Walk On The Child Side

"I need your help," the woman said. "I have to sue the people who sold me my house."
"Law books," I said. "You want Acquisitions. Just a second, I'll call her."
"No, I want to talk to you."
I looked across my desk at her. She sat, legs crossed, gazing at me. I said,"That's more of a legal question, miss. I'm not a lawyer, and I really can't give legal advice."
"Well, but this is your area. The house is haunted."
"Ah. I see. Where is the house, miss?"
"North Vesper Street."
"Well, if you'd like a free investigation, we're available." I slid my business card to her. It was my recently redesigned one, with a Bigfoot print and a ghost.
"No, I don't want that," she said. "I want the ghosts out of there. Now."
I cleared my throat. "Well, we're investigators, miss, not exterminators. We can check into it, of course, but...."
"I want to sue them," she said. "They didn't tell me the house was haunted. They legally have to tell you."
"No, they don't," I said. "That's a common misunderstanding."
She gave me a look. "What're you talking about? I thought you were the big ghost expert. Of course they have to tell you. Everyone knows that."
I sighed. "What you're referring to it Stambovsky v. Ackley. Look it up. It refers to a stigmatized property, which doesn't mean they have to disclose that the house is definitely haunted. It means they have to tell you if the house has been publicized as being haunted, which is a different story altogether. While hauntings have never been legally proven, nobody wants curious jerks trespassing and trying to break into their house. Your house hasn't been publicized, miss. I'd know---I'm the guy who publicizes them."
She stood up. "Well. Maybe I will talk to a lawyer."
"Of course," I said. "And if you decide to go with an investigation, I'm not going anywhere."

I get stuff like this.
My name is Lou. I work for the local library. Also as a freelance writer. And also, I'm a paranormal investigator. It's mostly in that last capacity that I tend to attract the nuts.
It's not always like that. There are some lunatics out there, and some people who don't really understand much of what they're talking about. But there's some interesting people out there, too, and some good stuff that happens.
I like it. I like it so much, I've been teaching a class on it.

"Guys, I'd like to welcome you to the first meeting of the year," I said, standing at the head of the room. "This year is special. As of tonight, it's an anniversary. It's been five years since Teen Paranormal was formed."
Kara sat at the table beside me. Around the table were my kids, the ones I taught. Some of them were new to the group, and some had been around a while. Aubree, Meridian and Seth, Alex, Catie, Skylar, and Olivia were all looking at their handouts.
"The purpose of the group," I continued,"Is to teach you how to be responsible paranormal investigators. We're going to learn how to find measurable, provable evidence of the paranormal. I'm an investigator myself, and I've been with the Lock Haven Paranormal Seekers for over a decade. I'm going to teach you."
"Are we going to go on an investigation?" asked Seth.
"Next meeting," I said,"I'm going to show you how to use the equipment, and we're going to investigate the attic. Right now, I'm going to show you how to do the historic research on a haunted house. Follow me."

Standing at my desk, I held out a cigar box. "Everybody take a name."
Each of the kids picked a folded piece of paper out of the box. Seth and Alex, my most enthusiastic, both took two. They unfolded their papers, each of which had a name.
"You guys each have someone to look up," I said. "These drawers are the indexes to our newspaper file, which goes back to 1813. We have obituaries and cemetery records for everyone who has ever died in the county. Each one of you should have a name on your paper. I want you to look them up, and tell me something interesting about that person."
Thw kids got to work. Alex began digging through the file in search of Mary Elizabeth Crocker. Aubree began to check for Wilson Kistler in the cemetery indexes. Kara leaned back against my desk, arms crossed.
"I always like when you do this," she said.
I smiled. "It's been a bit of a learning curve, these last five years. I've found the best way to teach the kids is to have something hands-on for them to investigate."
"Hey!" Olivia burst out. "I'm in here!"
I looked over her shoulder. "Mentioned in your grandfather's obit. Pretty cool." I turned and glanced into the PA Room, where Aubree was sitting. "How's our little social mutant doing over there?"
Aubree grinned. "I think I found Wilson Kistler. Is he in Highland Cemetery?"
"That's him. He's in a crypt up there." I turned to the others. "That's how you find the historic information. Next time, we'll be learning the actual investigation. Come on in."
We gathered around the table. I said,"We're gonna go up in the attic, and I'll teach you how to use the equipment. We'll investigate the place. We're getting some construction done on the building, too, which has been known to stir up ghosts. Wear something dark, that doesn't reflect---Dark blues and greens are good. See you guys at the next meeting."

"I'll schedule the investigation and post on the forum," Kara said as she pulled up by Taggart Park. "We'll see about finding the time to go in."
"Text me," said Lacey, jumping out of the car. "Go softball practice. See you guys later!"
She ran for the field, and Kara pulled out. She said,"So where are we going?"
"Oh hell, I got nowhere to be. Want to go look for the Ingleby Monster?"
"What's that?"
"Down around the Centre-Clinton line, near Sugar Valley, there are rumors. A creature that's been reported, though never seen---It's thought to be invisible. Said to have attacked and beheaded people, though that could be a myth."
"I don't want to get beheaded."
"You won't get beheaded."
"Tell me where to go."
"Narrows Road, Sugar Valley."
She turned onto Grove Street. I said,"That's John Sloan's house."
"That one? The artist John Sloan?"
"Yeah, that one right there with the plaque on the door. The famous artist is from here."
"Did he live here a little, or is he really from here?"
"No, he was born here. His family moved to Philadelphia when he was about seven. Sloan grew up to be a famous artist, and came back to Lock Haven once during his life. Rebecca Gross showed him where he was born, and Sloan didn't like it. It had no character, he said. So he chose a really terrible building on Church Street, and claimed that was the birthplace. His ashes are scattered in Highland Cemetery, near the Kistler crypt."
"No kidding."
"This makes me the only tour guide in the world who can show a famous artist's two birthplaces and final resting place."
We were passing Salona, heading south. We sat in companionable silence for a while.
"Are you going to do the psychic lesson for the kids this year?" asked Kara. "That's always fun."
"I usually get to that one in the winter," I said. "You know my feelings on psychics. They piss me off."
"That's why it's fun. Haven't you ever had a psychic experience? A dream that came true?"
"When I was a kid, I dreamed that my cousin Wendy was going to die."
"Did she die?"
"Twenty-two years later, yes."
"Where are we?"
I said,"Narrows Road. Turn here."
"This goes to Loganton?"
"Eventually."
"I don't want to get lost."
"If we find Loganton, we won't be lost."
We drove through what appeared to be a cloud. Kara wrinkled her nose. "Did you see that?"
"Seemed like smoke."
"Yeah, but wasn't that a little weird? Would it be that heavy if someone was burning something earlier?"
"No, and I didn't see any fire. It's strange."
"What do you think?"
"Ingleby monster," I said.

"Come here, let me show you this," the young woman said. "I did your star chart."
I looked up from my desk. "Huh?"
"Remember I was in here a couple of months ago, and I asked when you last had your astrological chart done?" she said. "I did one for you. Come over here."
I walked over, and sat down next to her at the computers. She had some sort of diagram on the screen, a circle divided into several segments, with odd symbols and red and blue lines.
"Now, you are very powerful," she said. "You're gifted. You may not admit it, but you can't hide it from me. You're very gifted with psychic abilities."
"Well, no, because that's not a thing," I said.
"You can deny it, but I see you. Look, right here," she said,"This means you're an empath. You can feel the emotions of others. You could totally be inside me if you wanted."
"Um...."
"Now, you're a Leo, right?" She pointed at another place on the chart. "Your Mercury is in Virgo. That means you're a fire sign. You're really hot."
"....And what's that mean?"
"You're a very intense person," she said.
I nodded. "I have been called intense."
"I'm a water sign. I'm wet."
Did she realize she was doing this? I said,"Um....."
"Now, let me show you this," she said. "We can take these signs, get their numerical values, and add them up. It's all math."
"No wonder I don't understand it."
"The value here is sixty-nine. You feel me? You're an empath, and very powerful, whether you admit it or not. We can even combine the charts to show how alike we are. Here, let's see what happens if we put you on top of me."
I closed my eyes.
She continued,"Now, let's take a look at Uranus---"
I stood up.
"I better get back to work."
I retreated to my desk and checked my messages. Kara had sent one; she couldn't make the Teen Paranormal meeting. I took a few minutes to send an e-mail to Resurrection Casey, with some instruction on how to look for ghosts. Then I stood up and paced a little; my family was still out of town, so I was feeling a little off.
I checked to see if there were any books to process. Nothing. No pending articles to be written, no new comments on the haunted stuff I'd written for the PA Wilds. I needed a quest. I have no life. Someone had to be more pathetic than this. There had to be someone out there with less of a life than me, and I was determined to find that person.
Halfway down the hall, it occurred to me that it might be the chick with the horoscopes, and I returned to my desk.
There was another message waiting for me. My old friend and former intern Chris was back in town, and he was asking if I was working.
I thought a moment, then got out my cell phone.
"Hey, Chris. You wanna come to a meeting?"

I stood in front of the kids, at the head of the table in the Sloan Room. Chris was sitting to my left, and Alex, Aubree, Caitie, Skylar, and Olivia sat around the table. My regulars.
"Guys, good to see you," I said. "Tonight we're gonna learn how to do a responsible investigation. I have my equipment with me." On the table in front of me, I had my camera, recorder, EMF detector, and laser thermometer. I was wearing my LHPS uniform, with the leg rig containing some of my stuff. "I'm going to teach you guys how to use this....And then we're gonna go upstairs, into the attic, and do an actual investigation."
Aubree grinned at me. "I got a recorder, too. I brought it along."
"Excellent," I said. "You guys might as well just go buy all this stuff immediately....You're gonna end up with it all anyway, so you might as well get it over with. Let me show you how this all works."

The Ross Library's attic was old. Like 1887 old. And it hadn't been upgraded too much during that time. The kids followed me up the stairs into the dusty five-room attic, and I opened the door to one of the storage rooms and walked in.
"First, get photos. Every conceivable angle. Get some EMF readings, and use the thermometer to get a baseline temperature. Check everything before we settle into the EVP session."
"I'm showing about seventy-eight," said Chris, who was handling my laser thermometer.
"That sounds about right," I said.
"Can I use your camera?" asked Alex.
"Sure, go ahead. Get photos all over the room." I handed it to him, and he headed off with Skylar, clicking pictures.
Aubree turned on her recorder. "I'm gonna get everything."
"Good. Good. Remember to tag all the intrusive noises from outside, and leave plenty of space for possible answers."
"Think we're gonna get any activity tonight?" asked Caitie.
"You never know," I said. "It's happened before. And they've been working on the windows lately---Construction can make the ghosts act up; sometimes they don't like it. So it's possible."
"Will we hear anything?"
"We have the recorders running right now," I said. "But remember, sometimes you don't hear anything until later. It's what they never show you on the TV shows---The review is important. You have to play this all back; a lot of the evidence comes from what you find after the actual investigation is over."
"I got a weird picture," Olivia said.
She held up her cell phone, and I looked it over. It showed one wall of the room with a weird streak of light.
"Get a temperature reading and some EMFs over here," I said. "Take more photos. Check this."
Aubree and Alex moved in, getting photos and checking with the EMF detector. Aubree said,"I'm getting a bit of a reading."
I nodded, and looked at my watch. "We're almost out of time tonight, guys. But we may have something here. You did good. I'm proud of you."

"Daddy!" The staff door at the library opened, and my son came running in. He was followed by my wife as he raced across the floor. "We're home!"
I picked him up and hugged him. "Welcome back, little man. I'm glad to see you."
"Did Sissy get me a surprise? What is it?"
"You'll see it when you get home. Also, I got you some more little gumball machine dogs for your collection. They're on the table."
"Thank you, Daddy!"
"So, did you have fun in Georgia?"
"Yes! But I misseded you, Daddy!"
I picked him up and hugged him again.
"I misseded you too, little guy."

A Room With A Boo

"Bye, Daddy." The little voice in my ear, as I lay on my bed. My son gave me a kiss.
I opened my eyes at six AM and hugged him. "Bye, little man. You and Mommy have fun in Georgia. You be good."
"I will," he said, and climbed off the bed. He left the room.
I lay there a while, with my eyes open, thinking about how my family was going to visit the in-laws for a week. I had the house to myself, which didn't actually feel like as much fun as it used to.
Fortunately, I had stuff to do.

I walked into the Genetti Hotel with the New Boss and the library's tech person. Looking around the lobby, the boss said,"I'll get us checked into the seminar. Coffee is over there."
"I need some," I said. "Who'd have thought there was a seven-fifteen in the morning, too?"
I was carrying my pack and the library's laptop. I dropped them at the table, and hung my jacket over the back of a chair. My shirt was the dark blue UFO one that said Believe.
I was sitting at the table with my coffee, trying to get the laptop to work, when one of the servers came around to pick up the empty mugs. She said,"Do you write for the Express? Are you Lou?"
I looked up. "Yes, that's me."
"I love your column!" she said. "I really liked the one about the Tiadaghton Elm. I actually wondered about that."
"Oh, thanks. I expected to get some hate mail over that one, but everyone seems to love it."
"Have you ever heard about the ghost in here?"
"Bits and pieces," I said. "Nothing too concrete."
"Over on the stairs, there's a photo of the ballroom," she said. "It has a little girl in it, sitting in a chair, but she's barely visible. She's all blurry. Some people think that's the architect's daughter. They think she died when she fell down a laundry chute as the hotel was being built."
"I've never heard that one before," I said. "What year was this place built?"
"1922," she said immediately. I liked that.
"Where's the picture?" I asked.
"At the bottom of the stairs, near the lobby."
"I'll check it out," I promised. "That's my lunch break today. Thanks."

On the way up to the conference room, I stopped and looked over the local brochures. I picked up one about the Avenue of the Arts---Fourth Street in Williamsport seems to be filled with murals and sculptures. I pocketed that one for later. Then I went up and got a seat in the seminar.
I plugged in my laptop---Low-budget public library machine; you can't depend on the batteries---And set out my notebook. I had the pen with the little multi-tools built in. It hadn't started yet, so I grabbed my camera and went off in search of the stairwell.
I found the photo after a short search. Framed photo, black and white, clearly old. The little girl was on the right side, and she was blurry as hell. Could be a ghost. Could be a fidgety kid. I got out my camera, turned off the flash, and got a picture for myself.

Back upstairs, I sat down with the laptop and a coffee. There were maybe twenty people in the room; New Boss was near the front. The instructor began talking about some of the library information systems we had available. I had the main page open. I also e-mailed LaKeshia in another window, asking if the Pennsylvania Wilds was interested in an article about the Avenue of the Arts.
I listened to the seminar for a little while, but to be fair, it got boring real fast. I opened another window and did a search for the Genetti Hotel.
Found it. Completed in 1922. The architect was William Lee Stoddart. Okay. that's a start, let's dig into him.
He was a fairly famous architect, responsible mostly for hotels. There was tons of information on his work, but very little on his family. I found one page that repeated the laundry chute story the hotel employee had told me, with no sourcing. It named the girl as Allison, but gave no other details. I looked up at the instructor and asked a question to prove I was paying attention, then went back to not paying attention.
Stoddart's biography detailed his two marriages. He'd been married once, divorced in 1909, and then remarried in 1923. I drank some coffee and did the math in my head. Making the safe assumption that he wasn't bringing illegitimate children to work with him, that would make the youngest possible age of his child about thirteen or fourteen while the hotel was in construction. A little old to be the little girl tumbling down a laundry chute like a moron.
LaKeshia e-mailed back, okaying the Avenue of the Arts piece. I tried Stoddart on findagrave. I hate findagrave; it's a clumsy way to handle cemetery research, but a county away from home in a seminar, it was all I had. I found him buried in New Jersey, and I checked for other family members. He had one daughter listed, who had died in 1998.
So, the story about the little girl had to be untrue.
I checked my watch, and slipped my camera out of my pack. Then I discreetly got out my portable ghost-hunting kit---I generally have a little basic equipment on me, just in case. You never know. I clipped the black packet to my belt.
"It's time to break for lunch," said the instructor. "We have a meal available to order, or you can go out for lunch. Whatever you choose."
Everyone stood up. Toward the back of the room, I spotted my old friend JA. She used to work at the library before accepting a director position somewhere else. She smiled at me.
"Hey, Lou! I wondered if you were going to be here. How's everything?"
"Good to see you, JA! I'm good. How about you?"
"Pretty good, pretty good." JA had always been a high-intensity sort of person; when she was speaking to you, you had her whole attention to the point her eyes practically burned lasers through you. "How's the little guy?"
"Oh, he's good. In Georgia with his mother right now. He's such a funny little guy." I got out the latest photo of Paul, and showed it to her. She smiled.
"He's a growing boy," she said. "He still believe in Santa? You can still play that card?"
"Right now, yes."
New Boss turned to me. "What did you want to do for lunch?"
"Hunt ghosts," I said.
"Your weirdness to work ratio is something like six to one."
"So you noted on my annual performance review."
"You really going to hunt ghosts?"
"Actually," I said,"I thought I'd just go for a walk."

I love this. I can't help it---I've always loved sneaking off on a little side quest while everyone thinks I'm doing something else. I've spent half my life doing that. Over lunch, my plan was to get photos and information for the Pennsylvania Wilds, and check out the haunting in the ballroom. It's amazing what you can accomplish over lunch hour if you move fast enough.
I walked out the front doors of the Genetti and onto Fourth Street, heading southwest. I put my lanyard with the PA Wilds ID on it around my neck. There is no real reason for this, other than it makes me feel like a low-budget Hemingway. I got photos of the Inspiration Mural and the Community Arts Center. The Long Island Medium was advertised to appear there in about a week, which pissed me off. I turned and walked back northeast, then turning onto Pine Street for more photos.
There was a wonderful bas relief of the lumbering era on the side of a building, and the corner of Third and Market was set up to be a baseball field, with statues of children playing ball. I took pictures of all of it.
I looked at my watch; I'd only managed to kill about twenty minutes. I could even grab some food, if I wanted. I passed Vinnie's Italian Eatery. Vinnie's! I'd forgotten about Vinnie's; it had been at least five years since I'd been there. Definitely before Paul was born.
Five minutes later, I was standing on the sidewalk by the Heart of Downtown sculpture, eating two huge slices of vegetable pizza.
"I love Williamsport," I said aloud.
When I finished the pizza, I walked half a block down to the visitor center. The woman at the desk looked up when I walked in. "Hi! Can I answer any questions for you?"
"I'm just browsing, at the moment."
"Okay, then," she said. "You browse, and let me know if you need anything."
I picked up a couple more pamphlets to add to the article, and then I saw the stack of PA Wilds T-shirts for sale. I picked out a tan shirt with a cross-cut of a log and the PA Wilds logo on it. Id' wanted one for a while, so I spent part of my recent PA Wilds paycheck on a PA Wilds shirt.
Then back to the Genetti, where I dropped off my new shirt and then slipped down the back stairs.
The ballroom was dark, but not locked. I checked to make sure nobody was watching, and then slipped in. This was going to be a quick one, not the usual heavy investigation I would do with LHPS.
Based on the photo, I worked out about where the girl in the picture was. The room contained pillars and little alcoves under the balcony, and she was pictured in the fourth one from the left. I sought it out and unzipped my pouch.
First I checked temperature with my laser thermometer. It was an even sixty-eight degrees, pretty much uniformly throughout the room. Hell, I've worked in museums that are less climate controlled than the Genetti. Then I checked with my EMF detector. Nothing. No signals.
So. Not only was the story untrue, it was likely that the hotel wasn't even haunted.
I put my equipment back into the pouch, and went back upstairs. I sat down and cleared my search history.
JA walked by.
"Hey, pal. Finding any ghosts?"
I grinned. "Well, not today."

I walked in my back door, dropped my pack in the usual place, and hung my jacket in the cellar door. Tif was inside, sitting in a chair in the living room.
"Hi, Dad. Thought I'd drop by and clean up Paul's toys while he's away. How was your day?"
"Pretty busy, for a seminar. I looked into a haunting and worked on an article."
"Weren't you supposed to be learning things?"
"In my defense, there were other options."
"You want to have dinner tonight? I could go for a Hot Mess down at Hangar Nine."
"Not tonight, hon. I'm exhausted. Tomorrow would be better. Let's meet up after work."
"Okay, Dad." Tif headed out the door.
I sat down at the table, picking up the newspaper. Usually I skim the local papers, looking for my name. Something brushed my ankle---Kasper, our Schnauzer.
I reached down and petted him.
"You and me, pal. I know. I miss the little guy, too."