Ghost Soldier Read online

Chapter Eight

  The vibration was better on the outside, but not untainted. The very atmosphere itself of the base was thicker and heavier, and it had absolutely nothing to do with the natural humidity of the area. Ellen struggled to clear her mind as they headed away from the levee and across the grounds of Jackson Barracks to the museum.

  “Are you feeling better?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you sure?”

  She could feel Monty’s concern beside her like it was a tangible thing. They were so close, so connected in a situation like this. It gave her the strong sense of “team” that she needed.

  “You don’t have to keep taking my temperature every few minutes.” Stopping right in the middle of the grassy field they were crossing, she looked at him. His expression was guarded. What in the world was wrong with her? It wasn’t at all like her to be this edgy. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that.”

  “It’s all right. I’m agitated as all hell, too.”

  She nodded and began walking again. Yes, that was it: agitation. Agitation beyond what she’d felt in the house. As she walked, she continued to clear her mind. That’s what she needed, to be completely blank before the impression began to enter again. Several deep breaths and then she could visualize it all again—the house, the staircase, the first woman.

  Ellen could see her now with her long dark hair, standing there cowering. What Ellen needed was information, someone to talk to her.

  As before, Ellen could see herself standing just behind Monty, who had the camera pointed directly at the staircase. But this time Ellen could see herself moving past him, directly toward the woman leaning against the wall.

  The woman was becoming more solid now. Ellen was reaching her on her own plane. The wide brown eyes were filled with icy dread, terror, but of what?

  “It’s all right,” she heard herself saying. “I’m not going to hurt you,” and then she added, “Loretta.” It had floated in—Loretta Archer. She was a housewife, a wife of a major on the base.

  “No,” Loretta moaned. “No more.”

  “Please Loretta,” Ellen said softly. “I want to help you.”

  She was flooded by disconnected images—such a sad life, lonely and depression, severe depression. Loretta had known he was planning to leave her, having an affair. But it wasn’t the first. The woman against the wall shifted her position and Ellen could see her wrists dripping with blood.

  It made her dizzy; and she swayed, Monty gripping her elbow to steady her but remaining silent, suspecting she was in one of her trances.

  It had taken so long, almost all afternoon. And no one had come to check on her. The children were in school, her husband was out. She’d changed her mind soon after the incisions, but she was too defeated, too weak to move.

  “Loretta,” Ellen whispered. “You don’t have to keep suffering. Let me help you.”

  For a second, she could feel it, the fog in the brown eyes clearing and then something else. Something powerful like a yank pulling the poor woman away where Ellen couldn’t reach her anymore.

  Her head swirled in dizziness so powerful she felt as though she would collapse. But Monty wrapped her in his strong arms and supported her weight. “What is it? Are you all right?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know. I think I need to sit down.”

  “Well maybe you can do it in there.” She looked up, discovering they were standing directly in front of the museum.

  Chapter Nine

  I left Ellen on a long wooden bench just inside the front doors of the Jackson Barracks Military Museum as I’d gone in search of a cup of water and another living soul. It was just what one would expect of a small museum: a long room with the air conditioning on too high, making it a tad chilly in contrast to the warm day outside; glass cases filled with tiny military reenactments that I would have gone nuts for as a boy; giant maps and photographs on the walls depicting the grand old history of the base; and not another person in sight besides Ellen.

  I came to a round wooden desk at the back of the museum. Behind it was an open doorway that I got the distinct impression was not meant for the public. “Hello,” I said directing my voice into that open doorway.

  “Hello,” I said tapping loudly on the desk. And then with much more volume and force, “Hello!”

  A little too abruptly, a figure appeared in that doorway—a fairly short, slightly pudgy woman with very dark-rimmed glasses. She had startling black slashes for eyebrows and unfortunately reminded me of an old school teacher who was not enamored of me. “Yes?” she inquired with a bit of a frown of disapproval.

  I straightened up from my leaning position over her desk and tried to put on a nice smile. I was admittedly rough around the edges but not without my own charm. “Oh sorry, I didn’t think anyone was here.”

  “Clearly,” she said smoothly, but added nothing else. Sometimes my charm failed.

  “My wife isn’t feeling well. I was wondering if there’s any way I could get her a glass of water.”

  The stony face melted just a tad. “Of course, I’ll get it for you. Mr.?”

  “Drew, Monty Drew.”

  “Yes Mr. Drew, just a moment. And welcome to the Jackson Barracks Military Museum,” she said just before she disappeared again into that mysterious dark doorway.

  Yes, welcome indeed.

  Chapter Eleven

  Mathilda Vance was the base’s archivist, which was a fancy designation for a librarian. But she was a sharp one. I had to give her that. Within the first few moments of acquaintance, when I introduced us as historians researching a book, she eyed us dubiously.

  “Historians. Really?” she murmured.

  Clearly we didn’t fit the mold of Tom’s weak cover story. Ellen drank the water Mathilda had brought her in a rather large mug that said “Archivists Rock.”

  Ellen was looking better and clearly warming to Mathilda. “We’re interested in seeing if there is any history connected with Number Four.”

  “Number Four?” The slashes of dark eyebrows seemed to arch a bit more, if that was even possible. She was sitting right next to Ellen on the long bench and I was standing in front of them. Already they looked like two gal pals, which made me feel a bit like the odd man out. “Well, every building around here is filled with history. A good many of them go back to pre Civil War. Was there any particular history you were interested in?”

  I glanced at Ellen but she cast her eyes down and took another sip of water out of Mathilda’s oversized mug. Guess she was throwing me to the wolves—or one wolf in particular. “Yeah, mostly dead people.”

  There was no expression on her pale, stony face, reminded me hauntingly of Morticia Addams at the moment. “Dead people?” she echoed my awkward elaboration. She glanced over to Ellen who smiled a bit sheepishly. And then Mathilda smiled too, a smile that was a bit creepy. “You two aren’t historians at all are you? That’s what they told you to say. You’ve come to investigate the haunting at Number Four.”

  I glanced over to Ellen, cover blown quite easily. Ellen smiled, “You’re right. We’re paranormal investigators. General Renshaw has hired us to look at what is happening in the house.”

  The shrewd brown eyes behind her dark-rimmed glasses seemed to be sparkling a bit. “ I don’t know why he thought he could keep this a secret. Everybody knows everything around here. You know my favorite is the Ghost Hunters show. Those guys are hot.”

  “So can you help us?” I cut in. I really didn’t want to know much more about who Mathilda found hot.

  “Number Four is one of the older structures left on the base that is still standing since Katrina. Of course there are a number of other houses that are just as old. But none have the level of activity of that place. Over the past year it’s just sort of gone crazy.”

  “Were there many deaths there?” Ellen asked calmly clearly trying to keep Mathilda on track.

  She sighed deeply, “A few. I suppose the most unusual one was Captain Beale.”

/>   “Captain Beale?” I asked.

  She nodded. “Yes, seems to have taken place just after World War I. You know those houses were not always used as private residences. They were often used as a barracks for the men to live in. It seems as though the captain, Joshua Beale, was living at Number Four. It was New Year’s Eve. The story goes the men were having a party, lots of drinking, cards, music. Blowing off steam.”

  “Sounds like New Year’s Eve,” I mumbled. “Cigars and women extra.”

  “And that’s when it happened.”

  We waited for a moment but Mathilda seemed to be pausing for dramatic effect. “What happened?” Ellen asked softly.

  “With no indication as to why, Captain Beale quietly went upstairs into one of the rooms and shot himself in the head.”

  Must have been a hell of a bad poker hand.

  Chapter Eleven

  We were going for a walk, all three of us. From what we had gleaned from Mathilda, Captain Beale’s suicide in Number Four was the only horrific death that had occurred there. But Ellen had told me, while Mathilda had disappeared into the back to freshen up before our jaunt, that she hadn’t even picked up on Captain Beale.

  And what about all the other spirits that she’d seen? And what was the deal with all the suicides around here? That was another thing that Mathilda had indicated—while they hadn’t occurred at Number Four over the years, the base boasted a high occurrence of suicides. As seemed to be the trend around there, we were left with more questions than answers.

  “Ready?” Mathilda asked, appearing with a light filmy scarf tied just under her chin to clearly protect her do. She was clearly enjoying the opportunity to break the fussy-archivist mold.

  I wasn’t exactly sure what Ellen had in mind but I was willing to give anything a try at that point. Our odd trio headed out of the front doors of the museum. Ellen and Mathilda walked side by side and I brought up the rear.

  “So are you a psychic or something?” Mathilda asked Ellen.

  “Yes,” Ellen answered without elaborating.

  Mathilda grinned. “And you knew I was going to ask that, right?”

  “I can’t read the living, only the dead.” I knew Ellen was half joking, but that stopped Mathilda’s line of questioning.

  I thought to ask my wife where we were headed but I didn’t. She was getting into her zone. I could feel it on my skin. Best to keep peripheral at moments like these. As they headed across a road, Ellen paused and turned in the direction of a small grassy yard. “What was there?” she asked Mathilda in a bit of a faraway tone.

  “Um, before the storm, for a long time it was a little park. You know, a picnic table, a swing set.”

  “I see a red glow near the swing set. Something happened.”

  “Yu-yes.” Mathilda was stammering a bit. Clearly the theoretical idea of a psychic on television and seeing one in action were two different things. “There was a woman, in the ‘80s who killed herself with a gun on the swing.”

  “Another suicide?” I couldn’t help myself. There was Captain Beale, the woman on the stairs that Ellen had encountered, and now this woman on the swing. Of course the place did date back several hundred years and in its long history, three might be considered a small percentage. Military service was a stressful occupation, even in times of peace, and the strain reached the families as well.

  Neither of them answered me but Ellen began to move away from the park area. Just past the administrative building, she stopped at a small parking lot almost as though she hit a brick wall. “There was a building here,” she murmured, “an older one.”

  Mathilda stood next to her as though confused for a moment. “Wait a minute, wait a minute. I think there was but a long time ago. In the 1850s, during the yellow fever epidemic. It was a hospital but once the siege was over it was burned down. They were afraid of the disease spreading.”

  “There were families, children, sick, afraid.”

  Mathilda shook her head in agreement. “Yes, sometimes whole families of the soldiers took ill. And some children were left orphans for awhile, until they got sick, too. It was a terrible time.”

  I moved next to Ellen, asking quietly, “What are you seeing?”

  “At first just a red glow where something happened, then slowly details creep in. There seems to be a lot of confusion and fear connected with this.” Her voice sounded a bit detached, distant as though she were operating from another plane.

  “I hate to ask.” I tried to inquire out of Mathilda’s earshot which was no easy task. “But what does this have to do with Number Four?”

  “It does,” she murmured as though focusing on something. “Somehow it does.”

  And she began walking again, heading back toward the residences. She stopped near an empty lot that looked as though it had been cleared. “There was a house here?”

  Mathilda swept in to stand beside her. “Yes, it was a wooden frame house, destroyed by the storm.”

  “Another suicide?” I asked, just jumping to the obvious conclusion.

  “Um, no but there was a murder. Domestic thing in the seventies.”

  “Seriously?” I asked. “What is it with this place?”

  “It has to do with the energy,” Ellen answered. “There was another house next to it.”

  Mathilda nodded, “Another small wood frame house, very pretty. There are pictures of them all in the museum.”

  “Who got killed there?” I asked a bit flippantly.

  “Um, that one was a suicide. At least it seemed so. A daughter with a gun, they found her slumped over the bathtub.”

  I froze on the spot. This was insane. “You know I wasn’t serious.”

  Ellen spoke as though to herself. “I could see the red glow there, too. So many spots around here like that. So many confused, lost spirits.”

  “There are others,” Mathilda added. “A man in charge of the horses in the stables shot himself after World War I. I’ve always found it strange how many traumatic sorts of deaths took place here. But I suppose I always attributed it to the lifestyle, the rigid discipline, the stress. Military life is an unusual one.”

  “That’s definitely part of it.” Ellen said. “But I think I’ve seen enough for now.”

  Mathilda looked a bit disappointed. Evidently she was enjoying the drama of it all and expected some big “Wow” moment where some ghost showed itself and danced the watusi. “Is there anything else I can do for you?” she asked a bit hopefully.

  “Yes, how about recommending a place for lunch?” I gave my stomach a hefty thunk. “I think Ellen and I need a breather for a little while.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Jeanfrou’s looked like a grocery, a small shop whose side area featured tables and chairs that qualified as their restaurant.

  I returned to Ellen after retrieving two icy cold root beers in glass bottles and ordering at the deli counter. “Mathilda recommended a hot roast beef po’ boy dressed,” I said to Ellen across the small two-seater table. “She also told me the history of the po’ boy. Seems as though they were very cheap sandwiches during the Great Depression for poor boys. Thus the po’ boy.”

  She smiled at me a bit weakly then took a long sip out of the bottle I’d just placed in front of her. “That’s interesting,” she responded in a way that made me think she was anything but interested, because “interesting” is about the most bland word in the English language. “It feels nice here.”

  “Yeah, I guess in contrast to where we’ve been. Look. I’ve been thinking the problems at Jackson Barracks clearly aren’t new and clearly go pretty deep.”

  “That’s true.”

  “So how about we throw in the towel here?”

  Ellen sighed deeply and leaned back a bit in the small metal chair, closing her eyes for a second. She was exhausted. I could feel it on my own skin. Granted, my hide was a bit thicker than hers in more ways than one, but this place was wearing on me as well. I felt as though I needed some distance and more than one
hot shower. “It’s the energy,” she said. “You can feel it on your skin, like a residue. The place is drenched in it for some reason.”

  I thought about what she was saying. It was true there was something odd about the place: the agitation of the soldiers when we checked in; Tom, seeming as though he were ready to jump out of his skin at any moment; General Renshaw, although I had a feeling he was pretty bombastic whatever the circumstance; and even Mathilda, sharp but decidedly on edge. “But why? Is it all the strange deaths, the suicides that have caused this?”

  “Caused?” she repeated. “I’m not sure. It certainly has planted the seeds for it.”

  I took a deep gulp of my root beer, wishing that it was real beer. But it was clear I had to keep sharp, for whatever was happening. “Not sure I follow.”

  “Yeah, well it’s like the red glow I saw. When something happens, traumatic, violent, with high emotion negative or positive, it leaves a mark. An energy imprint. And if enough of these types of events occur then the negative energy collects.”

  “And this causes people to commit suicide or act violently?”

  She shook her head. “No, energy can’t make you do something. But it can make you feel bad, perhaps inexplicably. And if you’re already of an unstable nature it could…”

  “Push you over the edge?”

  She shrugged. “Depends on the circumstance. But, yes, that’s possible.”

  “So this collection of negative events at Jackson Barracks has caused a concentration of negative energy?”

  “To a degree,” she murmured.

  “Okay, that sounds a bit wishy-washy.”

  She frowned a bit. “I know. It’s just not that simple. Too much negative energy makes a place vulnerable. As with people, people who are controlled by negative emotions—upset, fear, violence become vulnerable to being influenced, to being controlled.”

  “Controlled by what?”