The Ghostly Past

Chapter 34

The conference had ended. Clara had enjoyed it, spent time with James outside of the meetings, at least when he wasn't getting drunk and vanishing on hookups. He had gone into total self destruct, she thought sadly. She'd seen Leo too, briefly, as he was in London on business. His dad had told him to stay for a while. James had taken a leave of absence from work, and was moving that day to stay with Leo.

He couldn't handle Gloomsdale for a while.

Clara wasn't sure she could handle it either. Warren had given her a few weeks grace. Sitting in her hotel, she made a Skype call to Kim.

"Clara?" Kim was at home. "What's up?"

"How's everything back there?" She knew that out of everyone, Kim would be honest.

"Boring." Kim's voice was brittle. "No more deaths. Everyone is moping. Ryan is with Jess."

"God, I'm sorry." She paused. "How is Max?"

"Missing you. He's holding up." Kim sighed. "Idiot."

"I'm not giving up." Clara said fiercely.

"I figured as much." Kim paused."What can I do to help?"

"I need anything, everything in that archive. The journals. I know there's a few locked in the cabinet. Amelia Woodstock, Thomas Vella, two of the kids who died, their diaries are there. Meanwhile," Clara said, clicking away on her laptop, "Harriet and I are going to Malta."

"Why?"

"I need to find out more about the original curse. Understand the origins and everything else might make more sense. Mayor Vella will give you access to those journals, he as good as promised his aid the night of the ball. Please Kim."

"You owe me big time." Kim drawled. "Fine, I'll send copies of the journals to you via email, but you'd better find something."

Harriet had met her at the airport, and they had left together, heading through security and onto the budget airline. Harriet had been easy to convince to go on a quick holiday. She'd put in holidays at the Academy, called up a friend who was on some festival committee and had managed to get some gigs over there.

While they flew, sandwiched into their cramped seats, she looked over the documents Kim had already sent.

Thomas Vella had kept a meticulous journal. He'd written every day in neat ink handwriting, things about school, observations on his classmates, the weather and the local news.

'The scholar arrived yesterday,' He had written two years before his death. 'Arrived to stay with father and brought his daughter. She's about Eve's age, not very interesting.' Then he talked about the rest of his day.

A few days later was another interesting one. 'We've been banned from going outside after dark. They will have to keep their eyes on Eve, she's always slipping out when she thinks no one will know. Mary and Eve do not understand it, but I do. I remember the cautionary tales of my childhood, the stories of spectres. The ghostly past rising up to threaten the present. It's started again. Sometimes I wonder...I have dreams, dreams of lives I've never seen. Perhaps the product of an overstimulated imagination. Jacob and Eve are the same, crying out in the night.'

Amelia's journal was illuminating. She had accounts of life there, the day she caught Eve with Samuel in the porch, right up until the day some of them died.

The thing that struck her in the various accounts she read, was that there was always a suicide, without fail. Oliver's death had not been. How would that have changed everything?

"You're really into this history project." Harriet said, looking up from her gameboy with a grin. She had a tub of crisps and a packet of sweets and was perfectly happy. "This isn't what you were obsessing over before, is it?"