Ghost in the Machine, part 3

The Raven

Ghost in the Machine

Part 3

A man walks into a bar with his pet alligator on a leash. “Do you serve laywers here?” asks the man. “Why, certainly, sir,” replies the bartender. “Then I’ll have a beer,” says the man, “and a lawyer for my alligator.” Margo and Ernie are on the verge of a big discovery and the lawyers are not happy about it. Surely they’re not up to something dastardly, are they? Find out in this final installment, and check out Part 1 here, and part 2 here.

Do I need to tell you that I didn’t sleep a wink that night?

I gave up finally and got dressed and got to the lab just after daybreak. I was expecting to have the place to myself for at least the next few hours, but I was astonished to find Ernie’s car already parked at the back entrance.

“Looks like you couldn’t sleep, either,” he said when I walked in. He was sitting in front of a bank of giant high-definition computer monitors.

“Don’t tell me you’ve been here all night,” I said.

“No, I couldn’t sleep to save my life. I figured if I was going to be awake anyway, I might as well get a head start sifting through the stuff from last night.”

“I wish I felt as bright-eyed and bushy-tailed as you sound,” I said.

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“We’ll see how long it lasts,” he replied with a smile. “I thought it might save us some time if I ran my new image comparison algorithm on these videos.” The tool in question saves us the tedious task of having to examine every second of video evidence by comparing the frames and flagging the most minute changes. It now takes us seconds to find what used to take hours or even days. “This is from the webcam in the hall outside Dante’s studio. Look right here.”

I pulled a chair up next to him and looked at the fuzzy image on one of the monitors. A dark shadow in the doorway of the open elevator might have been a light artifact, but probably wasn’t.

“What about the elevator lobbies on the other floors? Do we have corresponding footage?”

“Indeed we do,” he replied. “Give me a minute.”

“I’m going to get some caffeine while you find them.” In the office kitchen I filled a reusable capsule with my favorite concoction. I popped it into our new hightech espresso machine that the college had given us when we moved into this space last fall. It was a major improvement over our old coffee maker—and totally Ernie-proof. The coffee Ernie makes could be used as paint stripper. Before we got the new machine, we poured out many a carafe of his near-toxic attempts at coffee making.

“What did you find?” I asked when I returned with my steaming cup of latte.

“After it stopped on our floor, the elevator went up to the third. According to the time stamp, that was at exactly the same time we saw the message on Dante’s computer.”

“Any idea where it went after that?” I asked.

“It was still on the third floor when we left. I’m not sure what to think of it.”

“Neither am I. How much of the conversation with the entities did we manage to record?”

“Margo, you surprise me. All of it, naturally. Look right here—at the precise time the voices started coming over the radio, this dark shape appears.” He indicated a dark area on the video.

It was just the faintest of dark blobs, but the video showed the shapeless mass moving into the room. I felt a cold chill run down my spine and shivered. “We’ve encountered unfriendly spirits before, but this one was different.”

“Absolutely. However, I think it’s pretty clear that we were dealing with multiple entities here. They aren’t all hostile. I had a microphone on the radio and I’m going to try to enhance the whispering to see if we can get anything,” he said. “The other thing that interests me is that music right at the end.”

“Why?” I asked. “Surely that was just a stray radio broadcast. I once read that some stations can reach hundreds of miles.”

“That’s true, but you’re thinking of AM radio. Under the right atmospheric conditions, AM radio signals can reach for more than a thousand miles, especially at night. That’s anything in the range from 535 to1605 kilohertz. But we were set to 740 megahertz. It actually falls in the frequency range that used to be for television broadcasts—from 300 megahertz to 3 gigahertz. And those frequencies aren’t even used for television broadcasts anymore.”

I pondered the implications of what he’d just said. “So there’s no possibility it was just the campus radio station?”

He shrugged. “Not unless something’s seriously wrong

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with my radio.”

“You have any idea what that song was?”

“You’re kidding, right?”

I sighed. “No, I know better. But there has to be someone around who knows.”

“The music department?”

“It can’t hurt to try.” I glanced at the time. “Soon as people start showing up for work.”

The door opened and Sandy came in, wheeling his beloved bicycle. I could tell by the forbidding scowl on his normally cheerful face that something was wrong.

“Everything okay?” I asked.

“No, everything is not okay. Look at my bike!” Both tires were flat and the seat had been slashed. But most disturbing of all, his brakes had been cut. He propped it against the wall. “Kickstand’s broken, too.”

His bike was a sorry sight. I felt terrible for him. He depends entirely on his beloved bike for transportation and wouldn’t dream of owning a car and. I’d add that he’s in great shape, but you’ve probably deduced that already.

“When did this happen?” asked Ernie.

“Last night. There was a neighborhood meeting, to talk about the zoning commission meeting that’s coming up. I just heard from Thornton: one of the girls had a flat tire on the way home.”

“Coincidence?” asked Ernie.

Sandy shook his head. “Jason’s cat is missing, too.”

“Somebody must have known about the meeting,” Ernie mused.

“Sounds like it. It’s almost like we’re being followed or something.”

“My thoughts exactly,” Ernie replied, catching my eye.

Sandy sighed heavily. “I’m going to take it over to the bike shop…when they open. How come you two are here so early? It’s barely light out.”

“You probably don’t want to know,” replied Ernie with a sly grin.

“Right. Well, we can leave it at that.” Sandy is a champion researcher and the best assistant we could possibly ask for, but he gets utterly oogied out by anything to do with ghosts.

“Tell you what,” I said. “Throw your bike in the back of my station wagon. I’ll take you and it over to the bike shop if you’ll help me find a jazz expert.”

“It’s a deal,” he said with a broad smile, retrieving his phone. “I know who will know.”

“All right. I should probably let Dante know about the message on his Mac.” I dialed Dante’s number and he answered immediately.

“Oh, Margo! I’m so glad you called. How did it go last night?”

It didn’t seem like a good idea to give him too many details until we knew more about what we were dealing with, so I just said, “I think we made contact with at least one entity. We’re looking at the evidence now.”

“I was going to call you: do you know if my computer was okay when you were here last night?”

“The old Mac? Yes, I think so. Why?”

“I think it died. I can’t get it to come on this morning,” replied Dante sadly. “It was working just fine yesterday.”

I cast a glance at Ernie, who was looking at me with

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raised eyebrows. “Are your files backed up?”

“Not recently,” Dante sighed. “First my studio gets trashed, and now this. I hope I’m not going to have to fork over big bucks for a new computer. That would be a stretch right now.”

I decided telling him about the cryptic message on his spreadsheet wouldn’t be the smartest thing to do, so I left it with a promise to show him our evidence later. That seemed to cheer him up.

Sandy and I left Ernie glued to his computer and hopped in my car for the short drive across campus.

I love having an excuse to visit Merrifield Hall, home of the music department. It’s one of the oldest buildings on campus and being there is like taking a trip back in time. Sandy led me past a practice hall where a string quartet was playing something that might have been Vivaldi. His phone chimed from his pocket. When he looked at his message, his face lit up. “Roscoe’s back.”

“Who’s Roscoe?” I asked.

“Jason’s cat. Says he’s limping and missing a couple of patches of fur but otherwise safe and sound. Here we go—this is the guy you need to talk to.” We were standing in front of an office with a wooden door. A nameplate next to the door indicated it was the office of Fulton Brooks, Associate Professor of Jazz Studies.

Brooks looked suitably like an aging jazz musician. His black turtleneck sweater contrasted unbecomingly with the pasty complexion of someone who spends little time in the sun and his long graying hair was pulled back in a ponytail. There was a saxophone on a stand in one corner of the small office. Except for a promotional poster for the 1967 Montreaux Jazz Festival, the walls were bare. I explained why we were there and played the fragment of music for him. “We were wondering if you could help us identify the piece.”

Brooks scratched his head. “Early 1920’s from the sound of it.”

“Is there any chance you could tell us more?” I pressed.

“I personally can’t, but I know someone who can,” he replied, whipping out a phone and tapping a message into it. “Are you a fan of jazz?”

I wasn’t keen on telling him any more than necessary. People can be unpredictable when it comes to the paranormal—either they want nothing to do with it, or they want desperately to get involved. “A friend of mine was playing around with an old radio and got this. He… um, decided it was something he wanted to know more about.”

“‘Friend’?” asked Brooks, with a not particularly discreet glance at my left hand. “Boyfriend?”

“More like a co-worker,” I replied, now annoyed. “But yes, I do have a boyfriend.”

Brooks stole a quick glance at Sandy, who’s a good fifteen years younger than me. Great, I thought. Now he thinks I’m a cougar. “His name’s Tim and he lives on the West Coast.”

“Lucky guy,” muttered Brooks.

The door opened and a young black man came in. Everything about him seemed like an anachronism. He was wearing a three-piece wool suit of an archaic cut, complete with starched high collar and neatly tied bow tie. His crinkly hair was parted in the middle and slicked back against his head. He had skin the color of dark caramel with thin lips and an aquiline nose.

“Ah,” said Brooks, “here’s our resident time-traveler.

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Margo, um…Monroe, did you say it was? And um…”

“Sandy.”

“Of course. Allow me to introduce Armstrong Fitzgerald Leonard.”

“Call me Lenny,” said the young man.

“Nice to meet you, Lenny,” I said. I played the snippet for him. “We were wondering if you could help us identify this music.”

“Of course I can,” he said. “Come with me.”

Brooks waved at us and went back to his desk. Sandy and I followed Lenny into a room a few doors down the hall. Every wall was lined with hundreds of vinyl albums, neatly stored in narrow vertical slots. He went straight to a shelf and pulled out an ancient record. “That song is a recording from 1924 and we happen to have an original 78 here in our library. It was on a small label from Indiana called Gennett. Crude sound quality, but of great historical significance. The band is called the Wolverine Orchestra. They’re important mainly because the cornet was Bix Beiderbecke. It sounds oldfashioned to our ears, but his solo on that piece was groundbreaking.” He held up the record for us to see. “We’re lucky to have this copy. Only a few thousand of these were ever produced. At the time, except for a few jazz fanatics up north, nobody had ever heard this. Of course, nowadays you can download it off the Internet. It was on the radio? It’s kind of odd—I didn’t know there were any stations around here playing that sort of thing.”

“Sort of. My friend has one of those multi-band radios. It picks up all kinds of frequencies.” That seemed to satisfy him.

“Yeah, you can get all kinds of stuff on short-wave.”

We thanked him for his time and left. I dropped Sandy off at the bike shop and went back to the lab.

Ernie was still in the same spot where he’d been when I left and looked like he was fading fast. I was, too, for that matter.

When he returned that afternoon with his newly repaired bike, Sandy tossed an article from the newspaper archives on my desk. It was from the Indian Springs Herald and dated August of 1924. The subject was an elevator accident in the Morris building in which two men had been killed. A faulty safety brake was blamed and the men had died particularly gruesome deaths. Interestingly, the article also mentioned rumors of apparently long standing that the building was haunted.

“Ernie, listen to this,” I said. “This is from August of 1924. ‘Horrific accident at the Morris Building’.” Something poked at the edges of my consciousness, but I brushed it aside. “Two men were killed and one seriously injured Thursday in an elevator accident at the Morris Building. Witnesses say a safety brake failed, sending the men plunging to their deaths. Amid allegations of negligence…” Then I realized what was trying to get my attention: 1924.

“Well, go on,” said Ernie impatiently.

“Oh, right. Sorry. ‘…the families of the victims have laid the blame squarely on the landlord, Ambrose Rummel. Numerous accusations have surfaced in recent years that much-needed repairs to the building’s infrastructure have not been made in a timely manner.’”

“Three guesses as to whose grandpappy old Ambrose was,” said Ernie. “Seems the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.”

“It gets better,” I said, and continued to read. ‘Killed in the accident were Ephraim Hawk, 33, and Wilson

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Greenwald, 26. Mr. Hawk, a well-known and admired figure around town, had been the night watchman at the Morris Building since his return in 1919 from the fighting in France. He was a native of Indian Springs who will best be remembered for his role as star quarterback and captain of the Indian Springs High School football team during the victorious 1907–08 and 1908–09 seasons. Mr. Greenwald was a machine operator and mechanic at Palace Printing and Engraving who only within the past year relocated to our fair city from New Paris, Ohio. He was a talented musician and aficionado of jazz whose energizing performances at the Indian Springs Dance Club will be much missed.’

“Well, now. That’s interesting, on a number of different levels,” said Ernie.

“There’s more,” I said. “That song we picked up on the radio: according to our resident jazz expert, it was recorded in 1924.”

Ernie shrugged. “Coincidence.”

“Could be, but something tells me it’s not. It was a limited recording from a fairly obscure record label.”

“If you say so,” mused Ernie. “Of more interest to me is the fact that one of the guys killed in the accident was a jazzman. What else do we know, Sandy?”

“Not much. The musician, Greenwald, had no relatives that anyone was able to locate. Hawk left behind a wife but no kids. I don’t know if it has any bearing on this story, but a few years later a man named Levi Hawk married one of Rummel’s daughters and ended up going into business with Rummel. That’s when they changed the company name to Corvus.”

Suddenly it all made sense to me. “And now their descendants are trying to tear the building down! No wonder Greenwald’s ghost is upset. I certainly would be—a double betrayal.”

“Speaking of Corvus, how’s the battle against the MonsterMart going?” Ernie asked.

“We had a rally over the weekend and half the neighborhood turned out,” Sandy replied.

“Was Rummel there?” Ernie asked.

“I don’t know. I’m not sure I would recognize Rummel or Hawk, and I’ve never seen the lawyers.”

“I imagine they have their minions take care of things of that nature,” I said.

Sandy shrugged and fished a phone out of his pocket. “I took some photos. Have a look.”

I took Sandy’s phone. There was an impressive crowd, but something else caught my eye. I had to zoom in on one of the photos to be sure, but it confirmed what I suspected. “Speaking of underlings…Ernie, tell me if this is who I think it is.”

Ernie studied the photo on Sandy’s phone. “Well, well, well. If it isn’t our favorite personal assistant.”

A little alarm bell went off in my head. “Can I have that back for a second?” Ernie passed me the phone and I zoomed in on the photo of Weldon Spradley. “Look right here,” I said to the two of them. “On his hand. Are those scratches?”

“Cat scratches! That son of a bitch!” exclaimed Sandy.

“I think I might be missing something,” said Ernie, looking puzzled.

Sandy explained the mysterious disappearance and return of Roscoe the cat.

“Margo,” Ernie said, “I don’t have a dog in this fight, but

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I think it’s time we sent a message to Weldon Spradley.”

“I’m inclined to agree. What say you, Sandy? Are you in?”

Sandy grinned. “I’ll come up with a plan to make sure we get our point across.”

“I knew we could count on you,” replied Ernie.

On an intellectual level, I knew Weldon Spradley was just doing the bidding of a powerful and unscrupulous employer. Like Nora, he probably felt like he didn’t have much choice if he wanted to keep his job. But I was enraged all over again when I thought about the damage he’d done to Dante’s studio. It was someone’s livelihood… if Spradley would do that to a man working to support an invalid mother, what else was he capable of in the name of following orders? Spradley didn’t strike me as being the brightest bulb in the chandelier, and when Ernie, Sandy, and I put our heads together, it didn’t take too long to concoct a plan that we hoped would send a clear message to Corvus Enterprises.

First, we visited Sandy’s favorite bike shop and bought a simple device used to locate stolen bikes. The next step required finding Spradley’s car and attaching the device. A short session with Google Earth assured us the only complicating factor would be the guard in the security kiosk near the front entrance of Corvus headquarters.

Getting around this was easy enough. One afternoon Ernie and I drove in separate cars to Deerfield and found the dark, looming office building that housed Corvus Enterprises. With Ernie in the passenger seat, I drove up to the front door and Ernie—minus his nerdy black glasses—got out. With a big show of waving goodbye, he went in and I drove off. While Ernie went into the barbershop on the building’s ground level arcade to inquire about a haircut, I drove around the block and parked his car along the street about a block away. I then walked the two blocks to the lot where earlier we’d parked my car. While Ernie was getting his usually rather longish locks chopped off (he complained vociferously about this part), I let about half the air out of one of my own tires and waited. Once divested of his signature hairstyle, Ernie put his glasses back on and sent me a text. Now in my own car and wearing a blonde wig, I pulled into the Corvus parking lot. The security guard was only too happy to help out with the air pump that he kept on hand for such emergencies. Distracted by a charming blonde damsel in distress, the guard paid not the slightest attention to Ernie when he strolled out the front door and across the parking lot. It took Ernie only a few minutes to find Spradley’s car and attach the device. We were on the road by 5:00 and having drinks at the Monk’s Habit by 5:30.

A pattern quickly emerged: most days, Spradley left his office around 6:00 and drove to Indian Springs, passing by the site of the proposed MonsterMart, and occasionally stopping at the offices of Welcher and Butz. Then he would drive the five minutes back up the road to Throckmorton and park about a block away from our lab. He usually remained until Ernie and I left for the evening.

Ernie and I came and went by the back door, and always took circuitous routes home. We insisted that Sandy leave his bike in the lab. One of us picked him up each morning and took him home every evening. He grumbled, but we knew from a previous incident that he was a vulnerable target on his bike. Last fall, we investigated the murder of a local professor—at the deceased’s request. We found ourselves a little bit in over our collective heads, and Sandy only narrowly missed being the second homicide victim in Throckmorton County in 80 years.

We warned our ever-vigilant night concierge, George,

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to expect something unusual and to go along with whatever transpired. Sure enough, Spradley soon showed up in the lobby and offered George money to “accidentally” forget to engage the intruder alarm the following evening. With a show of reluctance, George pocketed the wad of cash Spradley offered. A more intelligent man might have realized that his plans were meeting with alarmingly little resistance, but Spradley, in his arrogance, just assumed we were clueless.

The next night we waited in the darkened lab with 20 or so of our closest friends. Just after dark, when we heard the door being jimmied with a crowbar, we knew we were right on track. When Spradley stepped quietly into the lab, dressed in black from head to toe, we sent George a text. From his station at the front desk, George threw the switch that locked the back door and we turned on the lights. Spradley found himself surrounded—and trapped.

When Spradley saw that Dante was among our number, he began whimpering. I almost felt sorry for him. Now, it’s my philosophy that to do something truly harmful would only lower us to his level (or perhaps more accurately, to the level of Ronson Rummel). But we intended to send a clear message, and so we did.

In a flash, Spradley was divested of his clothes except for his dingy and rather ratty tighty-whities.

“Good evening, Mr. Spradley,” said George politely as we carried Spradley bodily through the lobby, with Dante in the lead.

As soon as Spradley was deposited on the pavement outside, we threw his car keys after him and he sprinted (it was a rather chilly night) to his car. However, more surprises awaited him when he reached his car, which had been decorated rather…artistically. We cheered loudly when he turned on the ignition, for his horn now blared loudly. Ernie had rigged it to stay on even after the car was turned off and the keys removed from the ignition. I dialed 911 to report a disturbance, and we locked up and adjourned to the Monk’s Habit to celebrate.

George offered to buy the first round with the money Spradley had given him. I thought he should keep it for himself, but he insisted. Our drinks had just arrived when Ernie gleefully showed me his phone. The tracking device was dutifully sending out the location of Spradley’s car: the Indian Springs police auto pound.

“Ha! Serves him right,” Sandy gloated.

Ernie chuckled. “I confess to succumbing to a touch of schadenfreude myself.”

“Huh? Shadenwhat?” asked George.

“You know: that sneaky little feeling of delight you sometimes get when something bad happens to someone that deserves it,” answered Ernie.

George pondered this for a minute and rubbed his grizzled chin. Then he said, “I don’t think it’s schadenfreude if the guy really deserved it.”

I couldn’t help but chuckle at this wisdom. “Good point,” I responded, and worried no more about it.

A couple of evenings later I was at home, about to curl up with a book, when my phone rang. It’s a rare occasion when Sandy disturbs me after hours, so I reluctantly put the book aside and answered the phone. “What’s up?”

“Remember I told you about Levi Hawk marrying Old Man Rummel’s daughter? Something about that didn’t seem right, so I’ve been digging around. You know me, there’s few things I like better than spending

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an afternoon rooting around in the county archives. Anyway, Ephraim Hawk, one of the guys who was killed in the elevator accident, had a brother named Owen who suddenly went from rags to riches. He bought quite a bit of property and shortly after the accident was living in a big, fancy house not far from the town square. It was his son that married Rummel’s daughter.

“Sounds like the Hawk family benefited handsomely from Ephraim’s death. How’d you find this out?” I asked.

“Property records are public; you’d be amazed at the information you can get from them. Unfortunately, we have to read between the lines to figure out the whys and wherefores.”

“Lawsuit?”

“Possibly,” replied Sandy. “But I didn’t find anything in the papers along those lines. This may surprise you, and I don’t know if it even matters, but Rummel was a judge; a well-respected pillar of the community. He was a rabid supporter of Prohibition and was instrumental in putting several bootleggers behind bars.”

“And he had the financial means to ensure that things went his way in Indian Springs. Sounds a lot like his grandson.”

Sandy chuckled. “I’m inclined to agree. What doesn’t make sense is that a man like Rummel doesn’t strike me as the type to countenance a marriage between his only daughter and a working man, much less go into business with him.”

“I agree, it does seem odd. Hush money?”

“Blackmail…that never occurred to me. That would certainly tie things together neatly. But blackmail for what?”

“Finding the answer to that is going to be the tricky part.” “Agreed. Here’s something else I found that might be of interest: a routine follow-up report from the police archives. Attempts to locate any family of the other victim, Greenwald, came to nothing. They quizzed Greenwald’s landlady, but she had no information. She was more worried about what to do with his personal effects so she could rent out his room. According to the report, his earthly possessions consisted of a clarinet, some jazz records, and a photograph of an unidentified woman.”

“I wonder what happened to that stuff.”

“Says here she donated them to the church bazaar. Which might explain how a rare recording ended up in the archives at the music college. There’s one other thing—remember in that article from the newspaper in 1924 where it mentions that the Morris Building was reputed to be haunted?”

“Of course. But I didn’t give it much thought—what old building isn’t rumored to be haunted?”

“Well, that’s just it. That section of that block isn’t all that old, or at least it wasn’t in 1924.”

“But the façade says 1888.”

“I know. That’s because the façades are all that remained of the original buildings, which were destroyed by fire in 1902. Four buildings were destroyed in total. Everything behind the façades was rebuilt a few years later.”

“How’d you find this out?”

“In the August 1956 edition of a magazine called Small Town Adventures. The article is called “Haunted Throckmorton County” and it mentions the Morris Building specifically. Five people were killed in the 1902 fires, but that’s not even where that story started. Listen to this: ‘The earliest settlers avoided the area, having been warned away from the spot by local Indian

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tribes. According to Indian folklore, angry spirits have guarded the locale since time immemorial. But the arrival of the railroad late in the last century spurred a building boom and the advice was either forgotten or ignored.’ That might explain the multiple entities. The place has some seriously bad mojo.”

“True. And it fits neatly into my theory that there are locations that just seem to be vortexes of paranormal energy. Anything else?”

“Only that the Indian Springs Dance Club was in the building two doors down from the Morris. And it was owned by none other than old Ambrose Rummel.”

“Where the Mexican restaurant is now?”

“Exactly. A few years later it was raided and closed down. I bet you can guess why.”

“Selling alcohol?”

“Bingo!”

“Sandy, I don’t know what we’d do without you.”

“Me neither,” he answered cheerfully. “Have a nice evening. See you tomorrow.”

That night I found myself reading and rereading the same page of my book. I finally slammed it shut in frustration. Various scenarios kept replaying themselves in my mind. Why would a man like Ambrose Rummel give the brother of his former employee substantial sums of money? Maybe Hawk came into the money by some other means. But I didn’t think so. Did Hawk know something Rummel didn’t want made public? Or was the old man just trying to assuage a guilty conscience? I finally started to drift off to sleep, then woke with a start when I realized I probably had the answer. The only problem was, the only person who could really tell me the truth was long dead.

I had never considered getting involved in local politics— to be honest, I had never really paid the slightest bit of attention. But it seemed to me like we had the perfect opportunity to address an injustice from the past and perhaps prevent another wrong from happening. It was clear that Corvus had to be stopped. They had always relied on citizen apathy to push through their agenda, and until now it had worked. But that was before they went head-to-head with us.

Through the efforts of Sandy’s neighborhood group and Dante’s close network of friends—and with a little help from social media—we launched a grassroots information campaign. Sandy (who is, after all, an art major) designed posters and flyers, and we took a few days off from ghost hunting to take to the streets.

The day of the zoning hearing, I considered it a good sign when we had to park several blocks away from City Hall. We got there just in time to see Ronson Rummel and Clay Hawk pushing their way through a shouting, angry mob. The mayor was there as well. I felt a surge of optimism: few things get the attention of a career politician like a sea of signs bearing slogans like “We’re Watching and We Vote”.

Ernie and I joined the surging crowd as it pushed forward into the council chamber. The council chamber was vast and dark and full to overflowing. There weren’t nearly enough seats, and many of our number were forced to stand in the hall outside and listen to the proceedings over the PA. Some well-meaning person had cranked up the air conditioner to full-blast. I shivered and put my jacket on.

Rules of conduct for council meetings strictly forbid any kind of outbursts or unruly conduct of any kind.

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Corvus’ lawyers were careful to conduct themselves with utmost courtesy. In fact, they were polite to the point of condescension. But then Dante stood to address the council. He was dressed in a formal morning suit, complete with top hat and kid gloves, but his waistcoat was of a shimmering peacock pattern. A shocking lime green tie completed the outfit.

His presentation was beautifully prepared. When he explained in eloquent detail the tax advantages of mixeduse, small footprint development over big-box sprawl, I noticed a number of commissioners nodding their heads in agreement. When he went on to explain the historical importance of the town’s downtown core, I glanced at Welcher and noticed beads of sweat forming on his brow. It certainly wasn’t because he was hot; the overflow of warm bodies was not enough to offset the artificial chill in the chambers.

“Don’t worry, Margo,” said Ernie once it was all over. “We’ve got them coming and going. Did you see Commissioner Wakefield give me a thumbs up?”

“No,” I said honestly. “But I saw Welcher give Rummel a high five.”

“Just whistling past the graveyard. Trust me, we have this one in the bag.”

“I hope so. If not, we’ve got some explaining to do. The ghosts of those guys that died in the Morris building aren’t going to forgive us if we lose this one.”

Two evenings later, I was about to settle into my comfy chair with my book and a glass of Merlot when I got a text from Ernie. Turn on TV to ch 5 was all it said.

I flicked the TV on, and there was Jessica Sharpe, our local anchorwoman. Behind her was City Hall, and crowds of people chatting and milling around, looking happy and relaxed. I recognized a few of them—they were some of the same people who had addressed the council at the hearing. I suddenly felt giddy although whether it was a premonition or the Merlot was hard to tell. I turned up the sound.

“Good evening. This is Jessica Sharpe coming to you from City Hall in Indian Springs. In a surprise development this evening, Channel 5 news has learned that the Indian Springs zoning commission voted earlier this afternoon to deny developer Corvus Enterprises’ petition to replace a block of historical buildings on Main Street with a parking garage. The commission cited strong citizen opposition as among their reasons for denying the developer’s request. Attorneys for Corvus have vowed to fight the decision. In a related story, another major client of the developer, the MonsterMart Corporation, has decided to withdraw its highly unpopular proposal to build a retail center in the Woodlawn Historic District…”

The shrill ringing of my phone interrupted Jessica’s conclusion. It was Ernie. “You know what we have to do, don’t you?” he said before I even got a chance to speak.

When we went back to the office building, we took a carload of computer and audio equipment along with the usual array of EMF meters and infrared cameras. Ernie set out one of his favorite pieces of equipment, a parabolic microphone. We call it the Sonic Ear. Although it looks for all the world like a toy ray gun, it’s actually a highly sensitive piece of equipment capable of detecting the faintest of sounds. Ernie hooked it up to a recorder and a set of speakers so that we could simultaneously hear and record anything it picked up. I noticed Ernie extracting from his large duffel bag something that on closer inspection turned out to be a vintage Mac even older than Dante’s.

“What’s that for?” I asked.

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Ernie shrugged. “They seem to like Macs.” He turned it on and waited patiently for it to boot up. With an affectionate pat on its top, he said, “This was my first computer.”

“And you’ve kept it all this time?”

“Margo, you should know me better than that by now. Of course I kept it, and I’m happy to have found a use for it. Are you going to test out your theory?”

“I’m going to try. Are we recording?”

“Everything’s all set,” he replied.

We dispensed with the usual check of background EMF levels and temperatures. As soon as it got dark, we turned out the lights.

Ernie whispered into his voice recorder. “Ernie and Margo in the offices of Rent-a-Geek, follow-up visit. Attempting to contact resident spirits…is there anybody here with us tonight?”

“If you’d like to communicate with us, we have a computer all set up for you here.”

We spent a few minutes making similar entreaties, keeping an eye on the various monitors. The office was unnaturally silent for several minutes, then the energy in the room suddenly changed. The feed from the cameras in the hall showed the elevator door opening, and there was a noticeable drop in temperature.

“Can you do something or say something to confirm your presence?” Ernie asked. He pointed to the Sonic Ear. “If you’ll try to talk into this device here, we might be able to hear you.”

We held our breaths, waiting for any sound from the speakers attached to the Sonic Ear. Nothing.

I decided to try a different tactic. “Look, we understand that there are some among you who don’t welcome our presence here. But you must believe me that we have only your best interests at heart. And we have some good news for you.”

“They don’t seem very talkative tonight. Maybe we need to…”

Ernie was interrupted by a soft electronic quack. He rubbed his hands together gleefully. “You see? I knew the old Mac would come in handy. Let’s have a look, shall we?”

The computer’s tiny screen had come on. A smattering of primitive-looking icons was scatted across its black and white screen. I didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. “Maybe it just has a loose connection somewhere,” I said.

Ernie seemed deeply offended. “I’ll have you know this machine is in fine working order. We just need to make things a little easier on them, that’s all.”

He clicked on an icon and a program began to load. “What’s that?”

“Text editor. Bare-bones to us nowadays, but it was quite advanced for its time.”

“And you propose to use this how?”

“Just humor me a minute, please. If there’s anybody here you can communicate with us by using this device—see, what’d I tell you?”

Letters began to appear on the tiny screen: we aRE heere

“How many of you are here?” I asked.

many

“Is Wilson Greenwald among you?”

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HEIs he4re

“Can we talk to him?” asked Ernie. To this we received

no response.

“Hmm, maybe he’s shy,” Ernie commented.

“I doubt it. Wilson, if you’re here, we’d like to talk to you. I think I know what happened, but you have to help us out. I don’t think that elevator accident was really an accident. Am I right?”

There was no response on the computer, but I thought I heard the faintest of rustlings through the speakers attached to the Sonic Ear.

Ernie shivered in the darkness next to me. “Is it just me, or did it just get cold in here?” he asked.

“No, it’s not just you.” I took a deep breath and prepared myself for a wave of nausea, but it never came. “Look,” I implored, “I know it’s not pleasant to talk about, but we mean you no harm and really want to know what happened to you. We beg you to please allow Wilson to come forward.”

We waited patiently, but the Mac’s screen finally went to sleep. Ernie sighed. “And we were doing so well—”

With the sound of an electronic duck quacking, the little square screen flickered on. “Well, now. That’s more like it,” he said quietly to himself. “Can you do that again?” he said out loud.

Quack!

“You see? I told you they like communicating via computer,” said Ernie smugly. I rolled my eyes. He ignored me and continued, “Wilson, if that’s you, can you make it make that noise twice?”

There was a pause, then two more electronic quacks from the little Mac. “Woohoo! I knew this would work! All right, now we’re going to ask you some questions. One quack means yes, two means no. Can you manage that?”

Quack!

“Who are we communicating with? Are you Ephraim Hawk?”

Quack! Quack!

“Wilson Greenwald?” I asked. After a few seconds, we were rewarded with a single quack.

“Good. Now, here’s what I think happened. I think old Mr. Rummel had something to hide…something he didn’t want people to know. Am I right?”

Quack!

“He wasn’t the righteous man that people thought he was. Am I right?”

Quack!

Ernie gave me a high-five. “Wilson, my name’s Ernie. That elevator accident wasn’t an accident, was it?”

Quack! Quack!

Ernie continued. “Was it because you found out something Rummel didn’t want people to know?”

Quack!

“Was he bootlegging?” I asked.

Quack!

“And you found out.”

Quack!

“It was no accident—you were murdered.”

Quack!

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“Thank you for your help,” I said. “Now we have something we want to share with you.”

A single word appeared on the Mac’s screen: teLL

“Wonderful,” Ernie said. He opened a laptop and launched a recording of the newscast from the previous evening. We listened in silence to Jessica’s report of our victory over Corvus.

When it was over, Ernie said quietly, “What this means is that your home is now protected. So you’re safe now, and you never have to worry about this building being torn down.”

We paused, and listened carefully for any sign that our message had been received. Then, suddenly and very briefly, all the monitors on all our devices dimmed just perceptibly. There was a subtle but perceptible change in the atmosphere of the room as the chill dissipated. And then I heard something. “Ernie, do you hear that?” I whispered.

“Hear what? Oh, that.”

We had to strain to hear it, but coming from the speaker attached to the Sonic Ear was the sound of cheering.

The air pressure in the room seemed to change and what felt like a cold breeze washed over me. Strangely, it felt comforting and pleasant, quite unlike the previous encounters that left me shaking and nauseous.

“Ernie”, I said, “I think a ghost just hugged me.”

His eyebrows rose. “I think I’m going to call Tim and suggest he visit you soon.”

Sometimes the hardest part about the aftermath of an investigation is wrapping things up with the client.

Dante was thrilled to have a resident ghost in his studio, and renewed his lease for five more years. The publicity that Dante got from his leadership of the neighborhood group earned him more favorable publicity than he could have imagined. Business picked up so much that he was able to buy a brand new, top-of-the-line computer. He, Thornton, and Sandy were approached by citizens’ committees in nearby communities, who asked for their help with similar campaigns against urban sprawl.

According to Ernie’s surveillance cameras, nightly activity continued in the elevators. But Marci was thoroughly annoyed when she found out we hadn’t asked the entities to move on.

“Why do you want them to?” I asked.

“They’re not hurting anything,” Ernie added.

She thought about it for a minute and rolled her eyes. “Fine. Whatever you say.”

“There haven’t been any more incidents, have there?” I wanted to know.

I have quite possibly

the coolest job in the

world. Officially, I call

myself a “research

specialist.” My name is

Margo Monroe and

what I really am is a

ghost hunter.

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“Well, no, but…”

“Then you’re happy, the ghosts are happy. It’s a win-win situation. Look, we’re ghost hunters, not exorcists,” Ernie said. “They have as much right to be here as you do.”

She rolled her eyes and shook her head. “Whatever.”

“Well, if anything else happens, you know how to get in touch with us,” I said with a discrete tug at Ernie’s sleeve.

We stopped by Sanjeev’s cubicle on the way out. He was on the phone, but gave us a friendly wave and the first smile I remember seeing from him.

Later that afternoon, we drove out to Deerfield to interview a potential client about investigating a derelict hospital.

“So,” I asked, “after everything that happened, was it worth getting your hair cut for?”

Ernie made a show of preening in the passenger-side vanity mirror. “It’s all in a day’s work, I suppose. I think we made our point with Spradley but I’m not sure about Rummel and his cronies. Not that it matters—it’ll grow out again soon enough. There’s something I still don’t get about that case,” he said. “How would Wilson and Ephraim have found out about Rummel’s bootlegging?”

“Oh, to me it’s obvious. Wilson was a musician, and he played in clubs—speakeasies. Rummel was probably supplying them with their booze. Here’s a supposed pillar of the community and outspoken supporter of Prohibition. Of course he was! He was making a fortune off of it.”

“And Ephraim Hawk?”

“Well, he obviously knew something. I don’t think he was just an innocent bystander.” “Based on what?”

“The fact that his brother was probably extorting money from Rummel.”

“Do you think Wilson and the Hawk brothers were friends?”

“I guess we’ll never know for sure,” I replied, “but I like to think so. Did you read the article in this morning’s paper? About Corvus selling off some properties?”

“Yeah, I saw that. Serves them right.”

“You don’t think they’re trying to punish the good citizens of Indian Springs for rejecting their diabolical schemes?”

Ernie smiled at my choice of words. “I wouldn’t put it past them, but I don’t think so. Losing that deal with MonsterMart hit Corvus pretty hard. They’re getting an awful lot of negative press lately and their stock prices are dropping like a rock.”

“I almost forgot to tell you—I heard from Nora, and she got a new job. Huge raise, the whole bit.”

“Where?”

“At the college, in the Legal Affairs department.”

“That’s wonderful,” Ernie said. “She certainly deserves it. Maybe we’ll run into her on campus. Turn left here; we’re almost there.”

As we headed home after our interview that afternoon, we spotted a new MonsterMart on the outskirts of Deerfield.

“Let’s stop,” Ernie said.

“Whatever for?”

“I need to pick up a few things. Besides, that’s what we

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fought so hard to fight down. We ought to at least have a look and see what the fuss was all about.”

I conceded that he had a point, although it was with reluctance that I took the exit off the highway. After circling a parking lot the size of a football stadium, we finally found a parking space. We were steps away from the door when Ernie grabbed my arm.

“What is it this time?” I snapped.

“We can’t go in there.”

“Are you crazy? It was your idea to come here…”

He pointed toward the massive store’s entrance. There, greeting shoppers as they entered, and handing out sale flyers, was Weldon Spradley.

We met at a cemetery. He was placing flowers next to my grave.

by Michelle Ray

The Raven

Bitches Brew

by Xari a Suarez

Magdalena Durand stirred the pot on the old wood stove in the shack on Bayou Savaugé. From atop the icebox, the radio played a jazz tune. She wiped the sweat off her face with her arm, nearly crying out in pain. Her right eye and cheekbone were swollen and black, black as the gator-filled water on a moonless night.

She sipped a cold Cocodrie beer, to which she’d added whiskey from the bottle she kept hidden under the stove. It eased the pain she suffered when her man was displeased with something. It was nothing she’d done, and he didn’t feel the need to tell her why she deserved to be hit. Most times, something else or somebody else had riled him, but she was his chosen form of relief. She understood how anger built up in a person like a pressure cooker ready to explode.

Magdalena turned up the volume on the radio, and the music took off, surrounding her, filling the kitchen. She danced around the table, hands above her head, whipping the air.

Outside on the porch that faced the water, the back porch or the front porch, depending on your point of view, her man Bodie, his papa, known in those parts as Big Walter, and her son Bo, Jr. talked their man-talk-shit about the Saints, how the fish were running, or their old broke down trucks. She heard the crush of beer cans and guessed they’d had about five each. Time to get some food into the menfolk.

All three of them disrespected her, even her boy, now that he’d turned sixteen. She’d caught him stealing cash from her purse. He’d given her an evil, disrespectful look so’s she didn’t even know him. Made the hairs on her arms stand up. He acted like she was someone else--not the one who’d raised him and cared for him no matter how hard times were. He’d once been the honey she drank and the sun she basked in, now he was one of them.

Big Walter never missed a chance to tickle some part of her if she let him get close enough. To the men she was just a slave, to be used for cooking and washing clothes, sex and beating on.

She took a big swallow of whiskey-laced beer. Her head felt like a globe someone had just spun.

The music from the radio turned deeper, flowing like molasses around the room, down into the pot and out again. That Miles Davis, he knew a woman. He knew her dark soul. She danced, hips gyrating, her head floating dizzily.

The horn solo spoke right to her. Do it, do it, do it, do-de wa-wa-do it.

The sax, low and growling, added its point of view. You know you wanna wanna wanna do it.

Into the boiling pot of potatoes, mudpuppies, corn on the cob, and spicy sausage, she added a special ingredient bought from old Mamma Jamma down the road.

“Ain’t you got sumptin’ to make him a little kinder?” she’d asked the woman.

“Nothin’ in this world gone make a bad man good. You

The Raven

Xariffa Suarez lives in Dallas, Texas, but thinks New York, New Orleans, or Oz (The Land Of, not the prison) is probably a better fit. Through her writings, she loves exploring the dark side of life and things. Her work has appeared in Bookmarks, published by Southern Methodist University, Mad Scientist Journal, in print and digital, and in The Raven.

just got to fix him ’fore it’s too late. That’ll be ten dollars,” the old witch said, handing her a small paper bag.

The music filled the kitchen leaving her no room to change her mind. She stirred faster and faster, watching the green powder dissolve in the brew. It swirled around and around, a hurricane in a pot. kitchen all day.”

She reached under the stove for the whiskey bottle. She carried it, a fresh beer, and a loaf of stale bread outside where she sat cross-legged at the end of the dock. Faint strains of the music reached her. The sun set. It wouldn’t be long now. The day’s work was almost done.

She dished up three heaping bowls, set them on the red and white checked tablecloth. Called to the men folk.

“Ain’t you eatin’, girl?” Big Walter asked, as the men seated themselves.

“I’m too hot to eat right now,” she said. “Been in this A mist rose from the cypress trees, dripping Spanish moss. The night bugs banged into the dock light, and the frogs cried for love. She tossed slices of bread into the water and the gators drew near, their eyes white marbles floating on the water.

Monster and alien have an unexpected encounter

The Raven

Room #317

by Kalisha R. Eddington

It was a weird evening. No wind, no thunder, only cascading bolts of lightning filling the western sky and a torrential downpour. The hospital window was slightly ajar, the industrial, abstract-patterned curtains wide open, giving Rosalinda H. full witness to the spectacle outside. Not that that was her focus. She felt awful, worse than awful. She felt like dying. Her head was pounding. Her protruding abdomen hurt. And the flatness of the hospital gurney on which she lay added to her back pain. Her vision came and went, blurry one second, clear the next, then blurry again. During the clear moments, from the corner of her eye, she could see the IV dripping.

Unthinking, Rosalinda raised a hand or rather tried to. The handcuff about her wrist cut the action short. She used the other hand to rub her tired eyes and palm her forehead. They needn’t worry about me trying to escape, she thought. That was the furthest thing from her mind. The only thing she wanted to escape was her body.

The door to hospital room # 317 opened with a soft swish. Rosalinda turned her head, noticing the nurse who entered and the guard posted outside her door. Or at least his blue polyester clad knee. The correctional officer was probably flipping through a magazine while dreaming of how he would spend his overtime pay.

“Rosalinda, I’m here to check your vitals. The doctor will be with you shortly,” said the nurse. Her voice was soft but lacked empathy. Her face was the same - soft features, no compassion.

“My body hurts and my head hurts.”

“You were given an epidural,” said the nurse in a staid tone. “You’ve received medication already.” The nurse quickly checked Rosalinda’s vitals, then retreated from the room.

A strong breeze entered the room as if to wash away the nurse’s presence. Rosalinda inhaled the fresh, wet air and used it like medicine to drift into a surface sleep. She was aware of the wind howling and the ferocious rain. She knew about the swollen raindrops ricocheting off the windowsill hitting one side of her face, body. Dull embryonic sounds inside the room and the aggressive howling and spattering noises from without filled the room, creating a near meditative state. The sounds grew louder and became words as the same nurse and a doctor entered her room.

“Dr. Sanger, the patient’s blood pressure is 159/101,” the nurse reported anxiously. “The labs are poor. She is exhibiting signs of HELLP syndrome and …”

“Are you a medical doctor?” asked Dr. Sanger.

The nurse lowered her head. “No, sir, I am not. The patient complains of pain.”

“These type of women are just seeking meds. If I had been here earlier, I would have stopped that stupid midwife from ordering an epidural,” Dr. Sanger replied viciously.

The nurse began to speak but the obstetrician gave her an evil look and she closed her mouth. Dr. Sanger positioned himself at the end of Rosalinda’s bed, threw back the thin sheet covering the patient, and checked her cervix. “Seven centimeters dilated. It will be hours

The Raven

Kalisha R. Eddington is an avid reader, advocate of binge-watching Netflix, lover of the supernatural, and a part-time writer. She resides in the American Southwest and can be reached online at Instagram.com/kalishaeddington/.

before this miscreant is born.” He turned to the nurse while stripping off gloves. “Keep monitoring the patient’s vitals.”

Their voices faded as they walked out. Rosalinda closed her eyes and welcomed the sounds that didn’t berate her or her unborn child—the medical equipment and the weather.

Soon, Rosalinda was bouncing between levels of awareness, sometimes, earthbound, aware of the beep, beep, beep of the Dinamap and the pop, pop, pop of rain splashing against the windowpane and the pain, the forever pain. Other times, she felt herself floating, light of body, absent of pain, in darkness except for a distant pinpoint of light.

During her unconscious travels, her pulse grew weaker, her body, too. It became harder and harder to return from the peaceful darkness where there was no pain, no slurs, no handcuffs. Only a prick of beckoning light. With a long exhale, Rosalinda gave into the darkness. Hearing was the last sense to cease; so, the final sound she took with her was thunder. It had finally joined the lightening, wind and rain. Soon after, all hell broke loose.

Unbeknownst to Rosalinda, lightning struck the window at the time she decided to stay in darkness and pursue the light. Shards of glass sprayed about the room. Wind blew in savagely, knocking over the IV stand and ripping the IV from Rosalinda’s arm. The Dinamap responsible for monitoring her vitals went silent. Rosalinda’s body went still. The guard, charge nurse, several staff nurses, and Dr. Sanger rushed into the room. Mad scrambling ensued as medical staff hooked up machines, prepped the patient, prepared medicines. The sound of glass crunching beneath their feet was barely heard above shouted commands and restarted machines.

“Code Blue,” a nurse called out.

“CLEAR,” someone else screamed.

The defibrillator sent a surge of electricity into the dead woman’s heart. At that moment, Rosalinda’s travel toward light ceased. She felt herself being pulled back to earth. In soul form, she reentered hospital room # 317 and floated in a corner of the ceiling. Rosalinda was awestruck to see a bright, radiant cord connecting her soul to her motionless body.

From her perch, she watched as the medical staff worked diligently on her body, worked with heart and compassion to beat the code, to restart Rosalinda’s vitals. All except one.

“That’s enough,” said Dr. Sanger sternly from the sideline.

Slowly, the staff ceased their movements to save. The charge nurse turned to the secondary monitor connected to the baby. Strong vitals. “Prepare the baby for delivery,” she instructed. The staff began assembling the essentials for delivery.

“I said that’s enough!” Dr. Sanger reiterated forcefully. Everyone stared at Dr. Sanger. Their actions stalled.

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Just then the most peculiar thing happened. The doctor was propelled high into the air. His body hung rigid, pendulous. His voice came out in shallow grunts. “I … can’t … brea … breathe.”

The correctional officer bolted from the room. Everyone else remained, eyes wide, mouths slack. Only one person, a nurse, closed her eyes, crossed herself, and began praying.

In the background, thunder roared long and loudly, and seconds later, lightening flashed brighter than the overhead lights. Its long tentacles reached into the bowels of the hospital, tripping a circuit. The hospital’s power failed and all the lights, especially those in room # 317, blinked off. In the dark of the room, Rosalinda’s cord glowed gently like a delicate candle.

“What the fuck?” a nurse asked, pointing needlessly in the dark at the cord that joined soul to body. The cord pulsed like a beacon, then grew brighter and brighter. The glowing light dispersed and wrapped around objects. Along one wall, it cast a shadow of a man, mouth open, screaming in agony. In between his screams, instructions, “Hee … hel … help … pp … me.”

Everyone averted their attention back to the doctor. A collective gasp filled the room as Dr. Sanger began swinging back and forth, like a pendulum, in mid-air.

“Hurry,” Dr. Sanger choked out. “Get four … gram … magnesium … sulfate.”

The medical team shook themselves free of their shock and jumped into action. In the now day-bright light, one nurse placed a new IV in Rosalinda’s arm, another ran out of the room and returned a minute later with a bag of magnesium sulfate and labetalol.

Just then, the backup generator kicked on. Artificial light engulfed the room, overcoming the spiritual light. The doctor’s body fell unceremoniously to the ground. He gasped for air and coughed weakly. He stood, wobbly, then administered the drugs with shaky hands.

A week later, Rosalinda H. opened her eyes and sat up in bed. She looked around, noting she was in a different room, a larger one with more chairs and equipment. She looked out the window, framed by opened curtains, and saw a clear blue sky. Rosalinda looked down at herself, realizing the pain, the aches, her discomfort was gone. As were the handcuffs. She turned to the left where gentle snores emanated. A nurse was fast asleep on a stiff blue recliner. Rosalinda looked to the right and for the first time noticed a hospital bassinet. She went to it, pulled back the pink blanket, and watched as her baby slept peacefully. Ignoring the guard who peeked into her room, Rosalinda smiled and cried.