The Haunted Island (A Lin Coffin Mystery Book 9) Page 6

  “How will we know which name belongs to the ghost?” Viv questioned. “Even if they identify every person buried on Canter, how will we know which one is the ghost?”

  “We’ll have to do more digging,” Lin said with a hopeful expression. “Eventually, even though it will take a lot of work, we’ll match a name to the ghost. We need to set up a meeting with Joyce Parker’s friend who had a relative die from smallpox on Canter. We might learn something from her.”

  “We should also go back to the historical museum to read the letters they have on file that were exchanged between Canter patients and their family and friends,” Viv suggested.

  Lin was happy to see that her cousin was leaving her worry of having special skills behind her, for now anyway.

  “When John gets here for dinner,” Viv said, “don’t breathe a word about what happened to me at the cemetery the other day.”

  “I won’t say anything about it.” Lin pretended to draw an X on her chest. “Cross my heart.”

  Viv said, “I’m putting my discussion with him about you and ghosts on hold, for now.”

  “I understand. Can I tell Jeff what happened to you on Canter?”

  “I guess so, but don’t let John hear any part of it. Not one part,” Viv added for emphasis.

  John and Jeff were meeting at Lin’s cottage to join the young women for dinner.

  “When we were at the cemetery,” Viv said, “did you receive any clues from the ghost? Did you feel anything from him? Do you have a sense of why he appeared there?”

  Lin thought back to the day. “His atoms turned bright red. He was angry, furious actually. I promised I’d help him. I hope I can.”

  “What was he angry about?”

  “There was no indication of why he was upset, but I’d expect it was because he died on the island. For some reason, he isn’t free to cross over.”

  “Why wouldn’t his spirit be free to cross?” Viv asked. “What could be preventing him?”

  Lin shook her head. “I honestly can’t say how it works. With other ghosts who don’t cross, it’s been because of violent death or due to some kind of unfinished business here on earth.”

  Viv tapped her chin in thought. “Unfinished business. Something happened to them and they want the truth to come out.” Her eyes turned to Lin. “Maybe unfinished business is the reason this ghost won’t cross over?”

  “I think that’s very likely.” Lin fed the dog and cat and refreshed the water dishes. “Why did the ghost show up at the cemetery?”

  “Because he’s buried there?”

  “Yes, but he’s only shown up three times. The first time I saw him on Canter, the second time was on the corner of Main Street in town, and then at the cemetery on Canter. Is he choosing certain places that have meaning to him or is he simply making random appearances?”

  “The first time he was probably getting your attention, and showing up at the cemetery makes sense because he’s buried there. But why did he show up on Main Street in Nantucket?” Viv asked.

  “I’ve been asking myself that very question,” Lin said. “He came on a boat from England and that boat stopped at Canter to be processed. How would the ghost know Nantucket? He couldn’t have been here before.”

  “One more puzzle to solve. Just add it to the list.” Viv made a sour face. “As if there aren’t already enough missing pieces to find.”

  Lin said, “I suppose he might have followed me home and that’s the simple explanation.”

  But I don’t think that’s it.

  10

  Under the old-fashioned street lamps, Lin and Jeff, and Viv and John strolled into town and down to the docks to a restaurant for drinks and they got a table looking out over the water.

  They’d sat outside at the table on Lin’s deck to eat the rice, salad, and burritos and had slices of chocolate mousse pie, and when dinner was winding down, John asked if they’d like to head to the seaside lounge for a drink before they all turned in for the night.

  Music played, the breeze off the water was warm, and the cushioned outdoors seats were comfortable as the foursome ordered drinks and continued their conversation.

  While Lin and Jeff were in the kitchen cleaning up and Viv and John were on the deck, Lin told her boyfriend about the unexpected occurrence on Canter Island.

  Jeff’s eyebrows shot up and he kept his voice down. “Viv? She felt the ghost?”

  Lin said, “She has similar ancestral lineage to me. There are paranormal skills on our side. Somehow, some skills seem to be developing late in Viv. Maybe it’s been there all along, but never really kicked in. Needless to say, she isn’t happy about it.”

  “Too bad she feels that way,” Jeff grinned. “I wish I had your lineage. I think it would be cool to have some special skills.”

  “Viv doesn’t share your enthusiasm.” Lin added the glasses to the dishwasher.

  “Maybe she’ll come around.” Jeff glanced out the screened door to be sure no one was listening or was about to come inside. “Since she’s so familiar with your abilities, why do you think she fears them in herself?”

  “It’s the unknown,” Lin said. “She might feel like she won’t be able to control the skills. Maybe she thinks her paranormal ability will scare off John. You know she doesn’t want to tell him about me. Imagine how fearful Viv will be if she has to tell him she has skills, too.”

  Jeff frowned at the thought. “I know she’s afraid to share this information with John, but I really think he’ll be okay with it.”

  “Let’s keep our fingers crossed,” Lin said. “Viv will have to tell him eventually. She can’t keep this from him for much longer.”

  On the outside patio of the restaurant, Viv swayed in her seat to the music.

  John said, “I heard this song on the radio the other day. We should add it to the band’s playlist.”

  “Everyone seems to like it,” Viv agreed. “It’s really popular. Let’s try it out at the next practice session.” Viv and John were musicians and had been in a band for years. The group had a nice following on the island and they played a couple of nights a week at bars and pubs in town.

  “How was the trip to Canter you took the other day?” John took a swallow from his beer glass. He’d been so busy with work and late evening house showings that he hadn’t seen Viv or Lin for a couple of days. Viv had asked that Lin and Jeff not bring up the visit to Canter unless John asked about it.

  Viv shot Lin a warning look reminding her not to say a word about what happened at the cemetery and then she started talking fast. “There was an issue at the cemetery.”

  “What sort of issue?” John asked.

  “The winter and spring storms caused unusually high tides,” Lin explained. “A lot of the graves got opened and some coffins were damaged.”

  John almost choked on his sip of beer and he coughed to clear his throat. “The graves were opened by the tides? What do you mean the coffins got damaged? You mean you could see the bodies?”

  “We could see some bones,” Viv said.

  John let out a groan of horror. “I’m glad I wasn’t able to go with you. I would have fainted. I can’t take stuff like that.”

  Viv flicked her eyes at Lin to be sure she wouldn’t slip and report that Viv had, in fact, fainted in the cemetery. “It was a shock,” she said.

  “We reported the damage to the state office of conservation,” Lin said. “They’ve already gone out there with machinery and excavators to repair the sea wall and the graves.”

  “Authorities have hired genealogists to help determine the identities of those buried on Canter and to search for the relatives. Relatives will be asked if they would like to have the bodies buried near them, otherwise, the bodies will be reburied at a cemetery on the mainland.”

  “Wow,” John said. “It’s an elaborate process.”

  Lin added, “The woman I spoke with at the conservation department said that grants had recently come in to restore Canter. It will become an histori
c site open to the public for tours and education.”

  “That’s great to hear,” John said as he took Viv’s hand. “I’m sorry you had to see the damaged caskets. I know it must have been upsetting to you.”

  A man’s voice called hello and the group turned to see Dr. Samuel Mitchell approaching the table. “I saw you from across the patio and wanted to come over to say hello.”

  Lin introduced Viv and John to the man.

  “I’ve seen you around the docks,” John said.

  “Did I hear you mention Canter when I was walking over?” Dr. Mitchell asked. “Have you heard about the damage to the cemetery there?”

  Lin was amazed that news had traveled so fast. “Dr. Mitchell wrote an article for an academic journal discussing the health experiments that took place on Canter,” she explained to her companions and then turned to Mitchell. “We know about the cemetery damage.”

  John said, “Lin and Viv are the ones who discovered the open graves.”

  Something moved over Mitchell’s face and his eyes widened in surprise. “You found the graves had been damaged? When?”

  “We took a day trip out to Canter,” Viv told the man.

  “A day trip? Why?” Mitchell asked.

  “All four of us were boating one day and we stopped at Canter,” Lin said. “We walked around the abandoned town area for a while, and Viv and I decided to go back.”

  “Really? For what purpose?” Mitchell’s eyes bored into the young women.

  “A day trip,” Viv bristled at what she considered the doctor’s nosy questions.

  “We hiked around,” Lin smiled. “We discovered the damage when we arrived at the cemetery.”

  “I see,” Mitchell said. “Did you see anything else?”

  “Only the road and the former foundations of the buildings that were once there,” Lin said.

  “Nothing else at the cemetery?” Mitchell questioned.

  “Like what?” Viv asked.

  “Oh, I don’t know. Was anything else damaged?”

  “The sea wall had broken apart,” Viv eyed the doctor.

  “The storms must have been wild to have created so much destruction,” Mitchell observed. “Well, the authorities are taking care of it. There will be quite a lot more people on the island from now on.” The man looked back to one of the tables on the other side of the patio and waved at the people clustered around it. “I must get back. Have a pleasant evening. I’ll see you at the house.” Mitchell smiled and walked away.

  “He’s weird,” Viv said with a look of distaste on her face.

  “Maybe a little eccentric,” Jeff suggested with grin. “He’s proving easy to work for.”

  Lin looked at John. “You said you’ve seen him on the docks? Does he have a boat?”

  John chuckled. “He has two boats. A gorgeous sailboat and a fabulous speedboat. The speedboat alone must have cost him over two hundred thousand dollars.”

  Lin’s eyes bugged as her cousin let out a yip.

  Jeff asked, “This guy is a doctor. Even if he’s at the top of the pay scale, how does he afford such things?”

  “Good question,” John said. “He purchased his new home for four million dollars.”

  “He must have inherited the money?” Lin asked as she took a glance over to where Mitchell was standing.

  “Or he invested well,” Viv said.

  “He would have had to have invested very well,” John said. “He has two houses on-island. At first, he was going to sell the one he’d lived in for years, but decided to keep it and rent it out. He didn’t need to sell in order to buy this new house so he must be rolling in dough.”

  “I wonder what his background is,” Lin said.

  “Maybe he has a money printing machine in his basement.” Viv took an appetizer from the platter set in the middle of the table. “If he’s so wealthy maybe I should make friends with him, even if he is weird. I can overlook that.”

  “Fine, make friends with him, just as long as you share with the rest of us,” John grinned.

  “Why was he asking all those questions about our visit to Canter?” Viv’s eyes narrowed.

  “Just conversation?” Jeff asked.

  “He did seem very interested in our day trip,” Lin said.

  “The guy seems a little like a busybody,” John said. “He must be one of those people who likes to know everyone’s business.”

  Viv chuckled. “Maybe I’m a busybody, too, because I’d like to know how he got all that money.”

  “Is the guy married?” John asked. “His wife might be wealthy.”

  “I don’t think he’s married,” Jeff said. “I haven’t seen a woman around the house while I’ve been renovating.” He looked at Lin for her opinion.

  “I haven’t seen a woman either. Dr. Mitchell could be divorced,” Lin said. “He may have received money as part of a divorce settlement. Or maybe he’s a widow. He could have inherited money from the wife’s estate.”

  “Okay,” Viv said with smile. “I must be a nosy busybody because I want to do some internet sleuthing on this guy one of these days.”

  Lin chuckled. “Let us know what you find out.”

  “I don’t really care what the guy is worth,” Jeff said, “as long as he has enough to pay Lin, Leonard, and me for our landscaping and renovation work.”

  “I don’t think you’ll have to worry,” John told them.

  The foursome had a laugh at the comment and then the conversation went in a different direction, but for a few seconds, a feeling of unease washed over Lin’s skin.

  11

  Joyce Parker’s friend, Sharon Powers, lived in a pretty cottage in ‘Sconset a few blocks from Joyce’s home. The small front lawn was surrounded by a white fence and fragrant flowers filled the space.

  Sharon sat in a rocking chair on the porch near the front door and when she saw Lin and Viv approaching, she stood up with a friendly smile and waved.

  “Lovely to meet you.” Sharon shook the young women’s hands and invited them onto the porch. “Joyce told me she had a wonderful chat with you. Canter Island’s history is really amazing.”

  Lin said, “Joyce told us you had a relative who was detained on Canter. We thought it would be interesting to speak with someone who had a connection to the island.”

  Sharon, a short, petite woman of seventy with silver-white hair cut short, poured glasses of iced tea and set them on the small table in front of the chairs. “It was a very distant relative of mine who was confined to Canter in 1889. His name was Patrick Brown. He was twenty-seven-years old.”

  “Where did he come from?” Viv asked. “Did he arrive on a ship that stopped for processing at Canter?”

  “No, he didn’t.” When Sharon sipped from her glass, the ice cubes made a gentle tinkling sound. “Patrick was a resident of Nantucket. He was born here. He and his brother, Harold, had a small mid-island farm where they grew vegetables.”

  “Harold was born here as well?” Lin asked.

  “He was,” Sharon said. “Their parents came over from Ireland and bought the acreage to start a farm. They had their children later in life, they were in their mid-forties when the boys were born. They owned a rambling farmhouse and the four of them lived there together.”

  “What happened to Patrick?” Viv questioned.

  “He had symptoms of fever and body aches,” Joyce said. “There were a few letters back and forth from Patrick to his family. I have them in my possession. I’ll show them to you after we talk.”

  “Did a doctor examine Patrick and send him to Canter?” Lin picked up her glass from the table.

  Joyce said, “One of the letters mentioned that Patrick went to the see the doctor out of fear that his symptoms might be smallpox. He did not want to infect his parents or his brother. He knew he’d be sent away to quarantine, but he was stoic about it.”

  “Did any of his letters speak to the conditions on Canter?” Viv asked.

  “He wrote that the observation secti
on of the hospitals was clean with natural light. There were three men to a room. They were allowed to go outside in the garden area, but he wrote that it was walled off. The staff made sure that those who were there for observation and those who were ill did not leave the confines of the hospital grounds. The Canter town had businesses, a post office, a restaurant or two … all the things needed to make a comfortable place for the staff to live. Of course, patients weren’t allowed into the town to keep the disease from spreading.”

  “Patrick came down with smallpox?” Lin asked.

  “Yes, he did, the poor man,” Sharon said. “So young. He wrote to his family for about two weeks while he was in quarantine. At the end of the two weeks, he informed them that he had taken ill. That was the last letter found with the family things. Perhaps, Patrick did write again, but from what I’ve read, when people became ill, their energy was sapped and most didn’t have the strength to sit up, let alone correspond with anyone.”

  “Patrick passed away from smallpox?” Lin asked the woman.

  “He passed away eleven days after his last letter arrived on Nantucket,” Sharon said. “The family received the news in a letter from a doctor on Canter letting them know that Patrick had lost the battle with the disease and had been buried in the island’s cemetery.”

  “Did Patrick have to be buried on Canter?” Lin questioned. “Could he have been sent back home for burial?”

  “It was frowned on,” Sharon reported. “Those that died from smallpox weren’t usually welcomed home. There were fears the body might spread the disease to others. The authorities preferred the bodies be interred on Canter.”

  “Patrick wasn’t married?” Viv asked.

  “He wasn’t married, but he had a sweetheart,” Sharon said. “I imagine they would have wed if Patrick hadn’t taken ill.”

  “Did his brother and parents stay healthy?”

  “They did. Strange isn’t it? Living and working in close proximity. One person comes down with smallpox and the others do not.”

  Lin asked, “Is it possible that Patrick wasn’t infected with smallpox until he got to Canter and roomed with other people suspected of having the disease? He may have only had a regular virus.”