Jon and Phil were limping back to the hotel.
There had been little point in staying where they were, as there was now very little remaining of the trailer. Several stacks of cut timber nearest to the ruined trailer were now ablaze, the snow cover melting and hissing away into steam.
Nothing could have survived.
Phil was nursing a pain in his guts and remained unclear as to why Jon had hit him. It was something to do with a girl Jon now claimed to have seen inside the trailer just before it blew up. As they stumbled along the path, Phil explained, over and over, that he hadn’t seen anyone at the trailer window and that he’d been inside the trailer not long before and it had been quite empty. But, despite Phil’s repeated protestations, Jon remained downcast and inconsolable.
Slowly descending the main staircase, Jeff and Rita were walking protectively on either side of Emma. Jeff had felt uncomfortable passing the door of the last bedroom, knowing that Neil’s butchered body lay in there. Down here in the lobby, it was now Rita’s turn to feel uneasy.
“It was standing right here,” she whispered, “Then it came creeping up the stairs towards me, until Jon goaded it into chasing him instead. He was insanely brave, really amazing, and his speech, you wouldn’t believe it. Maybe it came back to him because of the heightened emotion or the stress of the situation, I don’t know.”
“Weird. Did h-”
“Shh!”
Jeff looked around.
“What is it?”
“I heard something.”
They huddled together, listening hard.
“There it is again.”
They all heard it: a slow, grating squeak. It seemed to come from somewhere close by and, to their dismay, it was followed by the sound of careful footsteps, creeping towards them. Something was obviously trying to make as little sound as possible on the polished wooden floors. They nervously tightened their grips on each other: the footsteps were getting closer.
Suddenly Dave’s head appeared cautiously around the corner of the corridor. Initially he looked as shocked as they were, but then he broke into a huge grin. Delighted to see them all safe, he ran towards them and gave each of them a bear hug. He reserved his closest hug for Emma.
“God am I glad to see you safe, kiddo. Rita, let me tell you, this girl here is just about as brave as it’s possible to be. I mean, she stood up to the scary SOB who attacked me and trussed me up like some prize turkey. She was fearless. She gave him hell.”
Emma smiled awkwardly, unused to such effusive praise.
“Don’t you be shy girl,” Dave lifted her chin, “You’re a hero. You hold your head up high.”
They all laughed with relief and held on to each other until the laughter subsided.
“Did you hear the explosion?” Jeff asked Dave.
“Yeah, what was it? Hey, where’s Jon? We came here together, anyone seen him?”
Rita told him how Jon had taunted the Shadowman.
“He saved our lives, Dave. It was so brave, what he did.”
Emma looked up.
“Dave, did you and Jon set up explosives as a trap?” she asked.
Dave shook his head.
“I’d like to say yes. It would have been so cool to lure that SOB into a trap, but no; we came straight here. What blew up? Was it a car, or some sort of fuel store?”
“Of course!” Jeff exclaimed. “I must have been disoriented, seeing things from up in the attic. The explosion was at the trailer!”
Dave frowned.
“Trailer?”
“Yeah; Spielman’s trailer.”
“Hey, where is the old guy?”
Jeff and Emma fell silent as Rita told Dave how Spielman had died fighting the Shadowman down in the basement, buying them time to escape.
“So the old timer was one of the good guys. Poor old Spielman.”
They all nodded but, before Dave could ask about remaining members of the party, Jeff spoke up.
“Look, I’m sorry, but can this wait? We don’t know what’s happened in that explosion. The Shadowman could be back here again soon. He’s after the kids.”
Rita squeezed Emma’s hand.
“But we’re not gonna let the bastard even get close, are we?”
“How about you stay here with Emma,” Dave suggested, “while Jeff and I go check out this trailer?”
“That’s a very kind, if rather sexist offer, Dave, but we’ve decided to stick together from now on, no matter what.”
“All for one? That’s cool. OK, shall we go?”
As they turned to leave, a dishevelled figure appeared in the doorway, silhouetted against the light. It spoke.
“We killed it,” the voice was hoarse, but familiar, “Any chance of a drink?”
It was Phil.
Jeff was amazed.
“Killed it? What, the Shadowman?”
“The what?”
“Tall, dark, face like a skull.”
“Yup. That’s the guy. Blew him to smithereens. Now, how about that drink?”
“Phil, you said ‘we’; was Jon with you?”
“Yeah. He’s outside.”
Rita broke away from the group and went to the shattered doorway to call Jon in. He needed encouragement, but eventually he agreed. At that moment, the door behind the reception desk fell off its remaining hinge and everyone gasped as Spielman emerged from the wreckage, smiling and well.
“Mr Spielman,” Emma shrieked, “you’re alive!”
“Am I? Well, sure is a comfort t’hear that.”
Rita smiled.
“How did you get away from the Shadowman?”
“I don’t rightly know, ma’am. I had ma gun aimed at the door, jus’ waitin’ til it pushed its way in. I woulda shot it fulla lead. But somethin’ musta distracted it, cus it jus’ upped and went.”
Spielman’s smile froze when he caught sight of Jon stepping through the remains of the front doorway. His hand closed on the gun in his pocket.
“Ain’t that the wild man yuh met in the forest ma’am?”
“Yes he is and he saved our lives, and he’s got the others safe back in his cave, so please put away your gun and come say hello.”
Once Jon and Phil had convinced the others of the Shadowman’s death in the explosion, they all retired to the basement for some much-needed food and drink.
Over steaming cups of coffee and hot chocolate, they swapped their survival stories and eventually Dave asked the question that Rita and Jeff had been dreading.
“Anyone know what happened to Neil? Not that I care, you understand. That boat had definitely sailed.”
“He’s dead Dave.”
“Ah.”
Dave fell silent for a moment and, all around the kitchen table, people stared down into their cups, waiting to take their lead from him.
“Was it quick?”
“Yeah, think it must have been.”
“You don’t know? Was no one with him? He was alone?”
Rita nodded.
Dave again lapsed into silence.
“D’you know where his body is? Would you be able to find it again?” Dave forced a smile, “Because Neil wouldn’t have wanted to be seen dead out in the wilderness.”
Others round the table smiled sympathetically.
“Dave,” Jeff said gently, “he’s upstairs; in one of the bedrooms.”
“He died in his bed?”
Jeff shook his head.
“I’d like to go see him, to say goodbye.”
“I really don’t think you should, Dave,” Rita said quietly, “It must have been quick; there’s a hell of a lot of blood and...stuff,” her voice failed her.
Dave understood. He got to his feet. He needed some air.
“Think I’ll just take a minute if that’s OK.”
“Sure,” said Rita, “Want some company?”
Dave shook his head and left them. The others watched him go in silence.
Jeff was the first to speak.
“So, is that everyone accounted for, except Laura? Has anyone seen her?”
“Can’t say, son. What’s she look like?”
Jeff frowned and looked across at Rita. She had raised her eyebrows in a similarly questioning frown, no doubt sharing the same thought: how could Spielman not know what Laura looked like, if he’d really been as close to the Cousins family as he claimed?
“Laura, Mr Spielman,” Rita prompted, “The Cousins’s daughter?”
Spielman’s weather-beaten face creased into deeper, angry furrows.
“This some kinda joke? Cus it ain’t funny.”
Phil looked from face to face.
“Am I missing something? What’s going on?”
“I don’t know, Phil,” said Jeff, “Why don’t you enlighten us, Spielman?”
“Huh?”
“How is it you don’t know what Laura looks like? Memory failing you? Or is it that you’ve not been quite straight with us?”
A worrying thought occurred to Rita.
“Mr Spielman, why didn’t the Shadowman attack you, down in the basement?”
“That’s a good question,” said Jeff, becoming increasingly animated, “It rips Neil to pieces, but you, it leaves unharmed, just wanders off for no reason. Isn’t that what you said?”
“I don’t like yuh tone, son. An’ I ain’t answerin’ no more o’ yur damn fool questions.”
Spielman made to rise from his seat, but Jeff grabbed at him and pushed him back down.
“Phil, get his gun!”
Phil paled.
“He’s got a gun?”
“Yeah, in that pocket.”
“What the Sam Hill d’yuh think yur doin’? That gun don’t leave ma side. Give it back t’me.”
Rita tried to calm the situation.
“We just need to ask you a few questions, Mr Spielman. We have to be sure, after everything that’s happened. You can understand that can’t you?”
Held down by Jeff and Phil, Spielman was in no position to argue, so he grimaced and remained silent. Jeff then opened his mouth to speak, but Rita stopped him: she thought it would be better if she put the questions.
“What we want to know, Mr Spielman, is how it is that you don’t know what the Cousins’ daughter looks like?”
“I never said I didn’t. ‘Course I know what their little girl looked like -”
“Looked?” Jeff interrupted, “Looked? Past tense? Are you telling us Laura’s dead?”
“What are yuh talkin’ about? Yuh know damn well she’s dead. I told yuh I bin helpin’ her poor ma find her killer for years.”
“No, Mr Spielman,” Rita spoke now in a gently encouraging tone, “we’re talking about the second daughter.”
The old man was clearly mystified.
“There ain’t no second daughter.”
“Yes, there is,” Rita insisted, “I’ve seen her. She was here, right here in this room, before all this started.”
“Ma’am, I can’t say who yuh seen an’ who yuh ain’t, but I’m tellin’ yuh Karen’s little girl, Laura, has bin dead twenty-four years an’ I ain’t never seen no other girl here at the hotel, not in all those years.”
“Wait,” Rita said, remembering, “there’s a picture of Laura on the wall behind the reception desk.
“But -” Spielman started.
“Please let me show you, Mr Spielman. I’ll just get it.”
Rita hurried up to the lobby. The photo had been knocked from the wall, but it was unbroken, even the glass in the frame was intact. Rita carried it carefully down to the kitchen and showed it to Spielman.
“That’s her,” she said, pointing, “That’s their second daughter.”
“No ma’am. That there’s Laura: their first daughter, their only daughter, their only ever child. An’ I’m tellin’ yuh, that poor girl’s bin dead twenty-four years.”
There was an awkward silence, while everyone tried to grasp what was being said. Then Phil spoke.
“So, do we give him his gun back?”
Neither Jeff nor Rita answered him. They were both too confused.
Jon had been sitting away from the table, below one of the windows. Now he looked up. He took in the baffled faces and the uncertain silence, and wandered over to investigate. He glanced down at the photo, and paused.
“She in trailer,” he said sadly.
“What?” Rita asked, “When?”
Phil thought he’d answer on Jon’s behalf.
“When we were in the forest, hiding from the the...er”
“Shadowman?”
“Thank you Emma, when we were hiding from the Shadowman...Jon says he could see a girl at the window of the trailer. But I looked and I’m telling you, there was no girl, really, there was no girl in that trailer.”
“She in trailer, this girl,” Jon again insisted.
He jabbed at the photo.
But Phil was equally insistent.
“I’m telling you, there was no girl.”
Jon rounded on him.
“You hear her?”
Phil smiled nervously and that was enough confirmation for Jon.
“You hear her, yes.”
“What does he mean, Phil? What did you hear?”
Phil sighed.
“Just before the Shadow guy went into the trailer, there was this weird noise, like the wind. I guess it kinda sounded a bit like a voice.”
Jon nodded.
“Voice, yes. Hear voice. This girl voice”
“All the way back here, he kept on and on saying that he’d seen this girl and she’d been calling to the Shadow guy. Kinda luring him to the trailer, I guess.”
“She in trailer. Evil go in trailer. Trailer...”
Jon moved his arms up and out, miming the explosion.
“She dead in trailer.”
Everyone looked blank, uncertain how to react. Jon was once again overcome with sadness. He went back to his chair by the window and turned his back on those watching him from the table.
Rita turned to Spielman.
“You see? He’s seen her too, and now the poor girl’s dead.”
Spielman decided to try to convince Jeff.
“Look, son, I know yuh say he’s saved lives an’ all, but I don’t think yuh friend over there’s altogether right in the head. Know what I mean?”
Phil nodded.
“I’m with the old guy on that.”
“Phil! You’re not helping,” Rita snapped.
“Oh yeah? Well, way I see it, this is the old guy’s word against the weird guy’s.”
“No, Phil, I saw her too. I saw her right here in this goddam room.”
“OK, so it you and the weird guy’s word against the old guy, and me.”
“You?”
“Yeah, I told you: I was there when that trailer went up and I looked at the windows. There was no girl!”
“Can everyone please just chill?” it was Emma, “It’s no use you arguing this out now. Wait till the Cousins get back and ask them.”
“Emma’s right,” said Jeff, “We’ll wait till the road’s open. Everything will get sorted out then.”
“Except the Cousins won’t be coming back.”
“Phil? What d’you mean?”
“They’re dead. On the track into town. I found their pickup last night.”
“Shit.”
“Yeah, both either been dragged out or flung out in an accident. It wasn’t pretty.”
In the stunned silence that followed, they became aware of a small, stifled squeaking: the old man was weeping quietly, huge tears tumbling down the wrinkled leather of his face, dripping from his chin, to form dark stains on his old, tattered shirt.
To see this old man weeping so inconsolably was awful. Rita felt tears stinging at her own eyes in sympathy. Emma tried not to look at Spielman at all: it was too dreadful when old people cried. She hugged her father close. Jeff let his hand slip from Spielman’s shaking shoulders. He returned Emma’s hug. Phil turned the act of holding the old man down, into a consoling hand on the shoulder, an awkward gesture of comfort.
They all stayed like this for several moments until Spielman’s weeping subsided into downcast silence.
Jon had watched all this and now came over to Rita, drawing her to one side, away from the table.
“Girl in trailer, yes.”
“I don’t know, Jon. I don’t know what to think, but at least we know that the Shadowman is dead now.”
Jon frowned.
“Sorry,” Rita spoke more simply, “I said we know Shadowman is dead.”
Jon looked around to see that no one else was listening. Phil, who had casually watched Rita cross the room, took the hint and turned away. Jon then spoke to Rita in an urgent whisper.
“Many years, long time, I kill Shadowman. He kill girl, I kill him. But him body not stay dead. Put in ground, but body gone away.”
“What? You buried him and his body disappeared?”
“Disappeared, gone, yes.”
“Shit...Are you sure he was dead?”
“Yes. He dead. I...smash head with shovel.”
Words failed him, so Jon mimed raising the shovel and smashing it down again. As he did so, the sound of the shattering skull and liquifying brain filled Jon’s head, just as it had all those years before. He felt nauseous.
“Are you OK?”
Jon focused on Rita’s face and the awful memories and sounds began to fade. He nodded, but said nothing..
“Was that after he killed Laura?”
Jon looked at her with incomprehension.
Rita went to get the photo.
“Is that her? Did you kill the Shadowman when he killed this girl?”
“No. I kill Shadowman when he kill girl not her.”
Rita tried to understand.
“Suzie Bower was killed before Laura. Jon, did you kill the Shadowman because he killed Suzie?”
“Suzie, yes. Shadowman kill Suzie. I kill Shadowman. Smash head with shovel. But him body not stay dead in ground. Body gone away.”
“Are you sure you killed him?”
“Yes.”
“But his body disappeared?”
“Yes.”
“And twenty years later he killed Laura. Is that right?”
“Shadowman kill Laura, yes.”
Rita didn’t know what to say. She looked at Jon. He was sincere; she was certain of that. At the very least he believed absolutely that what he had told her was the truth, but Rita couldn’t make sense of it.
Phil called her, interrupting her train of thought.
“So, can we let the old guy go now?”
“Yeah...I guess...Sorry, Mr Spielman.”
Allowed to move again, the old man wiped his nose with the back of his hand then wiped his wet hand on the frayed sleeve of his shirt. Ignoring the disgusted looks of the others at the table, he then grunted with irritation, pulled the gun from Phil’s hand and rammed it back into his own pocket. Glowering, he pushed his chair back and got up from the table. His face was set in the deepest, most sullen frown: it was clear that he would need some placating.
“Tell you what, Spielman,” said Phil, rubbing his hands together, “How about I get you a drink?”
Spielman snorted angrily.
“Don’t know if I wanna accept no drinks after I bin treated so bad.”
“When I feel that bad, I turn to my friends.”
“Yeah? Well I ain’t got none.”
“No problem. Lucky for you, I have an old friend I think you’ll get on with just fine.”
Spielman looked dubious and even Jeff and Rita wondered where Phil was going with this.
“Yeah, an old friend of mine,” Phil winked, “goes by the name of Jack Daniels.”
Spielman looked at him for a few seconds in silence.
“Yur an idiot!” he said finally.
“You want that drink or not?”
Spielman continued to grumble, but he nevertheless followed when Phil went upstairs and into the bar.
Jeff looked across at Rita.
“What are you thinking?”
“That Spielman was overly generous. I’d have gone for moron at least.”
Jeff smiled.
“I meant, are you OK?”
“Hmm, yeah, I guess. There’s just been too much going on tonight. I can’t get my head straight.”
“Want to talk about it?”
Rita didn’t answer. She looked down at Emma, who was resting her head on her father’s shoulder. They both looked so content, that Rita couldn’t help but smile.
“What?” Jeff asked.
“Nothing. It’s just good to see you two together like that. Em, keep an eye on your old dad for a few minutes will you?”
Emma gave Rita a thumbs up.
“Thanks. OK, think I’m going to get some air. Don’t worry I won’t go far. I’ll probably just sit out on the stoop.”
As Rita passed the office, she glanced in and saw Dave sitting at the desk, reading some of the papers.
“Hi.”
“Hi yourself.”
“Feeling any better?”
“Well I’ve decided to take your advice and not go see Neil, or what’s left of him. I think that’s the right decision for me now; I’m kinda confused about my feelings for the man, y’know? I mean, he treated me and, let’s face it, the rest of you, his oldest friends, like so much dog poop on his Ferragamos, so I feel mad about that. But he died all alone, and I feel bad about that. I guess the thing that makes me the saddest though, is that no one really cares that he’s dead. I’m not blaming you, or the rest of them, but it’s sad that no one’s really gonna miss him.”
Rita rubbed Dave’s arm.
“Don’t worry,” he said, “I’m OK, really I am. But I just can’t believe how things have changed so much in just a few days. I mean, I really thought Neil was the one. I’d have done anything for him and I wonder, if we hadn’t come here, and all this crap hadn’t happened, how long would we have been together?”
“You really wanna know?”
“You’re gonna tell me like months, right?”
Rita shook her head.
“Days?”
“I don’t know what Neil told you but, Dave, he never stayed with anyone longer than maybe four months in all the time I’ve known him. Sorry.”
Rita turned her attention to the papers littering the desk and tried to distract Dave from thoughts of Neil by telling him what she, Neil and Jeff had discovered in the documents. She was telling him about the Boes and was so involved in trying to remember all the details, that she didn’t notice Jon standing at the door, watching her. Rita paused, wondering what he wanted. He surely couldn’t have understood what she’d been saying. She waited for him to speak.
Jon waved a hand around the room.
“What is?”
“These are papers to do with the Shadowman and the killings.”
Jon nodded, but Rita wasn’t sure if he’d understood. Dave and Rita watched him go around the room opening books and examining folders, an incongruous sight, in his animal skins. Rita thought he might be mocking them with his studious air; it was unlikely that he could read any of it. However, when Jon opened one particular drawer, he had no need of reading.
It was obvious that something in the drawer had caught his attention. He reached in and carefully lifted out a small ziplock bag. He held it up to look more closely at its contents. Rita could make out a scrap of material inside the bag. She leant forward and took a cutting from the drawer.
“What’s it say?” Dave asked.
“It’s a cutting from the Losien Gazette, dated Wednesday, September 18, 1946.”
LILAC LADY LAID TO REST
With still no clues as to the identity of the so-called Lilac Lady, whose badly decomposed body was found near the disused grain silos at Drover’s Creek, on June 15, a brief committal service was held today at the Havenlea Cemetery, Losien. Sheriff Mason Daniels, present at the interment, told this reporter that the file on this Jane Doe remains open at this time.
Rita showed the cutting to Dave.
“I think Neil must have read this, though I’m sure I remember him saying that the dead girl had something to do with lilies, not lilac.”
“Easy mistake. Anything else in that drawer?”
“Scraps of what looks like a brown paper bag, or an envelope.”
“That’s it?”
“Yeah, there’s writing on some of the scraps: looks like ‘LPD’.”
“PD could be ‘Police Department’. It’s probably the original bag that they kept that scrap of material in. No ziplocks back then.”
“I guess. Wonder why they kept it. Jon, could I see that?”
But Jon didn’t reply and when Rita looked up, she saw that he staring at the scrap of material as if it meant the world to him, and he was crying.
“Jon, what’s the matter? Jon, what is it?”
But Jon just kept on crying. He couldn’t put his feelings into words. He couldn’t say how he felt: he wasn’t sure himself. But, seeing this tiny scrap of his mother’s skirt after more than fifty years, telescoped his life and pulled him back to that day when the ugly, unloved and very lonely little boy watched the pretty lady walk away from him forever.
Rita went over to Jon and, ignoring his pungent body odour, put her arm around his shoulder. Jon didn’t react. From the distant look on his face it was clear that he was far away and Rita could only guess at what was on his mind. What did this remnant mean to him? She had so many questions, but how was she to phrase them in words that he could understand? She could see the cloth in detail now. It was slightly faded in one corner, but was clearly a shiny, lilac material: satin perhaps. And it held obvious, overwhelming importance for Jon.
They stayed like this for many minutes, until Jon raised his head. He looked into Rita’s eyes, pleading. He wanted information. Rita bit her lip. Should she lie about the cutting? Was it kinder to tell him what she had read, or to leave him with uncertainty? She dragged her gaze from Jon and looked to Dave for advice.
“You have to tell him,” Dave said, without her even having to ask.
“OK,” Rita took a deep breath, “Here’s the thing. Many years, long, long time, someone kill girl.”
Jon was looking at her, but said nothing.
“Girl dead, Jon. And this,” Rita touched the bag containing the lilac cloth, “with dead girl. Do you understand?”
Jon understood only too well. He reached back into his memory for the words.
“Ma say she go to West, but no. This girl, Jon Ma. Ma dead.”
“She was your mother? Oh Jon, I’m so sorry.”
Jon straightened and Rita felt he wanted her to let go of his shoulder. He was a proud man; he was going to deal with this in his own way. She dropped her arm and eased away from him.
“I go,” he said.
“You want I go with you?”
“No. You stay. Jeff go with.”
“Oh, OK.”
Rita was surprised and a little hurt that Jon would prefer to have Jeff’s support at this difficult time. But it was for Jon to choose and she had to accept that.
“Wait here, Jon. I’ll get him for you.”
She had explained the situation to Jeff before he came into the room. He couldn’t understand why Jon wanted his help; Jeff wasn’t someone to whom people routinely turned for support and advice. But then, these last few days had changed so much else, so why not this?
“What can I do?” he asked, “How can I help?”
“We go.”
“Right. Where?”
Jon looked at Jeff as if expecting some insight to dawn. When none did, he explained.
“You, Jon, go cave. Children go to here.”
Jeff was rather taken aback. So he was still not the person to whom people turned for advice and support, but he wasn’t too downhearted; he was now the person to whom people turned when they needed a strong man, an adventurer. He felt rather good about himself and Rita read the smugness of his grin with ease.
“Earth calling Indiana. Come in please, Professor Jones.”
But Jeff ignored her jibe; his thrill at being part of some elite could not be dispelled so easily. He had been chosen by the expert, the man who had lived years in the forest, to accompany him on a mission: a rescue mission no less! Now that the threat of harm to his loved ones was over, the danger thankfully passed, Jeff had begun to imagine how news of these last few days would be received by others on their return. Specifically, he had begun to wonder how the students and academics of his college would react. His selection by Jon to accompany him on this final trip played into Jeff’s daydream beautifully. He fondly imagined his students bragging to their peers about him, the coolest Prof on campus. And the anticipated envy of Jeff’s faculty colleagues would, if anything, be even more satisfying.
“Don’t get too cocky,” Rita chided, “If you’re going, just walk where Jon walks and do exactly what he tells you. And Indie?”
Jeff nodded.
“Take care of yourself.”
“I will.”
“You’re hopeless.”
“I love you too.”
It took only a half hour to gather food and extra clothes to take for the children. Jon and Jeff were now ready to leave and were saying their good byes.
“You sure you’re OK leaving Emma?” Rita asked, “I’m happy to go with Jon if you’d rather stay here with her.”
“No. I know she’ll be fine: you’ll be with her. And, yes, I do now realise that I was in fact probably Jon’s last choice for this trip: he won’t let either Dave or Spielman go, because they’re wounded, and he won’t let you, because he thinks Emma needs you. But I want to do this. Is that OK?”
“Sure. No problem. Go have fun.”
“What I can’t understand is why Jon didn’t ask Phil to go with him.”
They both looked across to where Phil, who had spent the few hours since dawn drinking an interesting assortment of spirits, was now slumped in an armchair, snoring loudly, an empty bottle cradled at his elbow.
“No,” Rita agreed, “I can’t figure that one either.”
Rita waved Jon and Jeff to the edge of the clearing and then wandered back into the office. Dave was still reading at the desk, surrounded by mounds of paper.
Rita flicked through the stack of medical reports, but she wasn’t reading them; she was thinking over those she’d read earlier.
“Dave?”
“Yeah.”
“I’ve been thinking...Remember Henry Boe, the guy whose shrink said he spoke in the third person and was unconsciously identifying with his father who beat him?”
“Yes, I remember.”
“Well, I think they got it wrong. Jeff found Ezra’s version of events, in some documents from his asylum on California. Turns out that, in the earlier papers, Henry wasn’t talking about how his own father treated him, he was talking about how he, Henry, treated his son, Ezra.
“Here, this is the one,” she continued, “Yes, here, Henry says, ‘He carved black magic figures: evil, wicked things’. See? He was talking about Ezra. I think Ezra was carving these dolls. And look here, Henry goes on, ‘He was trying to catch my God-given immortal soul...but I stopped him. I stopped him good. I beat him till he was red raw.’ Ezra was making these dolls and Henry thought it was something to do with Voodoo, so he beat the crap out of the poor kid. Jeez, I can’t believe I ever felt sorry for the guy. And something Jeff said, about monsters not being born but created, made me wonder how Ezra would have turned out if his father had treated him better. Henry was horribly cruel to him.”
“But Henry was beaten by his own parents when he was a child. His only friend, the maid, was sent away and then he was orphaned. No wonder he was messed up. Doesn’t he deserve your sympathy too?”
“OK,” Rita conceded, “so Henry was screwed up by his parents. But why didn’t that make him determined not to do the same to his own son?”
Dave sighed, put down the papers he was reading and turned his attention to Rita. He smiled but, when he spoke, his tone was subdued.
“You act like people are rational beings, Rita, when everything I see tells me that they’re not. Maybe Ezra only started carving his dolls because he was a little boy who liked dolls and he didn’t have a sister with Barbies he could borrow. But Henry wouldn’t necessarily have understood why his son was carving dolls to play with; don’t forget that attitudes were very different back then. God knows, things aren’t that great now, but back then...” he rolled his eyes, “Also Henry had grown up alone, with only the maid -”
“Gloria Mercy.”
“Yeah, great name, by the way. She seems to have been the only person to feature in his life but, fantastic name aside, she didn’t do young Henry a whole lotta good. She filled his head with superstition and nightmares and it was probably because of his childhood indoctrination that Henry later saw Ezra’s wooden dolls as black magic, when, all the time, his little boy probably just wanted to play with dolls.”
Rita nodded.
“Yeah, that makes sense. And I guess it wouldn’t have mattered how much Ezra might have tried to say that he just liked dolls to play with, because, like Henry says here, ‘The evil one puts lies into the mouth of the boy. You gotta beat that Devil outa him.’ That must have been one difficult childhood: no wonder Ezra was affected. Even if his Dad hadn’t been a voodoo freak, society as a whole wasn’t ready to accept difference back then. Ezra couldn’t have explained how he felt. He couldn’t have made Henry understand.”
They fell silent for a moment, then Dave spoke quietly.
“If you are the little boy who likes to play with dolls, believe me, there aren’t any words you can use to explain; because you instinctively know that those are precisely the words that your ma and pa don’t ever want to hear.”
Moved, Rita touched Dave’s arm. But he brightened.
“It’s OK. I got past my parents not understanding a long time ago. And anyway, I had my wonderful Aunt Sarah. And she was one cool lady...Maybe if Ezra had had someone like her in his life, things would have turned out different. The man’s life was a tragedy.”
“Oh, come on Dave. I feel real sorry for Ezra the kid, but Ezra the adult? No way. What he did was off the scale.”
“No excuses?”
“None...Why? Can you excuse what he did to those kids?”
“God no! I’m not talking about excusing what he did, just explaining, wondering what might have been...Believe me, I’d be the last person to suggest that what Ezra did was the result of his sexuality. Best guess, I think maybe he did what he did because he was desperately lonely.”
“Lonely?”
“Yeah, I know it sounds weird, but Ezra must have picked up some of what his father had heard from Gloria Mercy. He thought he could somehow bring his dad back from the dead by catching his soul in a doll...So I think he maybe started out wanting to preserve the children he kidnapped, to keep them as kids, as company for him forever. Anyhow, I’m just saying that, if as a kid he hadn’t been so alone, if he’d had someone in his life who gave a shit about whether he lived or died, he might have made different choices and given himself different options. Or, at the very least, someone might have been close enough to him to spot the signs and maybe get him some help, or stop him, before anyone got hurt.”
“You think too kindly of people, Dave. There aren’t many who could find it in them to feel sorry for Ezra Boe.”
“I can only do it because he’s dead now. He’s no longer a threat to anyone, just a nasty, rather pathetic little footnote in history.”
“No. It’s because you’re a nice guy. You are. I always said you and Neil were an unlikely couple.”
Even before she finished speaking, Rita regretted having begun. Now the sentence was out there and she couldn’t take it back.
“Sorry Dave. Me and my big mouth.”
“It’s OK. Neil’s someone else who might have made different choices if he’d had people around who cared.”
Rita looked offended.
“No, I mean when he was a kid. Y’know, he never would talk about his childhood. Not a word. I don’t know what caused it, but I reckon he started building walls against the world when he was a kid and then just forgot how to stop building. And he never let anyone inside the walls.”
“Not even you?”
“No. I once made myself believe that he would, but no, Neil was only ever interested in Neil. You saw it with the kids. I just couldn’t believe it: he really didn’t care what happened to them. It wasn’t just that he was frightened for himself. He had absolutely no feelings for those kids. Even if he’d somehow been given an absolute guarantee that no harm would come to him, I think he’d still have preferred to stay inside by the fire rather than go look for them. He’d have been just as happy to have the kids die or get saved; either way, he didn’t actually care. It’s like other people weren’t real to him.”
They lapsed into silence for a while.
“Did you come across anything new in here?” Rita asked.
“Yes, I did actually. There’s a police report somewhere... Ah, here it is. It’s from 1945, so Ezra would have been forty-three. He got himself into some trouble and was questioned by the Sheriff in a place called Ricoh. I checked the map; it’s a small farming community, about fifteen miles north east of Losien.”
“What did he do?”
“The Sheriff, a Wilbur Walter Watts writes that, ‘Ezra Boe arrived in Ricoh, in late September of 1945’. Ezra is described as, ‘tall, pale and unusually thin’. Also he seems to have been sullen with ‘an evil temper’. After wandering into town, Ezra took a menial job, working in the back room of the General Store. However, Sheriff WWW writes that Boe stayed at the store for less than a month before being given notice by the store’s owner, a Mr Elwood P Hacker. Apparently Hacker’s teenage daughter, Joanna, claimed that Ezra stared at her all the time and gave her the creeps. When the owner sacked him, Ezra apparently became violent and threatened both owner and daughter. The Sheriff was called, hence Ezra’s mention in the records, and Ezra spent a night in the cells before being told to get out of town the next day. He drifted off out of Ricoh, and the report ends.”
“The body of Jon’s mother was found near Drover’s Creek, just the other side of Losien, in early summer of the following year, 1946.”
“It’s possible, I guess: Ezra, probably still furious that he’d just been sacked from his job at the store, kills Jon’s mom and then, somehow, gets to California and continues killing there. Only there, he’s killing children. The only problem with that scheme is that Boe was arrested in 1950 and they reckoned he’d already been kidnapping kids for three years or so. How could he have got all the way across the country so quickly, from Drover’s Creek all the way to California, when he had no job and presumably no money?”
“Well, before he left with Jon, Jeff found something about Ezra’s first victim. Boe wouldn’t give many details, but he did say that it had been an accident and he had taken her tickets and money. I think he meant Jon’s mom, don’t you?”
Dave shrugged.
“Don’t suppose we’ll ever know for sure, but it sounds likely.”
They flicked through the papers in silence for a while. Rita wanted to talk over what Jon had told her and, as she scanned the papers, she mused over how she was going to raise the subject. In the end, she decided on the direct approach.
“Dave, do you believe in ghosts?”
“I’m sorry. Ghosts?”
“Yeah.”
“I don’t know exactly. Why d’you ask?”
“It’s something Jon told me. He insists that he killed the Shadowman when the Shadowman killed Suzie Bower, which is like the late fifties.”
“Right.”
“So what d’you think?”
“I don’t. I mean, I don’t know what to think...Do you believe him?”
“I believe that he believes it.”
“But the small matter of the Shadowman still being alive and killing for the forty years after that bothers you, does it?”
“Hmm.”
Dave eased back in his chair and thought for a few moments before speaking
“I don’t know Rita. Jon is certainly a somewhat strange individual, and his sartorial and personal hygiene standards are, to say the least, eccentric, but he’s a very brave dude and he has a good heart. There’s no way we’d have made it through the last twenty-four hours without him. So, if he chooses to believe that the Shadowman was some ghost, then I for one am happy to let him think it. The man’s been living out in the forest for decades, as far as we can tell, completely alone. Heck, he’s forgotten how to speak and he wears animal skins! He’s bound to be a bit...different.”
“So you don’t think I should tell anyone?”
“Like who?”
Rita smiled.
“Good question.”
“Yeah, well, hope that helps.”
“It does. And you’re right; who does it harm if Jon wants to believe in ghosts? His secret’s safe with me.”
It was still early morning when the snow returned. It began slowly with large flakes rocking gently to the ground, but soon smaller, more determined flakes were twirling quickly down, to add to the increasing depth of snow around the building.
Standing, shivering in the lobby, Rita took a few seconds to collect her thoughts. Only a half hour or so before this, as she waved Jeff goodbye, it had then seemed wildly incongruous to her that the gentle light of early morning was shining so prettily through the ragged, gaping doorway. Now the same view was of a total whiteout, with snow beginning to swirl in through the splintered gap to build up against the chairs and tables.
Rita was suddenly anxious for Jeff; the silly, vain, wonderful man. She could only hope that Jon would take good care of him. She composed her face into a confident smile before she went down to the others in the basement.
“It’s snowing again.”
“Dammit! Pard’n ma french.”
“What’s the matter, Mr Spielman?”
“Your friend Dave was gonna come with me to find Karen and John’s bodies. I don’t like t’think of them lyin’ out there. Like t’ give them a decent burial. But we need the snow to stop.”
“It’s very heavy at the moment, I’m afraid. But Mr Spielman, I’m not sure if you should bury them before they’ve been, y’know, examined for evidence, by detectives.”
“Detectives! Huh, they couldn’t find shit on their own shoes! Pard’n ma french. I watched them flyin’ in their heliocopters. They poked and prodded and measured and wrote their goddam notes in their goddam notebooks, but they did never find the Shadowman, did they? Detectives? Shit!”
Rita wisely avoided the subject of detectives thereafter.
She had a busy morning. With Dave’s help, she managed to get Phil back down to the basement from the bar, where the temperature was falling towards freezing. Phil now lay in one of the store rooms, snoring happily under a pile of blankets. Then Rita, Emma and Dave collected all the room keys scattered amongst the remains of the reception desk and went from room to room, emptying closets and gathering everyone’s belongings. They dragged the crammed suitcases down to the basement and stacked them in the side rooms.
Seeing all the luggage piling up, Spielman grumbled. The old man had no clothes other than those he had on him; everything else he had owned in the world was presumed to have been consumed in the inferno. Rita found a few items that almost fitted him. She took them predominantly from Phil’s suitcase, for the very good reasons that, not only was Phil the closest in size to the old man, but he was also fast asleep in an alcohol-induced stupor that would probably last for some time. Consequently Spielman was now sporting a rather jauntily oversized shirt and trouser combination that Phil had included in his packing against the possibility that the hotel might boast a discotheque. Rita was far from convinced that lime was a shade that flattered Spielman, but she decided not to share her sartorial reservations with him.
After his earlier spirited outburst, Spielman decided that he needed to take a nap. Checking in on him later, Rita was amused to see that the old man had taken the lime jacket off and carefully folded in to one side. He actually liked it. There was no accounting for taste.
The basement was not warm, but there was still gas in the cylinders, so they could warm themselves with hot drinks and food and later on, when the others returned, everyone would be able to bed down here. The thought of Neil’s dismembered body in the bedroom nearest to the top of the stairs acted as a bar to all the upper floor rooms. Certainly no one would want to sleep up there.