ENTANGLED (11 page)

I skipped past my apparently appalling lack of knowledge and pressed Martha for the scoop. “What else do you know about Robert Searle?”

“The information varies from source to source, even down to the date of the raid, but it was May 29, 1668 according to the historical society library records.”

“Searle and his pirates,” Brick inserted, “sailed in on one or two captured Spanish ships, didn’t they?”

“Indeed,” Martha said, her voice taking on a teacher tone. “Searle meant to loot the St. Augustine Royal Treasury of silver ingots. He and his men began the attack and ransacking of the town between midnight and one in the morning. Some reports indicate that Searle slaughtered sixty men, women, and children, and left the bodies lying in the streets.”

“That’s where some of the ghost stories I’ve heard came from,” said another female voice in the dark room. Deidre. She cleared her throat. “I have a friend in the ghost tour business. I don’t know how much the stories are embellished, of course.”

“A good bit, I’d wager,” Martha said. “According to historical library records, five Spanish soldiers were killed, but those sixty or so men, women, and children were taken hostage and ransomed for firewood, meat, cloth, water, and the like.”

“The ladies are each partly correct,” Zavier said, and I turned to face his gray-white form.

“You were there?” I asked.

He stood taller, puffed out his chest. “I served as the under-secretary to the overseer of the Royal Treasury.”

“Tell us what happened.”

“Ask him to speak up for the equipment,” Brick said.

Zavier floated almost to the middle of the triangulated voice recorders, presumably to be better heard. “The attack began in the Plaza. The villagers were rousted from their beds and marched through the streets. Some men with muskets and swords attempted to fight back. Villagers were killed in the crossfire. One small girl was just six or seven years old.”

Zavier’s voice trailed off, a look of deep sadness on his semi-transparent face. When his eyes met mine again, though, they held urgency.

“You must find that girl, ghost woman.”

“The little girl who was killed?”

“Only she can save us.”

“How can she do that?”

“It is said that she haunted Searle until he sailed away. She rid us of him once. She has the power to do it again.”

“Didn’t she go to the Light?”

Zavier shook his head, but more in frustration than denial. “Find the girl, ghost woman. She is our hope.”

“All right, calm yourself. What’s her name.”

“I know not, but you must find her by tomorrow night. Searle will come when the veil is at its thinnest.”

A loud crash from above made all of us jump. Even Zavier. He looked toward the ceiling, his milky white brow furrowed. Worried.

“Those are the noises coming from the attic,” Martha said. “That’s why I called you people.”

“Zavier, are other spirits here?” I asked.

“All over town, we are banding together for safety,” he admitted, “but we are not safe unless you find the girl.”

Another crash, a bang, and a thud sounded.

“I must go, ghost woman. Tell Martha we mean no harm.”

With that, Zavier zoomed up and through the twelve-foot ceiling.

“Well, Colleen?” Martha demanded. “What did my ghost have to say for himself?”

Since I didn’t want to taint Brick’s evidence, I suggested he and his team regroup to do a preliminary EVP review and analysis. If they had caught Zavier’s voice—and Da’s for that matter—then the ghost investigators would know of the situation first hand. No need for me to recap.

While the team set to work, Martha commanded I come along to the kitchen to help her set out refreshments—a gesture of pure Southern hospitality. Homemade chocolate chip and oatmeal cookies, soft drinks, and water with a side stack of napkins soon filled the round table top.

“Now tell me, Colleen, and don’t hold back. What did Zavier say? What is happening?”

I related my conversation with the ghost, highlighting that the additional spooks were temporary visitors, and that none wished her harm. When I finished, she arched a fine brow at me.

“So the ghosts will leave if you find the murdered girl?”

“All except Zavier,” I confirmed. “But it sounds to me like he’ll be gone along with most of the spirits in the entire city if this Searle character comes back to consume their souls.”

Martha scowled at the tray of cookies before meeting my gaze. “I don’t want Zavier destroyed, you know. I just want him to be quiet. I need to be at peace in my home.”

“I know, Mrs. Harrison. I think Zavier feels the same.”

“I do.”

Zavier wasn’t visible, but his voice was audible enough that Martha and I both gazed across the tray of treats to see a small, black object float toward us and settle on the table in front of Martha.

“My Bakelite anchor pin,” Martha said in awe. “You found it, didn’t you, Zavier?”

“It fell off your coat in the attic,” he said, again loudly enough to hear and understand.

“When I moved my winter things downstairs to air them. Of course.” She turned to me. “My husband gave me this before he shipped out with the Navy.”

Martha smiled mistily at the pin, then at the spot where Zavier had stood. “Thank you, Zavier.”

I slipped out of the kitchen, ready to go home and think. And, okay, I felt a little misty myself. I could be dead wrong, but I could swear Martha might be developing a soft spot for her spook.

I paused in the hall to let Dan and Melody tromp past me and up the staircase with their load of equipment. Then Brick beckoned to me from the dining room door.

“Come hear the EVPs,” he said, turning into the room and expecting me to follow.

I might’ve balked but color me curious.

Don and Deidre had eyes glued to the monitors. Brick indicated a free seat and handed me a set of headphones.

“I’ll play the recording from your house first.”

Da’s voice came through clearly if more softly than I thought it would. I had no trouble understanding every word, and couldn’t help but feel vindicated.

Then Brick switched recorders with the comment that he was playing the one that had picked up the majority of our encounter in the parlor.

I heard Zavier’s name without straining, and though his first knocks were faint, the pounding sure wasn’t. When our conversation began, some of Zavier’s speech was too garbled to understand, but many of his short sentences came across loud and clear. Especially his pleas to find the murdered girl.

When I removed the headphones, Brick switched the recorder off, took my elbow, and urged me outside.

“Am I getting the bum’s rush?” I asked when we stood in Martha’s front garden.

“Who is the girl the ghost wants you to find? She’s not a living person, right?”

“The ghost is Zavier, and of course he doesn’t mean a living child. Geez, Brick. Get a grip.”

“Hey, with ghosts you can never tell.” He tilted his head at me. “So how are you going to track down this ghost girl, Madame Medium?”

“Don’t call me that. I do not conduct séances, and how do you know I’ll do anything about this issue at all?”

“Because you want to help. It’s what you do.”

He had me there, but I shrugged. “In the first place, I don’t know if it’s possible to summon a spirit that’s crossed over. It’s not something I’ve done or ever wanted to do. Plus, what am I going to say without knowing her name? ‘Hey, child who haunted Searle. We need you to come back and get rid of him again.’ That’ll go over big.”

He looked away, over my shoulder. “We might be able to assist you with research. Deidre is willing to do it. See if she can get a name.”

I blinked up at him. “Why?”

“In spite of what you think, when we find real ghost presences, we want to help, too. Help the people whose lives are in upheaval from the haunting, and help the spirits themselves.”

A blast of cold spook air hit my back, and I spun to face the street to find ghosts lining the sidewalk and mouthing two words.
Help us
.

Great gator gunk.

I took a deep breath and exhaled a long sigh. Okay, so St. Augustine would certainly be an empty place without our non-corporeal residents, and they didn’t deserve to have their souls stolen. I also had a selfish reason to attempt this major intervention. Da might not be worried about Searle, but what if Da’s soul was as vulnerable as any other?

I looked over my shoulder where Brick watched and waited.

“All right. Tell Deidre to do the research. We’ll make a plan from there.”

“Guillelmina.”

“Say what?”

Brick walked through my office door at three in the afternoon, fifteen minutes after I’d returned from an impossible consultation with a new client and the out of control ghost that haunted the garden of his bed and breakfast. A little gentle hair pulling, acceptable. Tripping guests, so not okay. The visit left me determined to do all in my power to thwart the specter of Robert Searle so the city spooks would settle down.

As long as I kept thinking of the exercise as a large-scale intervention, I had hopes of pulling it off.

“Who is Guillelmina?” I asked from behind my desk as Brick lowered his tall, handsome self into a client chair.

“The child killed during the Searle raid.”

“Deidre is certain?”

“As much as she can be. Obviously, there’s no mention of the kid haunting the pirate. The historical society library records say he set sail on June 5, 1668 with his booty and a sizable group he’d captured that he considered not to be of pure Spanish blood.”

“Why did he leave with captives?”

“Apparently he sold them into slavery.” Brick grinned. “This dude deserves to go down.”

“All we have to do is figure out how.”

“You don’t have a plan?”

“Do you?” I countered.

He shrugged his wide shoulders. “You’re the medium. I planned to follow your lead.”

“Will you please,” I said through gritted teeth, “stop calling me a medium?”

“Why does that term bother you?”

“Aside from you yourself branding mediums as charlatans?”

“Hey, I apologized for that.”

“During the spiritualism movement of the 1800s and other eras, mediums were often exposed as fakes.”

“So you don’t like the association? Fine. We still need a plan for tonight.”

“We?” I echoed.

“The team and I want to be there. Is that a problem?”

I grimaced. “I’ll feel like an idiot working with an audience rather than alone.”

“I won’t judge you, Colleen. I learned my lesson. Now what do you have in mind for tonight?”

I drummed my fingers on my desk, but no new inspiration struck. Unless a scathingly brilliant idea smacked me upside the head in the next nine hours, I’d have to go with my seat-of-the-pants plan.

“All right, here’s my thinking. Ghosts tend to live their existence in patterns, right? They make the same noises, appear in the same rooms, open and close the same doors.”

“You’re banking on Searle’s showing up at the same time he staged the 1668 raid.” Brick nodded. “Makes as much sense as anything else.”

“Okay, so we’ll meet at the bay front about ten. The Halloween night ghost tours should be over by then.”

“Fewer people on the streets to distract us.”

“Exactly. I’ll start putting out the call for Guillelmina and hope she shows up.”

We looked at each other in silence, then Brick snorted.

“Pretty thin plan, isn’t it? No, no,” he added holding up his hand. “Don’t poker up. I don’t have a better idea unless—”

“Unless what?”

“You contact Zavier and some other spirits you know. Get their input.”

“I’ve already given the ghost-vine a shot. Not one spook has anything to suggest. They’re so upset, even their rumor mill has dried up. Tonight could be a spectacular success or a phenomenal failure.”

“Then we give your plan our best and hope it works.”

All Hallows Eve. A half moon and stars shining overhead. Temperature hovering at seventy-two. No wind, but thick white-gray wisps churned above the surface of the bay among the dozens of sailboats gently rocking at anchor. Water ghosts, I thought of them now. Land ghosts also still flitted through the historic downtown. Guess these spooks hadn’t found a safe place to take cover.

Brick, his team, and I arrived at the bay front within minutes of each other. The guys wore tool belts stuffed with recorders and meters. Melody wore Don’s 35mm camera on a strap around her neck, and Deidre carried the FLIR. I supposed they had more equipment at the ready in Brick’s truck parked across the street, but I doubted they’d need it.