Defending the Dead (Relatively Dead Mysteries Book 3) Read online

  Abby had been momentarily distracted by his touch, which always triggered intense sensations, thanks to the ability they both possessed. She forced herself to focus on the conversation. Ned was taking her seriously. He wasn’t treating her like some silly little woman—wait, no, that would have been Brad. Ned was definitely not like Brad. “I suppose more genealogy. Every time one of these seeings happens, I’ve rushed to follow up that ancestry line, looking for connections. Maybe I need to be more thorough, because there are still a lot of bare branches in my family tree. And certainly I’ve got the resources to work with around here.”

  Even as she spoke, she realized there was a murky idea taking shape in her mind. “Ned,” she began tentatively, “we know that it takes a strong emotional state for these people to appear to us, right?”

  “Yes,” Ned agreed cautiously.

  “And what historical events bring about that kind of strong emotion? I’m not talking about individuals, because we’ve already seen people in cemeteries, and of course there’s a lot of sorrow or even anger associated with cemeteries. And we’ve found some others around the Revolutionary War, so war is clearly a big stressor. But there’s something else that was pretty intense in Massachusetts history.”

  “I’m not following. What?”

  “Salem. The witch frenzy. And I’ve already identified one ancestor who was accused. There may be more. Surely if we explore Salem, there’s something to be found there?”

  “Interesting,” Ned said. “And don’t forget Andover—there were about as many accusations thrown around there as in Salem, or Danvers, which used to be part of Salem. I think you’re on to something, Abby. It’s worth a try.”

  “Good. It’ll give me something to think about while I peel all those walls.”

  2

  The next day Abby reluctantly went back to stripping walls in the front parlor. There were not one but two parlors, roughly the same size, separated by the original pocket doors. It struck her as kind of ridiculous. She didn’t know what to do with one, much less two of them. She didn’t have many friends in the area, and those she did have and would consider inviting to her home she would probably drag straight to the kitchen, which is where she spent most of her time because it seemed friendlier. How had Victorians decided who rated front parlor status versus back parlor? Anyway, she thought she would start the stripping in the front parlor because even though nobody used that room, it was the first one any visitor saw, and its walls looked as though they had a severe case of leprosy. She had a suspicion that nobody had used it for a long time—maybe they just shut all the doors and pretended it wasn’t there.

  A hundred-plus years added up to a good number of layers of paper, even for a room that didn’t get much wear and tear. Five, to be precise, the most recent added in the 1970s, an unfortunate era for amateur interior design. Below that, there was a layer from the 1940s, which was at least bland. When she got down to the original layer, which had survived here and there, she rather regretted that it was gone: it was dark and elaborately floral, but at least it fit with the room. It was also backed by what looked like a burlap bag, and as thick as canvas, which would have made it difficult to remove if the glue hadn’t long since given up its grip.

  As she had said to Ned the night before, having a project that occupied her mind would make this work go faster. Still, she had set herself the task, and it would feel like cheating to abandon a messy task to go play in various local archives, which she was looking forward to. Besides, she needed to think about what she wanted to look for, not just jump in and wander aimlessly in local libraries. The idea of researching the witch frenzy appealed to her: it was something most people thought they knew something about, but the details were kind of murky, and from what little she’d read or heard about it, there were some conflicting theories about what really had gone on. No matter what the cause, it was something that lingered in the cultural memory, particularly in Massachusetts. People were still talking about Salem and the witches over three hundred years later.

  What seemed odd to her, coming at it with fresh—or at least uninformed—eyes, was that it had exploded so quickly and died away equally quickly. The insanity had lasted barely more than a year, and had mostly been confined to a fairly small area. From Lexington she could drive to Salem in less than half an hour; from Salem to Andover in not much more. Of course, distances might have seemed longer back in 1692, but the spread of the madness had been limited. And given how small the population must have been, everybody must have known everybody else back then.

  She shivered: she hadn’t faced the question she was really asking, which was “why?” Okay, people had always been suspected of witchcraft, for centuries, long before Europeans settled in America. People, especially those clustered in tribes or groups, tended to be afraid of whatever they didn’t understand or couldn’t explain. Sadly, they often tried to destroy it. Maybe they believed that if a member of the group possessed special powers, he or she was a threat to the survival of the group itself, and had to go. The thing was, she didn’t believe in witches, or at least not as humans possessing supernatural powers. More likely they were simply smart, observant people who acquired certain skills, like healing the sick as far as was possible then, and for that they were sometimes put to death. Why was it those suspicious villagers tended to focus on the bad stuff, like the idea that witches made people sick rather than curing them? Why was it that hate and anger always seemed to trump kindness and comfort?

  And what did it have to do with her? That was the underlying issue she was dancing around. Abby was gradually coming to terms with the idea that she had an ability that most people did not. But she was aware that if she talked about it, people would label her as crazy and fear her. Oh, yeah, Abby—she hears voices. She belongs in the loony bin. Or, There’s medication for that now. Just take your pills, dear, and it will all go away. Which didn’t solve anything. She didn’t exactly welcome whatever it was, but she didn’t want it to go away either, medicated into submission. Still, she couldn’t let other people know about it.

  But Ned understood. How lucky was she, that she had just happened to meet him on a house tour in Waltham? When she’d tried to explain what was happening to her to Brad back then, he had predictably told her she was crazy, that she needed to get out more, find some friends, keep busy. It hadn’t been a warm and sympathetic reaction, but in a way she couldn’t blame him for that; he had never been a very imaginative person, except when he was visualizing his shining career path. But Ned got it, because he shared it, even though he hadn’t really admitted it to himself when they first met. So in a way, whatever she learned would help both of them.

  Scrape, scrape. Sometimes she got lucky and a couple of long strips peeled off easily. More often she had to hack away at stubborn spots with her trusty putty knife, while trying not to damage the plaster beneath. Nice plaster, it was—smooth and strong. Some nail holes here and there, showing where people had hung pictures in the past. Now and then she’d come upon a patched hole, which based on its size she guessed was where there had once been a gas line for a wall sconce—there were still a few in the upstairs bedrooms that nobody had bothered to remove. Abby couldn’t imagine how bright—or more likely, not bright—a gas-lit room would be. Nor could she imagine trying to read either a book or a newspaper in that era, since both used extremely small print, or to sew or do embroidery or anything dainty like that. What the heck had people done after dark back then? Held sing-alongs around an upright piano—that came with its own brackets for candles?

  Abby, you’re still ducking the issue: Would you have been labeled a witch in 1692? And would somebody have wanted you to die for it?

  She didn’t believe in witches. She did believe that her gift or power or whatever could have come down through the family genes, somehow. It wasn’t gender linked, so it could have come from any number of family lines. The immediate question was, had any of her ancestors been accused of witchcraft? Or had they laid l
ow, kept their unusual abilities to themselves, and prayed that no one would look their way? Either way, if there were ancestors, or if there were others in extreme fear, would she be able to sense them somewhere in Andover or Salem? Or the residue of the community’s shared fear?

  It wasn’t purely selfish or indulgent on her part to look into this, because there was Ellie to consider. Abby knew firsthand that Ellie was seeing people who were not there. Being young, she took it in stride, but even she had figured out that other people didn’t see them and she’d better keep her mouth shut or they’d say she was weird and shun her. Shunning could be very painful when you were in second grade. And look at how her mother, Leslie, had reacted. She and Ned had tried to explain, as best they could, what they understood of the phenomenon, and had gently tried to break it to Leslie that Ellie had the same ability. But Leslie had gone ballistic and shut them out of her and Ellie’s lives. After working with her for months, Abby knew that Leslie was an intelligent, educated woman with an understanding of history. But she was also a mother. To have a “psychic” child was not something Leslie had been prepared to deal with. Who would be? Still, Abby hoped for everyone’s sake that Leslie would reach out so they could all figure out the best way to handle things. She’d said her piece; now it was up to Leslie to make a move.

  By midday she had cleared another wall, but she’d had enough. Outside it was a beautiful day; what was she doing cooped up inside? She should get out, do something, and come back refreshed.

  What about Salem?

  The thought popped into her head, although she shouldn’t have been surprised since she’d been talking about it earlier. And as she had told herself, it was only a half hour away. She could go and scout out the scene, since she had never been there. She seemed to recall reading The House of Seven Gables back in high school, and she’d visited Nathaniel Hawthorne’s grave in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery in Concord—not as an homage to the author, but because she had found ancestors right down the hill from his resting place. Fine: she could combine a trip to a literary landmark in Salem with some ghost hunting. Abby, that sounds so silly! But “dead seeking” didn’t sound any better, nor “trolling for ancestors.” All right, she would visit Salem and see what she could see. If anything.

  She cleaned the worst of the wallpaper gunk off, grabbed a quick sandwich, and set off for Salem. The sun was shining, birds were singing, a few hardy plants were blooming—she’d already learned that spring came late to Massachusetts—and she felt freed. The house was great, or would be when they were finished fixing it, but she needed to have some kind of life outside its walls. There was a lot of the state she hadn’t seen—and a lot of ancestors to track down. She definitely needed to get out more.

  She arrived in Salem shortly after two, and found Hawthorne’s famous house easily enough. There was even parking available on this weekday. When she got out of the car she walked around the building, trying to count the gables, which wasn’t easy. Then she strolled toward the end of the lane, where there was water. She chided herself for not looking at a map: Was this a river? A harbor? Somehow she had never pictured the place as near water, but then, she had some vague memory that Salem had been a busy port back in the eighteenth century, so of course there had to be water. She was beginning to feel undereducated, so she went into the building, paid the entrance fee, and took the tour.

  In short order she learned from the well-informed tour guide that the building was actually the Turner-Ingersoll mansion, dating from 1668, and that Nathaniel Hawthorne had been born in the house in 1804 and spent some time there as a small child. The house and the land constituted their own National Historic Landmark District. When the tour was over, Abby drifted toward the gift shop—the oldest building on the site, dating from 1655, according to her pamphlet—and dutifully bought herself a new copy of Hawthorne’s book. Then she found a bench outside in a sunny spot, shut her eyes and waited to see if any ancestors appeared. Nothing. She sighed: it would have been kind of nice to be connected to Nathaniel Hawthorne. She felt she already knew him in a way, from his time in Concord, and based on portraits she had seen, he had been a rather handsome young man. But he had also been very attached to his wife, who had died far from home, along with their small daughter. There would have been sufficient anguish in Nathaniel’s life to carry him through to Abby’s senses now, if there were a connection. Well, she couldn’t be related to everyone in New England. Could she?

  It was still early enough to walk around a bit and get the lay of the land. Leaving her car behind, Abby wandered away from the water, crossing one street, heading toward the next major cross street. The street she was on was narrow and not particularly interesting—mostly nineteenth-century houses, she guessed. But . . . halfway up the block she felt something odd, a sort of shimmer, and the street in front of her wavered. She stopped abruptly. She felt fine, didn’t she? Maybe she’d sat in the sun too long, and should have thought to wear a hat. She waited, but the odd sensation didn’t come again. There was no one around, nothing happening. She moved on, more slowly, toward the larger street.

  A discreet sign suggested she turn left if she wanted to see the Witch House, so she did. She found it a few blocks away, embedded in yet another nondescript neighborhood. Funny how the very old, the modern, and everything in between were jumbled together. It was the older buildings that had been here before, with nothing around them, and then the city had filled in the spaces.

  She walked to the front of the building and looked at it. Good-sized, but clad with dark wood, with small windows. Old—as old as the other house, only a few blocks away.

  It happened again, the shimmer, stronger this time. She was still standing on the street, looking at the house, but at the same time she was seeing it in its earlier form—no trees in front, no houses around it, merely a very respectable wooden house, no doubt belonging to some wealthy man. It was disconcerting, the way her view of it kept shifting back and forth. What was going on? She knew where she was, but how was she seeing it? Through whose eyes?

  And what did this person feel? Anger. Outrage. With a touch of fear. Strong.

  And then the “seeing” snapped shut, leaving Abby standing on the sidewalk, bewildered. For a moment she couldn’t decide what to do—go back to the car? Take the tour? No, she didn’t want to listen to another lecture, but she did need to know whose house it was. A convenient sign was set next to the front door, so she read that. The house had been the home of Judge Jonathan Corwin—one of the judges who had presided at the witch trials. And she had “seen” through someone who had hated him. She had an ancestor from Salem, but she had no idea who it was.

  Abby turned on her heel and walked back to her car, her mind spinning. She was too distracted to think about driving yet, so she found the bench she had sat on earlier and tried to calm herself. She studied the house in front of her: the stylistic and structural details matched those of the Witch House. They would have been in their respective places at the same time. Had anything lain between them? There was so much she didn’t know about Salem, but she’d never had any reason to dig into its history. The place had merited maybe a paragraph in her high school American history book. Yet here she was, and she had a link to the place. And that upset her. From what little she could recall, the witch trials had been a terrible time here, although mercifully short. There had been a lot of pain and anger and fear—and she had sensed just a hint of it. She needed to know more. She needed to get home and figure out who her link to this place was.

  3

  On the drive home, Abby debated about what to tell Ned. She’d already kind of made the case that Salem would be a good test case. What she’d found today only reinforced that. But what she had sensed had been fragmentary and inconclusive. She was pretty sure that she had had an ancestor there, and that that person had been angry at one of the witch trial judges, but that was the extent of what she knew. Her family tree was pitifully sparse, and she knew how much time it took to fill in any branc
h of it—and back that far, there were plenty of branches. Would it be better or worse if she could sense anybody’s strong emotions? No, that would be chaotic. It was confusing enough having to deal with only relatives.

  In the end she told Ned over dinner that she had taken a quick trip up to Salem to get some basic information about the place, but she hadn’t delved any deeper. There would be time enough to involve Ned once she knew something more specific.

  The next morning found her back on her ladder, scraping. The longer she worked, the more her skills at removing paper and gunk from the walls improved, and by the end of the day she had managed to clear most of the front parlor’s walls. Drifts of gummy paper littered the floor. Abby hadn’t bothered to protect the floor, because some idiot a couple of decades earlier had decided that stick-on vinyl tiles were a good idea. She’d pulled up a few, enough to tell that there was some lovely inlay bordering the wood floor, but it was going to take a lot more work to remove the tiles and clean off the adhesive without messing up the wood. Not for the first time she cursed the former inhabitants of the house, who had either done nothing or had made fast and cheap “improvements” that were now falling apart. Some people just didn’t appreciate what they had. Or what they didn’t have: taste.

  She was surprised to hear her doorbell ring. The front door had one of those manual twist kinds of bell, polished brass, probably original to the house (she couldn’t imagine any of the clueless prior owners finding and installing it), and its ring was distinctive. She didn’t hear it often. The only people who seemed to use it were delivery people arriving with special shipments of something or other that Ned had ordered. She looked down at her sticky clothes. Maybe she’d scare off whoever it was. She certainly wasn’t going to shake hands, or they’d stick together.