PART FOUR: Premature Speculation
It occurred to Sam that he and Ellen hadn't set up a time to meet, and wondered just how they were going to get together at the right time and place. He needn't have worried, for when he entered the basement room at noon the next day she was there waiting for him.
As soon as he saw her, Sam felt the same "pull" he'd felt the day before. Her eyes held his and for the longest time all he found himself able to do was stare at her. With a coy expression she smiled faintly. That broke the spell. Was it a spell, for real? What if she were some sort of witch, some sort of succubus or...
Sam wasn't sure he cared.
"Hi," he said.
"Hi." Ellen held out a folder and gestured for him to sit down at the desk. He did so, and she perched herself on one corner so they could study the contents of the folder together. Sam leafed through the first few pages in rapt adoration of her work.
"This is great!"
Ellen had not only photocopied the documents they'd pulled, but she'd gone through and highlighted pertinent information. To top it all off she had at least a page and a half of her own notes and findings written on sheets of yellow legal paper.
He looked up at her. "You didn't have to do all this."
She smiled. "It was no problem. I enjoyed having a project." With a note of excitement in her voice, she pointed out some things to him. "I took a closer look at the chart the Herald reporter made up. The accidents have increased over the years, and the time between them has gotten shorter."
"More traffic," Sam nodded. "Faster cars..."
"I really don't think speed has anything to do with it, Sam. It's true that cars have gotten faster over the years, but they've also gotten safer with the introduction of seat belts, airbags and special crumple zones. That should make it all come out in the wash. Besides, you've seen that road. There isn't a curve in it for miles. Why are so many people having accidents?"
"What's the prevailing theory? The authorities have got to have noticed this pattern."
"Wind," she said bluntly. "They think it's the wind."
Sam looked at her incredulously. "Wind?"
Ellen nodded. "Freak gusts of wind that come up off that cornfield. They take people unaware, cause them to lose control if they happen to be speeding. On a long, straight road, at night, in the middle of nowhere, a lot of people are speeding." She paused, and gave Sam another long, earnest stare. "Sam, you told me you've investigated this kind of thing before. You know how hard it is to get people to believe. Rather than choose a supernatural explanation, they're going to come up with all sorts of more mundane theories."
He had to admit she was right. Leaning his elbows on the desk, he posed another question. "What do you think it is?"
After a moment, Ellen looked away from him, folding her hands in her lap as she bowed her head and shrugged. "I don't know."
"I think you have your own theory. Why else would you have sent us out there last night?"
She cast an eye in his direction. "What did you see?" she whispered.
"Orbs. Dozens upon dozens of orbs."
"Spirits of the dead."
Something in the way she said it, in a low, whispering voice, sent a shiver up Sam's spine. "Yes," he replied softly. "If they're behind the accidents, we need to know how and why."
Ellen seemed to recover from whatever melancholy had gripped her. Her animation returned as she reached out to tap the folder. "I know why, or at least I think I know why, and who."
"Who?"
"Who. John Haddox, one of the founding fathers of Chesterville. He and his family were the biggest landowners around here up until the early twentieth century. He's the original dead man of Dead Man's Curve."
Sam delved back into the folder and began reading. Ellen had done a remarkable job of researching and organizing her information, all in less than twenty-four hours. It was almost too remarkable. He had to shelve his suspicions. The important thing was to solve the mystery and prevent further deaths.
"John Haddox," he murmured.
Haddox had been a landowner of some reknown, but he had also been a farmer who was not above getting his hands dirty working his own farm. In 1896 he was killed in a farming accident while working alone in a field near the current location of the road. It had not been a quick death, but slow and agonizing as he was not found for nearly a day later. By then he had died of blood loss, shock and exposure.
Things were quiet for a while, until Haddox's descendents decided to start selling off parcels of land - something the senior Haddox had sworn he would never do. Part of the land was used to build what was now known as the Chesterville/Highcliffe road. Until that point in time Chesterville and Highcliffe had been rival towns, with plenty of bad blood between their founders. The establishment of connecting road across his former farm had apparently not gone over well with John Haddox's spirit. The first reported death was that of Gregory Haddox, the grandson who had divided up the land and sold it. They had continued for nearly one hundred years. Countless deaths, countless spirits.
"It has to stop, Ellen."
She nodded, and with the tip of one finger, slid a single piece of paper from the center of the folder. On it was the photocopy of John Haddox's obituary.
"I don't know why you're really here, Sam," she said softly. "And I'm not going to ask you to tell me. But..."
Sam looked up at her when she failed to continue. "But what?" he prompted.
Standing, Ellen got up and turned away from him, her shoulders tense and her arms wrapped around herself as if she were cold. After a moment's hesitation, Sam got up and followed her. He stood behind her wanting very much to put a hand on her shoulder but not feeling he had any right to do so without permission. The suspicion he'd held regarding her potential psychic abilities grew as she seemed to sense his presence behind her. She turned around to face him and he saw that there were tears in her eyes.
"You can make it stop, Sam. I knew the moment I saw you. Please," she breathed. "Make it stop."
Sam would be hard pressed to explain to anyone what happened next. One moment he was simply reaching out to wipe a tear from her cheek, and in the very next breath they were lip locked. His hands cupped her face as he kissed her deeply. He'd never kissed anyone but Jessica like that before and he had never wanted anyone but Jessica in the same way he now wanted Ellen. It was as if he were suddenly completely out of control of his own desires.
She was more than willing to be led too. Sam guided her back into the secluded corner where they'd first met, pausing several times to kiss her. There was no resistance. Her hands were all over him, her mouth sought his hungrily, tell tale signs of a starvation similar to his own. Neither one of them were thinking - not when he pressed her hard against the cool concrete wall, not when her jeans were unbuttoned and her panties shed.
He took her standing up, unprotected and completely uninhibited, holding her firmly against the wall as she wrapped her legs around his hips and dug her nails into his shoulders. She gasped, moaning as he entered her. He couldn't hold back, couldn't think of her pleasure at all. It had been far too long for him and too much had happened. Desire joined up loneliness, fear and frustration to make him sloppy and quick.
Desperation sex. Sam was embarrassed.
"Sorry, sorry...God I'm so..."
"It's okay." Her hands caressed him as he buried his face in her shoulder. She kissed his hair. His hands slipped from her thighs and she lowered her legs to the floor. "Really, it's okay."
Sam stood back, nervously setting himself to rights as she redressed herself. His fingers fumbled at his belt buckle. Ellen paused to help him and her sympathetic chuckle broke their uncomfortable silence. She favored him with her gentle smile. Her glasses were slightly askew and she took a moment to straighten them. Sam caressed her cheek with the back of his hand.
"I think I should go," he said softly.
Ellen agreed. "You probably should. It's getting late."
Together they walked back up the aisle, returning to the reading desk. Ellen closed the file folder and picked it up, pressing it into Sam's hands.
"Good luck," she said.
"Ellen..."
He never finished. He wasn't sure there was anything left to say.
