The First Church (7 page)

But it didn’t make any sense. 

Why now?
Brian asked himself.

Before he could think of an answer,
his phone rang.  A strange New Hampshire number appeared on the screen and then Brian realized it was probably the
Reverend.

Brian picked up the phone and answered it.

“Hello?”

“Mr. Roy?” Reverend Joseph asked.

“Right here, Rever
end,” Brian said.  “What’s the good word?  Did you find anything out?”

“Not really,” the Rever
end said.  “I’ve had a bit of a bad time.  But someone has shown up who might be able to help.  Do you think you could meet with us?”

“Sure,” Brian said.  “When and where?”

“As soon as possible,” Rever
end Joseph said nervously.  “I’m at
E
ight Washington Street.  It’s the first left after the Church.”

“Okay,” Brian said.  “I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

“Thank you,” Rever
end Joe said.  In the
background,
Brian heard several voices.  “Just hurry, Mr. Roy, it’s getting worse.”

“What do you mean?” Brian asked.

“There are two of them now,” the Reverend said.

“Two of who?”

“Two ghosts,” Rever
end Joe said in a low voice.  “Two headless ghosts.”

Chapter 15: Luke, Mr. Boyd and Saké, August 15, 1962

Luke didn’t go to the annual
parade anymore. 
Instead,
he went to see Mr. Boyd.  The year before
, Mrs. Boyd had been there, but this year, she was in Concord with her sister again.

He sat at the table with Mr. Boyd.  The older man had a beer and Luke had a Coke.  Empty plates, which had been graced with hamburgers a short time before, stood on the table.

“The coach from UNH came to talk to me yesterday,” Luke said.

Mr. Boyd raised an eyebrow.  “What’d he have to say?”

“He wants to make sure I’m going to play football for him,” Luke said, grinning.

“Hell,” Mr. Boyd said, laughing, “you’re only sixteen.  Guess you’re feeling pretty full of yourself?”

Luke nodded, and Mr. Boyd let out a chuckle.

“Well, leastways you’re honest, boy,” Mr. Boyd said.

A crash sounded from down the hall, and Luke turned as Mr. Boyd stood up.

The noise had come from Mr. Boyd’s war room.

“Luke,” Mr. Boyd said in a low voice.  “Look at me.”

Luke did as he was told.  Mr. Boyd’s expression was serious, his eyes focused on the door to the war room and not Luke.

“If I say run, you run.  Don’t ask why.  You just go.  Understand?”

“Yes sir,” Luke replied.

“Follow me,” Mr. Boyd said, “and do as I say.”

Luke did as he was told and the two of them went to the war room.

Muffled voices slipped out,
and Mr. Boyd frowned.  He took his key out, unlocked the door and pushed it open.

Luke almost fell down in surprise.

A headless man stood in the room.  The image was
blurry, though, as if the man was a bad signal on a television set.

But he was real enough, for he turned towards them.

On the floor was a pair of the small china cups decorated with the Japanese flag.  A third was in the headless man’s hands.

A question was asked in a language Luke didn’t understand.

Mr. Boyd replied in the same.  Then he turned and looked at Luke.  “Go to the kitchen, boy, and set a pan of water on the stove for me.  Light the burner and then you best get on home.”

“What is it?” Luke asked.

“It is a ‘he,'
” Mr. Boyd said.  “And we’re thirsty.”

“How can he be thirsty?” Luke asked, yet even as the question left his mouth a head appeared on the ghost’s severed neck.

A young Japanese man smiled at him and gave Luke a short bow.

“Bow back, Luke,” Mr. Boyd said gently.  “Ichiru
is being polite.”

Too surprised not to, Luke bowed.

“Now, on to the kitchen,” Mr. Boyd said.  “Fix up the water in the pan and get yourself gone.  Ichiru and I have some sak
é to drink.”

Numb with confusion, Luke turned away and went to the kitchen to do as he was told
.

Chapter 16: A Conversation at Mrs. Staples’ House

Mrs. Staples answered the door just a few seconds after Brian rang the doorbell.

“Good evening, Mrs. Staples,” Brian said, smiling tightly.

“Good evening, Mr. Roy,” she replied, stepping aside.  “Please, come in.”

Brian did so,
and he waited patiently for her to close and lock the door.  A faint smell of cat urine permeated the air and a small, orange tabby streaked by.  Mrs. Staples led him into her kitchen where he found the
Reverend, a teenager and an old man whom he didn’t know, at the table.

But Brian was more concerned with the Rev.

The man looked like he’d gone a few rounds with a heavyweight boxer and come out the worse for wear.

“What happened?” Brian asked.

“Sit down,” the Rever
end said, wincing in pain.  “I’ll tell you in a moment. 
First, though, I would like to introduce you to Mr. Luke Allen and his grandson, Jim Bogue.”

Brian turned, shook the teenager’s hand and then he turned to the grandfather.  The man had his hand
out,
and Brian realized he was blind. 

“A pleasure,” Brian said, shaking the man’s hand.

“Would you care for coffee, Mr. Roy?” Mrs. Staples asked.

“Yes, please,” Brian said, sitting down at the table.

“Well,” the Rever
end Joseph said, clearing his throat nervously.  “I had an encounter with the ghosts in the Church.”

Mrs. Staples set a mug of coffee in front of Brian.  “Cream and sugar?”

“No thank you,” Brian said.

She nodded and exited the room.

“There should be six of them,” Luke Allen said.  The older man’s voice was strong and deep. 

“Six?” Brian asked, looking at him.  “How do you know?”

“I know because I’ve seen them before,” Luke said.  He smiled.  “I wasn’t always blind, Mr. Roy.  And because my grandson
, here, encountered them right after the Reverend
did.  He described them to me
.”

“Do you know why they’re in the Church?” Brian asked.

“No,” Luke said.  “They must be looking for their heads.”

“So I figured,” Brian said.  “Why would their heads be in the Church?”

Luke shrugged.  “An excellent question.  I don’t know why they would be.  Or how they would have gotten there.  They originally were in the possession of a man who had brought them home from the Pacific.  He and his wife died in a car accident when I was in Vietnam.  I had asked around about his militaria, but no one had seemed to know anything about it.”

“And the two ghosts beat you up?” Brian asked, looking at the Reverend.

Rever
end Joe shook his head and blushed.  “I’m afraid I did this to myself.  I panicked and ran, fell down the stairs and landed
on my face
, unfortunately.  I was never particularly graceful.”

“I saw it,” Jim said, speaking for the first time.  His voice cracked slightly and reminded Brian of his own horrible passage through puberty.

“You saw me?” the Reverend asked in surprise.

Jim nodded.  “I was hiding in the burial ground.  I wanted to see the ghosts.”

“Did you?” Brian asked.

“Yes,” Jim replied.  “And they saw
me
or noticed me.  Whichever it is.  One of them shot me.”

Brian looked at the boy in surprise.  “Shot you?  How?”

The boy shrugged, winced
and then he said, “I’m not sure.  He pointed a pistol at me, pulled the
trigger,
and it went off.  I felt something hit my shoulder.  It feels better now, but it was really bad at first.”

“The place where there should have been a wound was cold,” Luke added.

“Great,” Brian murmured.  He played with the iron ring on his right hand nervously.  “Okay.  Let me see if I’ve got all of this straight.  First, we had one headless ghost who came along and blinded a couple of teenagers.  Second,
another headless ghost showed up. So now, we
have two.  Third, Luke here
, knows about them,
and he’s pretty sure they’re looking for their heads.  Fourth, they can shoot phantom bullets.”

Brian sighed and looked around at the others.  “Anything I forgot?”

“Yes,” Luke said.  “The heads are somewhere in the Church, and there are four more we have to worry about.”

“Great,” Brian said, shaking his head.  He picked up his coffee, drank a little of it and looked at Luke.  “Well, Luke, evidently these ghosts have been around for a while.  Have they killed before?”

“No,” Luke answered.

“Do you know why?”

Luke shook his head.  “No.  The only man who did know was Jonathan Boyd, and he’s been dead for over forty years.”

Brian frowned, rubbed the back of his head and said, “Where’s he buried, Luke?”

“What?” Luke asked, confused.

“Do you know where he’s buried?” Brian asked again.

“No,” Luke said.  “I’m sure we can find
out, though.”

“Good.  Let’s make locating Mr. Boyd’s final resting place our top priority,” Brian said.

“Why?” Jim asked.

“I want to see if he’s still hanging around,” Brian answered.  He drank his
coffee,
and then he smiled.  “If he is, I’ll ask him what it was he did to keep them happy.”

“What?” The Rever
end asked.  “What do you mean, ‘ask him’?”

“I can see the dead, Rever
end,” Brian said, his smile fading.  “And I can talk with them
, too.”

Chapter 17: A Talk

Jim sat in his grandfather’s sparse apartment and sipped his tea.  It was after ten thirty and his mother hadn’t been happy about him being out so late.

His grandfather didn’t tell her about Jim’s little trip to the burial ground.  Or their walk over to Mrs. Staples
’ house.

Jim thought about the man, Brian Roy.  He
seemed to be focused, and determined
.  Not too tall, not too thin, but bald
,
bearded and he looked like he had killed more than a few people.  The man’s matter-of-fact desire to speak with the dead, as well as his supposed ability to do so, was unnerving.

Jim’s sole run-
in with the headless ghosts had been enough.  He didn’t want to meet any
more.

“James,” his grandfather said.

“Yes?” he answered.

“Worrying about the dead?”

“Yes.”

“Don’t,” his grandfather said.  “Worry about problems you can control.  The dead aren’t one of those.”

“Do we have to go with Mr. Roy?” Jim asked.

His grandfather nodded and then he carefully brought his tea up to his mouth. 

“Why?”

“Because I knew Mr. Boyd, James.  I knew him well,” his grandfather said.  “He helped instill in me a desire to serve our country, just like he had.  We all have to sacrifice, although service isn’t a popular theme in today’s society.”

Jim knew his grandfather needed him, especially in an unfamiliar place.

Still, after the whole incident in the burial ground, Jim wasn’t thrilled with the idea of going near any more cemeteries.

“I know,” Jim said finally.  “I just don’t want to see any more ghosts.”

His grandfather nodded.  “Yes.  I understand.  I didn’t want to see any ghosts either, but I did.”

“You really saw them?” Jim asked.  He didn’t exactly doubt his grandfather, but he still found it hard to believe.  Even after what he had experienced.

“Yes,” his grandfather said.  He finished his tea, set the cup down on the table effortlessly, and turned his closed eyes towards Jim.  “Yes
,
I saw them.  I have few visual memories anymore, James.  The ghosts, though, the ghosts I remember.  I remember them well.”

“How many times did you see them?” Jim asked in a low voice, as though the headless men could hear him.

“Three times,” his grandfather answered.  “Three times
more than necessary,
as far as I’m concerned.  But you really can’t take back what you’ve experienced.”