Southern Bound - A Paranormal-Mystery (Max Porter Mysteries Book 1) Page 12

  Max jotted down the names. "It's a start," he said.

  In the course of packing away his notes, he glanced at his scribblings from the first day — Moravians and Unitas Fratrum and the founding of Bethabara. The foundation for this little research construction project had proven quite unstable. "Wait just a moment," he whispered. Why would Modesto have started him out looking into all this old history if all he had wanted was the binding book?

  Even as an idea formed in Max's head, he rushed toward the Special Collections room of the library. He spent a short time plugging in keyword searches until he found one promising entry. After handing in the request, he paced in front of the doorway as if expecting somebody to stop him at any moment. Then, before Max knew it, he sat in a private cubicle with the 1825 diary of Jeremiah Childress.

  Bound in leather (throwing Max awful recollections of human skin bound books) and written in steep-angled, cursive lines, many of the entries proved to be mundane accounts of the Childress farm. "I know you've got something in there," Max said, turning a page. He learned that Childress was well-respected and that by 1828, he had been invited to become a member of the Elders Conference. Then Max read:

  It is to my great dismay this twenty-first day of our Lord's year eighteen hundred twenty-nine that I must partake in a most unpleasant meeting of the Elders Conference. Our good man Thomas Christman, though perhaps I must restate his standing, has made it known his intentions to leave the warming fold of Unitas Fratrum. His soul has been poisoned by those who call themselves the Baptists. Indeed, Thomas claims he has stepped into the waters with their so-called holy men. I have known Thomas for many years, and though I cannot claim to be surprised by this development, I am, as I stated previously, dismayed. It is never a joyous occasion when we lose one of our own. Making this saddening situation worse is the indecent act dear Thomas has chosen to lay upon us. After receiving the Elders Conference's order to depart from Salem, Thomas shocked us all by refusing, such is his disdain for what he once held sacred. I am troubled by what has transpired since that moment of defiance. It was my fullest expectation that the Elders Conference would evict Mr. Christman from his home and send both he and his child away from Salem so as not to pollute the holiness and well-being of our citizens. That has not happened. In this action's stead, the Elders Conference voted not to evict as that would bring unwanted attention to our actions in the public forums. No, this honorable organization deemed it more appropriate to allow a soul-fouled man to retain ownership of his home until the Elders Conference could purchase the house from under its occupants. I spoke against this course and for my troubles discovered myself much alone.

  Max skimmed through the next few days, discovering little of value. When he turned the page, however, he found more than he could have wished for.

  Only one is willing to stand beside me and for that I thank the Lord for providing and His kindness and His grace. Tucker Hull is a young man in years but wise enough to despise this hypocrisy. We have shared numerous conversations and I believe he may understand our Lord's will better than any other I have ever conversed with. I consider him a friend. His comprehension of scripture far exceeds my limited fumbling and I do believe wholeheartedly that should he ask me I would willingly follow his leadership in any capacity he wishes. Truthfully spoken, I hold suspicions that he plans to remove himself, and those of us who support his ideas, for there are more than just myself, from the Unitas Fratrum and inaugurate a new Church, one unpolluted by the corruption of power, under his supervision.

  Max stared at the name Tucker Hull for a full minute. He might have spent another five minutes sitting in shock, if not for the two women who walked by murmuring to the tune of their clicking heels. These sounds roused him, and with quiet, determined motions, Max copied down the diary entries. When he finished, he hurried back to the office.

  Sandra and Drummond were waiting. Upon Max's entrance, Sandra gave him a quick hug and kiss. Drummond, however, burst into a rant that clearly had been rolling in his head for hours.

  "Nothing," he said. "I tried everything I could, but they won't talk to me."

  As Max took off his coat, he winked at Sandra and said, "You mean other ghosts?"

  "What the hell do you think I've been doing all day? There's even one standing outside in front of the Y. I know he can see me. He glanced up here a few times, but he won't come in. He won't even shout something my way. And why? I never did anything to him. I don't even know the guy. Oh, I know the reason he'd give. Same reason I've heard ever since I got stuck here. Connor warned me — actually, she taunted me with this but it's ridiculous."

  "You're losing me. What reason?"

  "The binding. Pay attention. Connor said that I'd be forever alone because no ghost would ever talk with me or be around me or anything if I'm bound. They fear they'll get caught in the binding, too. But this is important. I understand their worried and all, but if I saw some poor muck who had been cursed and I could help him, I'd be there right away. I can't believe none of these ghosts have any sympathy for me. It's downright immoral."

  "I thought you didn't know about any other ghosts or a community or anything."

  Drummond whisked over to the window, crossed his arms, and glared toward the street. "I may have misrepresented matters."

  Max looked at Sandra. "How did it go for you?"

  "Better," she said with a chuckle. "I found out that witchy-poo doesn't own her office and she doesn't lease it. She doesn't pay anything for it at all."

  "Do I even need to bother guessing?"

  "Oxsten and Son own it and they, according to your stock trace for Annabelle Bowman, are one of many dummy corporations. So, that's right, hon. Hull owns it. Owns most of the buildings on that block, actually."

  "Hull lets Connor use the office for free but then he has access to a witch whenever he wants."

  "There's more. This arrangement goes back well before Drummond was even born. Assuming all or most of the various companies named are dummies, and from what I can tell that is the case, then the Hulls have had a witch on retainer for over a hundred years."

  Drummond said, "Two old family businesses. Figures."

  "I also looked into this office building," Sandra said, and Drummond faced her. "It's also had a rather unorthodox history. Starts off fairly normal, changing hands a few times, but then the last owner disappears — I couldn't even find a death notice let alone a certificate. The building, however, keeps operating as if it had an owner. Nobody is named on any paperwork, yet no government action is taken. Then, out of nowhere, Hull assumes control. Their name is also missing from legal ownership, but they're the ones paying taxes, collecting rent —"

  "Keeping this a cursed office for their own use," Max said.

  "Pretty much."

  "Good job, hon."

  "Any time, dear."

  "Enough," Drummond said. "You two have got to curb the mushy-mushy."

  "The what?" Sandra said.

  Before Drummond could take the bait, Max spoke up. "You guys won't believe what I found."

  In a few minutes, Max explained how he found the diary and then, to Drummond's stunned silence, he read the entries. Sandra spoke first. "The Hull family goes all the way back to the seventeen hundreds."

  "They go back to the foundation of this entire area. It's no wonder that by the time Bowman is working at R. J. Reynolds, the Hull family has money and power. They'd been at it for almost two centuries."

  "You think this happened then — what this man wrote — that Tucker Hull defected from the Moravians to start his own church?"

  "Read this," Max said, showing Eve's letter.

  "You think this Hull is Tucker Hull?"

  "Don't you?"

  Drummond nodded. "So Tucker breaks away from the Moravians to start some evil magic religion."

  Sandra nodded. "It's all interesting, but how does it help us, exactly?"

  Max said, "I think it might help clear up a lot, but that's all details. Right n
ow, we've got to find that binding book."

  "What about that list from Connor's office?"

  "What list?" Drummond asked.

  Max jumped to his feet. "I completely forgot. It's a list of names with some checked off. And I've got names of the Butner POWs. But I don't think they match. I'll start looking into them right away."

  Drummond slid behind Max and read the list. "Those aren't people," he said.

  "What are they, then?"

  "Names of buildings in Old Salem."

  "Old Salem," Max said. "There's no putting it off, now. I'll go right away."

  "Slow down, there, kiddo. It's too late in the evening for that. You'll have to go in the morning."

  Max checked the window — night. "Oh. Then let's get some sleep. Tomorrow, honey, see if you can find anything more to help us, and maybe check out the background on some of these buildings. I'll look into them directly in the morning. Drummond —"

  "I'll just be floating around."

  "Help out Sandra. Tell her whatever you know about this."

  "Will do."

  Max copied the building names on a yellow legal pad and gave it to Sandra. He surveyed the names once more before putting the paper in his pocket. "I'm wired, so I'm going back to the library 'til they close. I'll see what else I can learn. Don't wait up for me. First thing in the morning, I'll go to Old Salem. We'll meet here tomorrow night."

  "Be careful," Sandra said.

  "It's just Old Salem. I'm going to a public historical site. There'll be tons of people there, tourists, schools, and locals. What could possibly happen? Relax."

  Chapter 18

  The next morning, Max arrived at Old Salem. There were tourists, but not the thousands he had expected. In fact, if not for the people dressed in historically accurate garb, Old Salem could have been mistaken for any aging, quiet neighborhood. Of the one hundred buildings (so the lady at the Visitor's Center explained), ninety-seven were original, and for a modest price, he could tour all of them.

  Before he even entered the town proper, Max knew this promised to be harder than he had expected. A detailed, covered bridge crossed the road below, linking the Visitor's Center to Old Salem's Main Street. Thick beams and struts crisscrossed to form a charming pattern. The strong, flavorful smell of hickory coated everything. Halfway across the bridge, Max stopped.

  It could be here, he thought, hidden in one of these beams.

  He walked back to the front of the bridge and searched with his eyes, looking at each minute detail. He glanced up and drooped with a sigh. Nailed over the entrance, Max saw an oval plate reading 1998 — too new to have an ancient book.

  Main Street inclined a bit as Max walked across the old stone sidewalks. First stop was Vogler's Gun Shop established 1831. The building consisted of two small rooms. The front room had a wide-planked wood floor, a long work table, planks in the ceiling, several hand-crafted, period precise hunting rifles, and tools everywhere. A man with a white beard and small glasses smiled and said, "Welcome to the Gun Shop." He then went into his spiel, explaining all about the process of making weapons, the man who originally owned and operated the business, and how he would answer any questions Max had.

  Max peeked into the back room. It was smaller and bore a rich, smoky odor. This was where the metalwork was done. A long wooden arm for pumping the bellows hung overhead. There were several anvils (one mounted on a tree stump), a trough of water, and plenty of ash that left the stone floor gritty.

  As Max moved around the shop, he shifted his weight from one stone to the other, one wooden plank to the other, but too many of them creaked or moved — any one of them could be the cover to a hiding place.

  Stepping back onto Main Street, he pulled out the paper and looked at the names once more. VOGLER did not have a little red dot next to it. Did that mean the witch had checked it out already and came up with nothing, or were the dotted ones the buildings already checked? He decided to ignore the dots since he couldn't be sure and instead headed up the street to the Shultz Shoe Shop from 1827.

  This building was even smaller than the first — just one room no bigger than his office. A cast iron stove warmed the room from the back and a wooden table took most of the middle. To the right, sitting between two windows, were a man and a woman, each busy in the process of making shoes. "Hello," the shoemaker said, "and welcome to the Shultz Shoe Shop." Like the old man before, the shoemaker delivered his presentation from memory (though Max was impressed with how enthusiastic the people were after they gave their required talk). Like the other building, the floors here were made of wide planks and the walls were a solid wide plaster-like substance.

  As Max pushed onward, a sensation he had become all too familiar with washed over his body — he was being followed. He tried to brush away the feeling, but the uneasiness refused to leave. He scanned the area — an old couple strolling hand in hand, a haggard father being dragged by an eager kid, a gaggle of ladies laughing and chatting. Nobody appeared to have the remotest interest in him. Nobody appeared out of place.

  He entered a large house which the lady in the foyer explained was the Vogler House built in 1819 but presented as it was in 1840 (Max wondered if this was the same Vogler that also made guns but decided it didn't matter). On the left side were two connecting rooms — a parlor and dining room. On the right, Max found Mr. Vogler's workroom where he repaired watches and did other such detail work, and a kitchen. Each room was completely furnished with as many original pieces as the Historical Society could acquire.

  In the dining room, a grandfather clock towered over him. It must have been near ten-feet tall. The lady in the room said that a man named Everhardt built and signed the clock, but Max could not recall the name from any of his research. It was such a beautiful piece (despite the crack running down the lower front) that even a novice like Max could appreciate it.

  Upstairs, Max discovered four bedrooms — one of them a nursery with a crib and toys. Each bed, each writing desk, each planked floor held the promise of housing the book. However, the more he thought about it, the more he decided none of them could be the answer. These bits of furniture had been handled over the years by various members of the Historical Society. How could the book have remained undiscovered if it had been hidden in the crib or the writing tables?

  The exit from the house was in the back, requiring Max to walk around in order to return to Main Street. As he turned the corner, he saw a figure dash into the house. It happened too fast to tell if the person was a man or woman or even if the incident was merely coincidence. However, the constant pressure forming on Max's shoulders and tightening his neck reminded him that sometimes being paranoid was warranted.

  As he walked onward, he saw the town square on his right — a lovely, open area of grass and trees with four walkways forming an X. Pines circled the center and several benches lined the walkways. Though attractive and peaceful, Max registered little of the atmosphere around him. He only saw hundreds of places to hide a small item.

  At the end of the block, on his left, stood a large building called Single Brothers. Max checked his list. The word SINGLE had no mark next to it.

  Inside he found a three story home for single men to learn their trades in preparation for getting married. My mother would love this, he thought. To the left of the entrance was a wide room like a mini-church (the attendant informed him the room was called the Sall). A boxy white organ took up the back corner and plain, backless benches had been lined up in the center. Like many of the rooms Max had seen, this one contained what he thought to be an ornate heating stove along the wall. The stove had been painted a rich brown-red color, and like the others, this one could be an excellent place to hide something.

  The options got worse as Max checked out the other end of the house. Here were numerous rooms, each devoted to a specific trade — joiners, potters, tailors, shoemakers. Downstairs, he found more — blue dyers, tin and pewter workers, and a carved door that led to a kitchen and small dining
hall.

  Enough, he thought. He was wasting his time with this and unnerving himself with every step that sounded like somebody following him. But if I'm being followed, then perhaps I'm close to something worth keeping an eye on. After all, didn't Hull order Modesto to get me researching this area?

  Cold air blew across his forehead. Max looked up to find a small vent cooling the room for guests — most certainly not a historically accurate portrayal of colonial times. And, of course, another possible hiding place.

  Max stormed out of the building and stomped his way back to his car. He hoped the others had fared better.

  * * * *

  With a few hours left before he had to meet at the office, Max went back to the library. He didn't want to show up empty-handed, and he had the research itch attacking the back of his head.

  It was those POWs. Too many questions. But now he had names, and names could be researched.

  The amount of information regarding World War II would have been staggering had he not seen it before. Even in the subset of POWs (and just German ones no less), Max's searches turned up thousands of hits. Yet when he plugged in the specific names, things became more manageable.

  Krause, Richter, and Bauer had little in their records to suggest anything noteworthy other than all three had visited the States prior to the war. Schulz and König were strong men with families and neither had any contact with the U.S. previously. Fritz Keller was the most educated of the lot and had authored several articles in German newspapers before being called to duty. And Walter Huber proved to be the criminal of the bunch. In less than six months upon returning to Germany, he ended up in prison for armed assault. Nothing singled any of these men out.

  "Not that I even know what I'm looking for," Max said to the computer screen.

  One odd piece of information did perk up, however. Max found an artist's website that included dramatic collages made from World War II paperwork. The papers were chosen to match a theme — a picture of a gaunt Jewish prisoner had been made from Auschwitz population lists; a tribute to the fallen soldiers of D-Day came from copies of Eisenhower's famous orders; and there was even a German POW made from transfer papers.