Read 2 A Reason for Murder Online
Authors: Morgana Best
Chapter Five
.
Melissa and I stood shivering in the dark in Swan Street, the main street of Morpeth, clutching our newly purchased flashlights. I was also clutching a notebook and pen. I was glad that Gavin King's Ghost Tour started at 8 p.m. and the other tour at 11 p.m., as I would be able to do both in the one night. I needed to get back to my cat, Diva; she was furious when I went away. She was locked in my cottage with plenty of fresh water and a full bowl of Furball Control Cat Food, but she would have no one's legs to sleep on tonight. Besides, she still hadn't completely forgiven me for sending her to the vet to have two bad teeth extracted the previous week.
It was a good clear night for a ghost tour. The stars were plainly visible and the moon was peeking through a few wisps of clouds. It wasn't dreadfully cold yet, but the air held the promise of a biting cold to come. I tightened my scarf around my neck and wished I'd brought a thicker jacket.
Gavin King rocked up right on the dot of eight. He reminded me of a televangelist. "Welcome, welcome, welcome! Alrighty, let's get the payment out of the way first. Cash only please. I hope you will enjoy your time on the ghost tour. Please have your cameras ready to catch orbs. Expect to have your clothes tugged at by ghosts. This will be the experience of a lifetime!" Gavin waved his hands expansively, and then looked me up and down. "Now as you all no doubt know, this is Campbell's Store, our first stop. As you can see for yourselves, Campbell's Store is a two storey stone and brick building. This store was popular back in the day, and people came here from miles away to shop. James Campbell even had his own coins minted in South Africa when coins in Australia became scarce."
Gavin paused to clear his throat, and then waved his arms around like windmills. "The ghost of a woman has often been seen upstairs, and we're about to visit the scene of one of the most recorded hauntings."
I was puzzled. I did not sense the presence of so much as a single ghost. It stood to reason that an historical town like this one should have several ghosts. In fact, I expected the place to be crawling with them.
Gavin was still speaking. "Morpeth is full of ghosts. In my intensive research for my book, which will be available next year, I've recorded all these ghosts in detail. Keep an eye on my website for updates. Soon you'll be able to pre-order the book." He waved his hands in the air dramatically. "A woman and a child have been seen in a clothing store just down this road, and in a nearby store, a boy moves shoes around, a woman appears in a store window, footsteps have been heard walking up stairs, and apparitions have been sighted at St James Church. I could go on and on."
At this point I hoped he wouldn't go on and on. I was beginning to lose feeling in my toes from the cold, and standing around here listening to the guide's list of ghosts was boring.
Unfortunately for me, Gavin pressed on. "My book won't be just about ghosts, as I'm a self-taught historian. There'll be a lot of history too. Morpeth was an important port in the early days, as it was at the head of the Hunter River. These days the river's all silted up here. At one point Morpeth had eighteen inns, five railways stations and eight wharves, not to mention an iron foundry and flour mill, and two steamship companies."
Thankfully at this point, he started to walk and we all followed him. His voice droned on and on. "I'm sure you'll be surprised to know that some famous Australian companies had their start in Morpeth: Arnott's Biscuits, the major transport company Brambles, and the Soul Pattinson pharmaceutical chain."
As he was talking, we were picking our way over the old flagstones which led to the back of Campbell's Store. Melissa pulled me aside. "Hey, he's fairly cute and he seems to like the look of you. Why don't you go for him?"
I groaned. "Melissa, please!"
Melissa snorted rudely. "Hmmpf. I know you like that guy, Jamie. Seriously, put him out of your mind; it won’t come to anything. He's in England and you're out here in Australia. And when did you last hear from him?"
Melissa had a low opinion of Jamie, whom I'd met him on my recent visit to England. He was gorgeous, and looked like a slightly bulked up version of Simon Pegg, the English actor and star of such movies as the zombi movie
Shaun of the Dead
, and of my fave movie ever,
Hot Fuzz
. Trouble is, Jamie worked for an undisclosed government organization and I couldn't tell Melissa. I instead told her that he worked in I.T. It was either that or the greeting card business.
I put on what I hoped was a convincing voice. "I told you, I'm not interested in him at all."
Melissa snorted rudely. "Come on, this is
me
you're taking to. Besides, have you heard from him at all?"
I shook my head. "He arranged for Diva to be sent over to Australia, as he was a friend of my Aunt's, as I've already told you, but I haven’t heard from him since then, and I don't expect to." Thankfully I was saved from explaining myself any further by our arrival at a mound of stones on the ground.
"These stones mark the cover of a well." Gavin King shone his flashlight over the stones. "A young boy died here in 1868. His mother, Eliza Cantwell, was the wife of the publican, and her son, Stephen, went outside in a heavy storm. He came here and drowned in the well. Eliza's ghost has been photographed looking out the window of her cottage. These days there are shops between the well and the cottage, but back then there was a direct line of sight. We'll walk over to the cottage now."
Gavin was interrupted by a shriek. "I felt someone pull my hair!" The teenage girl was visibly upset. Some of the other participants crowded around her. I did not feel a paranormal thing, and there was not an apparition in sight.
Gavin was excited. "Did anyone photograph this area just then? Look at your cameras. We usually find that when someone is touched by ghosts that we have orbs on film. Does everyone here know what an orb is?"
Most people murmured that they did, but the teenage girl said she'd never heard of orbs. Perhaps she was too young to have seen reruns of
Most Haunted
.
Gavin waved his camera at us. I take all my photos with my iPhone, but his camera was large and looked expensive. "Orbs show up where there's paranormal activity. An orb is the soul of a person who has died. It looks like a small round ball of light. Look, I've captured one here."
We gathered around Gavin to look at his camera. There, right in the center of the photo, was a large round white orb. The others, even Melissa, seemed impressed. I, however, was not.
The excited group then headed for Eliza's cottage. I managed to single out Gavin as we walked down the laneway. "I've researched orbs. How do you know that orb on your camera wasn't dust, moisture, or an insect? Do you think that every orb is a ghost?"
I couldn't see Gavin's face too well in the dark but I felt his tension. "Oh, I see you're a skeptic."
If only he knew. "No, not at all. No doubt some orbs are paranormal, but I do know that others are simply dust, moisture and insects, even pollen, any tiny particles. I know that some are just the camera's flash reflecting these things. I do know that the older digital cameras produced stacks of orbs, as they weren't able to fill in the pixels. Plus photos are only 2D, and the size of the orb will depend on how far away it is from the camera. Sometimes they've been proven to be things like dust and rain, hair and pollen. Sure, orbs are seen in photos of haunted places, but orbs have been seen in photos everywhere. The two guys from that TV show
Ghost Hunters
even agree with what I'm saying."
Gavin brushed off my remarks. "We often have skeptics on the tours. Everyone's entitled to their own opinion."
I was about to respond but we had arrived at Eliza's cottage in Green Street and Gavin was addressing us again. "Eliza's ghost has been seen in that window looking out to the well where her son, Stephen, drowned."
He pointed to the window on the right side of the cottage. The cottage was small, and made from wide vertical slabs of rough timber. My flashlight revealed a shingle roof.
Gavin produced a photo from his folder and shone his flashlight on it. "Gather around, guys. This was taken last month. Can you make out the woman in the window? She's in Victorian era dress. This is Eliza."
The photo to me looked blatantly photoshopped. There was a white cloud around the figure which looked like it had been done by someone having their first go on
Paint
. Again, everyone else was impressed.
I was concerned that some of the tour members pressed their hands on the window and tried to look inside the cottage. This was clearly the original glass, a century and a half old. The door was in the middle of the cottage and was flanked by large glass windows, each with twelve panes. I was sure the store owner wouldn't be happy to see fingerprints all over the windows in the morning.
"Come on now, the next site is a few streets away, and it's
very
haunted." Gavin said the word
very
in a loud voice. "There've been many sightings at the Morpeth Convent Guest House. All of you stick together and be careful crossing the streets at night, especially this one, Northumberland Street."
We all duly looked right and left then right again and crossed. Gavin was still talking. I was trying to take notes but it was difficult to walk while making notes.
"Try not to shine your flashlights into people's houses; they don't like it. Here we are; turn left into Princess Street. Now that is the Church of the Immaculate Conception, and the Morpeth Convent Guest House is next to it. It started out in 1909 as a convent of the Sisters of Mercy and was only shut down in 1980. It's a Bed and Breakfast now. The chapel inside has beautiful stained glass windows."
Just then one of the women on the tour grabbed Gavin's arm. "Something just pulled my coat, really hard."
I could see Gavin looked pleased, even in the dark. "Yes, there's a lot of spirit activity here."
I noticed a thin, scruffy looking man standing directly behind the woman. I was fairly sure he was the one who had been standing behind the girl at the time of the hair pulling incident. I made a mental note to keep my eye on him.
I had become the Keeper of the Society upon the death of my Aunt Beth.
Problem is, I didn't exactly know what being the Keeper of the Society entailed, or to be precise, I didn't have the slightest clue, and no one had contacted me to enlighten me. I didn't even know the name of the Society. I had changed since I had become the Keeper; since then, I had been aware of spirit activity. Trains, buses, stores, everywhere I went, I sensed spirits. I had expected Morpeth to be buzzing with the paranormal, but so far I hadn't felt anything at all. Zilch. Zero. Nothing.
We backtracked somewhat and made a right turn which brought us opposite a church.
"St. James Church," Gavin said unnecessarily, as we were standing in front of the sign that said
St. James Church
. "A shame a fog's coming in, as many people have reported seeing the ghost of a bishop who runs between the church and that building there which is now the residence." He pointed. "Careful not to go over to the church; we will have to stay on this side of the road. There's a cemetery and my research tells me that there are also unmarked graves all around there."
I thought that unusually sensitive of Gavin, and made notes as he continued. "St. James Church was built by Lieutenant Edward Charles Close, the founding father of Morpeth. Lieutenant Close served in the Napoleonic Wars, and in 1811 during a battle, he made a vow to God that if he spared him, he would build a church in his honor. Later, Lieutenant Close erected St James Church to honor his vow. Just a moment; I'll read from his diary."
Gavin withdrew a sheet of paper from his folder then handed the folder to me to hold.
"'In 1811 when Sergeant Meulen was wounded I went to take the color. When I arrived at the center a shell fell. We lay down till it burst. My head was between the legs of a soldier, and a soldier was on my right and left side, close against me. The shell burst, the man whose legs my head was protected by had half his head carried off; the other two were dreadfully mangled; the body of one was laid bare from his loins to his breast and both the legs of the other was carried off near the knee.'"
Well that was certainly more gruesome detail than I wanted to hear. Melissa nudged me and pulled a face. At that moment a cry pierced the air, and at first I thought it was a tour member also objecting to the imagery of the poor fallen soldiers.
"Over there! Over there!"
I recognized the speaker as a pleasant New Zealand tourist who had introduced herself to us before Gavin's arrival. All flashlights turned to her. She looked uncomfortable as she said, "I just saw a ghost running between those buildings."
I looked around, and sure enough, the thin man was nowhere in sight.
Gavin's voice rose. "Yes, I saw him too just then! There've been many sightings of that very apparition. Scarcely a tour goes by without him appearing."
The group was excited. I tugged on Melissa's arm. "Melissa, I think this is staged. Keep an eye on that thin man; he was right behind those people when they said a ghost touched them, and now he's missing, right when that figure ran across from the church."