Haunted (24 page)

"He wants to uncover the secret of, as he puts it, "The Lost Chamber of Sexual Tortures." He'd like to build the entire show around it."

David groaned. "No one has ever found it, Gaylord, including me." In the last few weeks, he'd spent hours in the Red Cay library, though he'd perversely avoided the newspaper office. But he'd found nothing new so far and, if he wanted a shot at locating the thing, he had a feeling he'd have to go to the Guardian and brave Calla Willard.

"Well, if you do find the chamber," Gaylord was saying, "and I have every confidence that you will, dear boy, Romero would like you to keep it mum so that he can focus the show around it. He's willing to send an escape artist out to help you find the entrance. At his expense, of course."

"I see. I don't think I want to try that at this point."

"It's your choice, of course, David, but if you can find that dungeon, he'll give you the entire hour. If not, you still get the majority of air time."

"Sounds good either way," David replied, still mildly worried about the problems a séance might cause.

They discussed a few more details before hanging up, then David tilted back in his desk chair, putting his feet up and twining his fingers behind his head. "The Jerry Romero Show," he thought. Not bad, Gaylord, not bad. On second thought, it was better than that--it was fantastic. Over the last few weeks, he and Amber had acquired a number of antique and neo-nouveau pieces with which they were slowly restoring the parlor, dining room, billiard room, and downstairs bath to their early twentieth century glory. By the end of the month, the final pieces should have arrived and the house would truly be a showcase.

Sitting back up, he stared out the window at the lighthouse rising stark and scenically severe against the blue sky. Since the atmosphere of the house had calmed down, something which Eric attributed to Christabel's withdrawal into the still paint-stained third-floor room to recuperate from the energy draining fight in Amber's room, David had spent too much time trying to find the entrance to the cellar, in an attempt to satisfy his curiosity. The Lost Chamber of Sexual Tortures, he corrected, smiling to himself. He was behind on the book now and knew he should get down to serious work, but the mystery continued to haunt him.

He first began to feel guilty when he'd found himself knocking on walls and pressing on odd-looking spots inside cabinets during writing hours. The frustration ate at him and he'd remind himself that Houdini had once attempted to locate the elusive entryway and had failed, and that he himself was a fiction writer and could very well rely on his imagination, which was probably far more gruesome than reality. He'd go back and try to write, but he couldn't stop thinking about it.

Now, Jerry Romero would be phoning next week and that gave David the excuse he needed to redouble his efforts. He had several more leads that might yield clues. One was poking around in the unfinished attic at the back of the third floor. He thought he might do that today, especially if he could talk the radar-like Eric into helping. Theo had told him that as far as she knew, it had been locked up since shortly after the 1915 investigation ended: no one had ever stuck around long enough or had the desire to poke around in its lightless depths.

He also intended to talk to the townsfolk, including the dreaded Calla, who'd taken to leaving messages on his machine at all hours. Until now he'd avoided her calls requesting an interview, a torture he decided he'd have to endure soon, not only to keep the locals from thinking he was a snob, but mainly because the lit'ry Miss Willard with her newspaper connections might prove invaluable as a source of information on Body House's history. More likely, though, she'd probably prove to be as fun as a boil on his ass. He expected that a chat with history buff Andy Cox would be far more useful, but he needed to spend an evening in Barnacle Bob's for that and he couldn't bring himself to leave Amber alone in the house.

He might get his opportunity soon, though. Theo had made good on her offer to introduce Amber to Kelly Cox, Ferd's granddaughter, and the two were not only spending a lot of time together, but as a consequence, Amber had met most of the kids who'd be in her senior class next fall. She was also practicing to try out for the cheerleading squad--Kelly, the head cheerleader, had assured her she was a shoe-in. Though Amber normally abstained from such activities, she seemed to be getting a real kick out of it.

In fact, this very morning Amber had asked him if she could spend the night at Kelly's, and he'd readily agreed. She teased him then, asking if he'd be okay alone in the house, and he'd said of course, with total honesty. Since that day when he and Eric had encountered the two apparitions, nothing more had happened other than catching an occasional whiff of jasmine. To be honest, the third floor room was as horrible as ever, but the horror was staying put, putting credence in Eric's theories. David had also experienced half a dozen more wet dreams, though they were more fun than disturbing because they seemed like dreams, not reality. Still, he'd become very clandestine about washing his sheets.

Before she left for the beach today with a batch of her new friends, Amber had also told him she'd been invited to the Come As You Were Dance, coming up in a little over two weeks, by one Rick Feldspar, a boy she described as tall, thin, and dark-haired. He wanted to be a graphic artist, she explained, and when David had asked her if Rick wore glasses, she'd looked at him oddly and said, "How'd you know?" David just smiled and told her it was fine by him, especially since they were double-dating with Kelly and her date.

The minute Amber took off, he'd realized he could leave the house tonight, so he immediately called Theo Pelinore and asked her out to dinner, something he'd wanted to do since he'd met her. Tonight, in the Rusty Anchor, a pricey seafood restaurant overlooking nearby Morro Bay, he'd accept her invitation to the dance. She'd issued it several times since he'd moved in, the last time just two days ago. He was glad he could finally stop putting her off.

His thoughts drifted back to the missing dungeon and he turned to his computer, wondering what clues might be staring him in the face. He called up a file he'd compiled on the house's history and began to review it, searching for anything he might have previously overlooked.

According to his notes, Byron Baudey built the house for his wife Margaret Cross Baudey. Their child, Charity, was raped in 1905, when she was only fifteen. Even younger than Amber. After the child was born, she took it to the third floor of the tower, where she strangled it then took her own life, accounting for the first two hauntings.

In 1908 and 1909, Byron and Margaret died, the former of a heart attack near the lighthouse, the latter by throwing herself from the aptly named Widow's Peak at the seaward tip of the finger. That made four hauntings altogether.

Lizzie and Christabel Baudey moved in in 1912 and in 1914, the decapitated body of Ezra Wilder, spice merchant and captain of the clipper ship Golden Horde, was found. Soon, his ghost was sighted. The captain was in love with Lizzie, according to Eric, and that was something David wanted to verify.

The captain fascinated David. On the surface, the tale was such a traditional ghost story that he had always assumed that, though Wilder had been murdered in the lighthouse, the haunting aspects were probably born of repeated telling of the tale.

Wilder's was the first mysterious death to take place on Byron's Finger after Lizzie and Christabel moved in. He had, according to history, been the son of a naval officer who had been a close friend of Lizzie's father, and it was he who detoured his ship to the island where Lizzie was thought to be living.

Wilder had brought Lizzie and her daughter back to America, spiriting them away in the night and, though Lizzie was extremely happy to be rescued, the daughter was horrified. She wanted to stay with her father, who was also her teacher, but according to the legend, Lizzie hoped she would turn into a normal child once she was away from the voodoo priest's influence. She should have left her there.

Christabel would have despised Wilder, whom she considered her kidnapper. And, if Eric was right, and Lizzie and Wilder had fallen in love, this would have served to further anger the girl. She had to hate the man. Given the circumstances and her nature, how could she not?

Early in the morning, the lighthouse keeper had descended the stairs and discovered Ezra Wilder's headless body just inside the lighthouse. The head, never found, was assumed by police to have been thrown into the ocean, but the condition of the neck had confounded police: the severing had not been done with a blade, but gave the appearance of being torn off by a huge wild animal. The police normally closed the case, saying that a bear had probably wandered down from the mountains fifty miles to the east, and done the damage.

This was accepted for lack of a better explanation, even though the lighthouse keeper had insisted that sound carried very well up the tower and he would have heard the struggle. In response, it was suggested that the bear killed the captain elsewhere and deposited his body in the lighthouse. Pretty neat, for a bear.

The fact that Christabel had begun making dolls before the captain's death fascinated David. Was there a doll of Ezra Wilder and did she try to use it to murder him? David didn't believe sticking a pin in--or pulling the head off--a voodoo doll would work on anyone unless they believed in voodoo and knew it was being done. Wilder was well educated, which made it unlikely that he would buy into such things, but he was also a sailor, and they were often superstitious.

Masters, you’re reaching. If he believed Christabel stuck a pin in a dolls heart, he maybe, maybe, could have a heart attack, but there’s no way, no matter how devout a believer he was, that this knowledge would tear his head from his body! Christabel, David thought, might have been behind his death, just as the rumors said, but a couple big brawny guys who were well paid to take their time and make it messy, most likely had more to do with Wilder's appearance than anything Christabel did with an actual doll. Still, it made for fascinating fiction, and was all going gleefully into Mephisto Palace.

After Wilder's death, several more people died mysteriously in 1914 and 1915, though he could find no more reports of hauntings until late in 1915, after the mass murder occurred. About nine months before the massacre, Lizzie's legs were broken, and rumor had it that it was Christabel's doing. Then, after the tragedy, rumors of Christabel's ghost began to supersede all the others. He also found a few possible references to Lizzie's ghost, but, surprisingly, the expected raft of ghosts of dead customers and prostitutes didn't manifest. Also the doll collection disappeared, and many bodies, including the Baudeys', were never found. Find the dungeon, David thought and you'll find the bodies and the dolls.

He moved his cursor down the screen. The house remained empty until 1917, when Maxwell Patton moved in. A retired naval commodore and Lizzie's doting godfather, he had been named as beneficiary in her will. Patton opened the home to other retired seamen in 1918, but things never went smoothly.

There were a few humorous anecdotes about a lascivious ghost--rumored to be Christabel--who used the men for its carnal pleasures. Several of the elderly gents died of heart attacks in bed. The lighthouse ghost was seen repeatedly. In 1921, Patton closed the failing home and moved away. In 1924, a silent film was made in the empty house. The leading lady died there--a fall down the stairs--and a stand-in was used to complete it. The film was quickly and poorly made and David hadn't been able to find more than this reference to it, let alone a copy. He wondered if the movie company had ended up more interested in getting out alive than in making a picture.

The house began to fall into disrepair, then, in 1931, the commodore's heirs decided to have it restored and sold--but the project stalled after several workmen died under mysterious circumstances. It began again in 1934 and was successfully completed in 1936. The house was sold to swashbuckling actor Drake Roberts, he of the red bathroom, who wanted it for a weekend retreat. Roberts made great use of the ballroom to entertain his famous friends. A couple was found murdered, in a very compromising position, in the middle of the room after one party, and the double murder was never solved. Another guest fell from the lighthouse and Roberts died shortly thereafter, of a heart attack.

Still nothing about that damned dungeon! Scrolling further, David saw that Roberts's estate attempted to rent the property out in 1939. The only tenant who lasted longer than a few weeks died after two months. There were no. details on that death, but there were repeated reports in Drake Roberts's time concerning the lascivious female ghost and odd smells, including an odor of rotting bodies that sometimes rose through the floorboards of the house. The sounds of a baby crying in the tower were also reported by various visitors.

The house remained empty and forgotten from 1942 until 1946, when a group of spiritualists came in and tried to contact the spirits. Very little happened and the reputation of the place began to fade, though no one wanted to buy the house. Then, in 1952, the house was sold to the Buckners, who by all accounts were a typical all-American family. A "Leave It To Beaver" family, though David wondered about the truth of that considering the phallic latches had evidently remained in place. The Buckners were violently murdered six months later. Again unsolved, these murders were attributed by local police to sexually deviant drifters. David made a note to go down to the police station and introduce himself to the chief, Eric's uncle Craig Swenson, and ask about these murders. He returned to scanning his notes.