Last Impressions (The Marnie Baranuik Files) (41 page)

Harry coughed into his gloved hand and read my intentions through the Bond. He gave me a slow nod and a broad, theatrical
wink. I didn’t know exactly what he had in mind, but knowing my Cold Company, I knew it wouldn’t be subtle.

I asked, “If we do run across ghosts here, we should talk to them and then… not release them?”
Into the light and eternal peace where they belong. Right, holy man?

The priest struggled with his apprehension for a moment then dismissed my question with an irritated wave of his hand. He pulled a little rag doll out of his pack and shook it a little. Its red yarn hair fell into place around accusing eyes of brown bead.

“Whatcha got there,” I asked, “Raggedy Damned?”

“A lure, if you like. The last time I was here a child’s spirit was lingering, probably the one Britney called Limping Boy. I might
entice him to appear with this.”

“We’re not here to play with creepy dolls or the ghosts of children. We’re here to talk to John Briggs-Adsit,” I said, but what he
was doing
had gruesome appeal; it was almost mesmerizing. The doll had arresting beaded eyes, and its neck had lost some stuffing, so the head hung askew, tilted to one side as if it had been hanged. Hearing
a goofy
pitch creep into my voice, I said, “No. Don’t do it.” I let out an involuntary
meep
of delighted faux-horror. “Don’t put the dolly in the mud!”

Scarrow sighed at my theatrics and set the rag doll against the brick wall in a relatively dry spot. “We can just leave this here with an EMF meter and video and you don’t have to worry about it. My side project.”

“Dear Diary: Father Scarrow put the dolly in the mud,” I whispered to myself and left him to his project, following where
Harry was
strolling, waiting for my Cold Company to make his move. He was holding the edges of his coat close to his body so they wouldn’t
brush
against anything dirty. I stood for a moment in my muck-smeared coverall with my arms crossed and just looked at him, smiling. “What’s wrong, Harry?”

Harry did a charming half-turn, letting his coat fan out like an opera cape, and I sensed it was time for the big show. “You know,
something has been niggling at my conscience.”

You have a conscience?
I thought, and tried not to grin. “Oh?” I prodded helpfully. “Would this have anything to do with that thing that we were discussing before? That you’re
super
sorry about and need to confess?”

“Oh, yes.” He performed a proper drama-king sigh. “If only I
could
unburden my soul’s darkest secrets and release this inner turmoil that weighs upon me…” He paused to give the priest the long side-
eye.

Scarrow clearly wasn’t buying it. “You’re not asking me to hear your confession, surely? Here? Now?”

“One wonders when one would have a better opportunity, Little
Father,” Harry said. “Do you not trust my pipistrelle to watch the
dolly for you? It does not seem an arduous task, no more so than her usual ganderflanking about.”

I scowled at him and shuffled closer, my snowsuit going
schlerp
schlerp schlerp,
having added grit and muck to the wet.
“Ganderflanking better be a good thing, dead guy,” I said under my breath. “Or I will hug you like Swamp Thing.”

“Besides, you may, in fact, have a point, Mr. Scarrow,” Harry went on as though he hadn’t heard me. “Kinship of the Departed
may be inhibiting the spirits here, instead of inducing them to come forward.
If the two of us were to step outside with the dogs, we could clear the atmosphere for MJ and she would have a better chance at contacting Captain Briggs-Adsit.” The gaze he leveled at the priest was a challenge. “Of course, if you wish not to hear the darkest secrets of a
creature of my advanced age, I would completely understand; few would have the stomach for it.”

“Balls,” I interjected. “He obviously means balls. Or maybe he's like Elian, and prefers the term
huevos
or
cojones
.”

Scarrow considered his EMF reader in one hand and the digital recorder in the other.

I repeated sadly, “The Ferengi would say you haven't got the lobes. I know a bunch of ways to call you a dickless chickenshit,
dude, even if my Klingon is rusty.”

Scarrow scowled and slapped the device into my gloved palm.
“Fine. Take readings. Listen, this is what an anomaly sounds like.” He pressed a button that said “Test” and it made a little noise like
voof-
whoosh
. “Keep the video running. Do temperature sweeps. If you get a drop of more than ten degrees—“

“You guys are right outside,” I soothed. “What could go wrong?”

Harry hesitated at that and gave me a worried frown; he hadn’t considered what I might actually do when he’d offered to distract the priest. Now, he wasn’t so sure. I shooed him away.

The minute the iron gate closed behind the dogs, Scarrow, and
Harry, I abandoned the digital voice recorder and the exorcist’s
video
equipment, and took the EMF reader and my backpack to the dark end of the tunnel where the snow blockage was settling in packed
clumps to allow scant moonlight to filter in.

At this end, the railroad ties and the ground both sloped down until they disappeared under the water. I unzipped the bag and took out the Ouija board, putting it on the ground. The thrifty Mr. Merritt
had saved some of Lord Dreppenstedt’s money and got the off-brand one; a “Wee-Gee Fun Board.” I set the EMF reader on an angle next to the wall. There didn’t seem to be any anomalies, but that
wasn’t really my focus.

I knew Harry wanted me to attempt to make contact with John Junior, and he was probably right, but the temptation to try what Britney had tried, to see what Britney had seen, was just too strong.
Perhaps John
was
the key, but Mama-Captain was the big fucking problem here. She would have to be dealt with. I pulled out my canister of Morton’s salt and drew a generous protective circle in the
mud. Next came the spray paint. Mr. Merritt had bought me glow-in-the-dark in sparkly pink, because apparently he thinks I’m a twelve-year-old girl. Considering I was wearing a My Little Pony nightshirt the other night, I supposed that was fair.

I shook the can and sprayed “John Briggs-Adsit has swamp dick,” on the wall. Then I added, “John’s syphilis is so bad,
it
has crabs.” I underlined the
it
, in case anyone got confused. Then, “John’s syph-crabs
have the Clap. Double-Extra Clap. Got it from the whores. Whore
Clap.” Okay, so I'm no Banksy. I was still sincere.

I felt like my inflammatory statements needed more
oomph
, but the thick air was filling up with aerosol propellant and I could barely
breathe as it was. I started humming and singing, “Mother Briggs-Adsit… I’m mocking your baby… I’m being disrespectful… Hey,
lady… do you hear me, Mama-Captain?” It was a wonder I hadn't gotten a songwriting contract from a record label. This was some catchy stuff. I decided to go back to what had worked in Nowland's apartment, set to the jaunty tune of, “Deep in the Heart of Texas.” “Ol' Johnny boy, your broken toy,”
clap clap clap clap!
“dicked every whoooooore in Jersey...” There may have been hip thrusting for emphasis.

There was a sound at the entrance of the tunnel, and I squinted to see if the boys had been drawn to the yard by my milkshake. I didn’t see anything until my eyes fell on the rag doll.

It wasn’t sitting against the wall anymore; it was laying face down with its little cloth legs spread. I didn’t take my eyes off of it as
I squatted by the Wee-Gee Fun Board box, removed a glove, and ran
my thumbnail around the lid to break the paper seal. I took the
board out and unwrapped the plastic on the planchette, all without taking my eyes off the muddy doll.

Its fabric dolly face tilted like a snake rearing up. I felt my eyes
go wide. The doll’s face was streaked with mud in a grotesque
parody
of tears, or maybe the lead singer in a Scandinavian death metal
band. It tilted an inch to look at me.

“It’s not
looking
at me,” I whispered to myself. “It has beads for eyes.”

Like an eel making a slow turn, the dolly swam through the mud
until it was a slow little cloth torpedo aimed right at me, then
stopped and waited.

“Oh, is that right?” I asked. “You mad, bro? You wanna go?” I put the spray paint down on the crumpled backpack and made
come-at-me
fingers at the dolly, totally channeling Morpheus from
The
Matrix
. “Good luck with that. You’re a toy. I’m a fucking freight train of disaster in a tunnel full of dead shit. Wait, what was my point,
there?”
The doll jerked forward like a fencer feinting. I squealed a little,
grabbed the planchette, and pointed it to the HELLO position on the board. “Is that you, Mama-Captain? You’ve smacked me around enough today. Hold onto your spectral titties and get ready for a craptastic shitstorm of magic.” I stuck a hand into my backpack to retrieve my sage, a match, and a toothpick. “We end this now.”

The air began to swim, and I wondered if I was just high from the aerosol in the spray paint can, or if there were more ghosts
wafting
around. I didn’t have to wonder long. One I took to be Tall Man with Flower came forward from the miasma, and then dissipated. The
EMF
reader was set to go
voof-whoosh
in the event of an anomaly, but it
went
bee-boop
instead. I didn’t have instructions for
bee-boop
. I had been waiting for
voof-whoosh
. What the hell did
bee-boop
mean?

The air got colder in front of me so I lowered my ski mask; my breath coming from the nose holes fogged. I hurriedly struck the match and lit the sage, smudging the air to rid it of any angry, dark
entities.
Several tendrils of the ghostly vapor shied away from the sage smoke, while others reached out for it. I kept one eye on them and one eye on the dolly that was again creeping my way. Belatedly, I
wished that I was part chameleon so I could swivel my eyes in different directions.

“Holy rolling shitballs,” I whispered. “How many of you misty jaggoffs are there? Listen, don’t you know you’re supposed to go into the light? This is not the place for you.”

A three-headed blob formed in the haze in front of me, and at first I thought it was Asmodeus; it did not solidify and start mocking me, however. I began reciting the first spell to come to mind, since I was really flying by the seat of my pants. Tossing the burning sage down beside the board, I pricked my thumb with the toothpick and flicked blood onto the GOODBYE, then spritzed a little paint on the back of the planchette.

“
Dread Aradia, I’m Your home / Write Your lessons in my tome /
Make me crafty, make me keen / Take possession, Holy Queen
.”

The blob parted to reveal a small spirit that moved with a limp, and the dolly shot forward like a striking rattlesnake.

With a fervent burst of power, I hurried my tongue and blurted, “
Mighty Hecate, Morbid Flower / Fill this vessel with Your power / amplify inflamed remarks / burn them with these farewell sparks.
”

I heard my last words come back at me with the backdraft and
realized that “amplify” and “inflamed” were bad choices. I grabbed
my backpack and bolted past the burning sage as the Wee-Gee Fun Board
ignited. At the last second I noticed the “flammable” and
“combustible” and “do not use without ventilation” warnings on the paint can, saw
the flames react to my spell with a great lick into the air, thought
fuckanut
, and took a running leap toward the entrance. I didn’t get
far before the can exploded with a healthy, mystically-magnified bang
and a violent shove of air against my back. I belly-flopped, covering my head with my arms. The spell forced the blast up and out,
expanding in all directions. The entire tunnel shuddered, and little stones began to
rain down, dusting from above, and another minor avalanche
sounded like it was collapsing through the overhead aperture.

There was a loud, splintering crack from the far end of the tunnel, and my warning bells started ringing louder as a support
beam groaned. I launched to my feet, threw myself against the gate to slap
it open, grabbed the iron bars, and sprang forth into the night; I flipped with almost ballerina-style grace in a perfect spin. If I hadn’t
been on fire, it might have been fancy.

I went headfirst into a nearby snow pile, rolled twice, and ended up face-down and spread-eagled like the doll. I picked my face up out of the snow only to see Scarrow’s small, rough hands cupping snow directly into my eyes.

“Ah!” I sputtered. He began packing it in the back of my head,
smacking, smacking, and plunging my face into the snow. I
squawked angrily. “What the glorious fuck?” I cried, muffled by the snow that was getting crammed up my nose.

“The back of your ski mask was on fire.”

“Oh.” I patted the back of my head with my bare hand. “Is that why I smell burning hair?”

Scarrow didn’t wait for Harry to help me; he hauled me up by my elbow. “What the hell did you do in there?”

I was going to snap, “my job, ass-hat,” except talking shit to suspiciously animated dolls is really
not
my job, here or at home. I pointed behind me, jaw working, and ended up with, “Limping Boy
started it.” I explained about the ghosts, and the spray paint, and the spell, and the Ouija board.