Fixing To Die

“No, and that’s the strange thing,” Mary Turner said slowly. “It’s spooky, of course, but I’ve never felt it was intended to scare me or warn me. Whoever or whatever is doing it doesn’t seem to mind me being in the room. We never let guests stay in here, you see, because of the value of the contents. It’s just safer in the long run to keep them off-limits to guests.”

“But you were going to let An’gel sleep here,” Dickce said.

Mary Turner looked slightly abashed. “Yes. For one thing, I knew we could trust her not to damage anything because you live with valuable furniture and objects like this every day. Then I figured you wouldn’t be scared out of your wits, maybe only spooked a little, like I was at first.”

“You were correct on both counts,” An’gel said, her tone rather dry. “It’s just as well that I don’t frighten easily, however.”

“But now you’re going to let Nathan Gamble stay in this room,” Dickce said. “He’s never stayed in it before, I gather?”

“No, he hasn’t.” Mary Turner grinned suddenly. “Frankly, I hope something happens while he’s in this room that will spook the life out of him.”

CHAPTER 11

Benjy thought the ghost looked an awful lot like his stepfather.

But what was his stepfather doing here? He ought to be in California.

Am I in California?

The ghost didn’t look like his stepfather now. It didn’t look like anyone Benjy knew. It also looked really angry about something. Its arms shot out, and its hands grabbed for Benjy’s throat.

Benjy screamed and backed away, but there was a wall behind him. Nowhere to go as the hands kept grabbing at his throat.

Somewhere a dog barked, and Benjy banged his head against the headboard and woke up.

He rubbed the back of his head and tried to orient himself. Where was he? Oh, yeah, the haunted house in Natchez.

His eyes fully open now, Benjy saw Peanut on the bed beside him, looking anxious. Peanut woofed at him again, and Benjy patted the dog’s head to reassure him.

“I’m okay, boy,” Benjy said. “Thanks for waking me up. That was some creepy dream I was having.”

He yawned. Where was Endora?

As if she had read his mind, the Abyssinian jumped down from atop the headboard and landed in his lap. He stroked her soft fur, and Endora stretched and yawned.

Benjy checked his watch and was surprised to see that it was nearly four o’clock. That meant he had been asleep for about two hours.

“Man, I didn’t think I was that tired,” he told the dog and the cat. He rubbed the back of his neck. “My headache’s gone, but I must have been sweating like crazy.” His neck felt a little clammy, and he realized his head was also damp.

Peanut suddenly licked his face, and Benjy grinned. “Thanks, but I think a shower is what I need. Let me take one and get dressed, then I’ll take you out. How does that sound?”

Peanut barked happily. He understood the word out. Endora did, too, Benjy knew, though she was not always as keen on going outside as the dog was.

Ten minutes later, freshly showered and back in his clothes, Benjy found Peanut’s leash and attached it to the dog’s collar. “I know you don’t like this leash much,” Benjy said in response to loud whining, “but we’re not at home, and I can’t let you just run around outside here. Next thing I know, you and Endora will be digging up a flower bed.”

Or a dead body, he thought, like the one they’d found not that long ago after a big storm back in Athena.

While he walked Peanut and Endora in a grassy area surrounded by trees behind the annex with the guest rooms, Benjy thought about his dream.

He figured he knew why he dreamed about ghosts. All the talk about haunted houses the last couple of days before they came to Natchez had kept the subject firmly in his mind. At first, he thought it would be pretty cool to see a real ghost. Then, the more he thought about it, he wondered how he would really react. Would he stand his ground and face the ghost? Or would he scream and run away, terrified, like people in the old horror movies he used to watch on television? He wasn’t sure at the moment whether he wanted to put himself to the test, not after that creepy dream about his stepfather.

But why had he dreamed about his stepfather? The man hadn’t been in touch with him after the events of a few months ago, when Benjy’s mother died. As far as Benjy knew, Miss An’gel and Miss Dickce hadn’t heard anything from him either. Benjy didn’t particularly want to hear from him. He had never liked the man all that much, and his stepfather hadn’t cared for Benjy either.

Benjy was nineteen, an adult, with no legal ties to his stepfather, but he realized that secretly he was afraid the man would come to Mississippi and try to make him move back to California. Benjy didn’t want that. There was nothing for him in California anymore.