If Onions Could Spring Leeks (18 page)

“Yeah,” I said. Reginald Nelson. I filed the name away as one I'd ask Jake about. I would have bet some of Teddy's onion rings on the fact that Reginald Nelson was, in fact, an owner of the theater, but one before my time, long before.

I hurried out of the theater and down the boardwalk. When I reached the other end, I crossed to the street and hurried even faster to the barn.

The doors were open and the lights were blazing brightly.

“Roy?” I said as I peered in.

“I'm back here,” he said. “Come on back or I'll be up in a minute.”

I threaded my way around the Triggers and all the tools, glancing only briefly at the spot where I'd found Derek. Roy was on the ground but still all in one piece and breathing—a sight that was surprisingly a relief. He was halfway under an elevated motor—though I didn't think it was a motor for a Trigger.

“Hey, Betts, how are you?” he asked as he peered up with a grease-dotted face.

“I'm fine, Roy. You?”

He shrugged. “Okay, I suppose.”

“Hey, do you mind if I look around out back?”

“Suit yourself. Nothing back there but an open yard. And I'm sure the police scoured it for evidence.”

“Thanks.”

I stepped around him and tiptoed through the organized scatter of tools that was also on the ground next to him. I pushed open the slim back door—which was as Roy had said, more a slat than a door—and stepped out onto the grass.

And didn't find much of anything. The field was too small to truly be called a field, but too big and overgrown to be called a yard. It was long, extending back a good distance. It was as wide as the barn, but for some reason, probably because it extended back so far, it didn't feel as wide. I had the urge to crouch down and inspect it, almost like I was inspecting a green before executing a perfect putt. From the low position, I could see a swerve in the land. It veered mostly to the left.

I stood, and confirmed that I didn't quite see the curve from a higher vantage point. I crouched once more and saw the curve again, realizing that it was simply a subtle roll that was better seen from a lower view. There was nothing magical or paranormal going on. And there was no reason to think I needed to inspect the spot on the inside of the curve.

Except, the niggling in my gut told me that was exactly what I should do.

I stepped forward, glancing at my feet as I moved. It was dark, but there was enough light coming from the open back
door of the barn and a street light just past the field that the ground was murky but not black.

The ground was also uneven but not dangerously so. As I walked, I wondered how in the world the answers—to whichever questions—could possibly be here. I must be missing something, or perhaps something was supposed to show itself to me. A ghost? I sniffed, but there was nothing unusual in the air.

“Doesn't make sense,” I muttered quietly.

I put my hands on my hips and stood silently for a moment. Maybe I was just being impatient.

Nothing happened. I literally threw up my hands and turned to go back into the barn. And my big right toe hit something hard. I bent down and ran my fingers over the ground, finding the hard object that was also cold and shiny upon further inspection.

It took only another moment to know what I'd found. A railroad rail. I stood, found the rail with my toe, gently this time, and followed it. It stopped about twenty feet later. Just stopped. Where there was one rail, there should be two, right? I scooted my foot across the ground and at about three to four feet away, I found the other rail. After a little more exploration, I decided that the two rails were both about thirty feet long, neither of them extending any farther.

I hurried into the barn.

“Roy, do you know anything about what used to be back there?” I asked him.

He scooted himself out from under the motor and stood, wiping his hands on his jeans.

“Can't say that I really do,” he said.

“Anything to do with trains?” I said hopefully.

“Maybe. I know this barn was a train station at one time.”

“What? No, I thought the station was down the street from my house. In a different field.”

Roy's eyebrows came together as he looked at me. “Well, I'm not sure, Betts. But I know that when I went to lease this place, I talked to Bunny. She's owns everything around here. She told me that this barn was once a train station. You should ask her, or better yet, ask Jake. He knows everything about this town.”

“I will,” I said as I fell into thought. I was sure that Jake told me that the station had been at the end of my street, was sure he'd confirmed as much when I told him about my recent ghostly visits. He'd never said one word about this barn being a station.

“You okay, Betts?” Roy said.

“I'm fine. Sorry to bug you.”

“No bother at all,” he said. “Hey, has Cliff given you any indication that they might be close to knowing what happened to Derek?”

“Not really, Roy. He wouldn't tell me anyway,” I said.

Roy's face fell as he nodded slowly.

“I'm sorry, Roy,” I said.

“I know. Me too. I just hope they figure it out.”

“They will.”

Roy nodded again, still without much confidence.

“I need to go, Roy. We'll talk later?”

“Sure. Tell Miz hi for me.”

I hurried out of the barn. I wanted to talk to Bunny and Jake. Bunny was closer, and I was sure she was working; she was always working. But I stopped outside in front of the barn. I turned and inspected it. It was a barn, nothing more, but its
shape was familiar in that it could have at one time been a two-story building with a wide porch on the bottom level, though there was no evidence of that porch now. The building was a similar size even if all the inside walls weren't there. I didn't know how a building could be hollowed out while the exterior walls remained the same, but it could happen, I guessed.

I hurried to Bunny's and then inside, eyeing Bunny and her ever-present pot of coffee zipping across the far side of the seating area.

“One?” the young girl behind the cash register said as she grabbed a menu off the stack in front of her.

“No, thanks. I'm just going to go ask Bunny a question,” I said.

“I don't think she likes to be bothered when she's working.”

“I know she doesn't, but I'll apologize.” I kept walking, hoping the girl wouldn't chase after me.

“Bunny,” I said as she turned from the counter, presumably after grabbing a new pot.

“Betts, what can I do for you?” she said as she stepped around me and took off for another empty cup. The pot was like a divining rod.

I followed at her heel.

“You own the barn where Roy puts the Triggers, right?”

“Yes.”

“What was it before it was a barn?”

“It's been a barn as long as I've owned it. Long before, too.” She poured. I smiled over Bunny's shoulder at the couple sitting in the booth.

“But do you know what it was originally?”

She stopped moving a moment and twitched her faint but
visible and always surprising mustache as she looked at me. “Yes, I think it was the town's original train station.”

“Original?”

“Yes, I think I heard something about the train tracks once going right through town, but that had proved to be poor planning, so the townspeople themselves moved the tracks.”

“So that building, the barn, was the station building?”

Bunny shrugged. “Probably. Maybe. That's what I assumed.”

“Do you know if there was a dentist's office inside it?”

Bunny shrugged. “I would have no idea, Betts. Ask Jake. He knows all about everything like that.”

“I will. Thanks.”

I realized I forgot to apologize to Bunny as I left the restaurant. However, I smiled and nodded my thanks to the girl at the cash register on my way out. I found my cell phone the second I stepped onto the boardwalk.

“Oh, Betts, I can't believe I forgot all about that story,” Jake said as he opened a file on his computer. “That's exactly what happened. The train running over there was a big bother. The town got together and changed the tracks. In fact, what they did was illegal, but I can't remember the specifics of the law or laws they broke. They rerouted the tracks themselves.”

I'd called Jake and asked him to meet me at his archive room. He hadn't even asked why, but was there to unlock the door a short fifteen minutes later.

“I would think that people who hadn't been properly been trained on laying train tracks would be in trouble for doing so.”

“Right. They were, but I think the government sent out inspectors . . . Yes, it's right here. Let me print this article.”

Another moment later I had a printed version of the article in my hands. It repeated what Jake had summarized, explaining that the townspeople took on the project without regard to the law, but it wasn't the way of Broken Rope citizens to pay much attention to the law anyway. They did a good job, too; all inspections passed muster. They re-created the old station and then pulled up most of the old tracks only moments after the new route was approved. It must have been a monstrous project.

“There are no pictures,” I said.

“I know. I'm working on it,” Jake said, his finger clicking the button on the mouse. “Yep, here it is. Printing.”

Another moment later, I held a picture of the station. It was the same one that had almost crushed us on the way to Frankland, the one that looked
almost
like the Broken Rope station.

“This is really crazy, Betts,” Jake said as we both looked at the picture.

“I know. And guess what, Jake. I just now see the difference. This station, the one that's now a barn, apparently, had a bell hanging from the roof of its front porch. The one where I met Robert didn't, I'm sure of it. The one that almost killed us did, or there was one lying on the front porch, probably fallen from its spot.”

“But you met Robert at the one without the bell. Maybe that's why we had to come upon the one with the bell, so you—or we—would know that the location was important. But back when he was alive, he must have been at the original one, the one with the bell. Maybe. Hang on.”

Jake went back to his computer. “Oh! This explains it, Betts. The reason you saw Robert at the new station was
because it was completed in November of 1888, a few months after Grace and Robert were supposed to meet at the original station. He spent the rest of his life waiting for her, but it was mostly at the new station.”

“That makes a little more sense. I guess.” I sat on a stool and thought. “Come back to the barn with me, Jake. Nothing happened other than the fact that I found remnants of train tracks. Bring your camera. Maybe something will happen now. For the first time ever, I kind of have a sense that it will. The ghosts and their antics have mostly been surprises, but I think something might happen tonight.”

“You do? Why?”

“I . . . Reginald Nelson,” I said. “Do you know who he is, how he might be associated with the Jasper Theater?”

He worked the computer keys again. “He was one of the original owners of the Jasper Theater. What in the world does he have to do with this?”

“I think he was the only conduit available at the moment,” I said, mostly to myself. I suspected that Reginald spent a lot of time at the Jasper, even if I—and maybe Gram, I'd have to ask—had never seen him before.

“What do you mean?”

“Come on and I'll explain on the way.”

“Let's go.” Jake hesitated but then grabbed the camera bag from the back of his desk. “I doubt it will work, but why not.”

•   •   •

Roy was gone by the time we arrived at the barn. All the doors were locked so we had to walk around the building,
both of us wishing for a machete to chop down the tall grasses in our way.

“You think it was Jerome in Reginald's ghostly form?” Jake asked.

“Yes. No one else calls me Isabelle.”

“Of course.”

The full moon now shone brightly on the field and the wind had picked up enough to cast dancing shadows everywhere.

“Oh, this is a perfect spot for a ghostly encounter,” Jake said as he pulled his camera out of the bag and held it at the ready. “Tell me where to point if something happens.”

“Will do.”

We stood silently for a moment as unseen crickets and frogs chirped and croaked loudly. The barn was dark and silent, looming. I heard car doors close from the direction of Bunny's parking lot, bubbles of laughter and conversation from Main Street.

“Am I seeing lightning bugs, Betts, or are those something else?” Jake asked.

I looked around. “Plain old lightning bugs. No need to record.”

“Too bad.”

“Let's just give it a few more minutes. We'll call it a night if something doesn't happen soon.”

“I didn't have time to see if Reginald was the one to give the credit to, but I know that one of the original owners of the Jasper was responsible in a big way for the town becoming a tourist stop. He was on the first town council that voted for Old West skits, if I remember the history correctly. The
skits started off on the Jasper's stage, that I'm sure of,” Jake said, adding conversation to our wait.

“The idea clicked.”

“Even if they could never have known how well or for how long.”

After a few more minutes of a noisy, critter-filled Missouri summer night, Jake cleared his throat. “Maybe Jerome's calendar was off? He doesn't really have to keep any sort of schedule.”

“No, but . . . well, I just thought. It's not looking good.”

“Another night?” Jake said as he put his hand on my arm.

I plopped my hands on my hips and looked up at the sky. There were no answers there either.

“All right, come on,” I said.

But as we turned to leave, something did happen. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the glow from the appearing station. It didn't take the place of the barn, but was farther back on the field. I looked at it and at the barn. I didn't understand why the apparition came into view where it did.

“Hang on.” I grabbed Jake's arm. “See it?”

“I see nothing,” he said.

“Point the camera over there and wait for me.” I pointed. But before I could take a step, Robert appeared in between us and the station.

“Robert's here, Jake.” With my fingertip I angled the camera more toward Robert.

“Betts, hello,” Robert said with surprise.

“You didn't expect to be here?” I said.

“I don't know what I expect anymore,” he said. “I'd like to just go . . . back.”

“I'm sorry. Your trip here won't last forever. They never do.”

Robert was the first ghost I'd met who wasn't okay with being in Broken Rope for a short time.

“I hope not.”

“Robert, I'm sorry but I need to ask some more questions. Is that all right?”

“Sure,” he said resignedly.

“Did you know someone named Justice Adams?”

Robert blinked and frowned. “I'm not sure. When you said his name, I knew immediately who you meant, but I didn't have any inkling of him before that moment. I don't understand.”

“He was somehow involved with you and Grace. He . . . loved Grace, too.” It had been more obsession than love, but I figured this version would get us where we needed to go.

“He did? Is he her killer?”

I swallowed. “We think that either he or you killed her.”

“I didn't kill Grace, Betts. Why do you keep saying that?

“Are you sure, Robert? I mean, really sure. Remember, it doesn't matter all that much except to get at the truth. You're both good and dead right now. Nothing can change that. You can't be arrested, or hanged, for that matter.”

“I did not kill Grace,” Robert said. He was almost solid—at least to me—in the dark. I could see the anger and adamancy in the fine lines at the corners of his eyes.

“Do you remember who did, then?” I said.

“You know I don't. I would have told you.”

“That might not be true, Robert. It's been my experience that you ghosts remember more the longer you're here. Maybe you haven't remembered it yet.”

Robert frowned again and then turned to look at the station. “I know this, but like I said, it's as if I wasn't aware of it a moment ago but am now: something terrible happened here.” He looked at me again. “Betts, I didn't kill Grace. I couldn't have. Nothing, absolutely nothing, could have driven me to hurt her in any way.”

“Okay. Let's go with something happening here. Let's try to get more of
that
story.”

Instead of merely glancing at the building, Robert turned all the way around and faced it.

“Justice Adams. When you said his name, a picture of him formed in my head. When I look at the building and think about him, I get a bad feeling in my gut. Was he a bad man?”

“Actually, he was thought of as a very good man.”

“But you think he might have killed Grace?”

“It's a possibility.”

“Oh no,” Robert said a moment later. “Betts. I remember.”

“What?”

“I did not kill Grace. I loved her with all my heart.”

“Okay.”

“But I know who Justice Adams was. He wasn't a good man. Not at all.” Robert faced me again. “And I
did
kill him.”

“Oh, dear. Why? Because he loved Grace?”

“Must have been the reason, or something like it. I must have been so angry. I was a gentle man, not a murderer. I can only think that he must have done something to hurt Grace. That would be the only way I could have killed him, or anyone.”

Perhaps there was a noble reason in there somewhere, but we still didn't have the answers.

Robert continued, “I'm tired of being here, or having the urge to be here as the case may be. I'd just like to go back to . . . wherever I'm supposed to be.”

“Maybe you're supposed to be here? Do you think?”

“No, I don't think that at all. Nothing can change. You said it yourself.”

“True, but if Grace understands what happened to her, or if you understand how you could have possibly been so angry as to have killed Justice, maybe you'll . . . rest better.”

He looked directly at me and for an instant I thought he was going to tell me something important, something about that place where he had been before he came back to Broken Rope. But it was as if a shield suddenly came down over his thoughts, as if he knew that admitting to being a killer was okay, but telling me any of the secrets about that other place was taking it too far. I'd seen the same sort of thing happen with other ghosts.

“I guess I just don't know,” he said.

“You want to look inside the station? It's still here.” I swallowed, hoping that it wouldn't collapse again. “Jake, do you see the station?”

“No. I'm not seeing anything except you and the camera. But, Betts, do I understand correctly? Did Robert kill Justice?”

“I think so.”

“Get more about that if you can.”

“I'll work on it. Come on, Robert. Let's have a look around. Jake, point the camera over there. I'm going to see if we can find anything inside the station. It's right ahead of us.”

Once Jake held the camera in what I thought was the right direction, I led the way with Robert in tow.

I carefully placed one foot up onto the platform. Then I stepped solidly with both feet.

“What do you see?” I asked Jake.

“You standing there.”

“Did you see me step higher up?”

“No, but I saw you take a step. You're still on the ground.”

“Interesting.” I walked toward the doors, Robert still at my side. My footfalls made noise, but his didn't. I was used to that.

The lobby was much as I'd already seen it on the way to Frankland, but there was one new addition. There was someone sitting in the ticket booth.

“I do believe we should have a chat with that man. There must be a reason he's here,” I said as I moved quickly in that direction.

“Hello, miss, how can I help you today? Ticket to St. Louis, perhaps, or Springfield? We've got trains going both those places today, with stops along the way.”

The young man might have needed a meal or two, or he was just wearing a uniform that was a couple sizes too big. His long, skinny face and pointed chin exaggerated the small space between his eyes and the hat upon his head reminded me of an old-time train conductor's hat: straight sides and a narrow brim. Tufts of black hair shot up around the hat, and his smile and voice were pleasant and friendly.

“Hi,” I said. “I'm Isabelle Winston. You can call me Betts. May I ask your name?”

“Frederick Elvis Rothington,” he said. “People call me Elvis.”