Framed for Murder
[Ghosts of Tapioca Falls, Part Three of Five]
“Detective Auburn, I don’t like what you’re insinuating with this line of questioning. I may be dead, but I’m no killer.”
Jacques Mann’s icy stare seemed to shake the detective. Good. He’ll know how serious I am.
“Don’t act like your alibi is solid,” Auburn said. “I’ve dealt with a lot of ghosts these past couple weeks, and you’re as transparent as they come.”
“Oh, you think you’re so clever with the whole ‘he’s a transparent ghost’ routine! You don’t know anything about me. What ever happened to due process? I’ve done nothing wrong! I had nothing against Sally McSilver, Hoss, or anyone in the family. There’s no motive. You got nothing, Greg.”
“You’ll need to do more than use my first name to scare me, Jacques. I’ve survived spirit attacks from your kind before. I got lucky, but let’s ask that fry cook down at Downtown Diner how harmless ghosts are.”
“My kind? What’s that supposed to mean, Detective? I am innocent!”
“Do you know where we are, Mr. Mann?”
“Innocent, I say, innoc—”
“Answer me!” Greg screamed.
“Yes. Sally McSilver’s house. But as you can see, I’ve been framed.”
Jacques looked at the detective through what appeared to be a window, but he knew it wasn’t one. Behind him was a three dimensional Thomas Kinkade-eque landscape. A beautiful forest, a river, a bridge with a path leading to an idyllic house…but Jacques couldn’t touch any of it. Any time he tried walking towards it, he got closer, but when he reached out to feel any part of the landscape—even the dirt that he should’ve been walking on, the view (though never actually moving) always remained a centimeter beyond his touch.
The floor where he actually stood was a light gray, hard surface. Walls on his left and right boxed him in with the picture behind him, and its frame ahead. Though he wasn’t sure how it looked from the outside, he knew what Detective Gregory Auburn saw: A ghost literally framed within a painting.
“Stop messing with me, Mann. I’ve had it up to here with you ghosts!” Auburn held his hand above his head like a line.
“I’m trapped here, every bit a victim as the poor girl, Sally.”
“You’re at the scene of the crime!” Greg motioned to all the evidence markers and the caution tape just outside the front door. “All evidence points to you, Jacques.”
“I’ve been trapped here the whole time! What do you want from me? We’ve been talking in circles for how long while the real killer’s on the loose?”
“Let’s say I believe you. If you’ve been trapped here, you can vindicate yourself. Tell me everything you saw that night. If you didn’t kill Sally McSilver, who did?”
“It’s not that simple.”
“Yes it is. But if you won’t tell me, I’ll have to take this lovely painting to the incinerator.”
“You wouldn’t, Detective!”
Greg stomped. “Tell me what I need to know.”
“There were multiple spirits. They’re dangerous, Greg. You need to back off and run. If you really care for the townspeople, you need to evacuate the town and give it to her.”
“Give it to who?”
“They’re coming back. They know I’m talking. They won’t let me enter the afterlife! Save yourself, Detective!”
Voice raw from screaming, Greg said, “Who are the spirits and who do they work for?”
“They call themselves the restless ones. And she is the puppet-master. I don’t know her name. You won’t be able to stop her. She’s too powerful.”
Another ghost walked in behind the detective. Sally?
She said, “Greg, you need to come with me. Now.”
“I know, the restless ones are coming, and—”
“It’s not that. It’s my sister. I’ll explain on the way. Timmy will take care of Jacques.”
Sally McSilver ran out of her house, and Detective Auburn sprinted after her. Jacques felt a tap on his shoulder. He turned and saw Timmy Saunderson standing on the bridge in front of the painting’s house. And the door was now open.
Jacques paused, and couldn’t find the words he wanted to say.
Timmy smiled. “Hello, Jacques Mann. Come with me if you want to die.”
[…TO BE CONTINUED]
