Last Ghost at Gettysburg (5 page)

“You
have
to wear all that?”

“Yeah, if you want to be authentic. Mom made
a lot of the stuff for me, but things like the hoop, you have to
buy from one of the reenactor supply places in town, and let me
tell you, it ain’t cheap.”

“I never realized you had to go through so
much to be realistic.”

“T.J., we’re selling the past here. People
expect that.”

They stopped abruptly on Chambersburg Street
as a white and blue police cruiser flew by. “There’s something you
don’t see every day,” murmured LouAnne, and she watched the vehicle
until it was out of sight.

“Pretty quiet here?”

“Quiet’s not the word, Cuz. Except for the
high season. But something’s going on around here. Even my dad’s
been a little on edge lately.”

“But he likes being a ranger, right?”

“
Oh sure, though in a way it’s the same
deal that I have at the Charney Inn. He conducts special tours or
talks around the battlefield for visiting dignitaries or ‘people
who know people,’ if you get what I’m saying. Much better than the
generic tour busses you’ll see all over the place. And let me tell
you, it gets
steaming
on the grounds during the summer, same
as it was during the actual battle. But Dad loves history, and he
loves the outdoors. Do you know he has a few buddies he goes
shooting with and all they use is Civil War style rifles and
pistols? You know, sticking the bullet down the muzzle, using a
ramrod, the whole deal. Comes home with black powder all over his
face. No, thank you. But he’s like an expert at it.”

“So, how long has he been a ranger?”

“Well, he retired from teaching five years
ago, but he’d started learning the ropes as a seasonal ranger a
couple years before that. Technically, he retired because of
disability. He ruptured a disc in his back while breaking up a
fight, but teaching twenty-five years of high school industrial
arts, or what you’d call shop class, was enough. He does miss
coaching football, though.”

“Did he have some good teams?”

“Too many to count. Football’s real big here
in Pennsylvania, you know. Dad was never a head coach, didn’t want
the headaches, he’d say, but he loved coaching defense. You’re
aware he was All Big-Ten linebacker at Michigan State. D’you know
what his nickname was?”

“Nope.”

“Maddog Mike. See, his idol growing up was
this guy Mike Curtis who played for the Colts back in the day when
they were still in Baltimore. This guy was a maniac. Used to try to
rip guy’s heads off and whatnot. So, Dad became “Maddog” Mike
Darcy. Wore Curtis’s number thirty-two and everything. He had a
bunch of his college buddies over once and they told me some pretty
wild stuff, both on the field and off. As you can see, Dad’s calmed
down a lot. You’d never know he was this crazy football guy. But
his legend lives on. I mean, I’d hate to be some guy coming over to
pick me up for a date and have Dad giving him
The
Stare
.”

“He’d do that?” said T.J., imagining Uncle
Mike in “Maddog” mode.

“Of course, silly,” chirped LouAnne. “I’m his
baby!”

“But your mom is so laid back.”

“Well, as they say, opposites attract. She’s
not at all into the history thing like Dad. Just putters around the
garden when she’s not volunteering at the hospital or the library.
Sometimes I need a buffer between me and Dad. He’s
so
protective!”

“So, uh,” ventured T.J., “does that mean you
have a boyfriend?”

“Not at the present time, and it’s not
because of Dad, either. Just nobody around here who’s worth the
trouble. Ninth grade guys are such dorks.”

Then T.J. remembered that although they were
the same age, his cousin was a year ahead in school because she’d
skipped a year in elementary school early on. Yet she seemed so
much older. He was caught totally off guard when she suddenly
asked, “And what about you? Lots of females chasing you through the
hallways?”

T.J. panicked. Yes, there were some girls at
school who thought he was cute and all, and he always showed good
manners, unlike most of his male classmates. So far he hadn’t
mustered up the courage to approach them, let alone ask them out.
But he didn’t want to look like a loser...

“Well, there’s this girl I’m kinda going out
with. Katie Vickers.”

“Katie Vickers,” LouAnne said slowly, letting
the name roll off her tongue. “Sounds pretty.”

“Yeah, she’s all right.” Desperate to get off
the subject of his nonexistent love life, he decided to impress
her. “I’m going out for cross country next year. The coach at the
high school gave me a summer workout program and everything.”

“Great!” said his cousin. “We can train
together!”

“What?”

“T.J., I was on the freshman cross country
team at my school this year!” She regarded his look of disbelief
and added, “What, you think your mousy little cousin can’t be an
athlete?” She shot him a definitely un-mousy look.

“No, no, it’s not that—”

“I just didn’t want to do the typical girlie
sports like field hockey. Or even soccer. I mean,
really
—running up and down the field and sometimes never
touching the ball. I prefer track. Just being alone with your
thoughts...relying on your own ability and all.”

“Me, too.”

“Problem is, I would actually rather train at
night during the summer, when it’s cooler, but I can’t on nights I
work. See, at the Inn I alternate with a boy over at Gettysburg
College who plays the part of a Confederate soldier. He’s pretty
authentic, if I do say so myself, but no way does he makes the tips
that I do. Anyway, I’d like to get a track scholarship to college,
help my parents out with the expenses. If I’m good enough.”

“You will be,” offered T.J.

“You’re sweet, Cuz, but it’s gonna take a lot
of work and I’m gonna have to lay off the partying. Man, at my
school it’s like every Saturday there’s a kegger somewhere. You’ll
see when you get to high school.”

For some reason that remark made T.J. feel
terribly young, and LouAnne, sensing his discomfort, quickly
righted the ship. “But I bet you’re a good runner. I can tell by
your legs. I can see your thighs and calves are cut up right
through your jeans
.” Which embarrassed him even more
. What
was it with this girl? Even when she was being friendly she made
him feel so off-balance.

“So, you wanna run tomorrow morning?” she
said with one eyebrow raised.

“Okay. Like, seven o’clock?”

“Too hot. Make it six. You’ll end up thanking
me. And here we are.”

T.J. looked up, amazed. They were back at
Uncle Mike’s house. Had they really covered all that distance? It
had flown by.

“I was about to come looking for you guys.”
Mike pushed open the front door, concern etched upon his face.

“Oh, Daddy, puh-leese,” said LouAnne,
disarming her father with a peck on the cheek. “I had T.J. to
protect me. And, guess what? He’s doing cross country, too! We’re
running the battlefield tomorrow morning.”

“That’s fine, as long as you stay to the
paved surfaces. But let’s lay off the night runs for a while.”

“How come?”

“Well,” said Darcy, measuring his words,
“there’s been some mischief going on lately in the woods.”

“I knew it!” cried LouAnne.

“No, you don’t,” cautioned Mike. “Not the
half of it. So, I want you to lay low for a while. Get your track
work in during the morning, before it gets hot. And, T.J., watch
out for your cousin. She talks a good game, but she sometimes
suffers from overconfidence.” Then his frown melted into a smile.
“I have no idea where she gets it.”

“Me neither,
Maddog
,” said LouAnne,
and with a toss of her hair she was off to her room down the hall
from T.J.’s.

Watching her leave, the elder Darcy turned to
his nephew and, placing a meaty hand on his shoulder, whispered,
“Don’t ever have girls.”

As T.J lay in the dark guestroom, serenaded
by an army of crickets outside his window, he reviewed the events
of the day and concluded that perhaps this trip to Gettysburg might
not be so boring after all.

Chapter Seven

“Okay, let’s go over this one more time,”
said a weary Al Warren as he sat across from the abject figure
slumped in an office chair before him. “You want a cup of
coffee?”

“Not strong enough,” murmured the thirtyish
man dressed all in black. His short, spiky hair was styled in the
popular “just rolled out of bed” coiffure and his toned arms bulged
from the two-sizes-two-small tee shirt with the letters GGC
stenciled across the front in a ghostly silver scroll.

“And how do we know you haven’t just been
drinking? The patrolman whose car you almost ran into said you were
babbling like a crazy man.”

“So breathalyze me.” His eyes glowed with
disdain.

“Okay, okay,” soothed Warren, palms held
outward. “From the top, Mr. Weinstein. You’re in Gettysburg...”

“To film a show. It’s called
Gonzo Ghost
Chasers
. On the Adventure Channel. I lead a team of four on an
exploration of a haunted site. We film over the course of a week
and then our editors back in LA put the show together. This is our
second year, and it’s a popular series.”

“So where’s your production crew? I mean, I
can’t tell you how many supposed ghost hunters and paranormal
experts have passed through here the past few years, and they all
have some kind of entourage with them.”

“Yeah, well, see, that’s what makes us so
different. It’s just the four of us; me, Caroline, Josh and Nugent
with our own hand-held video recorders and EVP equipment.”

“EVP?”

“Electromagnetic voice phenomena. It picks up
sounds that the human ear can’t hear.”

“Sounds? Like what?” Warren glanced sideways
at Bruce Morrison, head of the park rangers, whom he’d called over
from a late meeting down the hall.

“Dude, from the
other
side. You know,
dead people.”

“Oh.”

“So anyway, tonight we were just scouting the
area. The conditions were perfect, some moonlight, very little
wind. What we do that’s different from the other shows is we all go
out on our own and individually try to provoke the spirits into
responding to us. That’s why we’re the
Gonzo Ghost Chasers
,”
he added sheepishly.

“Uh-huh,” Warren replied with a grunt,
wondering whether this clown was actually serious about all this
nonsense. “Go on.”

“Well, we decided to split up the
battlefield, and I got Devil’s Den. I figured I’d check out where
that famous photo of the dead Rebel sharpshooter was taken after
the battle. We had a local guy drop us off at our sites—”

“Which is illegal after dark,” cut in
Morrison.

Weinstein held up his hand in
acknowledgement. “I was there a little while, and it was really
quiet. All you could hear was that little creek nearby. So I turned
on my stuff and started recording, provoking the spirit of the dead
Confederate.”

“By saying what?” asked Warren.

“Dude, it’s all on the tape, but I said,
like, ‘Are you here? I’m talking to the dead soldier in the photo.
Are you aware you died for nothing? Are you ashamed you were
fighting for an unjust cause? The bondage of other human beings?’
Stuff like that.”

“Oh, boy,” said Morrison, checking his
watch.

“Yeah, you can say what you want, man,”
Michael Weinstein argued, “but then how do you explain
that
guy
showing up?”

“What guy?” asked Warren and Morrison
simultaneously.

“The Southern soldier, man! It’s like, all of
a sudden I caught a whiff of what smelled like, I don’t know,
something putrid.”

“Did you smell horse?” cut in Warren.

“Horse?”
“Yes, was there the smell of a horse?”

Weinstein’s eyes widened as he recalled.
“Yes,” he said slowly, “there
was
a horsey smell in there
somewhere. Hey, how would you know that?”

“Lucky guess,” said Warren. “Continue.”

“Well, then the battery on my EVP recorder
died. Just
died
, man, even though I’d changed it that
afternoon. That’s what happens sometimes. Spirits drain batteries
in order to manifest themselves. It’s happened on other shows, but
not like this.”

“Why?”

“Because I looked up and he was
there
,
man. Not some whitish orb floating around. Not some shadow figure
or mist. A real, honest-to-goodness ghost!”

“Describe him, er, it,” said Warren, learning
forward in his chair.

“Well, I was sitting against one of the
boulders, looking up at him, but the moon came out from behind some
clouds and it was like a spotlight hit him, so I got a good look.
We’re talking over six feet tall, with a beard and kinda curly long
hair,
in a full Confederate uniform
! Boots with spurs, a big
old saber on his belt, gold braid all over the place, and to top it
off, a Western style hat with a big plume hanging off it.”

“Was he armed? Besides the sword, I mean,”
said Warren.

“Dude, this guy was packing the biggest
pistol I’ve ever seen! I mean, bigger than Clint Eastwood’s in the
Dirty Harry
movies!”

“You’re sure?”

“Of course I’m sure! It was an inch from my
face!” Weinstein shuddered at the still-fresh memory.

Morrison crossed his arms over his chest and
casually leaned against the wall, his salt-and-pepper hair and
bifocals giving him the appearance of a quizzical college
professor. “What did he say, Mr. Weinstein? Be specific.”

“Well, he asked me what unit I was with,
which at first I didn’t get, but then I figured out maybe he
thought I was some kind of soldier like him. So I told him about
the TV show and all, and he looked at me like I was from another
planet or something. Then I guess he didn’t get the answer he
wanted so he told me I was disturbing hallowed ground or something
and that he was going to have to shoot me! Well, the whole time I
was slowly reaching down for my infrared camcorder, which I’d
dropped, so I could maybe throw it at him or distract him and take
off, but just as I got my hand on it he says something like ‘I
truly regret this, but you leave me no choice,’ and he pulls the
trigger!”