Chapter Ten
A little while later, Jillian made her way to her room. Like Matthew said, it had been a long day and she was tired. She was close to finding the truth but she wasn’t quite there yet. She had a feeling there was more to the story than anyone realized.
When she opened the door to her room she looked up and froze in place. Her gaze was locked onto the dresser mirror. There, written in red, were the words.
Leave now or die in three days.
Jillian took a deep breath and released it.
She had been startled but took a few steps toward the mirror.
Running her fingers over the words, the tips of her fingers smeared the letters.
She glanced down at the dresser and found an open tube of lipstick.
Someone was playing a trick on her. “Your little tricks aren’t going to work, Claire. ”
Glancing around the room she didn’t notice anything else out of place.
The bed hadn’t been disturbed and the books she had been reading were still where they should have been.
Jillian walked over to the closet and opened the door.
Her clothes were hanging in the same place they were earlier.
Feeling a bit scared she even looked under the bed.
When she had checked every conceivable place to hide she went back to the closet to check again for anything that shouldn’t be there.
Suddenly, the lights in the room flickered and for a second, Jillian could have sworn there was a pair of red glowing eyes staring back at her. But when the lights came back on, the red glowing orbs were gone. She took a deep breath and slowly closed the closet door.
She went over to the bed and sat down.
The red eyes had made her want to scream but she hadn’t.
Was she afraid? Hell yeah, she was. But this only told her that she was getting closer to the truth.
Those glowing eyes were just another piece of the puzzle.
She got the sensation very briefly that it hadn’t been Claire standing there. But who else could it have been?
Jillian didn’t even bother to get undressed. She lay back on the bed and closed her eyes. The soft light from the lamp on the table still lit the room. She was so tired but how could someone sleep after all of this? She considered going down to the parlor and sleeping on the old sofa down there.
She scoffed at being run out of the bedroom. So she curled up on her side and brought the covers over her head. She slept undisturbed for a little while then Jillian began tossing and turning. Her dreams were being disturbed by the sound of someone calling her name.
She frowned in her sleep as she tried to place the voice with a name. When she didn’t hear it again she settled into a deeper sleep.
A little bit later the voice called out her name again.
Instinctively, she called back, “Tilly?” The voice she’d heard was not unlike Claire’s voice in the way she spoke but this voice was gentler, more feminine. Jillian struggled against the interruption but the voice running through her head was insistent.
It called her name again, “Jillian, time is running out. Please hear my plea. You must stop this insanity. Go to the family plot and dig around my great grandfather's headstone. You must dig up a small pouch and keep it with you.”
“Why, what does it mean?” Jillian murmured.
“I don’t know but I have a feeling it’s important. I don’t think he would have gone to the trouble of burying it, if it wasn’t.”
“Who buried it? Did Matthew bury the pouch?” Jillian murmured.
“No, not Matthew... I know Matthew is here with you. He must find where my bones are hidden. Please tell him to find me. It’s the only way to break the curse holding all of us to this place. Tell Matthew I love him, always and forever.”
“But who buried the pouch?” Jillian insisted.
“George buried the pouch. He came to us looking for a job and a place to live. We gave him shelter and a job, but there was something about the man that didn’t seem right.
He never talked about his family and he spoke with some kind of accent.
It was a little strange. Before long he began watching us.
Everything we did, he was always there somewhere watching us.
Claire and I thought it was odd and we began to feel uncomfortable around him.
Then one day I saw George burying something in the cemetery.
I didn’t know what it was but I think it has to do with what’s going on. ”
“What am I supposed to do with whatever I find?”
“I don’t know, it must mean something. Please help Matthew to find me.”
The voice faded away.
Jillian was left with nothing but a sense of urgency. She struggled to wake herself up. She opened her eyes and bolted upright in bed. She glanced around the room but didn’t see anything. Raising her hand, she wiped the sweat from her forehead. This night was getting stranger and stranger.
She didn’t know if what she just went through was real or not. It could have been a dream? The message was cryptic at best and she didn’t know exactly what Tilly wanted her to do. She didn’t understand what a small pouch had to do with anything but Tilly had been insistent on retrieving it.
Jillian lay back down on the bed and tried to close her eyes. She was worn out and knew she needed her rest. She couldn’t go to the family cemetery plot in the dark anyway. She would need light to do what was needed.
Finally, she fell asleep again.
The next morning...
Jillian sat up on the side of the bed and rubbed her tired eyes.
Her long dark hair was tousled and her eyes burned from lack of sleep but she forced herself to get up.
Walking over to the window facing the backyard, she gazed outside.
It looked the same as it had yesterday but today she knew about another piece of the puzzle.
Tilly hadn’t known what the pouch was all about but Jillian was determined to find it.
She took a few minutes to wash her face, fix her hair and change her clothes.
Then she made her way downstairs. Neither of her guests were up yet so Jillian made coffee and while it brewed she went to the back door.
Looking around the porch, she found what she needed.
Going back inside she sat with a cup of coffee and tried to wake up some more.
After a bit she felt better and she got the right shoes on and some garden gloves that were still in great shape. She then walked toward the cemetery.
Stepping over the short fence, she went directly to the biggest headstone. Funny, how she had been here yesterday and dug out all the weeds. It would make this job somewhat easier to do.
Kneeling beside it, she read again the words written there.
Thomas Eugene Belmar, Beloved Husband and Father.
She reached out and touched the cold stone.
Her fingers skimmed the letters carved in the marble and she wondered what kind of man Thomas had been.
He seemed to be the start of the Belmar family.
Too bad that there were no more Belmars that she knew of anyway.
Tilly and Claire were the last ones and they never had any kids to continue the line.
She searched the base of the headstone but couldn’t find any recent signs of someone digging or burying anything.
Then she shook her head. The diggings like the rest of the story would have been almost forty years old by now.
She began poking around at the base of the headstone.
She worked her way around the marble base and when she was halfway around the back, her hand shovel brought up a small fabric pouch.
Brushing the dirt off, Jillian discovered the pouch wasn’t very big and it still had a bright purple color.
As she tumbled the pouch in her hands she could feel something inside.
She got to her feet and shoved the bag into her pocket.
She had already hung out in this cemetery for two days now and that was a creepy thing to do.
She needed to wait to open it when she got back to the Inn.