"There's the paper factory," I said, pointing it out to my son. "We really should start checking it nightly for the Jersey Devil. It's been a hundred and eleven years since he showed up there, but you never know with the Jersey Devil."
Paul was shining his flashlight on the sidewalk, checking for slugs. It was about nine, and we were doing our nightly Alien Patrol. Thanks to my son and I, the Hill Section of Lock Haven had not been invaded by aliens in at least two summers.
"No aliens at the moment," I said. "They're all social distancing. They're scared of Coronavirus."
A few bangs went off, up the block. I said,"Fireworks. I hate these people who start celebrating the Fourth of July until about August twenty-ninth. A lot of people mistake fireworks for UFOs; it happens in Renovo practically every year."
We rounded the corner onto our street, and Paul collapsed onto the sidewalk, because he is five. Lying on the ground on his back, he pointed up into the air. "Look! A alien ship!"
I turned and looked. A small thing with red and blue lights was lowering over the three hundred block. I said,"That's the first thing I've seen in the sky in like three months."
"It's landing!" said Paul.
"It's a drone," I said. "Sometimes they get mistaken for UFOs. Let's chase it."
We ran up and around the corner, into Finch Alley, but the drone was gone. I said,"First thing we've seen in a while. Good sighting, little man."
"Can we go and tell Mommy?" he asked.
"Yes. Let's go tell Mommy."
"How's it going, Lou?" Adam asked as he came into the lobby to take over the shift.
"Pretty slow," I said. "I got so bored I discovered a secret code here in the lobby/"
He set his stuff down on the table and turned to me. "Okay, I'm bored too. I gotta hear about this."
I pointed to a metal plaque on the wall.
"This plaque was for Wilson Kistler, who established a membership-only library in Lock Haven," I said. "Kistler was a big deal in the community. First board president here. Involved in everything. I investigated his house once."
"Okay."
"You'll note that there are leaves and berries carved in it, up top," I said. "All the times I've walked past this, I never noticed before. Now, the Victorians had this flower language, involving plants and trees. I'm embarrassed to admit I learned about this from a Batman comic."
"Cool."
"So these leaves and berries look like cherries to me. I looked it up, and cherries are the symbol for education. Wilson Kistler was big into that. It makes sense to commemorate the man who helped create the library with a symbol that means education."
"That's cool, man. I'm gonna have to look into that."
"This stuff's all over, if you know where to look for it."
I walked inside and sat down at my desk. Chris came in a minute later---Chris is an old friend. He'd trained under me about a decade back, and gone into local tourism himself.
"Hey, Chris."
"Hey, Lou. Just gonna get a few old articles for the Record. The microfilm working?"
"Yeah, I was on it earlier. It's good."
He sat down at the machine and began searching. "So, how's things? Been up to anything good?"
"Not as much as I'd like." I stood up and leaned against the index file. "Been doing a lot of working from home. I'm lucky to have some archives stocked up over there. But man, it's getting old."
"Oh, yeah. I think everyone wants to get out and do something."
"I get it. I mean, we need to be careful. We're not out of the woods yet. But man, I need something. I been indoors looking at familiar ghosts and historic tidbits for months. I want a good, solid UFO sighting. I want a water monster. I want to chase Bigfoot."
"I can fake a sighting for you."
"Technically unethical. I don't mean to be a whiner about it. I realize people are dying. It's just that I haven't been able to do anything really good in a while."
I walked into the library, took my temperature, and sanitized my hands. Procedure. I was wearing aliens on both my shirt and my mask. Mel was working the desk, and her husband Jim was standing nearby.
"Well, since this happened twice," Jim said,"I may as well say something."
"Oh, this again," groaned Mel.
"What's up?" I asked.
"This has happened twice," said Jim. "I've come in early, been working alone in the building. At the staff door, I've heard the sound of a key, and someone coming in on the steps, but when I look, there's nobody there."
I grinned. "Ah, I see why you came to me with this. I've had something like the same experience; I've been working alone in the building and heard footsteps over in the stacks. This about nine, nine-thirty?"
"Earlier. I get in about seven."
"Okay, so real early."
"Working alone Saturday morning is gonna be fun," commented Mel.
"There's generally no threat," I told her. "Ghosts were people too."
"I just don't want to see anything."
"I'll check into it," I told Jim. "It's been slow lately. I'll see what I can find, and let you know."
I was carrying one of the big scrapbooks when I went out to the lobby to take over from Zach. He asked,"Doing a little research?"
"Jim heard a ghost."
He nodded. My co-workers are pretty much used to this. "What're you trying to find out?"
"I want to know when the staff entrance was built."
"Good luck," he said. "I mean, if anyone can find out, you can."
I started paging through the scrapbook. The Ross Library's scrapbooks date back to when Annie Halenbake Ross died in 1907, leaving her home to the city. Every article since then had been cut out and pasted into these things. Yes, in recent times, that includes my own articles.
Zach returned a little while later, on his rounds picking up the trash.
"Find anything?" he asked.
"Yeah, dad you know this place served as a shelter after the 1936 flood? I just discovered that. Also, it looks like the stacks were built in 1963."
"I always heard the fifties."
"I always heard that, too, but I'm seeing newspaper photos of that wing being built here, and they're all 1963. Our estimate was a little off. The staircase seems to have been built about the same time, which means that it happened during the term of Isabel Welch, the longest-lasting director this place ever had. New Boss is about fourth from the bottom, at this point."
I pointed at the scrapbook. "Now look. Isabel was also the first director to live off-premises---She had an apartment on Park Street, where the laundry stands today."
"Did she? It would be interesting to see if that's haunted, too."
"It would, at that. I'll check one of these nights. But this means she'd have been the one to have the staff entrance built, and the first one to routinely unlock that door and come in. She worked here for a long time. If there's a ghost there, it's likely to be Isabel."
"Didn't she establish the Pennsylvania Room?"
"Yeah, so often when I look into a haunting I use her work. She also got married while she worked here....I hear when she met her husband, she would come in to work all giggly and happy."
"Awwww...."
"Yeah, it's really kind of sweet, isn't it? They were really in love. I checked them both on Findagrave, and it turns out that he died the year after she retired in 1984. He was killed in a bike accident."
"Oooh. So if this was a warning....You and Adam...."
"Right," I said. "Me and Adam."
When I walked in the next morning, I was all in black. My black T-shirt had a large ghost on it. I'd considered wearing my LHPS uniform,but this wasn't team business, so I'd worn the personal one. (My mask still had an alien.) When I got into the building, Mel said,"Be right back, Barb. I understand Lou figured out some stuff about the ghost, and I want to hear him tell Jim."
We walked down into the lobby. Jim was there on his shift. I said,"I'm still looking into it a bit, but right now, I think you have encountered Isabel Welch, you lucky bastard."
Jim laughed. "Okay. Who was she?"
"Longest-lasting director we ever had. Big into local history. She was the one who had that door installed, and lived off-site, so she was the first to use it every morning. Given all that, it's logical that she's the one you heard."
"So she was cool?" Mel asked.
"She was. The usual suspects would be Annie Halenbake Ross or Mary Elizabeth Crocker, but the door didn't exist during their time, so they had no reason to be using it. I'll be down later to install some trigger objects in your office, Jim."
"Trigger...."
'Toys. You put a tiny toy on a card, circle it, and see if it moves."
"If you hear me scream, you'll know it worked."
An hour later, Adam came down to take over the lobby shift from me. I said,"Hey, Adam. This is gonna sound weird, but it's me, so I'm doing it anyway."
"Sure, man. What's up?"
"Jim's been hearing a ghost at the staff entrance."
"Sure, man, that happens."
"I think it's Isabel Welch, whose husband died in a bike accident. Could be she's trying to warn others away from the same thing." Many people would scoff at this, but that's not Adam.
"Dude."
"Be careful when you're riding out to Beech Creek, okay?"
"Always am. But thanks. I'll be extra careful."
"Me, too."
I usually have a few pieces of ghost-hunting equipment in my pack, and I always have trigger objects in my desk. I grabbed a little alien and a tiny dog, and put them in my pocket. Then as an afterthought, I picked up the little alien that had sat on my desk the entire quarantine, and put him back on my blotter.
I walked out to Jim's office, which is in the garage. I placed a small card on one of his shelves, put the little toy dog on it, and traced around it with a pen. Then I walked out into the stairwell, and after a moment of consideration, I put the alien on the table with our thermometer and hand sanitizer, and traced around it, too.
Then I got out my laser thermometer, and swept it around the stairwell. Everything had a baseline in the mid-seventies---No big dips. I checked my ring, a new one that registered temperature. It showed thirty-six degrees---It only worked in Celsius. But thirty-six was about right.
I got out the EMF detector. As I pressed the button, it blipped. It continued to make a sound every few seconds, which was interesting. There was no reason to think the stairwell was filled with electricity. That was worth noting.
I left the trigger objects to sit overnight, hoping to catch a ghost.
Just another day at the office.
"Got the alarm?"
"I got the alarm. Was anyone on the third floor?"
"Just up there."
"Let's do this."
I hit the buttons to set the alarm, and Zach and I walked out of the building. As the door closed behind us, he said,"See you tomorrow."
"Have a nice night, man."
I climbed on my bike and rode down Erie Alley. The bike was a used one I'd gotten for about ten bucks. Paul and I had painted it various shades of green with leftover spray paint I'd found around the house, and it had come out roughly the color and texture of a reptile. We called it the "Lizard Bike." The thing was a tank, though, solid and unstoppable.
I rode to the end of the alley, and turned left. Then I slammed on the brakes and skidded to an abrupt stop---A car flashed past me, going far too fast. I hugged the edge of the alley, up against the building, as it missed me by inches.
As it sped away, I stopped for a moment and breathed. Jesus. I'd nearly been killed---It had been close, but I'd stopped in time.
I recovered and looked up---Across the street, at the laundry on Park Street. What was once the home of Isabel Welch, right near where I'd almost been hit.
"That was close," I whispered. "Thanks, Isabel."
I had my coffee. I had my mask on. Looked like I was going to be able to be productive any minute now.
I sat at my desk with my Sasquatch travel mug. It was first thing in the morning, and I was having more than the usual trouble focusing. Finally I stood up and walked into the Pennsylvania Room.
The room itself was named for Isabel Welch, though nobody ever referred to it that way. Her portrait hung in the short corridor that led into it. I stood for a moment, drinking my coffee, looking at her picture.
And then, for the first time, I noticed the frame it was in.
It was a big, decorative thing, wood with a gilded covering. I reached out and ran my fingers along it. The pattern of the carving showed what appeared to be English ivy.
I thought about the secret codes I'd mentioned to Adam. I went back to my desk and looked up what ivy meant, in the Victorian flower language.
It translated into marriage, dedication to being married.
Representing a woman who had loved her husband so much, she was still trying to protect people from dying the way he had.
"I'll be goddamned," I said.
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