Charlaine Harris - Crimes by Moonlight

Slumped in an easy chair that was an uneasy match to the couch was Josh Lincoln, who looked to be about the same age as our county dispatcher. He had on black sneakers, blue jeans, and a black long-sleeved T-shirt that had the same logo displayed on the van outside. There were tattoos on the back of his hands, and he had earrings in both ears. His dark hair was in a ponytail, and he was just staring at his feet.

“Mr. Toland? Sir?”

Ralph looked up, like he just recognized that someone else was in the room, and said, “Yes?”

“Sir, I’m Chief Hoyt Graham, Salem Falls Police. Is there a place where we could talk, just for a few minutes? Just the two of us?”

“Um, sure,” he said, getting up from the couch, squeezing his wife’s free hand. “Sure, come with me,” and then Carrie looked up at him, her face pinched, and whispered, “Your fault, damn you, your fault.”

He sighed and ran a hand across the top of his head, and I followed him as he walked into a kitchen, flicking on a light. I took in all the stainless steel gear and thought my wife would drool at seeing such a display. He took a stool and so did I, and I said, “I know you’ve talked to Officer Harris, but I just want to hear it from you, what happened.”

He shook his head and sighed and said, “Damn… I mean, it seemed like a hoot at the time, you know? I was watching some TV last month, saw this program on the paranormal, and saw a bit on an outfit called the New England Ghost Hunters. And Carrie and I thought it would be great to have someone come here and investigate our house.”

Sure, I thought. Your idea and your wife’s idea. I wasn’t buying it, but I went on and said, “And what would be the purpose of this… investigation?”

He shrugged. “Some publicity. We’re thinking of converting this place into a bed-and-breakfast, and we thought a television program about what’s been going on here would be wonderful in getting our name out to the public.”

“Has the planning board approved your proposal?”

“Not yet, but our lawyer’s confident it will get approval.”

I flipped over a page in the notebook and thought, Then your lawyer doesn’t know Salem Falls that well, but poor Ralph was already having a terrible night, so I didn’t want to add to his misery. Aloud I said, “So tell me, sir, what’s been going on that you thought about bringing in ghost hunters?”

Ralph looked embarrassed and said, “Oh, stuff.”

“What stuff?”

“Well… ever since we moved in, there’s been… incidents.”

I tried to keep the impatience out of my voice. “Like what? I don’t like games, Mr. Toland, so tell me what’s been going on here, what’s occurred so that you felt compelled to bring in two strangers from Massachusetts to spend the night here, one of whom is now dead in your house.”

That certainly got his attention, and he stared at a point about a foot above my left shoulder and said, “Little stuff at first. Carrie’s always on me for leaving the toilet seat up, and I swear, I always put the seat down… and she’d always find it up. And doors would open and shut by themselves… and you’d be walking down the stairs and man, you’d just get a blast of cold air… and at night… well, sometimes it got worse at night.”

I didn’t say a word. Just waited, and he added, “Just as you’d be drifting off to sleep, there’d be whispers out there, whispers that you could barely hear… and when you’d sit up, they’d go away. Or if you went around, thinking maybe the TV or a radio was left on, there’d be nothing. But back into bed… more whispers. And… shadows on the wall… odd lights that would just flicker at the corner of your eye…”

I sighed. “Mr. Toland… this house is more than a century old. Odd things happen to the foundation. The house can settle and either close or open doors, make creaking noises, or let in drafts that’ll freeze your fingers. Old pipes can rattle or gurgle water… make it sound like whispers. And lights… the eye can play tricks at night, especially… well, especially when you’re predisposed to think something’s going on.”

He stopped staring over my shoulder, now looked at my face. He said, “Two weeks ago, my wife woke up screaming, saying something cold had grabbed onto her foot. And before you ask, no, it wasn’t me. So don’t tell me it’s just an old house, all right?”

I went to my notebook. “All right, we’ll leave that be. Now, tell me about these two ghost hunters.”

Another shrug. “At the time… like I said, it was just a hoot. I called their one-eight-hundred number, they came up here, asked if they could spend the night, and we said, sure. They have all this gear, you know, cameras that can take pictures in the night, stuff that measures variations in temperature and electromagnetic radiation. I was going to stay up with them, but they said, no, they got better results with the homeowners not being present. So Carrie and I went to bed, and just before two a.m… I woke up, heard some screaming, and then a thumping sound, and then more yelling. That’s when I got out of bed.”

“Where did you go?”

“Up to where I heard Josh yelling, yelling about his bud Peter. His friend… it was awful. Blood everywhere. And that’s when I had Carrie call nine-one-one.”

“And what was Josh yelling about his friend Peter?”

“Upset talk… that’s all… that he had fallen, was bleeding hard, what was he going to tell his parents, stuff like that.”

“All right,” I said. “Is there anything else you can tell me that might help with our investigation?”

He shook his head. “To think something like this would happen in our house…”

And I don’t know, maybe I was feeling grumpy or something for being woken up and having my weekend ruined, but I said, “Oh, one thing, Mr. Toland. Just so you know.”

“What’s that?”

“Earlier you said this was your house. Not entirely accurate. This is the Logan house, named after the man who built it, back in 1882. It may be your house for a while, but it will always be the Logan house. Funny thing, I know, but that’s one of the funny things about small towns. Now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to talk to your wife for a few minutes.”

I don’t think Mr. Toland liked being corrected like that, and truth be told, I didn’t particularly care.

NEXT I spoke to Carrie Toland in her fine kitchen, which was mostly a waste of time. She was at times weepy and other times angry, and she mostly repeated what her husband had said, with one notable exception, that the visit of the alleged paranormal experts was entirely her husband’s idea, and not hers.

And when Peter had died a couple of hours ago, she was fast asleep and heard a thump, and yelling, and that’s all she knew. She got up from bed with her husband, went upstairs to the second-floor landing, and when she saw the blood on the stairs and the crumpled form of Peter, she retreated back downstairs to the living room and called 911.

“All right,” I said, looking at my notebook. “But tell me this. Your husband claims that ever since you moved into the house, that there’s been… incidents. True?”

She tried to draw her bathrobe even closer about her neck. “I… I don’t know.”

“Could you be a bit more precise, Mrs. Toland?”

“Ralph… he’s really the one who thinks something’s been going on here. At first, it was a little joke, you know? That there was somebody else living here, somebody sharing our house. We even talked about charging rent or something… just a little joke.”