“Do you have any idea what this room represents?” he asked them both. “What it held?”
“I always assumed it a junk room,” Sherman said, sneering at the space.
“More likely it was an odd museum of some sort,” Deidre said. “But a rather boring one, I always felt. It seemed a rather mundane collection of items assembled inside. But your uncle was always a little on the eccentric side of the fence.”
“And my uncle’s vocation?” Baker questioned them further. “Was it known to either of you?”
“No, but I assumed him retired for many years,” Sherman said first. “We didn’t talk much, sir. As Miss Ahearn has attested, your uncle had little need for most people. And when he did it was generally about the tending of something.”
“He never spoke of his work to me, but I guessed, by the books in his study, that he had been a doctor of some kind,” Deidre said on her turn. “He was intelligent enough to have been anything, sir. And quite successful at what he did, I am sure.”
“Are you familiar with psychical research?” Baker asked them both.
Deidre frowned curiously. “Can’t say that I am but I don’t like the sound of it.”
“I’ve heard a little about it,” Sherman replied, but he elaborated no further.
“My uncle and I were both involved with psychical research,” Baker explained. “We investigated claims of supernaturalism.”
“I always took him for a little morbid, but I had no idea he engaged in such black pursuits,” Deidre said, with a superstitious distaste. “The things I’ve heard; mediums and séances. Spiritualists bleeding slime from their mouths. We aren’t meant to call upon the dead. The good lord put a fence between us and the deceased for a good reason, I am sure.”
Baker was having more impressions regarding the lady. He imagined her deceased husband had done well, but still left her with little. And there were children involved; otherwise she would have simply found another husband. She had been educated. Perhaps too well, and there was a dearth of opportunity for women who were too smart. God-fearing was blatantly obvious. He tried to appeal to that intelligence of hers.
“My dear lady, it is nineteen twenty-five, after all. It is time to look with objective eyes toward things we don’t comprehend. And as I stated, Miss Ahearn, we were scientists,” Baker stressed. “As such, we approached this particular research as skeptics. There are several flamboyant charlatans out there giving the studies a bad name. I have worked with many spiritualists over the years, and found only two that I could not disprove as conmen who were using theatrics to bilk widows. My uncle and I both had a particular corner of the field that we specialized in, and that’s where this room comes into play.”
“What corner would that be, Mr. Johnson?” Sherman asked.
“A dark one, absent of the lord’s light, I am sure,” Deidre threw in.
Baker ignored her. “The haunting of places,” he replied to Sherman’s question.
“And how does this room fit in with that?” Sherman said. He seemed absolutely fascinated with Baker’s story.
“In many cases of a haunting we suspect a human spirit to be behind the phenomena. Sometimes it is something more malevolent than that,” Baker explained.
“Demons,” Deidre proposed gravely. “Excited and released into purpose by the fooling with things best left alone.”
Baker looked at Deidre, and he felt that exceptional patience of his waver for a moment. But then he realized that no amount of reason would undo what the church had put in this woman. She spoke from ignorance and fear, and Baker was not a fan of either. But still, it was her right and he gave it to her.
“There are such things as inhuman spirits and they can be called into action by sinners or saints,” Baker explained. “What makes one sensitive and prone to this type of visitation is still unknown. We have theories on the catalysts for such occurrences, but believe me when I say that the innocent and guilty alike can be haunted. So, coming back to my point, in many cases we have found a connection between the haunting and a physical item on the haunted premises. In such instances, we removed the items from the afflicted structure and we would store them, in rooms such as this. My uncle called this his black room.”
“What, he would keep trophies stored here?” Sherman asked.
“This isn’t a trophy room, Mr. Drummond,” Baker said solemnly. “This was a prison. My uncle was its warden and I was willed this property strictly to sit upon those haunted items as the new guard. But now, I suppose I have no prison to maintain.”
“Why would your uncle give these items away?” Deidre said as a dark realization set into her. “He was giving these accursed things to people. He was sending demons home with them. Why would he do such a terrible thing?”
“He suffered from dementia,” Baker guessed. “He surely wasn’t right in the head. And I can tell you from my own experiences that my uncle perceived many enemies in his life. He could carry a grudge like a birthmark.”
Sherman nodded. “Yes, I have seen signs of that from him toward people in the building. But what would happen to someone taking these items home?”
Baker shrugged. “It would depend, I think, on the level of sensitivity one has to the supernatural. In most cases, I would think the energy would sit there, undisturbed. But it is possible to reawaken a spirit within it.”
“I took something from the black room, Mr. Johnson,” Sherman confessed, and he seemed lightened, somewhat, by this admission. “I took something and I think it has haunted me, sir.”
“Please explain,” Baker said.
“Well, as I prepared the items in the room, I noticed a very nice quill and inkwell. It looked quite old. I aspire to be an author, you see, and I thought it would complement my meager and plain work desk.”
Baker nodded, thoughtfully. He knew Sherman had a desire that burned elsewhere. “And why do you believe yourself haunted by this item?”
“I write poetry, lighthearted and lyrical, in tone. But recently, my muse has grown considerably darker. My imagination sprouted fangs, suddenly. I don’t normally think of the macabre and grotesque when I work. I am certainly not a fan of it. There is a place for it, I suppose, around campfires and on Halloween night. But I thought myself more of a Longfellow than a Poe. I am driven to write, sir. I do this every night. But what I write now scares me as I can’t understand the inspiration for it. It is not me.”
“And does the quill and inkwell still sit on your desk?” Baker asked.
“No sir. I suspected it the influence and tossed it. But still my work is marred.”
Baker looked to Deidre, and the anxious expression on her face gave Baker a strong suspicion.
“You took something, too, Miss Ahearn,” he said, positive about his assumption. The woman had listened to Sherman’s story with more familiarity than empathy.
She was silent for a moment, but finally her grey face shook slightly. “Yes, I took something. I was working the day that Mr. Drummond opened the room to the public. I was working here in this building. On my way out, I noticed that some of the leftover items had been consigned to the sidewalk with a note encouraging people to give the items a home. I noticed a cookbook. A very old one, as it was wrapped in aged leather and written in hand. I took it, as I am fond of cooking.”
“And were you bothered after taking it home?” Baker asked.
“I made a lovely shepherd’s pie with one of the recipes. It tasted like perfection, but I took violently ill the following day. When I recovered, I made a few more dishes from the book, as I suspected turned meat for my poisoning. Each dish made me sicker than the last. And even when I took the book from my kitchen, nothing would settle and linger in my gut. I can only hold down bare crackers and water, now. I’ve lost ten pounds or more. I had decided to see a doctor tomorrow, before I waste to my bones.”
“And do you still have the book?” Baker asked.
“No,” Deidre said, firmly. “I had the same realization as Mr. Drummond. I don’t know why I thought the book capable of the black magic it had wrought, but I did. I fed the damned thing to the furnace in my building.”
“Is there a cure, Mr. Johnson?” Sherman asked, hopefully.
“Yes,” Deidre chimed in. “Something that doesn’t involve any murky business, of course. I won’t clasp hands in a dark circle and draw the devil in.”
“The solution to both of your problems should please you, especially, Miss Ahearn,” Baker said, with a reassuring smile. “Have someone from your church bless your homes, for although you have destroyed their vessels, the spirits still obviously linger with you. Something inhuman sounds at work here. But they are usually frightened off easily by religious symbols and people of the cloth.”
“So the cure for this science of yours is a man of the cloth?” Deidre said, sarcastically. “Imagine that.”
“The cross works, for whatever reason,” Baker admitted.
“I am not a very religious man and I wouldn’t know how to broach that subject with someone who was,” Sherman admitted.
“I have contacts,” Baker said,