Dead Night: Snippet 2

A chapter of Groundskeeper Tales

This is the second chapter of the first Chloe novel! I am on track for publication of The Groundskeeper: Have a Dead Night on Halloween, so if you liked the first chapter and this chapter leaves you wanting more, you’ll be able to buy the book very soon! There will be a paperback, and an ebook, and I am very much looking forward to hearing how readers like it. There will be more. Chloe is really learning and growing, and this book is going to be a huge leap into the unknown for both of us.

The first chapter, if you missed it last week…

Morning Meeting

Della had laid on the tea and departed just before Mr. Cruor ushered the detective into the library. Chloe was pretty sure the detective did not know about the housekeeper, Trunk, and likely the rest of the cemetery denizens. Chloe was standing to greet him, and he shook her hand.

“I remember you, it hasn’t been that long. And now you’re read in, eh?”

“Yes, sir.” Chloe had decided that from context he meant the oath to the Brotherhood of Death. “I am.”

“Miss Brandt is my successor in training, Detective Murray,” Mr. Cruor took his seat; Murray sat to his left, and Chloe sat across from her boss. “I understand that will entail paperwork.”

“Yes.” Murray had a slim case he was removing a stack of paper from. “Almost everything else in the world is online and electronic, but not when it comes to you, Cruor. Strictly burn-before-reading.”

Chloe started to object that burning first would mean... and stopped herself from saying anything.

Murray gave her a quick wink. “Now, I’m assuming she’ll need the same set-up you have. Expert consultant, vague bullshit, nobody says nothing about psychics.”

“Indeed.” Mr. Cruor poured out tea.

“I am not,” Chloe spoke up this time. “A psychic.”

“Of course not, that’s why we don’t say you are.” Murray handed her papers. “Read these. Initial and sign. Happy to take questions.”

Obediently, Chloe started to do as she was told. She was aware that while she was poring over forms which excused the police force of any and all liability in the course of her consultation with them, the two men were talking about Murray’s family, and when they started in on sports she tuned them out.

As she progressed through the papers, Chloe was surprised to learn she would be paid for her work if and when she was called on to consult. She looked up, caught Mr. Cruor’s eye, and he nodded slightly. She signed, moving on. Getting paid twice sounded like a nice perk, if you could get it, and evidently she could. She stacked the papers neatly, and looked at Detective Murray.

“All done? No problem with the NDA?”

Chloe shook her head. She couldn’t talk about the Brotherhood outside of a select few, and anything she did with the police would fall under that umbrella.

“I can believe you’ll keep it, too, you’re so quiet.” He took the papers from her and slipped them back into the case. “So, that out of the way, let’s talk business.”

This time he gave folders to both of them. “Miss Brandt, I don’t know how much your boss has filled you in on his work with us, yet.”

“Not at all,” Mr. Cruor answered for her. “We had been busy with theory and foundations. I have, in the past, made certain she understood that investigations move slowly, very methodically, and that our role sets us in a position outside the path, where we see very little of the machinations of the investigators.” Her boss caught Chloe’s eyes. “And we have to be satisfied with that.”

“Yes,” Chloe spoke quietly into the space following her boss’s firm statement.

“Well, you’re doing better than I would be. But then again, not being able to drop it is why I’m a detective, I guess.”

“I don’t have a choice,” Chloe shrugged. “And I’ve learned that sometimes it wouldn’t be safe to keep chasing my curiosity.”

“And yet, you do it anyway.” Cruor murmured, sipping tea.

Detective Murray looked at her for a long moment, and Chloe could feel herself blushing.

“How much do you know about the mass grave under a certain house?” he asked, finally.

“Some.” She shrugged. “Have you ever seen a ghost, sir?”

“I’ll deny I ever said this, and I wouldn’t say it outside of this room, but I’ve seen some things which are really difficult to explain. I think anyone in my line of work has. We don’t talk about it. We pretend we didn’t. But I landed with this liaison, and things got really hard to ignore.”

Chloe nodded her understanding. “I hadn’t before I came to Belleview. Now, I talk to them regularly, and mostly they’re just people.”

Detective Murray shuddered. “Sorry. The way you said that gave me the creeps.”

“She isn’t wrong, however. They were human. Some of the other things...” Mr. Cruor set his cup down. “I respect that you would rather not know, Detective. However, that does not make them any less real.”

“Yeah, well, this one,” Murray jerked his head in Chloe’s direction. “She’s so young, and, well, it seems wrong.”

“I don’t argue her youth. However, sometimes those who can break a paradigm are those new to the field, who have not internalized what is normal. They will question the accepted answers.”

“Nothing,” the detective muttered, “is normal about this.”

“Isn’t that why they call it paranormal?” Chloe asked, curious. “We,” she gestured to Belleview around them, the house, it’s occupants, “are outside of the norms?”

The detective sighed, noisily. “That you are. And for all that it’s weird and I try not to think about it, you get results.”

“So what have you brought us now?” Mr. Cruor changed the subject, looking at the folder he’d been given. Chloe had three.

“A new puzzle. And for you, Miss Brandt, the puzzle pieces you’ve already been involved with.”

“Thank you.” Chloe realized she had been handed the files on her crying ghost’s victims, and the jawbone of the hoodoo skull. That latter file was very slim, being a bare three pages, mostly details on where the bone had turned up and a page of a medical examiner’s report.

“Don’t expect answers anytime soon on the bone. It’s illegal to traffic in human remains, but without evidence of foul play, doing further testing isn’t happening. Budget constraints.”

This was what Mr. Cruor had told her already, so Chloe just nodded and opened the thicker file, the one with the new case.

“I, personally, don’t think there’s anything to this. As you’ll see in the file, it’s a nervous old lady. We’ve responded, and by we I mean patrol, until the last call, about fifty times over the last two years to her house. She’s convinced she has a stalker.”

“And you don’t think so.”

“Nothing shows on the camera.” Murray shrugged. “But just in case, because her nephew is my boss, we’ve called in the ghostbusters.”

“Which is us?” Chloe looked up from her reading.

“You’re probably too young for that reference.”

“I am not.” She smiled. “My parents gave me an education.”

He laughed. “Good for them. So, yeah, I fully expect this one to be a cakewalk.”

“Good training.” Mr. Cruor didn’t look up as he spoke.

“Point there, I suppose. I don’t know what changed, but this last call I went out there with my partner,” he looked at Chloe, “who is not read in. We had a long talk with Mrs. Buchanan, and I have to say, she creeped me out. So there may be something in it, but these cases are not out of the normal, if you know what I mean.”

“I do, and you are correct that most of the time nerves fool the mind into seeing more than is there. It is not, however, something which should be dismissed and ignored.”

Murray’s face went serious. “No.” He looked at Chloe. “You into true crime?”

Chloe shook her head. She’d always found the true crime stuff to be overly dramatic for her taste, and also, just plain nosy.

“Right. So there’s a famous case of a woman who was stalked. Years, she went through life looking over her shoulder, she was abducted and then released, was blamed for doing it just to get attention. And then,” Murray shook his head. “She was killed. By her stalker. And the cops had blown her off, over and over, had even said she was doing it all herself. Rules got changed. We take stuff like this,” he tapped the folder. “More seriously now.”

“So what can we do to help?” Chloe asked.

“Not much.” Detective Murray flipped his hand like he was tossing something away from him. “You can’t appear in court, so your word isn’t evidence. You can’t collect clues, but as I understand, you can follow them.”

“We can rule out the abnormal,” Mr. Cruor added. “Which is sometimes very useful. And occasionally, we can confirm that there is a paranormal element, which is generally not helpful other than allowing the case to be shelved.”

“Yeah, it’s not that we want to have another cold case, sometimes that’s just where the trail runs out and we stop. Does help to know, personally, there’s no way to bring that one to justice in the courts and all.”

Chloe considered this. “So, don’t touch anything, keep my eyes and ears open, and if there is a tangible clue, bring you to it.”

“You’ve got it.”

Chloe looked at Mr. Cruor. She wasn’t sure how much she could talk about in front of the detective. Mr. Cruor shook his head a tiny bit, and she left it for a later, private chat.

“When would you like us to pay Mrs. Buchanan a visit? And what pretext will we be under?”

“Soon; it’s been a couple of weeks since the last call, so we’re due.” Murray eyed Chloe. “I have no idea how to explain you.”

“So don’t,” Mr. Cruor suggested. “I can explain her, if asked, as a student.”

“She’s no stranger than most college students, I guess.” Detective Murray tidied up his case. “I’ll introduce you as the researcher, then.”

“It is true, and truth covers a great deal of ground.”

“I’ll make the calls.” Murray stood up. “Miss Brandt, a pleasure. Also, so you know, the old lady usually calls at two in the morning.”

“The witching hour.” Mr. Cruor stood to escort the man out. “When most of the living world lies profoundly sleeping.”

When Mr. Cruor returned, alone, Della was clearing the tea things.

“You had many thoughts, Miss Brandt. I could see them chasing one another across your face.”

Chloe sighed. “I’m that transparent?”

“At times, yes.”

“What if...” She paused for a breath. “What if something else committed a crime? Not human?”

“Then it falls into our jurisdiction, Miss Brandt, not into the police’s business. Detective Murray is a good man, and not a linear thinker, as any good detective should never be. However he is determined that the paranormal should not exist and so, for him, it does not.”

“Then why does he work with you?” Chloe tilted her head slightly to one side. “And now, me?”

“I’ve been able to give him leads which developed into answers he could accept. For that, he’ll put up with a lot. I rather think he views me as a sort of Sherlock Holmes, detecting the inscrutable in a manner which may look like magic but is in reality a science.”

Chloe pondered this, slouching into her chair. “It doesn’t obey the laws of physics,” she finally muttered.

Mr. Cruor nodded. “It may, but at a quantum level most do not understand, and he certainly would not. However, that is outside the scope of our work, Miss Brandt. I will draw your attention to the word I used initially. Jurisdiction. A definition, please.”

“The word of the law?” She sat up. “Wait, the Brotherhood has a court?”

“Not quite the word, but the speaking of law. It is also a term used to define a territory, and within those limits, the authority over it. The Brotherhood of the Dead has the authority over the dead.”

“What about Horace?” Chloe was thinking rapidly of the denizens of the cemetery, those she considered under her care, first at the Groundskeeper, and now, as whatever she was. Mediator.

“Horace is a... he is not dead, so he would not fall under our authority, except that, like Trunk, he has sought sanctuary in Belleview, which does bring him under that umbrella.”

“Huh.” Chloe was staring at the table. “And Padraig, Hugh... any other fairytale creatures I don’t know about yet?”

“A great many of those are, indeed, only figments of active imaginations. Or misunderstandings of one kind, spun into many tales.”

“But there are more. And whatever is bothering Mrs. Buchanan could be something like that. What do we do then?”

“You’re asking if there is another layer of sub-rosa enforcement, like the Brotherhood?” Mr. Cruor was now the one doing the head tilt. Chloe wondered if she’d picked it up from him.

“Yes?”

“There is not.” Mr. Cruor wasn’t focused on her, he was looking over his head as though he were seeing something not there. “There was, yes.”

“Oh. And so, that’s us, isn’t it?”

“Indeed, Miss Brandt. It may not have been in the job description originally, however...” His lips crooked up just a little.

“I know how that goes. First, you’re mowing lawns, and then suddenly you find yourself on a stakeout looking for figments.”

He chuckled. “Since the future is uncertain, I strongly suggest that you go get lunch, make your visit to a certain large kitty, and then sleep early.”

“I’ll do that.” Chloe got her backpack and started tucking books into it, then changed her mind and left some of them on her desk. “I’ll dial back the homework tonight.”

“Excellent. I will see you in the morning, not before.”

“Unless there’s a phone call.” She put her hand on the doorknob. “How does that work?”

“I will call you. We will meet at the car fifteen minutes after that. How are you at waking and dressing in a hurry?”

Chloe remembered how she’d woken up that morning. “I’ll be ok.”

“Right, then. Perhaps tonight will not be the night.”