The Ghost and the Halloween Haunt

by Anna J. McIntyre

  Danielle chuckled and opened the car door.

  Sunshine was not the only thing to greet Danielle as she stepped outside the garage a few minutes later. Max leapt into her arms while giving a pitiful crying meow.

  “Whoa,” Danielle said, fumbling with the hefty cat so as not to drop him or her purse. “Good to see you too, Max.”

  Following Danielle outside and closing the door behind him, Walt furrowed his brow at the cat, who now snuggled in Danielle’s arms but peeked over her right shoulder, staring into his blue eyes.

  “Danielle, stop,” Walt said a moment later.

  Danielle stopped walking and turned to face Walt, the cat still in her arms. Walt took Max from her, holding him up so that he could look into the cat’s face. He held him there for several minutes, the pair staring at each other, neither one making a sound.

  Watching in curiosity, Danielle wondered what the cat was telling Walt—or what Walt was saying to the cat. Normally he repeated whatever he was telling Max out loud so that Danielle could at least hear his side of the conversation. But for whatever reason, Walt remained silent, and she had no idea what the two were discussing.

  Finally, Walt set Max on the ground and looked at Danielle. “I think you should go over to Lily’s,” Walt told her.

  Danielle frowned. “Lily’s? Why? What is going on? What did Max tell you?”

  “It seems we have a visitor,” Walt told her.

  Danielle glanced quickly to the house and then back to Walt. “Should I call the police?”

  “Not that kind of visitor. I doubt they could help.”

  “I don’t understand; who is it?” she demanded.

  “According to Max, Harvey is in the house. He wants to talk to you.”

  “Harvey?” Danielle squeaked. “Presley House Harvey?”

  Walt nodded. “Yes.”

  “I thought he moved on?”

  “Apparently not. Unless we’ve been wrong all along, and Halloween is a time souls from the other side can also visit.”

  Danielle shook her head. “No. I don’t believe that’s possible. If it was, then more people would report experiencing Halloween encounters.”

  “All I know, he is here. So you need to go to Lily’s.”

  Danielle stood in silence for a moment, trying to process what Walt had just told her.

  “Danielle, are you listening to what I’m saying? Let’s get back in the car, and I’ll drive you to Lily’s. Or maybe somewhere else. Someplace farther away.”

  She looked up to Walt. “Not sure why I should go to Lily’s. But if I wanted to go over there, I could just walk.”

  “You don’t need to cross the yard and risk running into him. Let me get rid of Harvey. You don’t need to deal with him. He caused you enough trouble.”

  Danielle smiled softly and reached up to Walt, gently stroking his cheek. “I don’t think you can just get rid of him. It’s not like you can pick him up and show him to the door—even with the gifts you brought over from the spirit world. If Harvey is here, I imagine he’ll have to leave when Halloween is over. But until then, I have no intention of staying away from Marlow House. For one thing, we have a fundraiser going on.”

  “Yes, a haunted house. Lucky us, we picked up another ghost for the event,” he said dryly.

  “I’m not thrilled about having to see Harvey again, but I don’t know how I can avoid it.”

  “I suppose on the plus side, we now know who was probably here last night breaking things,” Walt grumbled.

  “You think it was him?”

  Walt shrugged. “Max asked him, and he claimed it wasn’t him. But I have no reason to believe Harvey. And we know from your last encounter that he is capable of moving objects.”

  Danielle let out a sigh. “I actually hope it was him. Because if it wasn’t, not only is Harvey here, there’s also another mischief maker out there who might return to cause more problems.”

  Walt studied Danielle a moment and then said, “Okay, but I would like to stay with you.”

  Standing on her tiptoes, Danielle brushed a brief kiss over Walt’s lips. Standing back down on the balls of her feet, she smiled up at her husband and said, “I love how you always try to keep me safe. I love how much you care. But I have a feeling that if Harvey is here to talk to me, he will probably want to do it alone. And I’m hoping, the sooner I talk to him, the sooner he will go back—to wherever he has been.”

  “I don’t like this,” Walt grumbled.

  “I don’t either. But we have no other choice. How about when we go inside, I’ll go in the parlor, and I’ll start reading a book. You can wait in the living room, and if I need you, I’ll call for you. Would that work?”

  Walt anxiously paced the living room floor. The door to the hallway was open, as was the door leading into the parlor. So far he hadn’t heard anything out of the ordinary. He began wondering if they were handling this all wrong. Perhaps they should have first gathered together all the mediums, along with Eva and Marie. Eva seemed to know how to handle this sort of thing.

  “I know the cat told you I was here. I’m just surprised you’re not in there with her. I heard how protective you are of your wife,” a strange voice said. Walt whipped around to face the person—or ghost—behind the voice.

  “Harvey Crump?” Walt stammered, looking the apparition up and down.

  “In the flesh,” Harvey said with a grin. He then added, “I suppose that was a poor choice of words. Not the flesh exactly. But you know all about that, don’t you?”

  Not taking his eyes off Harvey, Walt found himself astonished at what he was seeing. He is no more than a boy, Walt told himself. Harvey Crump—the image of a scrawny adolescent, wearing oversized faded jeans, belted at the waist with a worn rope, and a dingy button-down white shirt, its front stained in blood—stood in his bare feet before Walt. His mop of unkempt brown hair looked as if it had never seen a comb.

  “You are just a child,” Walt stammered.

  The smile faded from Harvey’s face. “I haven’t been a child for decades. That was taken from me—my childhood, any future I might have had.”

  “I am sincerely sorry about that,” Walt said kindly and then asked, “But why are you here?”

  “It isn’t to talk to you. Although, I have to confess, I was curious. Walt Marlow. I used to hear stories about you when I was alive. How you hanged yourself in your attic. We used to walk by here and look up at the attic window, wondering why you really did it. But you didn’t kill yourself, did you?”

  “No. I didn’t.”

  “We have a lot in common,” Harvey said.

  Walt arched a brow. “We do?”

  Harvey nodded. “We were both murdered. Our deaths were blamed on the wrong people. We both haunted a house, although I was only allowed to do it one month out of the year. And we both care about Danielle.”

  “From how you treated her, I have to say you have a peculiar way of treating someone you care about.”

  Absently holding his hands behind his back, Harvey kicked an imaginary rock with his bare toe. “Yeah, that’s why I want to talk to her. I…I need to straighten some things out before I move on.”

  “Why haven’t you already moved on?” Walt asked.

  Harvey looked up to Walt and said, “No disrespect intended, but it’s really something I should talk to Danielle about.” The next moment Harvey vanished.

  Danielle felt his presence before hearing his voice.

  “Hello, Danielle,” Harvey said.

  Sitting on the sofa, Danielle closed the book she was pretending to read and set it on her lap. She looked up at Harvey, who sat on a chair facing her.

  “Hello, Harvey. I thought you had moved on by now.”

  “I couldn’t. Not without talking to you first,” he explained.

  She frowned. “I don’t understand?”

  “I thought I would be able to. After all, the only reason I stuck around, I wanted to right the lie told about my uncle. I wanted the world
to know what had really happened to me. But…well, when I went back to the cemetery after the house burned down, I was stuck there.”

  “This entire time?” she asked.

  He nodded. “I was able to leave each October, like before. But returning to a vacant lot, well, there was nothing for me there. And then I realized, I couldn’t leave because I had something else I needed to do before I would be free to move on.”

  “What’s that?” she asked.

  “I had to make amends to you. If it wasn’t for you, the truth would never have come out. But I almost got you and your friend killed. And I never apologized for that. I’m sorry for how I treated you. I’m sorry for scaring you and your friend. Can you ever forgive me?”

  Danielle smiled at Harvey. “Yes. In fact, I forgave you a long time ago. But I do have one question for you, and I would like you to answer truthfully.”

  Harvey nodded. “Go ahead. Ask me.”

  “Last night someone was here in the house after Walt and I went to bed. They tipped over some chairs and broke a vase. I believe it might have been a spirit. Was it you?”

  Harvey studied Danielle for a few moments, saying nothing. Finally he said in a low whisper, “No. It wasn’t me. I don’t know who it was. But I do know I’m not the only spirit attracted to Marlow House this Halloween season. There are other spirits anxious to move on, and like me, they can’t do it until they work things out here.”

  “What does that have to do with Marlow House?”

  “It’s not my place to say. But others are coming. I suspect some may already be here—especially considering what happened last night. But for me, I’m free to move on now. Have a good life, Danielle, and thank you for helping me and for forgiving me.”

  The next moment Harvey vanished.

  Sixteen

  Death had not diminished Eva Thorndike’s flare; it enhanced it. She waited until Marie arrived to make her entrance. All the mediums, except for Evan, sat in the Marlow House living room with Marie, Ian, Lily and baby Connor. Although technically speaking, Connor could be counted among the mediums since he was able to see and hear both Marie and Eva.

  She arrived in a whirl of white smoke—befitting a Halloween setting—wearing a long black chiffon gown. Atop her head sat a black pillbox hat, its netting covering the top half of her face. Eva twirled along with the smoke as she made her landing. While Ian and Lily could not see her, they saw the smoke and for a moment seemed a bit panicked that something was on fire. Not exactly the entrance Eva was going for.

  Silent screen star during her brief lifetime, many had compared Eva’s looks to Charles Dana Gibson’s iconic drawing of the fictitious Gibson Girl—which had actually come out before Eva had even been born. While Eva did bear a striking resemblance to the drawing, it was the artist Bonnet who had accentuated that resemblance—playing it up and even enhancing it a bit, making it more than it really was.

  Eva didn’t attempt to play down the resemblance or dissuade the artist from focusing on the comparison. The Gibson girl had been Eva’s inspiration when playing roles on the screen or in the theater. She had mimicked the expressions Gibson had given the drawing, using it as her creative muse.

  “I thought something was on fire,” Lily said, still clutching Connor as she sat back down after practically jumping from the sofa a moment earlier in an attempt to save her baby from imminent danger.

  Eva let out a sigh. “Tell Lily I’m sorry. These things do not always work out as I imagine.” A chair appeared to the mediums and Eva immediately sat on it.

  “I was just about to tell them about Harvey’s visit,” Danielle explained. She then went on to tell the group everything that had gone on since they had last seen her.

  “Do you think it’s dangerous to continue with the haunted house?” Lily asked. “Look how Harvey almost got us killed.”

  “But he didn’t,” Eva said.

  Danielle looked to Eva. “That was only because Heather got there in time.”

  Eva shook her head. “From what I understand, if Heather had never showed up, Harvey would have had enough energy to release you from the basement and save you from the fire—which he was willing to do, but he had used all his energy to allow Heather to see him.”

  “So you’re saying it was my fault?” Heather asked.

  “Absolutely not,” Eva began.

  “Her fault for what?” Lily muttered, confused since she couldn’t hear Eva’s side of the conversation.

  “I’m just saying Danielle and Lily were in no real danger—if you showed up or not. Either way they would have gotten out of the house before the fire reached them,” Eva said.

  “How can you be so sure of that?” Danielle asked.

  “Because, as you well know, spirits are generally not allowed to harm the living. The worse that will happen here, your guests might get a good scare, which is why they’re coming to a haunted house anyway.” Eva smiled. “You can view it as having extra help with the fundraiser.”

  “We know sometimes spirits can harm people—I’m thinking Darlene,” Danielle reminded her.

  “Let me rephrase,” Eva said. “The universe will not let a spirit harm an innocent.”

  Seeing Lily’s agitation at being left out of the conversation and Ian’s confusion, Danielle quickly summarized what Eva had just told them.

  They continued to talk for another thirty minutes, moving on to any proposed changes for tonight’s tour. Finally Ian walked Lily and Connor home, planning to return right before the opening to help with the haunted house, while Lily stayed home with the baby.

  “Melony should be here in about fifteen minutes,” Danielle said after Lily, Ian and Connor went home.

  “She’s going to do the ticket sales tonight?” Heather asked. Heather, who wore a witch’s costume, would be returning to her place in the kitchen, as she had the night before.

  “Yeah. She also told me she doesn’t think Adam is going to come to the haunted house,” Danielle said with a chuckle.

  “Why not?” Marie asked.

  “I think Marlow House as a haunted house kind of freaks Adam out,” Danielle said.

  “From what the chief told us, I don’t think Brian is coming either,” Chris added.

  Before they could continue with the line of conversation, a small voice said, “Am I too early?”

  They all turned to find Ginny standing at the open doorway to the hallway.

  “I hope it’s okay. I just walked in. Can I go put my costume on?” Ginny asked.

  Danielle stood up. “Certainly. But I thought you’d gone to Portland with your aunt and uncle?”

  Ginny smiled up at Danielle. “We got back earlier than we expected. My aunt said I could help again with the haunted house. Do you still want me?”

  “Of course. So glad you could make it. I know Evan will be happy to have his haunting partner,” Danielle said with a grin. “Go ahead and get in your costume.”

  By the time the chief arrived with Evan and Eddy, Ginny was already in her ghost costume, and Ian was just walking back from across the street. Not long after the chief dropped his boys off and left, Melony Carmichael showed up to help sell tickets.

  The crowds seemed even larger on the second night—and it had been fairly brisk on Friday. Because of the steady flow of traffic, Melony waited for people to leave before letting more in. A line of customers anxiously awaiting entrance to the haunted house stood along the walkway leading from the street to Marlow House’s front porch.

  Joe Morelli parked his car in the street in front of Marlow House. He looked at the line of people waiting to get into the tour and then glanced at his watch. It was almost 10:30 p.m.

  “I wonder if we should have come later—or earlier?” Joe asked Kelly, who sat in the passenger seat, busily sorting through her open purse.

  “I texted my brother. He said they have been busy all night.”

  “So you’re talking to him now?” Joe teased.

  “Texting is not talking,” Kel
ly grumbled. “And I’m still annoyed at him for not having enough faith in me to watch Conner.”

  “Don’t be so hard on your brother. I remember my sister was pretty paranoid when she was a new mother.”

  “I’m sure Lily talked him into coming over and checking on me,” Kelly said.

  “To be honest, I’m just relieved it was Ian who got in the house. The thought of a stranger getting into the baby’s room like that freaked me out,” Joe said.

  Kelly let out a sigh. “I suppose you’re right. Freaked me out too. Of course, now I understand why Lily wasn’t upset about it. She obviously knew Ian had come over to check on the baby.”

  Joe unfastened his seatbelt and leaned over, giving Kelly a quick kiss. He then said, “Someday it will be a funny story you can tell your nephew. You know, about how goofy his parents were.”

  Kelly chuckled. “True.”

  Joe and Kelly walked into the Marlow House library. The room was dimly lit save for two spotlights, one shining on the portrait of Walt Marlow, and a second shining on the living Walt Marlow, who sat on a chair adjacent to the portrait. Dressed exactly like the man in the painting, it looked as if Walt had stepped out of the canvas and now sat reading.

  Curious, Kelly inched closer. Her eyes widened. Instead of holding the book, Walt’s hands rested on the arms of the chair while the book seemingly floated in the air in front of him, a page turning every few minutes. Kelly looked for wires yet didn’t see any.

  “How does he do that?” Kelly whispered.

  Walt flashed her a grin. “Because I’m a ghost, of course.”

  Joe chuckled and said, “I remember now, you like to dabble with magic. Good trick, by the way.”

  Walt nodded at Joe. “Thank you.”

  “That’s really cool,” Kelly said.

  After they left the library, they headed upstairs to see what frights awaited them. When they came back downstairs, they visited the bedroom with the casket, and Kelly let out a scream when Chris popped up in his full mummy garb.