The Queen and I (11 page)

He poured himself a Scotch and drank it quickly to calm his nerves. He checked his locks and windows one more time and quietly returned to bed.

Meanwhile, the ghost watched his every move and was a little hurt that he did not eat the sandwich.

Chapter Nineteen: Pish-Posh, Tisch-Tosh

The next few nights were more of the same, unusual and very vivid dreams followed by his awakening in the middle of the night to that same raspy singing. He searched the house from top to bottom and could find no signs of forced entry, no items missing, and the only disturbances he was ever made aware of was that the shower was continuously left on and there always seemed to be food missing from the refrigerator.

He tried staying up and keeping an eye on things, but the singing always returned at about the same time, and he was never able to locate its source. He would leave the room for five minutes and come back to find the lights on in the kitchen and another sandwich or a drink sitting on the counter waiting for him. The really odd thing was that the items that were left out were exactly what Jeffrey was in the mood for and prepared precisely as he would have done it. It was as if his subconscious was preparing the treats for him and his mind was blocking it out.

He searched the Internet for anything that resembled the strange phenomenon he was experiencing and found nothing. He looked up “Haunting” and came up empty, although he did read some very interesting things about music in the night.

After determining that he had used the Internet to the best of his research capabilities, he decided to try another route and headed into town to check out the used bookstore that he had seen; perhaps this was the outlet he needed to find some of the answers he was so desperate for.

He remarked to himself how into the Jewish lifestyle the townsfolk were when he returned to Zion, and had to laugh when he saw little black kids walking around with payots and yarmulkes. This was like a bad episode of
Candid Camera
, only he could not find where the crew was hiding.

Pulling into the parking spot directly in front of the store, he noticed immediately that the sign about Hamas had been replaced with one that announced the coming of a seminar on the threat of paranormal activity in Zion. It looked like he had made the right decision in coming.

He could not shake the feeling that he was being watched from various wandering eyes throughout the town, and decided that it was probably his nerves from lack of sleep and the odd encounter that he had had with the sheriffa few days earlier.

A young couple across the street waved at him and said “Shalom.” He waved back, offered a shalom of his own, and quickly made for the front door of the bookstore.

The first thing he noticed when he entered was the smell of incense. It was very strong and not unlike the aroma that he had smelled when he first arrived at the cabin. The store itself was a bit dark, cryptic, and reeked of that kind of nostalgia that is so often written about when referring to an old bookstore, even down to the dusty light wafting in through the windows.

He walked from aisle to aisle and saw nobody else, not a clerk, a person who resembled an owner, or even another customer. He had the very odd feeling that the store had been left alone and was now his for the discovery of imminent doom, but he brushed that thought away as being nothing more than simple paranoia.

It was a remarkable store and one he would have never expected to find in a town like Zion. It was like someone had ripped the building out of Greenwich Village and deposited it here in the lonely confines of the Finger Lakes as some kind of hoax for the amusement of an intelligent, if not warped, mind.

Books and manuscripts of what seemed to be of every era were here for the taking, and the sheer volume of old first editions and relics of days gone by were something to behold. As an author and a lover of reading, he quickly forgot himself and his purpose for being in the store, because he was mesmerized by the collection that was presented in front of him. The value of this collection alone was enough to probably buy the entire town three times over.

He picked up a copy of
Plutarch’s Lives
and did a double take when he carefully opened the cover. It appeared from what he was looking at that this was a first edition, but how could that be? The book was originally published in the fifteen hundreds; that would make this copy over five hundred years old and priceless beyond any account.

“It’s yours for twenty bucks,” a voice from behind him said, a sharp, feminine voice that rang of cynicism and contempt.

Jeffrey turned and saw a small woman of about five feet tall, wearing an afghan and fingerless gloves, with hair that looked like a collection of spiders’ nests, and carrying a tome in her hand that looked as if it weighed more than she did, was staring at him.

“Do you know how old this book is?” he asked.

“Of course I do, that’s why I’ll sell it for twenty bucks.”

“But this book is a masterpiece and …”

“And it doesn’t have any young love, vampires, or neurotic werewolves in it, so nobody wants to read it anymore,” she spat.

He watched as she slowly walked past him. She was an odd-appearing woman, to say the least, and was different from anyone else he had seen or met in the town up to this point because she was not decorated in the traditional clothing of an orthodox Jewish woman. She had a more eclectic style about her, and the way she carried herself made Jeffrey think that she could quite possibly be a very interesting person to get to know.

He followed her through the store to a small desk that held a vintage typewriter and a stack of books, small volumes that looked to deal with matters regarding spirits and ghouls.
This must be where she catalogues her collection,
he thought and watched as she took a seat.

She asked, “So, how about it?”

He was taken aback by the harshness of her tone and asked, “How about what?”

“Do you want the book or not?”

He looked down and saw that he was still carrying the ancient relic and replied, “Are you sure that you only want twenty bucks for it?”

“If you don’t open that book, and it hasn’t magically transformed into a book about young love in the Dark Ages, then yes, I want to sell it for twenty bucks.”

Jeffrey opened the book slowly and answered, “Well, would you look at that, a teenage vixen waiting for her Prince Charming; that’s remarkable.”

She gave him a wry smile and said, “Cash only.”

He reached into his pocket and fished out a twenty and continued, “My name is—”

“Jeffrey David Rothstein,” she interrupted. “I know who you are; I’ve been expecting you.”

This was a bit troubling for him to hear, but it might lead to more answers to some of the questions that he had been asking himself for the last couple of days.

“How did you know that I am who you think I am?”

“Google.”

He smiled at the directness of the answer and the evasiveness that it implied and asked, “What I meant was, how did you know I am who you say I am? How did you know I was coming to the town?”

She lit a cigarette and smiled at him, sizing him up from where she sat and answered, “You really have no idea what is going on, do you?”

Jeffrey had to admit that he did not, but he was not about to reveal too much to this strange woman. “Just that the town seems to have a fixation on Jewish customs and on me.”

“And there it is,” she pointed. “You are the whole reason for all of this. Ever since they found out that you were coming, the entire town has lost its entire identity and has made it the town goal to ingratiate itself into your life so that you will never want to leave.”

He thought about the weight of those words and wondered how true any of it was. Her cryptic clues and evasive way of speaking were leaving him with more questions than he had come in with, and he was losing sight of the main purpose for his visit.

She said something about the town knowing that he was coming; how could that be? He had been very careful to see to it that the purchase of the house was anonymous and that nobody, not even the local law, was made aware of his arrival. This was all very disconcerting. He would ignore what she had said for the time being, but store it away in the back of his mind for some further research at another time.

“I’m flattered,” he replied, trying to be evasive himself. “Maybe you could tell me something about spirits?”

She looked at him with an inquisitive expression and pried, “What do you know about spirits? What do you
want
to know?”

“I just bought an old cabin from a man named Richard Kearney and was wondering if he was into any kind of weird stuffthat you or anyone else might know about.”

She chuckled softly and said, “Doom and gloom.”

He stared at her, confused by her answer, and asked, “I’m sorry, but what does that mean?”

She leaned back in her chair and took a long drag, letting the smoke out slowly, and continued, “Listen to the music.”

How does she know anything about the music?
This was very unsettling, and he wasn’t sure how to proceed.

“He loves the music, my dear. Listen to the music.”

“I’m sorry, but what the hell are you talking about? Do you know something that I should know?” He waited for an answer that was not coming. “Were you in my house recently?”

She looked at him slowly and said in a low whisper, “You will never find me in that house, my dear.” She looked out the window, and he followed her gaze. Sheriff Pitts was coming across the street toward the store, and she continued, “Answers are there to be found if you look hard enough.” She looked at
Plutarch’s Lives
. “Never stop looking.”

The mysterious woman rose and quickly escorted him from the store; she practically pushed him and slammed the door shut behind him, closing the curtains as she did.

Jeffrey looked at the book and suddenly noticed for the first time that there was a bookmark. He pulled it from the book and noticed that there was writing on it. He looked at the sloppy penmanship for a moment before deciphering what it said:

We’ll talk again. Say nothing. Abby Tisch: Ghost Hunter

He put the bookmark back where he had found it and waited for the sheriff to reach him.

Chapter Twenty: Everyone Is a Critic

Jeffrey returned home after his encounters with the very odd Abby Tisch and then with Sheriff Pitts again. His second encounter with the sheriff was not as cold or suspicious as the last one, but it was interesting to Jeffrey that Pitts just happened to know that Jeffrey had been at the bookstore after he had been so suspicious about his interactions with the members of the town.

He had asked some obligatory questions about how he was enjoying life in Zion and what he thought about the bookstore. He eventually changed his line of questioning to matters concerning Abby; he seemed to be very interested in speaking about Abby.

Jeffrey was elusive with his answers and feigned ignorance to most of the questions, while taking record of everything that seemed to be interesting the strange lawman. It was as if the sheriff was trying to piece together a case against Abby Tisch for some reason, and he was being as aloof as Jeffrey was when it came to giving anything away. The only thing that Jeffrey was sure of at this point was that there was something wrong with the citizens of Zion, and they seemed to be dragging him into their dreck against his will.

He drove back to the cabin after stopping at the specialty food store so that he could pick up some challah bread and chopped liver, along with a couple of bottles of wine, and he quickly opened one bottle, made himself a snack platter of the spread with lightly toasted bread, and sat on the back porch overlooking the lake.

It was when he returned to the living area that he noticed the mess.

Papers were strewn about everywhere, and there appeared to be scribbles on most of them. His heart skipped a beat as he immediately thought of the singing and the odd dreams and wondered if there was an intruder in the house. He quickly ran to the kitchen and grabbed a chef knife from the counter and began checking his windows and locks; everything appeared to be in order, and it did not look as if anyone had entered the house without his knowledge.

He briefly thought about calling the police, but quickly brushed that thought aside. The thought of Malcolm Pitts sniffing about was more distasteful than the notion of an intruder plaguing him. After all, he was a New Yorker; he could handle anything that these country folk threw at him.

Examining the papers more closely, he realized that someone had left notes all over his outlines for potential scripts and notes about Schultz and Fujikawa. They were very descriptive and even a little harsh. Whoever had written these notes was not holding back his criticism and was definitely showing a real contempt for Jeffrey at the moment.

He immediately thought of the mysterious Abby Tisch, but he was able to dismiss her as a suspect because she had still been at the store when he left, and whoever was responsible for this disgrace would have needed more time. He also remembered that he had the bookmark with her writing on it, and the handwriting did not match those that were on his notes. If anything, the intruder wrote with a more feminine flare.

As he examined the notes in more detail, he was shocked to see just how cruel and even personal some of them were; it was as if the person responsible was going out of his or her way to hurt Jeffrey’s feelings, and he didn’t know why.

His heart skipped a beat as he suddenly thought of Heinrich Schultz and Mendel Fujikawa; could they have possibly found out where he was and were sending him a message? That was certainly within the realm of possibility. As with any men of power, they had resources that sometimes make the impossible possible. The citizens of Zion had seemed to have no trouble figuring out that he was coming to their town, so it was definitely within reason to believe that Schultz had found him.

But this didn’t seem like Schultz’s style, and even if it was, why would he still be interested in tormenting Jeffrey? He had won, the damage had been done, and there was nothing that Jeffrey could do to stop what had happened. No, it had to be someone else.

The scribbling on his notes intrigued him because, even though a bit harsh in its language, it seemed to ooze with the feeling of coming from a person who was as passionate about Broadway as Jeffrey was. This was not a random act of vandalism; this had been done with a deliberate hand, and the person behind the notes had set out to make Jeffrey think there was something wrong with his work.

He read through remarks like:

“What do you intend to do with this?”

“I’ve seen that before.”

“Try some originality.”

“Do you think the audience is stupid?”

“Do you always plagiarize?”

“You should call your next play,
I Have No Talent
.”

“No wonder you’re washed up.”

The last one really hit close to home. Who could have possibly been behind something so personal and factual about his current state of affairs? Who else, other than Rachel and his closest associates, knew exactly what was being done to him? Was there something in the way that he was writing that was giving away his lack of vision and struggles with creativity?

All of these questions left him wondering if maybe it was his own subconscious that was behind this; perhaps he was the one writing these notes, and his own personal defense mechanisms had changed the style of penmanship.

Whatever the reasons or whoever was behind it, he was left with more questions than he had answers, and it only drove him deeper into confusion and despair.

* * *

What kind of a
schmendrick
was he dealing with? Everything that had been done to his notes was specifically designed to let this schmuck know that he was not alone in the cabin and that there was somebody else working closely with him.

How was he supposed to work with a man who wore such heavy blinders and could not see the forest for the trees? Here the ghost was trying to help this putz and the only thing that he could do was walk around his house and check his locks, grab a chef knife, and, from the looks of him, contemplate whether or not he was going to call that insufferable sheriff
nudnik.

Try as hard as he wanted to, the ghost was becoming angry with Mr. Jeffrey David Rothstein. The ghost was a professional, he had once been the star, the people used to line up to see him, and now he was offering his services to a man who clearly lacked any imagination at all.

He figured that Jeffrey must have seen that lunatic, Abby Tisch, by now and that she had given him some kind of warning that there was something afoot with the house, and yet, he still could not see the very simple clues that were being left in front of him.

The ghost decided that he was going to have to use another form of contact, one that he had not used in years, and one that could only end in one of two ways.

Either Jeffrey would see the wonder that was presenting itself to him as a servant to guide and assist in his endeavors, or the playwright would go insane with fear and do the same thing that the horrible Richard Kearney and all of those before him had done, leave.

Whatever the result, it was clear now to the ghost that he would achieve nothing by playing this game of cat and mouse anymore; he needed to be more assertive, he needed to use a blunter instrument, and he needed to find something to wear.