The Ghost Who Dream Hopped

by Anna J. McIntyre

  Danielle remembered Walt talking about the influenza before—or what was known as the Spanish flu or the influenza pandemic of 1918. She had read the death toll of that epidemic reportedly claimed between twenty to fifty million lives worldwide. At the time of reading that, she thought there was quite a hop from twenty to fifty, yet even at twenty million, it was an unfathomable loss. Walt had been incredibly lucky to have survived.

  “The son wasn’t married? Didn’t have children?” Danielle asked.

  “No…I don’t think he was the marrying type. At least, not back then.”

  Danielle glanced over to Walt and frowned. “Why not?”

  “It doesn’t really matter, considering he’s been gone almost a hundred years now.”

  “What did you mean, not the marrying type?”

  Walt let out a sigh. “Maybe the easiest way to explain…I’ve learned a lot from your television. How some words are used differently now. How what might have been hidden then is now out in the open.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “In my day—what used to be my day—gay meant happy—when someone was called a pansy, they weren’t being called a flower.”

  Danielle shrugged. “I guess when I think of a pansy, I think of someone sort of wimpy. Is that what you mean?”

  “No. Let’s just say Marymoor’s son was a happy flower.”

  “Are you saying he was gay?”

  “They didn’t call it gay back then. They called them pansies.”

  Danielle wrinkled her nose. “That doesn’t sound very nice.”

  Walt shrugged. “Nicer than some of the other words used—which, by the way, are still used today, if some of the articles I’ve read can be believed.”

  “I didn’t even think people from the twenties really knew about gay people.”

  Walt chuckled. “Danielle, please, you know there have always been gay people.”

  “I know that,” she said impatiently. “I just thought straight people were—rather clueless about it all.”

  “From what I gather, they still are.” Walt chuckled and then grew serious. “But what you’re saying is true to some extent. My grandfather was aware—yet I don’t think my grandmother had a clue, nor did most well-bred sheltered young women of my time.”

  “Considering Mom told me her grandmother didn’t even know what a period was when she started, I’m not surprised.”

  “Danielle, please!” Walt cringed.

  Danielle giggled. “Sorry, I forgot that subject is taboo to men.”

  Walt cringed again and then said, “Of course, I probably understood about the Marymoors’ son because of Eva.”

  “Eva?”

  “In the theater, in some circles it was rather open. My friendship with Eva gave me windows into other lives I may have never had an opportunity to witness. Of course, her parents would have been horrified if they truly understood their daughter’s lifestyle and the type of people she befriended.”

  “I suppose it would have been best for Marymoor’s son if people didn’t know. I imagine it was hard on them back then,” Danielle mused.

  “The Marymoor family had their share of challenges, yet it had nothing to do with the son’s preferences—considering the number of times someone set a cross on fire in their orchard.”

  “The Marymoors were black?” Danielle asked.

  “Black? No. They were Catholic.”

  “Why would someone burn a cross on their property?”

  “We’ve talked about this before. The Klan was pretty active in Oregon when I was a young man. Blacks weren’t their only targets, so were Catholics.”

  “What did your grandfather think about the Klan?”

  “Not a fan—and they weren’t thrilled with him. Especially when he hired non-whites to work in his shipyard. I suppose one reason I left the States for a while after my grandfather died, it bothered me how their people were moving up in the ranks, becoming so involved in local and state politics. I couldn’t stomach their bully tactics, their hate, intolerance, or how they treated people like the Marymoors—or your aunt’s mother.”

  “Katherine O’Malley?”

  “She wasn’t ostracized just because she was an unwed mother, but because she was a Catholic. To be honest, that’s probably one reason I put her in the will. I never really admitted it before, but it’s true. At the time, I imagined I had my entire life before me. I wasn’t thirty yet and was recently married. Yet I thought if something did happen to Angela and me—if I was snuffed out in the prime of my life—well, I didn’t want Roger to get my money. But leaving it to someone like Katherine, who could really use it, might make my dying more palatable. And if it irritated the Klan, so much the better.”

  “I suspect it didn’t make your dying more palatable—considering you stuck around here and refused to move on. And are you saying your brother-in-law was a member of the KKK?”

  Walt shook his head. “No. But he hung around with them. Take Hal Tucker, for example. I know he was a member.”

  “Hal Tucker? Wasn’t he the policeman who threatened Emma?”

  “The same.”

  “It didn’t cause him a problem, being in the KKK? The police force was okay with that?” Danielle asked.

  “From what I recall, the police chief was a member,” Walt told her. “I know when you think of the KKK you think of people hiding under sheets. It wasn’t like that back then. They were a political force. No one was hiding. There was a group for women—the Women of the Ku Klux Klan, and for teenagers the Junior Order of the Klansmen.”

  Danielle scowled. “That’s sick.”

  “They also supported prohibition. Bunch of moralistic hypocrites,” Walt said. “Most bootleggers got into moonshining for the profit. I didn’t need the money. I suppose it was my way of giving a metaphoric Bronx cheer to all the bluenose prohibitionists and those saps dressed up in white sheets.”

  Twenty

  Early Friday morning Pastor Chad sat with Ben Smith in the museum office. It would be a few hours before the museum opened for the day, and they were the only two people in the building.

  “There’s no way I’m sneaking around Marlow House and going into Walt Marlow’s bedroom,” Chad told Ben. “And how exactly does Millie imagine I’m going to smuggle enough in with me to make the kind of switch she suggested? Should I just show up with a large trash bag filled with old newspapers?”

  “I agree.” Ben nodded. “It was a crazy idea. This is the best way. And if it doesn’t work out, then we’ll just have to deal with it.”

  “I feel bad enough as it is. And the only reason I’m willing to do this today is because I don’t want Sam and Ruby to do something stupid—if they haven’t already.”

  “Let me see if she’s there. I don’t think it’s too early to call.” Ben picked up the phone. A few minutes later he had Danielle Boatman on the line.

  “Millie said Mr. Marlow would be willing to loan the museum the portraits,” Ben began.

  “No problem. They’re just in the downstairs hall closet,” Danielle told him. “When would you like to pick them up?”

  “Would it be okay if Pastor Chad picked them up this morning? He has a couple of boys from his church who are willing to help. They have a van. But they would need to pick them up within the hour.”

  “That would actually work out perfect. I’d rather do it before our guests arrive this afternoon,” Danielle said.

  Ben looked at Chad and nodded while he told Danielle, “Wonderful.” A few minutes later he was off the phone.

  “Okay, while the boys are taking the paintings out to the van, I’ll tell Danielle I saw Beverly in the hospital, and how she told me about the boxes she took over to Marlow House,” Chad said, going over their plans one more time.

  “Remember the part about telling her we’ve been looking for some boxes that Steve had taken home to go through and how you’d forgotten all about it until Beverly mentioned them,” Ben reminded him.

  “I’ll a
sk if I can just take the boxes with me so we can inventory them, see if it’s what we’ve been looking for, and promise she’s welcome to anything on Marlow House.”

  “Or maybe suggest photocopies. After all, the originals should stay with the museum. The boxes do belong to us, so it’s not like you’re lying. You have to remember that, Chad. Nothing you’re telling her is a lie.”

  “Lie of omission,” Chad reminded him. “Not to mention the fact we have no intention of giving her back anything that’s in those boxes.”

  Danielle found Walt in the kitchen, drinking his coffee and reading the morning newspaper at the table.

  “This is going to work out perfect!” Danielle said cheerfully as she poured herself a cup of coffee.

  Walt looked up from the paper. “Whatever it is, it certainly has made you happy.”

  “Pastor Chad is picking up the paintings before the guests arrive, so I can put the boxes in the hall closet!”

  Walt laid the newspaper on the table, his eyes on Danielle. “I don’t think you realize how troubling it is that you’ve derived so much pleasure out of the fact you can move some boxes into a closet.”

  Danielle frowned at Walt as she joined him at the table. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I think you have spent entirely too much time cooped up in this house looking after me. You need to get out and do something fun. Maybe we should rent that hot-air balloon we talked about.”

  Danielle shivered. “No. Remember what I said about heights. But, as soon as that cast comes off, I want to take you up on your other offer.”

  “What was that?”

  “I’d love to go sailing. I’ve never really been.”

  “I’ve taken you sailing a number of times.” Walt sipped his coffee.

  “I’m not talking dream hop sailing.”

  Walt set the cup back on the table. “Okay, it’s a deal. But in the meantime, and since you have guests arriving later, maybe we should settle for breakfast out?” Walt suggested.

  “I’d love to.” Danielle glanced at the clock. “But Pastor Chad is picking up those paintings sometime in the next hour.”

  A moment later the kitchen door opened and Joanne Johnson entered the house.

  “Morning, Joanne,” Danielle and Walt chorused.

  “Morning, you two.” Joanne walked to the kitchen counter and set down her purse. “What are you both up to this morning?”

  “I was just about to take Danielle out to breakfast,” Walt said with a grin.

  Danielle looked to Walt in surprise. Walt nodded to Joanne, who now stood at the counter pouring herself a cup of coffee, her back to the kitchen table.

  Danielle grinned. Standing up from the table, she said, “Joanne, Pastor Chad is going to be stopping by sometime within the hour. When he gets here, can you let him in? He’s going to take the Marlow portraits for a temporary display at the museum. Can you show them where they are?”

  “Certainly. It’ll be nice to free up that closet again.”

  Steve Potts was one of Pastor Chad’s special projects. The boy had gotten himself into trouble a couple of years earlier, when Presley House had burned down on Halloween. The investigation that followed discovered that Steve had taken the freshman Sean Kelley over to the house as some sort of initiation for the secret club known as the Hell Raisers. The club wasn’t as ominous as it sounded. Just some bored high school kids who thought they were tough.

  But Steve was graduating from high school next month, and since his first class didn’t start for a couple of hours, he normally spent his Fridays helping around the church. It wasn’t Steve’s idea as much as his parents’.

  Chad didn’t know the other boy, Kevin Gormely, well. He just knew he was also graduating this year and didn’t have a Friday morning class.

  “Oh, this is where that woman was staying. You know the one who was killed on the beach by that lawyer in town,” Kevin said as they pulled the van up to Marlow House and parked.

  “I assume you’re talking about Danielle Boatman’s cousin,” Pastor Chad said as he unfastened his seatbelt.

  “Yeah, that’s the one!” Kevin said excitedly.

  “This is Danielle’s home—the poor woman was her cousin, so it would probably be best not to bring up the subject,” Chad told him.

  “We found her passed out in an old beach shack,” Kevin said as he climbed out of the van.

  “Like I said, best not bring up that subject,” Chad told him.

  “Good morning, Pastor Chad. Danielle told me to expect you,” Joanne said cheerfully after she answered the front door a few minutes later.

  “Good to see you, Joanne. This is Steve and Kevin. They’ve offered to help me today,” Chad introduced as the three entered the house.

  “Hello, boys. Come, I’ll show you where the paintings are.” Joanne closed the front door and started down the entry hall.

  “Wow, this is awesome,” Steve said as he looked around the large entry.

  “I was hoping I could talk to Danielle,” Chad said as he and the teenagers followed Joanne.

  “I’m afraid she’s not here,” Joanne told him.

  “Not here?” Chad paused a moment, his expression blank.

  Without looking back, Joanne shook her head. “No. She and Walt went out to breakfast.”

  “Oh…” Chad said dully.

  Joanne arrived at the hall closet and opened the door. “They’re in here. And if you don’t mind, I need to go back to the kitchen. I have something in the oven.”

  “Thanks, Joanne, we can take it from here,” Chad told her just as he noticed a stack of apple boxes sitting in the hallway opposite the closet door.

  Chad glanced down at the boxes. They were Marymoor apple boxes. Three boxes.

  “I’ll be in the kitchen if you need me,” Joanne said as she walked away. Steve and Kevin had already started to remove one of the paintings from the closet.

  “Please be careful,” Chad said as he glanced down at the apple boxes again.

  “These are ridiculously big,” Kevin grumbled.

  “Go ahead and put it in the back of the van, and I’ll pull the other one out for you,” Chad instructed.

  A few moments later, as Kevin and Steve carried the first painting out of the house, Chad stayed behind and knelt by the boxes. He lifted off one of their lids. Inside were old black-and-white photographs. He then opened a second box. It contained old newspaper clippings—he spied one on Marlow House. Hearing the boys’ voices coming from the open doorway, he quickly returned the lid and stood up. By the time the boys reached him, he had already pulled the second painting from the closet.

  “We can take that, Pastor Chad,” Steve said as he and his friend picked up the painting.

  Chad glanced down at the boxes again. It was then he saw it. The word museum was scribbled on the box lids.

  “Boys,” Chad called impulsively. They paused a moment and looked back at him. “After you load that up, come back in the house. There are a couple of boxes I need you to grab.”

  “You just took them?” Ben asked Chad after Steve and Kevin left the museum.

  “I know, crazy.” Chad nervously combed his fingers through his hair. “And I want you to call Danielle right now, tell her I have them, and offer to bring them back.”

  “I don’t get it?” Ben frowned.

  “When Joanne told me Danielle wasn’t there, I figured the only thing left to do was come back later and ask her if I could take the boxes Beverly had brought over. But then I saw the boxes—they were just sitting there in the hallway—and they said museum on them.”

  “So you just took them?”

  “I figure, since I’m not the one that called Danielle about picking up the portraits, you can tell her I was confused. That when I saw the boxes sitting there, and they said museum, I assumed I was supposed to pick them up too.”

  “You said Joanne was there? What did she say?”

  “She was in the kitchen, on the phone when I left.
I basically just gave her a wave goodbye.”

  “She didn’t see you take the boxes?” Ben asked.

  Chad shook his head. “No. I figure, if we work fast, we can put something else in the boxes. But first, call Danielle. I’d rather we be the ones that tell her we took them, instead of her finding them missing.”

  Several minutes later, Ben had Danielle on the phone.

  “Did you get the portraits okay?” Danielle asked.

  “Yes, we did, and I want to thank you. But I’m afraid they also picked up some boxes by mistake. They were marked museum, sitting in the hall by the closet. I apologize. They thought they were supposed to take them too. I’m really sorry. I can get someone to drop the boxes off later today,” he offered.

  There was no response for a moment. Finally, Danielle asked, “I hate to ask this, but can you just keep them until Tuesday? I just pulled up into my driveway. If it was five minutes sooner, I’d just stop by and pick them up myself, but we just got back to Marlow House. And our guests are going to be arriving today. I’d rather not deal with those boxes right now.”

  “No problem. After all, it was our fault.” Ben looked over to Chad and grinned.

  “What did she say?” Chad asked when Ben got off the phone a few minutes later.

  “We’ve been saved!” Ben laughed. “Danielle doesn’t want to bother with them until Tuesday. It’ll give us time to go through the boxes on Monday and switch out the material. This way, we can take a little more time picking out what we want to put in them. I’m sure she’s at least looked in the boxes and has a general idea of what’s inside.”

  “Why wait until Monday?” Chad asked.

  “For one thing, I have to take off in about ten minutes. The wife and I are leaving for the weekend, and we won’t be back until Sunday night. I want to make sure we do this right. I don’t want to rush. I figure this is what we would have done had Danielle been there and had given you the boxes.”