A Ghost of Fire

by Sam Whittaker

  Chapter Twenty

  “The otherworldly population of this town is really starting to unnerve me,” Trent said sardonically as we sat down in my apartment. We had left the library and headed back to my place. On the way back we had a brief discussion of theories of how the supernatural realm might work. Trent did most of the talking since he had done most of the research. We came to no conclusions. Then, on topic, he added, “How do we know what we’re looking for in this thing?”

  There was no time to ponder the ramifications of the library Ghost’s name. We both knew important keys to solving the larger mystery waited in the pages of the book. I cracked the tome open and laid it on the kitchen counter next to the phone.

  “I think I may have to feel this out,” I said feeling hokey as the words tumbled from between my teeth. Without waiting for a reply from Trent I flipped through a few of the pages to see if anything jumped out at me. Nothing came. I tried again, this time picking the book up as I slowly allowed the pages to fall one after another. I tried to will something to become clear but it was like fishing in the dark with an invisible net. When you don’t know what you’re looking for it can be pretty hard to find.

  “You getting anything?” There was no hint of frustration in Trent’s question, only honest curiosity.

  “No,” I said, “but it’s not like a switch you turn off and on.” I flipped pages as I talked. “It really seems to come whenever it…” I didn’t have a chance to finish because one page refused to turn. In fact, it stood straight up in the air. I first noticed when I tried to push it down on the opposite side. It might as well have been a brick wall. “I can’t turn this page,” I said incredulously. Trent reached forward and tested it, finding no different result.

  The page fell back into place by itself only after we stopped trying, though the corner curved upward at first as if held by invisible fingers. Before I could read what had been written I saw the picture which dominated the top half of the page. It was of an old building I recognized instantly from the dreams. The caption under the image read, “St. Francis Orphanage.” Beneath that a bold headline reported, “Fiery Tragedy in 1911.”

  “I know that building. It’s the one from my dreams. I watched it burn. I was in it as it burned in the first dream. In the second one I was in the root cellar. He was there too, and the little girl.” The full details of the dreams flooded back, things I couldn’t recall before. I remembered promising myself to run an internet search on the orphanage when I awoke but then somehow I’d forgotten. That no longer mattered. That barrier had now been broken though.

  “What does the article say about it?” Trent urged.

  “Give me a second,” I said. My eyes devoured the words; reading, comprehending, interpreting. When I finished I started over from the beginning but went more slowly this time to make sure there was nothing I missed.

  “Okay,” I started. “It was an orphanage until 1911 when it burned down. But before that it was a mansion owned by a wealthy businessman. Around the Civil War it was allegedly part of the Underground Railroad and used to smuggle escaped slaves.” I remembered something from the dream. “Tunnels!”

  Trent threw a puzzled expression. “What?”

  “There was a series of crude tunnels underneath the house,” I clarified.

  “Underground Railroad,” Trent confirmed. “Those were probably the same caves from my dream.”

  “He chased me through them,” I said getting more excited over the realization. “Except it wasn’t me he chased. I mean, I watched the whole thing like a movie but it was from her point of view. It was a bit of the past, like a rerun on TV.”

  “What do you think he did down there?” Trent pondered out loud. We both fell silent at this; unsure we wanted to even speculate what that kind of man would scheme and execute in the dark. I thought back over the dream and the chase through the tunnels. There were things I’d seen down there. I couldn’t recall them at first.

  Then another piece of the puzzle fell into place. I had seen a makeshift bed down there. “I think he lived down there in those tunnels. That was his home, his little base of operations. What kind of a guy lives in a cave under an orphanage and then burns it down?”

  “I don’t know,” Trent retorted, “What kind of guy keeps on going after he dies and terrorizes janitors and college professors while they sleep?”

  “Good point,” was all I could say to that. I returned my attention to the book. “It says here that arson was the suspected cause of the fire, no surprise there, but there were no witness to how it started. It says that suspicious things had been happening in the neighborhood; break-ins, dead pets, missing valuables, small fires here and there. The police thought they had tracked the culprit to the orphanage and theorized it might have been a miscreant older boy living there. Before they could look into it the place burned down and the problems stopped.”

  “Okay,” Trent said, “so what?”

  “I…I have no idea.” I looked at the picture of the building again. Something about it bugged me. I remembered the same sensation from the dream. “I know this place. I swear I’ve been there before…Oh my God.” Like a ton of bricks.

  “What is it?”

  “I have been there,” I said with uncanny realization and a flash of intuition. “I’ve been going there for weeks. That’s where the Spectra building is now. I freakin’ work there!” There was no persuading me otherwise. It felt more certain to me than the ground beneath my shoes. Before we could explore the ramifications of this new development the phone began to ring. The noise of it startled us both.

  I picked it up and the display showed the name and number of the bookstore where Katie worked. As I pulled it to my ear I had the feeling I wasn’t going to like what I was about to hear.

  “Steve?’ She said before I even had a chance to say anything. She was worried, that much I could tell.

  “Yeah, Katie, I’m here. Are you okay?”

  “No,” she responded. “I’m not. There’s a man here in the store. I think he wants to hurt me.” My blood ran cold and scenarios started to run through my mind. Was it the dark figure from my dreams? I dismissed that idea almost immediately. It didn’t feel right. I did, however, feel the presence of danger.

  “Okay, I’ll be right there. Just hang tight and stay near other people.” I closed the book with my free hand and started for the door. Trent needed no explanation and followed.

  “Trent, do you have your cell phone with you?” In answer he produced it from his pocket. “What’s the number?” He rattled off the number and I gave it to Katie. I hung up the apartment phone and a few moments later Trent’s cell rang. He handed it to me and I answered it. “Okay,” I said I’m here.”

  I put the phone on speaker and handed it back to Trent. “I’m here in the apartment with Trent Blacker but we’re on our way to you. He knows everything too. I’ve got you on speaker so we can both hear you. We’re leaving the apartment right now.” Shortly after that we were in the car and with lightning speed I worked through the process of getting it started, in gear and moving. We jetted back out of the parking space and almost hit another car in the opposite side of the aisle as it was getting ready to back out also. I didn’t stop to apologize or even acknowledge my fault. My only concern was how well I was going to be able to break the speed limit.

  We rocketed forward down the aisle and took the corner hard making movie sound effect screeching noises with the tires. We were going fast but my heart even more so. I wasn’t about to let something happen to the new woman in my life, ghost or no ghost. But something told me this wasn’t an incident unrelated to everything else going on.

  From the passenger seat Trent tried to counsel Katie into calmness and thankfully it helped a little. We could hear her breathing had slowed and some of the panic had gone out of her voice. But she was still scared and I thought she might have some right to be. Something was going to be waiting for us at the book store and I wondered if perhaps we should
be at least a little scared of it too.

  “Katie,” Trent said, “can you describe him to us so we know what to look for when we get there?”

  “He looks a little wild. His hair isn’t combed and he has a few days worth of stubble on his face.” She paused, probably to take another look at the guy. “He’s wearing some pretty nice clothes but they don’t look clean. They’re all wrinkled. What is this guy’s problem?” Some of the panic was back, eating away at her hard won calm.

  “Okay,” Trent interjected, “why do you think he wants to hurt you?”

  “He asked for me.”

  “What?” I couldn’t help the volume of the exclamation. It didn’t do anything to help Katie’s nerves. I knew I was going to have to apologize later if things settled down.

  “I don’t know,” she came back more worried. “I don’t recognize the guy. Roger came to tell me someone was looking for me. I thought it was you and so I came. We both saw each other at the same time. When he spotted me he got this real angry look and started walking fast to me. Something just told me to run so I did. Hurry, I’m hiding in the aisles but I can’t keep this up all day.”

  Then through the phone we heard the angry voice of a man exclaim, “Gotcha!” Katie screamed and must have dropped her phone. We couldn’t tell what happened next but we heard the fast footsteps of someone as they ran past the downed phone. Then there was nothing.

  I tried to stay calm and told myself that she was in a public enough place and that surely someone would see something bad was going on and try to step in and help. Every time a reassuring thought like this floated to the surface of my mind a thousand questions seemed to arise to discredit it. Would someone who tried to help be in time? Could they be enough?

  I pushed down the gas pedal just a bit more. Within five minutes we were screeching into the bookstore parking lot. I ripped the keys out of the ignition and flung the door open. Soon the distance between the entrance and me was closing rapidly. I hadn’t bothered to keep track of Trent but knew he wouldn’t be far behind. We burst through the door and were greeted by the sight of Roger the store manager squaring off against the man who had been stalking Katie through the aisles. A small band of onlookers had formed and created a half-circle around and through the aisles where the confrontation was taking place. It wasn’t long before I recognized the man, disheveled though he was. He was James Price.

  “Look,” Roger said with a fair amount of authority and steadiness, “we’re not interested in trouble. I’m going to have to ask you to leave…” The sentence was interrupted when Price sprang forward and landed a stiff kick in Roger’s gut. Once again action triumphed over words. I may have heard something inside the man snap and then he pitched backward to land hard on the floor near my feet. Price began to turn away doubtless to resume his hunt for Katie when suddenly he halted in mid-turn. His body whipped back around and his gaze landed on me. There was a brief moment of puzzlement in his eyes. It was soon replaced by hate.

  “Oh, Hell,” escaped my lips.

  He began to hiss like a snake. This was not the same James Price who confidently sat in a hospital bed near me not long before. He was wild and powerful. This had the fingerprints of the dark man all over it. But that wouldn’t matter if Price got his hands around my throat like I feared he wanted to.

  Trent stepped in front of me and handed the phone to me.

  “I’ve already dialed 9-1-1. Just tell them what’s going on. I’ll handle this guy.” He said all of this as if it were no big deal. I heard the voice of the dispatcher on the other end of the line and I started rambling through the situation as best I could all the while I kept my eyes on Trent and Price. And all the while Price kept his eyes on me, unconcerned with this new threat walking his direction.

  I saw Price step forward and thrust a fist at Trent. To my surprise the college professor easily blocked the punch and swiftly placed one of his own squarely on the left side of Price’s jaw. Astonishment took the man and he took a step back. Trent pressed his advantage and threw a left hook catching Price on the opposite side of his jaw. Instead of falling one more step backward Price planted himself, crouched and then sprang forward in an attempt to tackle the other man.

  The other man, however, was too quick for this move. He merely stepped out of the way as Price raced past him. Trent seized the back of his collar and yanked backward. A choked sound escaped Price as he came backward and landed in a pile at Trent’s feet. He lay motionless for a moment and then scrambled after Trent’s feet. Trent danced out of the way and then landed a kick in Price’s ribs.

  “Give up,” Trent ordered. The man looked up at him and grinned as blood trickled out of the corner of his mouth. “Don’t even think about,” Trent advised in a clear warning.

  Price didn’t give up but neither did he press the attack. Instead he vaulted himself over the bookshelf to his left which barred his path to the entrance. Then he ran like a man possessed, which he probably was, and disappeared through the door. Trent started to follow him but then stopped as he saw Roger laying motionless and groaning on the floor. He knelt beside him and started talking to him gently.

  “Holy crap,” I said. “Where did that come from?”

  Trent looked up at me and then quickly returned his attention to Roger as he groaned again. “I teach a self-defense class on the weekends. I have a little Karate and it does just fine. Did you finish with 9-1-1?” I told him I did and that the police were on their way and paramedics too. I marveled at him as he crouched next to the injured man. I remembered how earlier that day he had been terrified and probably close to returning home and forgetting he had ever seen me. And now there was this completely different representation of the same man. I shook it off and then remembered why we had come to the bookstore in the first place.

  “Katie!” I yelled. “Are you okay? He’s gone.” There was no response. I yelled her name again but still there was nothing. I began to sprint up and down the aisles looking for her but she was nowhere to be found. Worry began to sink its roots in me as I quickly moved up and down the rows upon rows of books. When my heart was about to explode I heard her voice, faint and whispered, but present.

  She stepped out from behind a recessed part of the wall where the bathrooms were located. She held a fire extinguisher in here hands and her eyes scanned the room to make sure the menace was gone. She wasn’t tearful or terrified but more aware to her environment. The little red canister in her hands was clearly going to be used as a makeshift weapon if necessary. Her knuckles were white around the thing.

  “It’s all good. He’s gone,” I said. “Trent ran him off and I don’t think he’ll be back for more any time soon.”

  She dropped the fire extinguisher and heaved a sigh of relief. She asked, “Is everyone okay?”

  “No,” I said, “he attacked Roger.” Her face fell when I delivered the news. “He kicked him pretty hard,” I continued, “may even have broken one of his ribs. Ambulance is on the way so don’t worry about that.” She nodded her head and then looked me in the eyes. I walked to her and embraced her in my arms. She hugged me fiercely in return.

  “Are you going to be okay?” I said when we parted.

  “Yeah, I think so. I’m just going to need a few minutes to calm myself down.” She leaned against the wall and looked at me. A shadow of a smile touched her lips. “Thanks for getting here so fast. I’m really glad to see you.”

  Adopting a joking macho tone I said, “Well you’re just lucky I was around. No telling what could have happened.”

  She smiled, shook her head and said, “I’ve just been through a tragedy. I don’t know if I can take you sense of humor too.” We both laughed a little and just like that we were at ease again. “Well,” she said, “that was really strange. I still don’t have any idea who that guy was.” I cleared my throat a little and looked down. “What?” she said. “Do you know him?”

  “That was James Price,” I said. “That was the guy who ran us both off the
road and almost killed us. I don’t think that was a coincidence. I also don’t think he’s doing this by himself.” I braced myself for the inevitable question.

  “What do you mean?”

  “The thing that chased you in the hospital, the ghost, I think he’s behind today’s festivities. He was trying to get you to get at me.” She examined me and seemed to decide I was right.

  “Okay, let’s say you’re right. What are we doing about this thing?”

  “We’ve actually got something new,” I said. “Trent and I found something at the library you should take a look at. There’s another weird story behind that too, but that will have to wait.” She nodded and we headed back to where Trent was tending to Roger. Katie sighed when she saw him. He looked better. He didn’t sit up because it hurt too much but he lay on his back on the floor and coughed a few times, each one bringing pain.

  While we waited for the ambulance I borrowed Trent’s phone and made a call to Stuart Vox and told him about Price. There were a lot of interested and animated questions from the lawyer but I couldn’t answer most of them. He didn’t seem to care. He was just glad to have a lead…and more importantly something new with which to nail Price to the wall. We exchanged a few more words and the call ended.

  Flashing lights now splashed against the glass of the entrance doors and sirens pierced the air. The police and the ambulance had arrived and they would bring questions with them. Smirking, I thought there were already more than enough of those to go around.

  Part III

  All Hell