Hologram: A Haunting Read online

  “Yes, a picture of Claude Reichart.”

  “Oh?” The woman advanced and hovered over Meg. “Goodness, what an attractive young boy. Look how full of life he was! And to think how short his life was to be! When did you say he passed on?”

  But he didn’t pass on, Meg thought, not really. That’s the whole point. “1911,” she answered now, “just a few months after this picture was taken.”

  “Isn’t that a shame?”

  It was a shame. More and more, Meg’s heart was weeping for the tragedies of Claude and Alicia Reichart. She felt their losses more keenly every day, it seemed.

  “Shouldn’t you be finishing up for the day?” Miss Millicent asked, glancing purposefully at her watch.

  “I will. I promise. I just know there must be something here about his death.”

  “If it’s been here all these years, dear, I’m certain it’ll wait till next time. Mystery is a spice, isn’t it?”

  No, it can’t wait, Meg wanted to say as Miss Millicent went about the business of closing up.

  Meg found it now—the keystone of her search. She had not been focusing much on the newspaper’s front pages, but as the front page for July 17th flashed by, she sighted something familiar. She brought the page back.

  There was the same picture of Claude Reichart, just below a two-column story at the right of the page. The caption read:

  Reichart Barn Burns;

  One Dead

  Meg shivered at the thought of a child burnt to death in a fire—and, somehow—this child especially. She was for the moment a vessel, and sadness filled her to the brim.

  Meg had no time to read the details.

  “I’m afraid it is time,” Miss Millicent said. She had her coat on. “Did you find something else, Meg?”

  “Yes, something,” Meg answered, pressing the button for the copy machine—and relieved that the woman was too involved in closing the room for the day to inquire further.

  Meg placed the two important finds of the day in her purse. She had, she thought, the final piece of the puzzle. Putting it together would now be up to her.

  During the drive home, Meg’s thoughts shifted to Kurt.

  How were they to keep their marriage from unraveling?

  He had been leaving several desperate sounding messages on the machine daily, pleading his innocence. Yet her heart had told her it wasn’t innocence she read in his eyes when he addressed the Valerie Miller issue.

  She turned into the driveway and for once allowed herself to study the old coach house as the car glided toward it.

  What was this aversion she had to it? Was it merely that face at the window she had seen months ago?

  There was no face at that window now. The structure defined the word dilapidated. The low stone and mortar wall and foundation seemed to be in better shape than the rest of the wooden structure’s two stories and hip roof. The carriage doors in the back had been boarded up years before, and those in front had been replaced in the 50s or 60s with cheap metal overhead doors—rusty, broken, and useless now. On the second floor, where living quarters had been fashioned, four windows faced the drive—two for the bedroom and two for the little living room.

  Meg and Kurt had planned to have the building demolished. She would be glad to see it gone—if they could still somehow keep the house. The thought of losing the house put her on edge. It was a dark thought, and she put it out of her mind.

  Meg was out of the car before it dawned on her that there was another car in the drive, next to hers. She didn’t recognize it and couldn’t imagine whose it was. No one seemed to be about the grounds.

  Had Kurt borrowed a car again? It wasn’t likely he’d come out on a Monday. Meg thought of Mrs. Shaw, and ruled her out because she owned a red Lumina—but maybe it belonged to one of her clients.

  Had Kurt given Mrs. Shaw keys to the house? Meg burned at the thought.

  She let herself in the side door. Five curving steps would take her up to the kitchen door.

  She paused now in the cool hallway, listening. And then she was nearly overpowered by the scent of violets, decaying violets. She was only just taking this in when a terrible, bone-chilling cold entered her—and then passed out of her, moving upward in the direction of the first floor door. It had come from the basement steps. She stood, motionless, thoughtless. She felt as if she had been violated, raped.

  A muffled cry suddenly wrenched her to alertness. The cry of a man.

  “Who is it?” she called, her voice breaking. She clutched her purse to her chest, her hand already searching for her mace.

  “Meg!”

  The voice was Kurt’s!

  “Yes! Where are you?”

  “Down here! In the basement, Meg!”

  Meg turned right, descended two steps, turned left, and moved down toward the bright red basement door.

  “Meg!” Kurt called again.

  “Coming!” As she came to the door, she could not believe what she saw. The door was bolted on her side.

  She pushed back the bolt, and Kurt pulled the door open.

  She had never seen him look frightened before. Not ever. He was white as porcelain, and terror clouded the blue eyes. Cobwebs clung to his dark hair. Blood spattered his white shirt.

  “Oh, Meg, thank God!” His breathing was labored. He leaned against a small chest-size freezer that stood near the door. “I . . . didn’t know what to do . . . these damn glass block windows. My God, it’s like a prison down here!”

  Meg didn’t hesitate, moving toward him in her concern, grasping onto his arm. “You’re hurt!”

  “It’s—it’s just a little cut—from the light bulb.—Let’s get upstairs.”

  “Are you all right?”

  “Upstairs, Meg!”

  She held onto his arm as they moved up the stairs. He was trembling, she realized.

  They seated themselves at the dining room table, and the details of Kurt’s ordeal poured out.

  As Kurt became less frightened, Meg inwardly became more frightened. It was her fault. She had done this. She had opened herself up to this. If only she had known she would be putting others in jeopardy.

  His story told, Kurt rested in the first floor bedroom while Meg prepared a quick meal. She knew he wasn’t sleeping. She knew they were both taking inventory and stockpiling weapons for the struggle to come, the struggle between themselves. The struggle about the house.

  They hardly spoke at their meal. Meg ate slowly, surreptitiously glancing at Kurt, not wishing to bring up the subject of the house, and thinking again and again about the old newspaper article in her purse, the one she still had not yet read.

  The turkey pastrami and cheese sandwich and the beef barley soup seemed to restore Kurt. Meg could tell he was embarrassed about what had happened, how he had behaved. She knew his male pride had been damaged.

  He sat watching her; he had finished first and appeared to be waiting for her to finish. The moment she dreaded was coming.

  Still, it was she who spoke first. “Feel better?” She pushed away her unfinished soup.

  “We’re getting out of here, Meg. Tonight.”

  Meg studied him. She had made the serve and his volley now was direct and lethal. The terror was gone from his eyes, and his face was set with determination.

  “Look, Kurt. I don’t need to ask why. Not after this afternoon. And I can’t blame you— ”

  “Meg, you’re not going to say you want to stay?”

  “It’s not that I want to stay— ”

  “Then it’s settled.”

  “Not quite, Kurt.” If only she could communicate her need, make him understand.

  “What is it? It’s about last Friday, isn’t it?”

  “No, that’s not— ”
r />   “Yes, it is. . . . I went to see Wenonah today.”

  “You did what?”

  “Her part in this wasn’t too hard to figure out—and I can see how she arrived at her circumstantial evidence. And, Meg, I wasn’t completely truthful.”

  Meg had been prepared for another denial, but she felt her heart catch now at his last admission. What was he going to reveal? She looked away, resigned to hear the worst.

  “Valerie Miller is a flirt, Meg,” Kurt was saying.

  “And not unattractive.”

  “All right, attractive enough. I’m not going to make excuses for myself. You need to hear me out. That night that Wenonah saw us . . . we did go into her apartment, and I have to admit the intention was for more than a little deli supper.”

  Meg turned back to him, tears brimming in her eyes.

  “I did,” he continued, “make a terrible decision. Of that I’m guilty. But thank God, I had time for second thoughts. I thought how my first marriage had fallen apart. You were right on about that—I was having an affair when Julie found out. The affair meant nothing—nothing!—but it destroyed my marriage. I became determined not to let history repeat. And I can tell you that I got the hell out of Valerie Miller’s condo as fast as I could.”

  “Oh, Kurt— ”

  “You can rip at me all you want, Meg, but I’ve been faithful to you. I want this marriage to work. I want you with me, Meg. And the baby.”

  Kurt took Meg’s hand now, his eyes fastening on hers. “I have been faithful, Meg—with the exception of one mental lapse.—Hell, even Jimmy Carter lusted in his heart.”

  Meg would not validate the humor relief he was attempting. “You were going to act on it.”

  Kurt’s eyes lowered to half-mast. “But I didn’t, Meg. I didn’t.” The eyelids slowly lifted now. “Do you believe me?”

  Meg sensed that this was the truth, and relief streamed through her. “Yes,” she said. Kurt squeezed her hand, and she returned the pressure.

  “Thanks, Meg.” He leaned over and hugged her to him.

  It was an awkward gesture, but she appreciated it, nonetheless.

  He drew back now. “Then you’ll come back with me tonight?”

  Meg looked into his hopeful eyes and shook her head, sadly. “Not yet, Kurt.”

  “Meg— ”

  “I’ve still got some things to figure out.”

  “About the house?”

  “Yes.”

  “The . . . spirits?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you crazy? Why? What’s making you stay here?”

  “I don’t know. A feeling—an impulse voice—that’s what Doctor Peterhof calls it. I feel that somehow I can set things right.”

  “To keep the house?”

  “Maybe—but, well, maybe I can do some good.”

  “For people who have been dead for years? Decades? Come on, Meg!’”

  “I need just a little more time in the house. If that doesn’t do it, I’ll come back to the city next week and never look back.”

  “And if it is enough time, if it does do it, what then? You expect to stay here? Do you think I would spend another night in the house after this afternoon?”

  Meg shrugged. “I can’t think of all the things ahead of us. We could at least sell the house with clear consciences. I know I need only a few days.”

  “Even if I don’t—can’t—stay?”

  Meg pursed her lips. “Even if.”

  Kurt’s face flushed with anger at her resoluteness. She watched as he tried to reign in his temper.

  “Then I’m wasting my time,” he said, pulling his hand away and standing. “I have to pack my clothes.”

  Meg could think of nothing to say, nothing to resolve their differences.

  His temper tore free of its mooring now. “I swear to God the only way I’ll come back to this house is to sign the sale papers. Or to pick you up! And you’ll have to call me, Meg!” He was shouting now. “You’ll have to call me! I won’t call or come begging!”

  Meg held back her tears. Still, her mouth would not move.

  When the silence became too much to bear, Meg picked up the dishes and went into the kitchen. She heard Kurt moving off toward the bedroom.

  Meg went back to the dining table and sat, despondent that she had hurt him. Oh, it was hurt all right that sparked his temper and provoked his ultimatum. Hurt that she didn’t choose to be with him, hurt that she had chosen the house over him. If only he would understand—could understand—what compelled her. But how could he?—when she didn’t understand it herself.

  After Kurt had piled his belongings at the front door, after he had carried them to the car, after he had called out a goodbye that begged her to relent, she thought of running to the door and calling to him. She thought of leaving with him.

  Now the car was backing down the drive, and Meg stirred herself from her lethargy at the table. She found herself hurrying—not to the door—but to the living room where she had left her purse.

  In it was the article on Claude Reichart’s death.

  TWENTY-TWO

  Kurt had taken the less traveled Chicago Skyway out of Indiana instead of the Bishop Ford Expressway. He couldn’t remember having made a conscious decision to do so. The Caprice emptied into the Dan Ryan expressway now, and the lights, noise, and motion awakened him to the foggy state he was in. He sat up straight, opened the window. One had to drive with all senses alerted when on the infamous Dan Ryan.

  Why had he taken the Skyway? He could not even remember paying the $2.50 in tolls—the reason why it was the road less traveled.

  His life was in a tailspin. Things that he thought mattered—Mrs. Shaw, The Robbins, unloading the house, even the spirit of the house—fell into perspective. Even his career, or maybe especially his career, surfaced in his mind for what it was—a job with a sharklike nature of overseeing cutting and slashing, a job that made for him a comfortable living, as long as he played the current corporate game of health care, an industry—yes, that’s what it was now!—that precluded any humanitarian thoughts or concern for the health of patients.

  What mattered were Meg and his child. These were real to him. And he had screwed up again. How had he managed to do it?

  He thought of turning around and going back. He wished that he could, but he couldn’t. He had set an ultimatum for Meg that he regretted now, bitterly. What had he been thinking? Did he expect her to come running out to the drive, make him stop, and accompany him to Chicago?

  No, Meg was stronger than that. He was still learning how strong she was.

  The Caprice was approaching Lake Shore Drive now. He would be at the condo in ten minutes.

  What’s keeping me from turning back?

  Meg sat quietly in the bay, but her body was tense, her mind on edge. She had read the article twice. It detailed the burning of the barn that had been repurposed to use as the Reichart garage with servants’ quarters overhead. The wooden structure burned down to the four-foot-high stone and mortar wall and foundation. Claude Reichart, a nine-year-old child pianist and composer, died in the blaze. An investigation of the fire’s cause was being undertaken by the fire and police departments. No one could explain Claude’s presence in the barn. It had been, a grieving Mrs. Alicia Reichart told the reporter, out of bounds for her son.

  Mrs. Reichart had been hosting a luncheon at the time for the members of the Presbyterian Ladies Society. Claude, already well known in Northern Indiana as a musical prodigy, was to play the piano for the ladies after the meal.

  At the first alarm, the ladies ran to the verandah and watched in horror as the barn was consumed by the blaze. They could, Mrs. Julia Mulvihill said, see Claude’s face and form at the upper window before the smoke inside became too thick. “He was
there one moment,” she said, “and then he was gone.”

  The story was disturbing and heart-rending.

  Meg remembered now what Krista had said about dual unities—that such a manifestation was common with mothers and newborns, but could also apply to a mother and older child if the bond was especially close, or if one or both deaths were traumatic, perhaps leaving things unfulfilled. The likelihood of this phenomenon might even be further increased, she had said, if the mother witnessed the child’s death.

  Alicia had witnessed her son’s death, and it had been no bedside vigil where some measure of preparation and closure might have been possible. Alicia had watched her first-born—a child with the talents of one in a generation—burn to death before her very eyes.

  Good God! Was it any wonder after that and the subsequent loss of her husband and twins to influenza that the woman died in an asylum?

  What a tormented soul she must have been. Or is!

  Meg became convinced that the experiences with the spirits—or ghosts—of the boy and his mother did suggest a dual unity.

  But what, if anything, did they want from her?

  How could they be put to rest?

  Meg read the article again, and not long after, a profound tiredness came over her. She fell asleep in her chair at about nine o’clock in the evening.

  She dreamt.

  Afterward she would recall that it started with a soundless dream she had had before. She was seated in a small, crowded room. It was daylight and the heat was almost tropical. People’s faces turned to her occasionally. Women’s faces. Women with large decorous hats and broad smiles behind waving fans.

  All at once the women were on their feet, and Meg found herself in the crush as they pushed toward a doorway. Their faces bespoke panic and horror, but their screams from open mouths were as from a silent film.

  Meg was on a porch now and looking up at a burning building—a barn. She would recall the dream as one in black and white, like the silents—except for the flames bursting in hues of yellow, orange, and red, flames that rose from the building like fluttering tropical birds.