and clicked CALL. Cindy picked up on the second ring. “Well, look who finally bothered to call.”

  “Hey, Cindy.”

  “Well, well, so you are still alive.”

  Her comment made me think of Eric, and I snorted bitterly. But Cindy, of course, didn’t notice. “I thought maybe you’d shacked up with someone down in hicksville and that was why you went AWOL.” Her voice sounded hopeful.

  I was glad Cindy couldn’t see my face colouring as I thought of Eric and our dance. That was way too complicated to explain. “No, nothing as exciting as that. It’s just been crazy here. There’s a ton of work to do. But I don’t want to talk about work. Tell me all about the weekend.”

  “Oh, girl, it’s been CAH-RAZY. Right, so I got to talking to Damon at the party on Friday. He’s actually pretty cool, he’s into all sorts of crazy stuff.”

  “Oh, yeah?” A tiny flicker of jealousy snaked across my stomach. Since when was Cindy hanging out with Damon? All we’d ever done was admire him from afar. Suddenly I wasn’t there, and she was talking to him? How had things progressed so fast?

  “He is experimenting growing his own tobacco, and he flies those little planes that look like they’re made of cardboard. And I told him all about you and he thinks you sound great. Anyway, so he invited me to the VIP room after the show on Saturday, and since you weren’t there I took Tanya and my friend Angela from work—”

  Cindy spent the next hour recounting every detail of their crazy evening partying wi
th Damon Sputnik and his friends, a bottomless tab of champagne and party pills. Damon had his driver take their limousine through the drive-thru, and it got stuck on the kerb and they had to get another driver to tow them out. My stomach twisted with envy. I wanted so badly to be at that party and in that limousine. If Clyde hadn’t sent me to Crookshollow, I would’ve been the one partying it up with Damon Sputnik.

  But then you never would have met Eric, Devil’s-Advocate Elinor raged.

  Exactly! I shot back at myself. I wouldn’t have met Eric, and felt so confused about everything.

  The doorbell rang, startling me out of my funk. “Cindy, I’ve got to go. There’s someone at the door.”

  “Sure thing, sweetie. Call me later in the week.”

  “Are you still going to try and come up here next weekend?”

  “Yeah, sure. I’ll try.” The phone clicked off. I actually felt relieved. I didn’t want to hear anything else about Cindy’s weekend with Damon. It made my chest feel tight, and I couldn’t explain why.

  I threw my phone down on the desk and got up to answer the door.

  “Duncan?” I was surprised to see the elderly man on the porch. He grinned back at me from behind a large filing box.

  “Hello, Ms. Baxter. How is the work going?” he asked, shifting the box from on arm to the other.

  “Fine. What are you doing here? Did we have an appointment?”

  “Oh, no. I was just in the neighbourhood, and thought I’d drop in to give you these files and see how you were getting on, maybe have a cup of tea.” He smiled. “Relax, Elinor. That’s a perfectly normal thing for people outside of London to do. I used to stop by on Alice all the time. We had our tea on the back porch.”

  “I really do have to get back to work—”

  “I’ll just stay for fifteen minutes. I promise I’ll leave right after I’ve drained my cup. There’s actually some things I need to discuss with you.”

  “Oh, well, sure. Come on in. I’ll boil the kettle.” I held the door open, and Duncan bustled inside. He headed straight into the kitchen, which struck me as odd at first. But then I remembered that he looked after Ms. Marshell while she was ill, he might feel pretty comfortable in the house. Duncan pulled his round body into one of the stools, and I filled the kettle with water and placed it on one of the burners.

  “Alice loved tea,” he said, his voice fading into wistfulness. “I used to make her at least ten cups a day.”

  “I’m sorry for your loss. I know you were close with the family.”

  Duncan closed his eyes and sipped from the warm mug I placed in his hands. “We were. Alice was a very dear friend. She was heartbroken when George left her, and then Eric moving to London so soon after. It was just so unexpected. I don’t think she ever really recovered.”

  “Eric came back and visited her, though, didn’t he?”

  “Only after her dementia had progressed to such a state she wasn’t herself anymore.” Duncan said. “He could be quite selfish, that boy. And after everything she’d done for him.”

  The kettle screamed. I made the tea, and handed Duncan his cup. “Should we go out onto the back porch?”

  Duncan’s face lit up. “After you, ma’am.”

  I hadn’t ventured out into the back garden yet, I’d only looked down on it from my window. The porch was a lovely space, or at least it would have been when it was being cared for. A small iron table and two chairs sat under the eaves, giving a perfect view of the wild, overgrown garden beyond. Dead leaves and dirt had collected in the corners, and cobwebs were strung between the columns. Wisteria vines curled around the arches and snaked across the underside of the roof, slowly commencing their inevitable march to consume the whole house.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, setting down my tea on the table and slumping into the uncomfortable metal chair. “I didn’t think to buy any biscuits. Or scones. This looks like the perfect porch for scones.”

  “Ah,” Duncan lifted the top off the filing box. Inside was a small box bearing the insignia Bewitching Bites. He lifted the lid and revealed four perfectly-formed cupcakes, each with a different coloured icing. My mouth watered when I saw each was topped with chocolate curls or tiny marshmallows.

  “You can come for tea anytime, Duncan,” I reached for a cupcake.

  “I’ll bring some scones next time,” he promised, sipping his tea.

  “So, what did you want to talk to me about?”

  “Um, well, as the executor of the will, I guess I just want to know what my role is. I was just wondering how far along you’ve gotten with Alice’s accounts?”

  “Not far. It’s a big job. Alice was a very clever woman. She has a lot of different accounts and investments. Money is flying everywhere. It’s a huge job to track it all. I’ve barely scratched the surface. In fact, I’m not sure I’m going to be able to get everything done in two weeks.”

  “Is that so? How closely do you need to go through everything? Surely the banking software is taking care of most of your work?”

  “At the moment, my task is really to go through everything, sort it, and figure out exactly what Alice Marshell’s estate actually owns. If I see anything fishy, I would send the papers along to our forensic accountant.”

  “Oh.” Duncan shifted in his seat. “Is there something fishy?”

  “Not so far. Why? Do you know something I don’t?” I grinned at him, but he looked uncomfortable.

  “No, not at all. Just making chitchat, getting some mileage out of my allotted fifteen minutes.” Duncan took a bite out of his cupcake. Crumbs sprayed down the front of his shirt as he spoke. “I’ve been organising Alice’s accounts for the last five years. I was an accountant before I retired, you know.”

  “I didn’t know that.”

  Duncan tapped the box with his foot. “I’ve brought you all her records and tax filings. Everything in there is completely up-to-date. I figured it might be easier for you to work off than the online system. It can take some time to get your head around how it works.”

  “Thank you, that’s very kind. You’re right, it will be much easier.”

  “Good, I’m glad to help.” Duncan took another bite, glancing around the porch and garden. “This house is really something, isn’t it?”

  “It’s not really my taste, but it’s a pretty amazing house. Was that all you wanted to talk to me about?” I cringed at my tone. Duncan was a nice old man who’d just brought me cake. I hadn’t meant to sound as though I was pushing him out the door.

  “Oh … I’m sorry.” it took Duncan a few moments to come back from his memories. “I didn’t mean to take up your time. I know you’re busy. I just—”

  “I apologise.” I said quickly, smiling across at him. “I didn’t mean to sound so abrupt. Lawyers are trained to get down to business as soon as possible. Our clients are being charged by the hour, after all.”

  “Of course that’s perfectly understandable. I know you need to get back to work. I just wanted to run over some of the details for the funeral—”

  “What funeral?”

  “For Alice and Eric. I’m responsible for the arrangements for both of them, and with Eric being who he is, you can imagine the kind of turnout we’re expecting. But of course I’ve got my own business to attend to, and I won’t be able to be around every day. So I’m going to need you to let in a few people during the week, gardeners and caterers and such. I’ve typed up a list for you here,” Duncan patted the top of the filing box. “The work will mostly be outside, so there should be minimal disruption throughout the week, although obviously Friday and Saturday are going to be quite hectic—”

  “Excuse me? The funeral is going to be here? At the house?”

  “Didn’t your office tell you?” Duncan looked confused. “I was very clear on the phone about it.”

  “No, they didn’t.” Damn you, Clyde. He knew I’d never have agreed to go to Crookshollow if there was a funeral in the house. So instead he’d just neglected to tell me about it.
Classy.

  “Oh, well.” Duncan shrugged. “I trust that won’t be a problem. It just makes the most logistical sense. We can host 400 people in the garden, and as both Alice and Eric will be interred in the family mausoleum—”

  I held up my hands. “It’s fine. It’s fine. Just let me know if there’s anything you need.”

  “As I was saying, the caterers will be here on Thursday to inspect the facilities. They’ll need to use the kitchen for most of the day Saturday. The gardeners will arrive tomorrow to start work on the garden. They shouldn’t need to come into the house, unless they want to use the facilities, but don’t let them out of your sight if they come in because they can be notorious …

  I listened to Duncan prattle on with half an ear, hoping like hell that Eric was still upstairs hiding and hadn’t just heard that he’d be playing host at his own funeral in a week’s time.

  Never mind Eric, Devil’s Advocate Elinor snapped. How are you going to handle it? It was only thirteen months ago that you gave the eulogy at Joel’s funeral, and now you have to attend another one? For another guy you care about? What are you going to do, Elinor?

  What are you going to do?

  After Duncan left, I went back to the office. I opened Duncan’s box of accounts and started to go through them. He was right, he’d put everything in order, exactly as I needed it. This made my job much easier. I put on some music and got to work, and a couple of hours flew by without me noticing.

  When I glanced up again, it was just beginning to get dark, the sky streaked with golden orange as the sun fell behind the overgrown hedges. I wondered how the gardeners Duncan had hired would ever manage to get the exterior looking presentable in time for the funeral.