A Conventional Murder, page 9
part #2 of Megan Montaigne Series
“For barely a year,” Kendall said. “Three years ago. It didn’t last.”
“Petra Bates?” Megan asked. A new name to research.
“No, she kept her name. Petra Ferris.”
“Oh,” said Megan. Unfortunate, she thought. Patrick Bates and Petra Bates, she thought; if biographies had been written about them, they’d have been shelved right next to each other in the biography section. The ultimate romance story. A story that would never be written, she thought melodramatically. “And the guy?” she asked. “Topher?”
“Topher Holliday.” Kendall was still gazing at the couple with hostility, but the hostility was somehow distant, as though she’d settled her face on that expression she had when thinking about how she didn’t like them, but she’d gone on to think about something else.
Megan took a breath. Was Kendall just unfriendly in general or was it something about Megan, or the convention, or the situation the made her so cold? She’d seemed friendly the first time Megan met her, but then things changed. One of her colleagues had been murdered, Megan told herself. Everyone would be off kilter for a while.
“Were you close to Patrick?” Megan ventured. “Did you know him?”
Kendall shot a look at Megan that Megan couldn’t read. After a beat, she spoke. “Everyone knew Patrick.”
That was not particularly helpful, Megan thought. “That’s what Isabelle told me,” she said, nodding at the young woman still locked in an uncomfortable conversation with a seemingly uninterested victim. “Or rather, she told me everyone liked him.”
Kendall pursed her lips. “Isabelle is crazy,” she said. “Not even a writer, hardly. She stalked Patrick. My guess is she came here just to be near him.”
“Patrick was familiar with her?” Megan asked.
“She sent him emails almost every day,” Kendall said. “He blocked her on Instagram and Facebook once but she made a new account and told him how weird it was that the programs had blocked her. She didn’t think it was possible he’d done it himself.”
“Had they spent time together before this trip?” Megan said. “I know they … met up the night before he died. Was that the first time they were together?”
This time, Kendall’s eye roll was out in the open. “She would occasionally find out where he was going and plan her own trips there. She’d stalk him all day and then laugh when they ‘just happened’ to be in the same place at the same time. She followed him to …” Kendall let the thought trail off.
“To …?” Megan pressed, but Kendall was done. The travel writer turned and stepped away just far enough to make it clear that their conversation was over, leaving Megan wondering where Isabelle might have followed Patrick to, and why, and what might have happened.
Heath’s reappearance put an end to her pondering. “Sorry about that,” he said to Megan with a smile. “That’s Sidney Remington. He’s the one who owns the hospital and all the land around it. They’re going to turn this into a hotel, and construction starts next week. That’s the contractor he’s with. They’re checking out the site today. Just wanted a quick word,” he said.
“Ohhhh,” said Megan. “Turning it into a hotel. That explains it. That’s why they’re opening it up to the travel writers, I’ll bet. Publicity.”
Kendall’s ears had perked up at the conversation and she stepped over. “They’re turning this haunted hospital into a hotel?” Opportunity flashed in her eyes as she sauntered over to where Sidney was standing with the contractor. Megan noticed a slight extra swing to Kendall’s hips. It seemed Sidney noticed it as well, as his eyes lit up on her approach.
Megan couldn’t hear the conversation, but was intrigued by the interplay of body language. First, Kendall seemed open and even seductive, like she was trying to spin Sidney into her web. She handed him her business card, which he received with a wink. Then he said something and she stiffened, making him laugh with what seemed like a bit of malice. Kendall’s smile turned cold—the smile Megan recognized too well—and she turned and tromped away. Sidney’s eyes followed her bottom, which was swinging much less on her retreat. He shook his head in bemusement and turned back to the contractor.
“What do you suppose that was about?” Heath said quietly.
“Who knows,” said Megan, just as quietly, “but I am more and more intrigued by that woman.”
Heath raised his eyebrows, but didn’t ask anything further; he had a group to lead. “Everyone!” he called out in a booming outside voice. Once he had the attention of most of the people present, he continued. “Sorry about the delay there, but we’re ready to go now. I’m Heath, your guide as we go through what used to be the Northwest Hospital for the Mentally Infirm. I’m a member of the Skagit Valley Paranormal Investigators, which recently did a full week-long assessment of the buildings and area. I can tell you, this space has an extraordinary amount of paranormal activity. Much of this old building is not normally open to the public, but today the owner has agreed to let us in. Please be respectful both of the building, and of the residents.”
Heath turned to check the path behind him to make sure it was clear, then started walking half-backwards toward the hospital while still talking to the travelers. “This hospital was built in 1911, a time when medicine and our understanding of mental health were a bit different than they are today,” he said, and his audience laughed encouragingly. “Due to poor care, failed experimental surgeries, some less-than-professional staff, and a general operational philosophy that would, hopefully, shut down any facility today, many people died here.”
He stopped at a gate that was already open. “And, I might add, after this week, the place won’t be the same. So take the time to walk quietly, to listen. Keep your eyes and ears open. The science is not complete on ghosts.” The audience again laughed amicably. “Will they stay when this place has been turned into a hotel? Will they luxuriate in the new king size beds, much better than the narrow cots they once found themselves chained to? Or will they finally move on to a more restful resting place in the great beyond?”
Megan shuddered at the thought of patients chained to beds. Heath saw, and wiggled his eyebrows at her.
“People,” he said, raising his voice again, “here’s what you can expect. There’s a woman in a white dress.” He turned to a woman standing next to him. “There’s always a woman in a white dress, isn’t there? This one, they say, is a nurse named Esther who was strangled by a patient who had made his way loose from his bonds. She wanders the halls and the room where she was strangled. There is a staircase at the end of the building,” he tilted his head toward one end of the hospital, “where, it is rumored, another nurse once pushed an eight-year-old boy down the steps. That boy, they say, named William, has never left those stairs. Maybe today will be the day you’ll walk right through him?” A tittering of voices rippled through the visitors. “When we go through the surgery, keep an eye on the people around you. Many people report feeling they’ve been touched … when there’s no one near them. Throughout the building, you might feel like someone is standing beside you or watching you, and when you turn, no one will be there. You might feel a cold spot, or the air might feel thick, like water. You might feel like someone has pushed you.” He pushed the air with his hands to demonstrate, his eyes glittering with delight. “There might be sounds that have no origin—you’ll think you heard a thump on the floor, or a door slam but all the doors are open, or you’ll hear a chair screeching across the room but the chairs haven’t moved. A door might open or close on its own. Or maybe someone will speak to you.” There was a small gasp from one of the group. “Yes, that’s right, I’ve heard it myself, the voice of a woman saying ‘I’m here,’ right next to me, when no one was there.” He looked around and let his words sink in, then continued.
“Outside, we’ll go by an old crypt, and you’ll want to be careful there, too,” Heath said. “Some say that when they’ve gotten to the bottom of the stairs, they’ve turned around to find a young man standing on the steps, blocking the way back up. All told, there are at least nine ghosts haunting these grounds, we believe. Probably more. You are welcome to use your cameras and flashlights. Try not to flash your lights in other people’s eyes. I have a few EMF meters that you’re welcome to use.” He tapped a large bag at his side. “Your cell phones or some electrical outlets will likely trigger a reading, so if the lights spike, make sure you’re not near anything manmade before you jump to conclusions. And if you feel the hair rise up on the back of your neck …” he paused for dramatic effect. “Then be careful that you don’t become ghost number ten.”
Several people swarmed forward to claim the EMF meters, and soon there were none left. After a quick explanation of how to use them, Heath led the group up the wide front steps to the spacious porch and into the large building. People rubbed their arms and giggled as they walked through the various hospital rooms, laughing at sounds they weren’t sure they’d heard or conjured up in their own minds, trying to determine if the room was cold or it was just their imaginations. Occasionally the lights from the EMF meters jumped from one green light to two, and even more rarely up into the orange, for just a millisecond. But no ghosts seemed to want to stay and chat. After a while, they went through to the morgue, which Megan thought would be creepy even if no one ever claimed it was haunted, and then on to a large room with tiled walls and floors, open holes in the walls, and some old, rusted-out plumbing.
“This was once a communal shower area,” Heath said. “They weren’t too concerned about patient privacy in those days. A ghost named Robert is often encountered here. Let’s see if we can convince him to talk to us.” Heath was about to continue when someone cried out.
“What is that!” screamed a woman standing by a wall. She was pointing at a mirror, onto which someone had written I KNOW WHAT YOU DID in bright red lipstick. Quickly recovering, she laughed at herself. “That scared me! I think my nerves are on end!”
Heath laughed as well, and the tension in the group quickly dissipated. Heath tried a few times to get Robert or any other ghost to come forward and speak, or to make the EMT meter lights move, but after five minutes he gave up. He led the group back to the hallway and outside to the crypt. “There’s not room down there for everyone,” he said as people peered down the stairs, “so take turns, if you would. Be careful not to disrupt The Man on the Steps!” he said, wavering his voice in spooky effect. People lined up to head into the underground chamber, going in looking a little fearful and coming out all smiles, somewhat relieved to be aboveground again, unscathed.
Heath turned to Megan as they stood waiting for everyone to make their way through the crypt. “That message in the shower room,” he said in a low voice. “I was here earlier to check everything, and that wasn’t there.”
Megan’s eyes snapped to the guide. “It wasn’t? But who …?”
Heath shrugged. “I’m told kids get in here all the time. Probably just a prank. The gate was open, and it shouldn’t have been. Remington’s people have been really lax about keeping the place locked tight. There’s nothing too hazardous here. They just have it boarded up to keep people out. But with the construction coming up, people have been through here every day. Wouldn’t be at all surprised if someone forgot to lock up. Who knows?” he said.
But Megan wasn’t convinced—either about the assertion that there was nothing hazardous in the space, or the idea that random kids had come by to write on the mirror. Who had put the message up just before the travelers arrived, and for whom was the message meant? Without having to look, she knew that it would be impossible to differentiate footprints, with their own group of fifty having traipsed through every room without a care, as well as all the construction workers, contractors, Sidney Remington, and who knew who else. She pulled out her phone and sent a quick text to Max.
Strange message on mirror at haunted hospital, she wrote. I KNOW WHAT YOU DID. In lipstick.
A few seconds passed, then Max’s reply came through: ???
Yeah, could just be kids and a prank, Megan wrote. Wanted you to know. Will talk more when I’m back.
10-4 good buddy, Max replied. Will check it out.
Megan put her phone back in her purse. She scanned the crowd for anyone looking particularly guilty or smug, but much to her disappointment no one was wearing an expression that said, “I murdered Patrick and then wrote in lipstick on a mirror.” She sighed. Then, a chirp of a laugh to her left caught her attention. She looked and saw Petra and Topher, having already made their way through the crypt, standing there and giggling once again. “Time to introduce myself,” Megan thought.
Trying to look nonchalant and not at all like she was channeling her inner Miss Marple, Megan strolled over to the fit and firm adventure travelers. “Hello,” she said when they looked up to see who was approaching. Or rather, Megan thought, who was invading their space. Neither looked particularly pleased to have their conversation interrupted.
“Hi,” said Petra warily. Topher scowled but nodded.
“I’m Megan Montaigne, Library Director,” Megan said. She let her face fall into a serious and compassionate expression. “You’re Petra. I’ve just learned you used to be married to Patrick Bates. I wanted to extend my sympathies. I can’t imagine what you’re going through.” Don’t ramble, Megan told herself. Miss Marple didn’t ramble.
Petra’s expression scrambled for a moment, like she, too, was trying to decide what face to put on in this situation. She settled on something between sad and heartbroken.
“Yeah,” she said. “I can’t believe it. It’s awful.” She glanced up at Topher. “Terrible.”
Topher nodded but looked unmoved, and Megan thought she had perhaps never seen a squarer jawline. He then looked away, like he was trying not to be part of the conversation, like a three-year-old who thinks if he can’t see you, then you can’t see him.
Fascinated as she was by this man, Megan dragged her eyes back to Petra. “How long were you married?” she asked.
Petra flinched slightly. “About eight months,” she said, lifting one side of her mouth into a half smile. “Just didn’t work out.”
Megan felt an abundance of awkwardness around these two people. It puzzled her, sometimes, how people could be so exuberant with some people but so uncomfortable around others. Petra and Topher, for example, seemed like two peas in a pod, at least from a distance. But Megan could hardly figure out how to communicate with Petra, and she wasn’t even going to try with Topher. She decided it was the situation more than anything; surely that was the problem. How to ask what she wanted to know without seeming crass or sounding like she was interrogating them. Given more time she could have slipped her questions into a normal conversation. But here, in the haunted gardens of a haunted hospital, none of it came naturally. Did you kill him? Did you have reason to kill him? Did you hate him? Did he hate you?
Almost everyone gets impatient with long stands of silence, though, and as Megan twirled the questions around in her head trying to figure out how to phrase them, Petra grew fidgety.
“We parted on good terms,” she said. Quite apropos of nothing, Megan thought, which was very interesting. Of all the things Petra wanted Megan to know, this, to Petra, was most important. That said something, though Megan wasn’t sure what.
Petra’s glance slid up to Topher’s eyes. He was still focused intently on something in the distance, but his square jaw seemed to be clenching and unclenching.
“It was amicable?” Megan said, pretending she didn’t notice Topher.
“He was a great man,” Petra said with a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “Everyone loved him. Ask anyone.” With her head she gestured toward all the other travel writers in the garden, and her look said: Go on. I mean it. Leave me and ask anyone.
Megan paused, but realized she wasn’t likely to get much more out of this exchange today. At least she’d made an introduction, and maybe she could catch Petra alone later. Topher seemed to be the brick wall in this situation, almost literally. Petra by herself might be more willing to talk.
“Again, my condolences,” Megan said, and she walked away. She was so lost in thought that she didn’t notice Kendall sidle up to her as she was walking.
“It wasn’t amicable,” Kendall said to Megan, quietly, looking at the fog that still clung to the air, creating a ceiling that could, perhaps, contain even ghosts.
“What?” said Megan, pulling her brain out of its own fog.
“Petra and Patrick. She was a gold digger. He was already doing well from his YouTube channel. Lots of money, a lot of followers, a lot of promise. She wanted in on that. A free ride. The second she had a ring on her finger her true colors came out. Belittling, condescending, contemptuous, demanding. Piece of work, that one,” Kendall said, then she veered right, walking away from Megan.
Megan shook her head, wondering if all of Kendall’s conversations were like that: bump in, say her piece, and leave before anyone could contribute or contradict or question. Before there were any consequences for her words. Before there was any possibility of connection.
Once everyone had had sufficient time at the crypt, with no ghostly apparitions appearing but many selfies taken, Heath led the group on to a secondary building.
“This is where they housed the most insane patients,” he said. “This is where they lived …” another pause for dramatic effect. “… and died. Dozens of patients died here of neglect, of botched surgeries, of experimental lobotomies, and more. At least two ghosts frequent these rooms, I’m told … but never at the same time.” The group wandered through the old rooms with high ceilings and an abundance of rusted out beds, people occasionally tapping each other on one shoulder and yelling “boo!” over the other shoulder, laughing at themselves and not believing but all the while hoping to be the ones who might actually witness something worth writing a blog post about.
After his patrons had enough, Heath led the group around the back to an overgrown old cemetery, the headstones tilted and crumbling or fallen completely. The group’s voices dropped to whispers, out of respect for those buried and out of the inevitable sense of the shortness of life, the awareness of one’s own mortality that cemeteries bring.
