Windwood Farm (Taryn's Camera) (19 page)

After the doctor left Verna clucked her tongue. “I know you’re working at Windwood Farm and I know what you mean about the ghosts. But you’re dealing with a real li
ve person here, missy.”

“Yes, I know,” Taryn agreed
. “They slashed my tire, too. I’m sure it’s the same one.”

“Probably a kid, no doubt. When I was growing up and my kids were little, this was a different place. Kids today, no respect. They just don’t care no more, you know what I mean? The place is a ghost town. Why, you used to be able to ride the train from here to Fitz and go shopping, get an ice cream cone, eat lunch, and then come back. Now the whole place is just about gone. Stores all boarded up. It’s sad. Built a bypass around the whole town.”

“What happened to the Fitzgeralds, anyway?”

“Same as everyone else
, I reckon. Some went off to college and never come back. ‘Brain drain’, they call it. Passenger rail gone away. Lost money. Some moved up north and worked in the factories after the war. Just spread out into the wind. A few still around here. None of them have the money the old family used to. The old house ain’t even still standing. Whole thing divided off and made into subdivisions: every house built of the same material and looks the same. Come home after dark and how are you supposed to know which one is yours?”

Taryn laughed.

“Do you know anything about Jonathan Fitzgerald?”

Verna nodded. “I met him once. Of course, he was an old man when I was a little girl. He lived in his daddy’s house and didn’t get out much. I’d see him in town sometimes. Always pretty friendly. His wife was a little strange. I was in Dickerson’s, that was a general store on Main Street, once and I didn’t have enough money for some candy. He bought me a handful and smiled. She snapped at him, mean
-like, and he said to hush. That was the only time I met him. He dressed real fine.”

“Did you know he was supposed to marry Clara Bowen from Windwood Farm?”

Verna shrugged. “I heard that, but she died so young. Of course, I never met her. I heard stories about
her
daddy, but he died before I was born too, and that house has been empty my whole life. My friends have gone out there and tried to see the ghosts. Some of them have seen and heard things, but I never messed around with it. My mama always told me that you don’t do that. That you might bring something home with you if you do. And my mama didn’t raise no fool.”

Despite the fact the hospital staff had been
compassionate and the food exceptionally good for hospital fare, Taryn was ready to break loose and get her car back. The local garage that the tow truck had hauled it to had taken pity on her and replaced the tire for free, even without her having full coverage, and then driven it over to the hotel for her. One of the nurses took her to the hotel when she got off duty and that saved her a cab fare. This was all good news since she was really starting to have bad thoughts about small central Kentucky towns in general.

Once she got the poison diagnosis
, she’d had to file yet another police report. But this meant more visitors, and for a brief moment, she’d felt like a celebrity. The police had come in and seen her and done their thing (they’d interviewed everyone at the library that afternoon but nobody had seen a thing, of course), Reagan stopped by with flowers and his stunning little wife and come by and pampered her with chocolates and bubble bath from Bath and Body Works. A group of women (and the one solitary man) from the Stokes County Historical Society made a brief appearance and cooed and clucked over her, offered sincere apologizes, and even shed a couple of tears over her pale appearance. The bird-woman seemed particularly upset and brought an apple pie, which everyone assured her was the best she would ever eat. Taryn took a couple of bites while everyone watched her and was, indeed, amazed at the tartness and juiciness it offered her.

So, all in all, her hospital stay was not a bad one.

But she was ready to leave. She felt a little silly as they wheeled her down the elevator, balancing her pie, flowers, and bubble bath in her lap. But she bet she made a better picture than she did when coming in, covered in vomit and feces.

Back in her hotel room
, she changed out of the sweatpants and T-shirt the hospital had given her. She’d had nothing but the soiled dress she’d been wearing at the police station, and she’d made sure they’d thrown that away since it was covered in gunk and oil, and put on her pajamas. She then went to work calling Matt and plugging in her laptop.

“Hey dude,” she said into the phone as her computer booted up. “So, listen, I’ve had a little incident
, but I’m okay.”

He listened quietly as she ran through the events and told him what she knew.

“You should have called me,” he finally said when she was finished. “I would have come up there.”

“I know. That’s why I didn’t call you.
” She had dozens of emails, mostly job offers. She’d sort through those later. “But I feel okay now, still a little fragile, but the stuff is out of my system. The vomiting and diarrhea was good, actually, it was getting it out. And you know, the police think it was probably just some kid playing a prank on me. Trying to make me scared since I’m working at that house and all. I’m fine, really. So listen, I found out some information and I want to run it by you—”

“So that’s just how it’s going to be then?” he asked, his voice still quiet. “Some crazy person is going to poison you and try to kill you and I’m just going to stay down here and wait for you to call and tell me that everything is ‘fine’ and call me whenever you feel like it and I’m supposed to be okay with that? That’s not okay, Taryn.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t want you to worry, that’s all. And I mean that. I’m used to taking care of myself. Look, they have a very nice hospital up here and everyone was really helpful. It’s stopped raining and I can finish the damn painting now and get out of here. I’ll just stop drinking tea, that’s all,” she joked.

Matt
groaned. “It’s not funny.”

“I feel really, really bad, if it helps.”

Matt sniffed. “It does, a little.”

She did feel bad.
Matt was in the same boat she was in. His family sucked in a different kind of way. He had one but they didn’t care. Hers might be dead but his didn’t know he was alive, which was kind of weird since he really should have been the golden child with his big brains and good job. They rarely saw each other, though, and more often than not, he spent his holidays alone except for the times when she coaxed him to visit her or she went down and stayed with him and they celebrated together. Their families were a lot alike that way, or had been when hers was alive. She would do better at keeping him updated.

“So what did you find? I’m all ears
.”

She spent the next hour updating him on the news, little as it was. He was nothing if not a good listener and she smiled as she heard him scribbling notes. No wonder he graduated a year in advance. When she was finished she put him on speakerphone and let him process the information while she ran herself a bubble bath, courtesy of Mrs.
Jones, and sank into it while he mumbled to himself and let his brain work.

“So what I think we have ourselves here is either some kind of weird love triangle or some really off
-the-wall coincidence that has nothing to do with anything. That’s how I see it.”

“That’s what I’m seeing, too,” she agreed. “Either Clara was stringing both men along and Jonathan killed Donald out of jealousy and then refused to marry her because she was ‘soiled’ or some shit like that or she really did die of TB before he could marry her and Donald’s disappearance has nothing to do with Clara at all and he just took off.”

“Do we think Clara and Jonathan were really in love? Fifteen years age difference? Wealthy man and daughter of man in debt? That’s not ringing true for me…”

“I don’t know either. Something seems off. But it could’ve happened.
The only thing I know about Jonathan, other than his family and money, was that he brought sweets for a kid once, nothing seems to say he was a bad guy.”

“So the one thing we know for sure is that Robert did die
, probably from a heart attack, but he wasn’t murdered. We know that Jonathan Fitzgerald eventually married someone else and lived happily ever after. He was never legally tainted with anything bad. We also know that although Robert died owing a lot of people money, he never lost his farm, right?”

Taryn, whose body had finally relaxed under the steam and bubbles, rose up out of the water. “
Matt! That’s a really, really good point. And a really obvious one. If he was in so much debt, and owed everyone so much money, how was he able to keep his house? What was he doing to earn money? We know it sold after his death, and that the farm was worked because nobody lived in the house, but I’ve never once asked anyone what Robert did. I just assumed he was a farmer. Was he taking out loans? Did they just keep giving them to him?”

“All good questions and a good place to start. Shouldn’t be hard to figure out. I’d try to see if you could find any records. The
historical society might have financial records of property taxes.”

“And I do need to work, too, eventually,” she sighed.

“How’s that part going?”

“It’s going. Some parts are easier than others. I’m going to have to make a supply run up to Lexington tomorrow. It will feel
good to get out of town anyway, I think.”

“Good, because there’s a man I want you to stop and see. I’ll tell him you’re coming and he’ll be waiting for you,”
Matt said.

T
aryn had spent her time in the hospital stressing about not working on the painting, even though the folks from the Stokes County Historical Society and Reagan both told her not to worry about it. She hated falling behind, though, and the little detour had cost her nearly a week’s worth of work. She wasn’t sure how far her funds were going to stretch at this point and she was antsy to get back on the road.

On the other hand, a huge part of her wasn’t ready to leave. She was tied to the house, hook, line and sinker, whether she liked it or not.
She’d bought into the stories just like everyone else in the county apparently had, only for some reason now she felt like the house had chosen her to unravel its secrets. True, her camera only seemed to pick up on things when the house wanted to reveal them, but she felt so close to knowing the truth that she couldn’t stop now if she’d wanted to.

Now that she was back in her hotel room, though, she couldn’t work up the motivation to get the painting out and work on it. It rested on its easel in the corner of the room, watching her as she tried to ignore it. “I know you’re there,” she said in its general direction. “And I promise I’ll get back to you. I have some other things right now, though, so you’ll have to wait.”

She was amazed at the number of online communities that targeted the paranormal and after spending a couple of hours sifting through them, reading forums and websites and even getting involved in a live chat, she felt like her head was spinning. Was everyone in the world psychic or clairvoyant or some combination? She was astonished to find there were even classes that offered certifications to help people develop their intuition and “powers.” She never knew such things existed.

“I’ve been living under a rock,” she muttered out loud.

Of course, when you spent the majority of your time studying the culture and lives of people from several centuries before, it was easy to be surprised at the flippancy and acceptance that such things were shown today. This wasn’t Salem, after all. Now, being a witch was actually something most people seemed to be proud of. Indeed, they even offered classes and certifications for it.

But nothing, in all of her searching, showed her anything that came close to what she was experiencing. She read about haunted houses and mediums and those who could converse with the dead
(some people had their own reality shows), and some of these people even sounded like they might be legitimate, but she didn’t find anything that had to do with taking photographs of the past. Of course, she’d already been down that road and had come up empty handed before, but she figured it didn’t hurt to try again.

After visiting one forum where the members chatted about developing their intuition and sensitivities, she sat back and blew out some air she’d been holding in. “These are my people,” she laughed. “Is this what I’m really in for?” She didn’t think she’d be handing over money any time soon but reading about the process was fascinating.

T
he man Matt wanted her to see was the owner of a store called “New Age Gifts and More.” The “and more” included small appliance repair. The shop was located in a strip mall and situated between a Showbiz Pizza and a Habitat for Humanity Restore. It was bright and cheery and she was immediately greeted by the scent of incense and candles. One side was lined with crystals balls, Tarot cards, essential oils, candles, and gemstones. The other side had televisions, laptops, PS4s, and iPhones behind display cases. It was a little surreal but the store clerk at the end of the store had a big smile and threw up a big wave at her as she took a few steps forward. He wore a Hank Williams T-shirt (Sr., not Jr.) and was reading a biography on the Dalai Lama.