“I came back home wiped out and fell asleep. I was just getting into the middle of the most excellent of dreams when a sound woke me up. I thought someone was coming back in on me again so I jumped up and grabbed my knife. It wasn’t the intruder, though. It was a woman. She had long dark hair and was wearing a white dress. She just stood there at the foot of my bed and pointed out the window. ‘Look,’ she commanded. Just ‘look.’ That was all. She disappeared. I felt like a fool, let me tell you, standing there in the middle of the floor in my underwear, brandishing a knife. But that’s when I smelled the smoke. I ran to the window and saw the flames. I don’t know what made me think it was your house. The thought just popped into my head.”
Taryn shouldn’t have been shocked, not after everything she’d seen and been through, but she was. “Damn.”
“Yeah, you’re telling me,” he muttered. “Do you think it was that Mary-the-Wanderer?”
Taryn shook her head as she pulled into the parking spot in front of the Horton House. “I don’t think so,” she replied. “There are many spirits here. I think it might have been Georgiana. She’s also told me to ‘look’ a few times. It seems to be the only word she knows.”
“Well, you’re lucky to have a spirit watching out for you,” he said. “She was adamant that I help.”
“Thank you for what you did.” Taryn hopped from the vehicle and then reached behind her, feeling for Miss Dixie. It took her a moment to remember that she was no longer there. Taryn’s face fell and for the second time that day she felt her eyes welling up with tears.
“It’s your camera isn’t it,” David said sympathetically. He walked around the golf cart to where she stood and rubbed her lightly on the back. “I’m so sorry. If I could’ve gotten inside…”
“I don’t know what to do without her,” Taryn cried. “She’s always with me. I know it’s stupid to be so attached to an inanimate object, but it’s like–“
“She’s not just your camera; she’s also your eyes,” David finished. “It’s okay to grieve something you love.”
Taryn nodded miserably and wiped at her eyes. “I want to show you something,” she said, trying to compose herself. “It’s over here.”
She led David through the trees on the other side of the road, towards the tiny cemetery. “See that wall up there?” she pointed.
David nodded.
“It’s where Rachel is buried. There’s a legend on this island that says each night a candle appears on her grave. That her husband placed one on it while he was in jail and now he continues to do it in death. I thought he did it out of guilt.”
“But he didn’t?”
“No, Matt was right. It was out of love.”
They’d almost reached the enclosure when Taryn stopped walking and turned to face David. “She was afraid of the dark. Deathly afraid. Her nanny used to lock her in a small closet when she was a child. Her fear was so strong that each night she lit dozens of candles at home. Her husband and maid would ensure they kept burning until morning. He brought her the candle so that she wouldn’t be alone here in the dark.”
“So the fire at the hotel was an accident?” David prodded.
“Just an accident. She must have knocked one over and it caught her gown. Maybe she did it in her sleep,” Taryn added. “Her husband took the blame for her death. There were lots of reasons he did that, but the important thing to remember is that he loved her. He wouldn’t have hurt her.”
They began walking again.
“And you found all this out?” There was a touch of amazement in David’s voice as they reached the gate.
“With a little help,” Taryn smiled. “I hope his name will be cleared now and that, wherever they are, they’re happy.”
“So it wasn’t her ghost trying to give you a message this whole time?”
Taryn shook her head and undid the latch. “No, I think her spirit has passed on. It was Georgiana’s. I think in some ways she loved William. She kept the diary safe for him until she died. She kept his secrets. But now that time has passed she knew it was time to talk. Hopefully, her spirit will be at peace now as well.”
Rachel’s grave was on the other side of the small enclosure. Someone had placed fresh flowers on it. It wasn’t the flowers, however, that caught Taryn’s eye. It was the glint of sunlight, reflecting off of something shiny.
“What the hell?” David exclaimed as she rushed forward.
Taryn, who thought she’d never be surprised by anything ever again, felt her mouth drop open. The gate closed behind her with a loud “bang” as her hand dropped limply to her side. She was unable to move.
“Taryn,” David’s voice quavered as he dropped to the ground by her headstone. “Taryn, you’d better come here.”
Taryn moved slowly across the patchy grass, unable to take her eyes off the object in front of her. She was a little beaten, a little black from the smoke, but resting right under the inscription on the stone was Miss Dixie.
Taryn fell to her knees and grabbed her camera, clutching it to her chest. She wasn’t even warm from the sun. She hadn’t been there long.
“Well,” David said in a strangled voice as he smoothed back his hair and shook his head in disbelief. “It seems as though Georgiana wasn’t the only one looking out for you.”
Taryn’s bags were packed and in her car. Her laptop, which had been safely tucked away in her trunk the night of the fire, was untouched. Her newly recovered memory card was where it belonged, in her camera, and Miss Dixie was buckled into the seat next to her.
“I’ll come visit in a few days,” Amy promised.
Taryn shut her door and rolled down her window. “I’m planning on it,” she smiled.
“When’s your boyfriend coming back?”
“He’s on his way right now. He should be here in a few hours.”
Amy nodded and smiled. “It will be good to have someone there with you for awhile. But enjoy yourself! No work!”
“No work,” Taryn agreed but thought that maybe she’d do some painting for herself. It had been a very long time since she’d done it for the simple pleasure of creating something.
“I can’t believe you gave up Paris and London for Saint Simon’s,” Amy teased her. “You sure you know what you’re doing?”
Taryn laughed. “I like it here. I’m looking forward to settling in over there and resting. I’m feeling more like myself than I have in a very long time.”
As Taryn pulled out she saw Amy behind her, standing in the road, waving. She raised her hand and sped off, feeling good about everything that had happened.
David would work with the hotel group and ensure that no graves were disturbed and what artifacts they did discover would be properly labeled and given to the right places. Amy and Carla both still had their jobs, Johnny and Steve were in jail–along with the project manager and general manager of the new hotel.
Taryn had enough now to get her aunt’s house fixed and then some. Matt had acted happy for her, but there was something in his tone that made her feel like a part of him was hurt as well. She thought maybe he’d been looking forward to taking care of that for her. She’d need to work on that, on letting him get closer and not just act like her research assistant when she was on the job.
As Taryn sailed over the Sydney Lanier Bridge, she rolled her windows down and slipped on her cheap sunglasses. With Dwight Yoakam’s “Secondhand Heart” cranked up, the sun in her eyes, and her hair whipping across her face she laughed with happiness.
There was a new chapter starting in her life; she could feel it. And it felt wonderful.
The End
Author’s Notes
And here is where I try to set some records straight about how much of the book is true, sort of true, and not true at all.
For starters, the Jekyll Island Club Hotel on Jekyll Island is very much a real place. It is beautiful, charming, and haunted. It truly was created as a playground for the rich and famous. The porch, bar, ballroom, croquet
lawn, dining room with tea, and valet stand are all real.
The fire, however, exists only in my imagination. The hotel never burned down like it does in my book. Still, the fire is not entirely fictional. I actually based that particular storyline on a real fire that occurred in northern Kentucky at the Beverly Hills Supper Club. A popular nightclub, it caught fire during a busy night and killed many, many people. It’s considered one of our country’s worst entertainment disasters. If you do a little searching you can find interviews with the survivors, as well as lots of news stories and videos. It’s a chilling story and, unfortunately, real.
There are cottages that belong to the hotel. And yes, some of them do look like little mansions, containing as many as 15 rooms. Ivy House and Adena Cottage are fictional. Ivy House, however, is loosely based on Hollybourne, which is the only standing cottage that hasn’t been completely renovated. It is reportedly haunted and some of the tales Ellen mentions about the house are real stories I heard while on the ghost tour of the property.
The Horton House is a real place and is also reportedly haunted, much in the same manner that I describe in the book. There is a tiny cemetery across the road from the Horton House and the description of it is accurate. Rachel Hawkins (a fictional character) is not really buried there, though. However, the part about Taryn visiting the cemetery and feeling someone close to her sighing is a true story. It happened to me while I was there by myself.
Mary the Wanderer is a real ghost that haunts both Jekyll and St. Simon’s. I haven’t seen her.
Rachel and William Hawkins are fictional characters. The story about Rachel’s grave is a true ghost story, but takes place on St. Simon’s Island, not Jekyll Island. The story was told to us by our guide during the ghost tour of St. Simon’s. Apparently, a young woman was buried in Christ Church cemetery. Like Rachel, she was deathly afraid of the dark because her nanny used to lock her in the closet as a child. Supposedly, the woman had to light candles every night. One night wax burnt her and she developed an infection, an infection that eventually took her life. Each night visitors are meant to be able to see a candle light appear on her grave, a practice her husband started and apparently continues in death. Our guide told us that the cemetery became so popular with late-night visitors that they had to remove the headstone. I have no idea if this story is true or not, but I liked it anyway.
All of the beaches are real.
Yes, there are alligators on Jekyll Island, but they’re mostly on the golf course and what they call “alligator pond.” They don’t normally attack people.
Sea Turtles are protected on the island. If you’re there in the summer you’ll find markers for their eggs. Please don’t disturb them. The Sea Turtle Center is fun to visit and I recommend it, regardless of age.
The wildlife and vegetation of the island are much as I described. And there really are a ton of golf carts and bicycles. I borrowed a bike from a friend while I was there and rode all over St. Simon’s Island with my son.
The story about the airport having remains under it is true. There is also a park on St. Simon’s where native remains were discovered as well.
Lastly, all the characters in the story are fictional. None of them are based on any real people.
I truly did visit all the locations in the book. My family and I went to Jekyll and St. Simon’s twice over the course of a year for me to conduct research and spent an entire month renting a house there so that I could get a feel for it. It is magical, ghosts or not.
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Kentucky Witches
Like THIS series? Rebecca has a brand NEW series coming out in December. Meet the Kentucky Witches!
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Sneaky Peek!
Chapter 1
Liza Jane Higginbotham was a witch.
Mind you, not the kind of witch that put hexes on people or could make herself look like a supermodel with a wave of her hand (although both of those skills would’ve been very useful on a number of occasions) but a witch, nonetheless.
When she was twelve she’d watched a movie about a girl who came into her witchy powers on her sixteenth birthday. “Teen Witch,” it was called.
She wasn’t that kind of witch either.
Liza Jane had been born a witch, known it most of her life, and considered it as normal as her hair color.
(Okay, maybe not quite as normal. After all, her natural color was kind of a dirty brown. Thanks to Clairol and some plastic gloves, she’d fixed that.)
She couldn’t make herself invisible, the future she could see was rarely helpful, and she couldn’t turn people into frogs.
Nope, she thought as she gave the last box on the U-Haul a good, solid kick with her tennis shoe and sent it flying down the ramp, she was just a regular witch with few useful skills.
Had she been a TV kind of witch, she’d have just wrinkled her nose a few times and sent those boxes flying into the house, where they would’ve graciously unpacked themselves. Then she would’ve spent the rest of the afternoon lounging on a perfectly made bed (not made by her, of course) feeding herself strawberries.
And then she would’ve turned Jennifer Miller into a frog. Or a cockroach.
Liza Jane hopped from the truck and watched as the box slid off the ramp and landed with a thud at the bottom. One side was caved in. She hoped there wasn’t anything breakable in it. She hadn’t taken the time to mark any of them.
Divorce was making her more unorganized than usual.
“What the hell was I thinking?” she muttered to herself as she turned and looked at her new house.
Well, technically, her old house. She had lived there, once upon a time. She’d been six then and now she was thirty-five so it had been…Well, she didn’t need to think about how many years ago that was. She was already depressed enough.
Her grandparents’ white farm house rose before her, proud and neglected. Paint had chipped from the siding and now sprinkled the brown, dead grass like dirty snow. An upstairs window was boarded up. She was almost certain the porch was leaning to one side. Liza Jane cocked her head now and studied it. Yep, she thought, it was definitely crooked.
“At least it has electricity and running water,” she stated cheerfully.
Nothing answered her back. She was surrounded by more than fifty acres of mountainside and pastureland.
Her divorce was almost final. Her high school sweetheart had left her for the woman at Starbucks who made him his coffee every morning. She’d lost her job as the administrative assistant at the nonprofit she worked at when everyone in the building overheard her yelling obscenities to her husband’s lawyer on the phone. She’d let the happy new couple have her house. Now, she was moving back into the only thing she owned–her grandparents’ dilapidated farmhouse in Kudzu Valley, Kentucky.
She was depressed.
“Well, maybe just a little something,” she muttered, flipping her hair back from her face.
For a moment the air around her stilled. The words she chanted rose from her like a gentle breeze, lifting the ends of her hair and making her lightweight jacket flutter. Her heart raced and for just a second she felt a surge of adrenalin. And then it stopped.
Smiling with satisfaction, she opened her eyes and studied the farmhouse again. The porch was perfectly straight.
“Yeah well, I deserved it,” she said to no one in particular and then proudly marched up her new steps.
***
Want MORE Taryn?
Want to learn about Taryn’s beloved grandmother and get a glimpse of Taryn when she was a child? The companion novella to the Taryn’s Camera series e
ntitled Stella is 100+ pages and available in the Ghost Children anthology.
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Reviews for the
Taryn’s Camera Series
http://www.rebeccaphoward.net/books.html
Windwood Farm:
"This is an absolutely wonderful book and I didn't want to put it down. It was exciting and sad but it was uplifting too." (Kim @ The Open Book Societyopenbooksociety.com/)
"I won't spoil anything but this book has great characterization, loads of atmosphere and is never dull. The first book in the Taryn's Camera series so roll on number two!" (A Drunken Druid's Reviews the-drunken-druid.blogspot.com/)
"The author does a great job painting just what life in a small town in Kentucky is like. She also writes a great mystery." (Lisa Binion @ The News in Books thenewsinbooks.com/)
Jekyll Island: A Paranormal Mystery (Taryn's Camera Book 5) Page 24
