Page 5 of Ghost Walk
Which was why the Riveras had always been a stone in their sensible shoes.
For generations, Grace’s relatives had been the fortunetellers in town. Their small shop had been housing tarot card readings and mixing potions since before the Revolution. Way longer than the cutesy antique dealers had been in town.
Regardless of their authentic provenance, though, the rest of Harrisonburg was embarrassed to have their storefront anywhere near their white picket fences. They wanted to forget all the messy aspects of the past and focus on having fife-and-drum parades every day at three o’clock. The Riveras had never fit into that gentrified ideal. From the day her parents died and she moved in with her aunt, until the day she went off to college, Grace had felt out of place. Which is whyshe’d left this stifling town and never looked back.
Well, until her breakdown had driven her from Richmond and she had nowhere else to go.
Harrisonburg hadn’t changed much since Grace left, just like it hadn’t changed much in the two-and-a-half centuries before. It was the most complete Colonial town in America, filled with eighteenth century brick houses and cobblestone streets. For generations, it had been forgotten and past by as America grew-up around it. In the 1940s, the Harrisonburg Preservation Association had successfully lobbied to have the entire town set aside as a landmark. Instantly, ruined buildings turned into “historic” buildings and property values doubled. The small town now existed out of time. Entering Harrisonburg was like stepping back to days of John Handcock.
In a completely sanitized way.
The whole place was part history lesson, part Disney World. Unsavory things like slavery, dirt, and James Riordan had no place in their pretty reimagining of history. Friendly actors showed tourists how to make paper or weave blankets in quaint shops. Horses clumped up and down the streets. Musicians serenaded diners with high-spirited fiddle music. …But there were still three Starbucks within walking distance.
Harrisonburg’s modern restaurants and shops fed off happy tourist dollars. It gave the place a sense of artificiality that Grace hated. Harrisonburg should be teaching people whatreallyhappened, not just what was appealing to the customers. The Founding Fathers had walked these streets and slept in these buildings. Redcoats attacked Patriots not three miles away. The United States had been conceived in the backrooms of these taverns.Thatwas what Harrisonburg was really about.Thatwas what they should be focused on, even if it meant that the shops on Main Street didn’t make a fortune every summer, selling six dollar popcorn in plastic powder horns.
No one else saw things her way, though. Most of the people who actually lived there were retired college professors, small business owners, and paid-by-the-hour employees. All of them liked Harrisonburg just the way it was. They didn’t careabout historical accuracy. They just wanted to stay the seventh most popular tourist destination in Virginia, even if that meant adding air-conditioning to the historic mansions so no one got too hot while experiencing the “authentic” lifestyle of Colonial America.
Since triple homicides and lynchings didn’t exactly blend with the cafes, garden tours, and the annual fireworks display, all the remaining evidence of the murders was locked up in the basement of the Harrisonburg Historical Museum, on permanent non-display. No one would be happy about Grace reminding guests that the town was also the site of America’s first serial killing.
Too bad.
She needed the tips.
“Lucinda’s family immediately suspected that James Riordan was behind her disappearance. The two of them had been seen around town, in the weeks before the murder. There were whispers and speculation. Her sister Eugenia nearly fainted whenever she saw him. Men muttered that something should be done. …But there was no proof.”
“Bloody right there wasn’t.”
“People grew even more suspicious when Anabel Maxwell and Clara Vance went missing in the following days. Like Lucinda, they were never seen again. Anabel disappeared out of the governor’s hedge maze at a party and Clara vanished at the 4thof July celebration in town square. All that was ever found of her was a lace shawl, splattered with blood.”
The heckler paced around, glowering at her.
Grace almost didn’t blame him this time. Even two and a half centuries after the girls’ deaths, it seemed tacky to twist the crimes into some macabre form of entertainment. Her rent money was at stake, though, so she kept going. “Since these were the three women who’d rejected Captain Jamie’s lecherous advances at the Summer Ball, Harrisonburg grew more convinced of his guilt. The good citizens of the town decided to act.”
The tour began to buzz amongst themselves, liking thistale.
Most of them, anyway.
“Oh bullocks! That isn’t true, a’tall!” The loudmouth stalked closer to the lantern, looking even more pissed off. …And even more stunning in the stronger light. “Whoever told you this was out of his skull.” His face was a study in masculine perfection, his auburn hair tied back in the kind of ponytail favored by guys who not-so-secretly longed to be Wesley inThe Princess Bride.
Whowashe? He looked familiar. Maybe he was an actor who starred in some pirate TV show that she was too smart to watch.
…Or maybe he worked in Harrisonburg.
Yeah, that actually made sense. Obviously he was a local, since he said he took a Ghost Tour every night. She was surprised none of the other guides had mentioned him. Grace looked him up and down, trying to recall if he worked in one of the local shops. If he did, she was totally going to get his ass fired.
In the light, she noticed that he was dressed in Revolutionary-era style clothes, which backed up her new theory. Many employees wore period costumes, to keep Harrisonburg “authentic,” but this guy actually made the leggings and brightly patterned waistcoat seemnotstupid. That annoyed her nearly as much as his running commentary.
Grace herself was wearing a wide skirt and bonnet that weighed about six thousand pounds. Unlike her unwanted customer, she knew she looked wilted and silly.
Ignoring that depressing fact and the stifling summer heat, she reached the grand finale of her gory tale. “The same night that poor Clara vanished, the angry townspeople vowed not to let Jamie Riordan strike again. They dragged him from his cabin on his ship, theSea Serpent, and carried him down this very street, burning torches and chanting for justice.”
“Bloody cowards.”
“Then they strung a rope from a tree that stood right there,” she pointed to the stump of a giant oak, which had been struck by lightning sometime during the Civil War, “and tied theother end around Captain Riordan’s neck. They say he begged forgiveness for his crimes, but Harrisonburg wasn’t in a charitable mood. They hanged him, while he pleaded for mercy.”
“That’s a fucking lie.” Long John Idiot bellowed. “You donea know what you’re talking about!” His accent was thicker than ever, so it actually took her a beat to translate the snarled “donea” into “do not.” “How did you even get this job, woman?”
Grace had had enough. “Would you just shut-up?” She whirled around to face him, jabbing a finger at his chest. “Itiswhat happened. James Riordan’s crimes are straight from the history books.Horror in Harrisonburg, written by Anabel Maxwell’s own brother Gregory, outlined the whole story. Feel free to look it up yourself, if you don’t believe me.”
