That didn’t stop the proliferation of “authentic” photos of ghosts, and Wayne himself had included orb photos taken at the White Horse Inn with his promotional materials. He did add a disclaimer at the bottom, stating, “Orb photography is a controversial field and opinions vary on its research validity,” but it was like a beer-can label that warned alcohol could impair your motor skills. The warning itself was good publicity.
As Wayne scanned the crawl space, looking for good locations to post the cameras, the shadows shifted at the far end of the attic. A wall vent covered with wire mesh and wooden slats allowed air to circulate in the attic, and thin slices of sunlight leaked through. Passing clouds could cause a change in brightness, altering the quality of light in the entire attic.
Groovy effect, now all I need is a ragged sheet on a coat hanger...
The shadows shifted again, though the air was still.
Wayne crept forward, keeping his head low so he wouldn’t bump it on the rafters. The flashlight’s globe bobbed in front of him and the boards creaked beneath his boots. The hairs on his neck tingled–the wiring, it’s an EMF effect on my brain circuitry–and the air seemed charged with an expectant weight. A papery rustle in the walls, probably the migration of disturbed mice, sounded almost like a whisper.
Cumulatively, the various phenomena could be called an “encounter,” but Wayne knew them for what they were. Suggestion, a mild alteration in the physical environment, and cultural folklore meant that if it walked like a ghost, talked like a ghost, and shat like a ghost, it was ghost. The image of ghostly turds made him suppress a grin.
Then the shadow moved again.
Mice.
A chunk of darkness pulled itself free and moved near a crusted brick chimney. Wayne flicked his beam toward it, and the black outline grew more vivid.
It was a human form.
A brittle, high frequency pierced his ears and his teeth jolted as if he were chewing tin foil.
The whisper came again, and this time the wind was quiet and the words were clear and in a language mice never spoke outside of Saturday-morning cartoons: “You’re blinding me.”
Wayne retreated a step and his skull knocked against a support post, sending squiggly lime sparks across the backs of his eyelids. His flashlight bounced to the decking and went out. He wobbled and hugged the post for balance.
The temperature in the attic dropped 10 degrees and the electrical surge rippled from his head to his toes.
The wind, dummy, it’s November. And mice. Yeah. Mice.
He squinted into the darkness, orienting himself by the distant square light of the access door and the zebra-striped vent. The dark form now blended into the black space of the attic, and it was easy to believe he’d imagined the whole thing.
But that didn’t stop his heart from hammering like a man trapped in a coffin.
“Wayne?” Burton called.
He swallowed and his throat chafed as if the air had turned to sawdust. “I’m okay,” he croaked.
“What’s going on?”
“Nothing.”
“I heard a couple of bumps.”
“I dropped my light.” Wayne reached out with the tip of his boot, probing for the flashlight, wondering what he would do if something grabbed his foot.
Burton’s head poked up through the access opening and he swept a flashlight across the attic until Wayne stood in its spotlight like a cabaret dancer on stage. He blinked into the light–You’re blinding me–and then glanced toward the chimney.
The shape was gone, just as he knew it would be.
Because it had never been there.
We made a promise, Beth, but neither of us believed it. And lying gets easier as you get older.
He stooped and gathered his flashlight from its bed of shredded paper. He tested it and found it still worked. “Okay, pass me a couple of the cameras,” Wayne said, pulse returning to normal.
He was a little embarrassed at his suggestibility. He’d never considered himself a skeptic, and he wasn’t interested in all the physiological changes that caused people to hallucinate. Ghosts were good business, from campfire storytelling to blockbuster horror movies. With thousands of people running around chasing them with fancy electronics, the poor souls were probably hiding safely under ground instead of rattling chains and slamming doors.
Burton set a plastic case on the decking and slid it toward Wayne. “Two Sony DVMs,” he said. “Hey, it’s cold up here.”
“November in the mountains,” Wayne said. “What do you expect?”
He mounted the first camera so that it would catch the main section of the attic, though one wing of the hotel would not be visible. He aimed the second camera so it would take in the chimney. He connected the cables that Burton had snaked toward him, and then used the viewfinder to test the chimney cam. As he zoomed in, the camera’s auto focus fixed on a hand print in the chimney’s soot and grime.
Made by a worker’s glove, probably.
He zoomed out and duck-walked over to the chimney, keeping his head low. He ran his flashlight over the bricks and masonry joints. The hand print was gone.
He went back to the camera and set it to record, the satellite hard drive in the control room capable of recording an entire weekend’s worth of footage. “Come on out and play,” he called into the dead air of the attic.
“What’s that?” Burton called from below.
“Nothing,” Wayne said.
What was he expecting? Beth?
Nothing.
Just like always.
Chapter 7
Nailed him.
These New Age flakes were too busy smoking fairy dust, drinking koo-koo Kool-Aid, and gazing into crystals to peek behind the curtain. Which gave Ann Vandooren all the power of the Wizard of Oz, and by Sunday, Digger Wilson and his band of merry pranksters would wish they’d never left Kansas, or Pluto, or wherever the hell these losers came from.
Ann had hidden a closed-circuit television camera in the corner of the attic two days earlier, renting Room 306 so she could be across the hall from the infamous Room 318. She’d drilled a hole through her closet ceiling and surreptitiously ran two cables into the attic. One cable connected to her multiplexor to store video footage on a hard drive, while the other cable allowed remote operation of a pocket-size projector. She’d borrowed the gear from the Optical Sciences department at Westridge University, where she was a tenured professor of physics.
The trick had worked better than she had imagined. With Duncan’s help, she’d collected footage of herself in a black gown and stage make-up, dancing and cavorting in front of a sheet while floor-level spotlights blazed up from below. In the editing process, she’d turned the image into a reverse negative, so that her body appeared almost translucent. She’d then dubbed the footage in slow motion, creating a rippling, almost sensuous ballet. It had taken an hour to aim the projector lens so that the image appeared to float across the attic, and the dust and sweat had been worth the result.
Ann figured Digger would squeal like a pig on a hillbilly honeymoon, run from the attic, and cry “Wolf,” giving her an opportunity to retrieve her gear and let the mystery drive SSI batty for a few days. Then, after all the conference attendees had marveled over the “evidence,” Ann would come out with her own version of the facts, backed by a video recording of the hoax.
But Digger had actually approached the image, more startled than afraid. She could almost respect him for that. After all, his sick obsession was a close cousin to her own scientific curiosity. A pity he wasted his energy and resources on bunk.