Runner Ramirez & The Great Ghost War
Chapter 1 (from The Story Genie)
And here we are! The second story featuring Runner Ramirez, that itinerant wanderer who battles the supernatural forces of evil! And did I mention he’s possessed by a demon? A runaway, reformed demon but a spawn of Hell nonetheless! Over the next 12 weeks we will follow Runner as he deals with all sorts of ghost shenanigans on the streets of Chicago! Let’s go! **(By the way, this story features real historical characters and events that actually happened in Chicago in the mid-1920’s. Now I’ve changed some of the timing and details and personalities (this is fiction after all) just to let everyone know.)**
And now…
Runner Ramirez & The Great Ghost War
Chapter 1
“…not sure how he conjured that lightning strike, but it finally took care of those trolls.”
“Um, okay… And you didn’t go back into town after this, um, run-in with trolls?”
“No way. We’d probably still be answering questions if we did. Nah, it was time to go.”
“I assume your, um, ‘friend’ prompted you to leave?”
“He was still radio silent from before that last battle. Supernatural power is not always needed to see the writing on the wall. Know what I mean?”
“Uh, sure. I guess. Um…that was one of the more, um, interesting stories you’ve told me today Mr. Ramirez. Um, rather fascinating.”
“Listen pal, I don’t need that demon back in my body to know that you don’t believe a word I’ve said here today. Especially not about the trolls.”
“Okay, you got me. Though the story about that bird creature stretched the bounds of believability as well.”
“Don’t know what to tell you son, it’s all true. And you’re the one who came to me remember?”
“Yeah, I know. Um, why don’t you tell me how your ‘friend’ left you?”
“Not right now. I think you need to hear about what happened after we left Missouri. You won’t believe it either but I think it’ll be more up your alley.”
“Oh? This one involve Bigfoot or little green men?”
“No. By the way, Bigfoot’s a jerk. And those guys, really more of a turquoise.”
“Right…”
“I see a lot of novels in your office here. You like mysteries?”
“I do.”
“What about Agatha Christie?”
“Oh, she’s my favorite. The GOAT.”
“I don’t know what that means. But this story involves the time I met her.”
“Now that is up my alley. Go on.”
~~
We had been laying low for a few days in St. Louis to recover from our wounds, trolls pack a pretty mean punch, when I woke to one of the stranger shocks I had ever received. It was…music. Big band jazz. The McKinney Cotton Pickers to be exact. They played mostly clubs in Detroit. Don’t ask me how I know. I really had no idea how my ‘friend’ knew, to be honest with you. Anyway, he was pointing us to the great state of Michigan.
But first we needed a new set of wheels seeing as my old car had just been destroyed. This wasn’t much of a problem because it turns out exorcisms weren’t the only thing Fairweather learned at school. That kid could boost a car in 5 seconds flat. That’s how we came into possession of a very nice Duesenberg Model A. Forest green and quite slick. Car would serve us well for a long time. Now don’t give me that look, we took it from the owner of one of the businesses we saved from the troll horde. Since we didn’t charge for THAT service I figured taking the car made us square.
Now this was late November 1926. Even though the nation had just launched the first Federal highway system, roads between states were nothing like they are today. The one we took, Route 66, was just a cobbled together stretch of both paved and gravel surfaces. The route sorta meandered in a diagonal direction and passed through seemingly every blasted small town in the country. I’m glad my ‘friend’ wasn’t pushing us hard to get there as we could not move at a very high rate of speed. Add in the dozen times we had to stop due to cows on the road and our travel time was quite slow.
We entered Illinois after a few days’ travel and promptly ran out of gas. The Duesenberg guzzled the stuff but we hadn’t fully learned that fact at the time. Fortunately we were within a mile of the nearest town so we decided to push the car to the next station. I pleaded with my ‘friend’ to give me just a small burst of that good ole supernatural power but he had been silent since I got that musical shock in St. Louis. We encountered a rogue herd of goats right on the outskirts of that town which meant we made it to the gas station AFTER it closed.
The Duesenberg was a great car to ride in but made for a terrible bed. I tossed and turned all night and was grateful for the Sun to finally rise. The station owner arrived a few minutes later. I relate this because of what happened next. As the owner placed the gas hose into the car’s receptacle I got a tremendous series of shocks up and down my spine. It lasted until the owner withdrew the hose and turned off the pump. There was no rhyme or reason to the shocks, they did not translate to Morse code or anything else. Very odd even for my ‘friend’. This will be important later. I believe that statement is called “foreshadowing”.
Anyway, we ate at a small diner in town and got back on the road. We managed to avoid any livestock-related delays and made pretty good time to Detroit. A new set of shocks hit my spine as we entered the city but these were of the normal, translatable kind. They were basically a series of lefts and rights given to me as I weaved through the city. Before long we arrived at the Garrick Theater.
“This place looks very familiar,” Faiweather said as he got out and stretched. “But I’m not sure why.”
By this time I had been around the country enough to see all manner of playhouses and moving picture theaters. While nice, this one pretty much looked like all the others. We walked up to the main door but found it locked. We still had no idea why we were actually here or who we were supposed to meet, if anyone.
“Look at this,” Fairweather said as he pointed to the side. We stepped over to see a large collection of flowers and other paraphernalia clustered just off the sidewalk. It looked like something you’d find at a cemetery.
“I-“
“Psst!”
A muffled voice drew our attention to the alley down at the end of the building’s front. We saw a short-haired woman leaning out into view. She waved her hand in a frantic manner, like she was beckoning us over.
“You think we need to talk to her?” Fairweather asked.
A quick shock and my subsequent yelp answered the question for me. Try as I might, I could never fully expect when a shock might arrive. We walked to the alley. The woman motioned for us to follow and we did so to a side door, one tucked in between a couple large dumpsters. We ducked inside and found ourselves in what looked like a dressing room. It was rather large and full of numerous odd-looking contraptions.
“Houdini!” Fairweather exclaimed as he stepped past the woman. He stared up at a large poster that showed a shirtless man leaning over with chains connecting his wrists and ankles. Fairweather spun back to me. “This is where Houdini played his last show! Right before he died.”
Now I know you’ve heard of him. Harry Houdini, famed magician and escape artist. At the time I remembered reading in a newspaper somewhere that he had indeed died. I didn’t remember the exact circumstances but according to Fairweather Detroit is where it occurred. I looked from him to the woman and saw that tears streamed down her face. I was pretty sure I knew who she was in that moment.
“Mrs. Houdini?” I asked. I could see the color drain from Fairweather’s face out of the corner of my eye. The woman nodded and extended one delicate hand.
“Yes, please call me Bess,” she answered. I shook her hand after which she drifted to a chair. Fairweather rushed over.
“I’m so sorry ma’am, I didn’t realize who you were,” he said. She waved away his concern and looked to me. She pointed to a chair opposite her.
“Please sit Mr. Ramirez.”
Fairweather and I exchanged a look. How did she know my name? I walked over and sat. Bess wiped her eyes and picked up her pocketbook. She looked directly at me.
“Thank you so much for coming,” she said. “I don’t know if you are aware but my husband spent the last several years of his life debunking all the spiritualists and mediums who have been plaguing this country. It became more important to him than any of his shows.”
I was not aware of Houdini’s side work at the time but did know that people purporting to be able to communicate with the dead and tell fortunes had become all the rage. This was mostly con artistry at its highest level but I had experienced enough by then to know that some of those people had true power. I mean, I was walking around with a demon inside me after all. I was not going to tell her that of course.
“I did not know that,” I replied. “But please, go on.”
“These people…” Bess continued. “They operate in groups. Like organized crime. I think one of them killed my Harry in retaliation for his work. He cost a lot of people a lot of money.”
I exchanged another look with Fairweather. He shrugged; he didn’t know where this was going either. I leaned back and let out a long breath.
“You want us to find who killed him?” I asked.
Bess stared at me and cocked her head in a confused manner. She straightened and shook her head.
“No, I know who did that,” she said. “I want you to find him.”
It was now my turn to look at her with confusion. I scratched my forehead and stood. I paced a few times as if deep in thought. I glanced at Fairweather, he had no answers. I stopped back in front of Bess.
“Um, I’m sorry ma’am but I don’t understand,” I said.
“My husband and I really didn’t believe that you could talk to the deceased,” Bess said. “Or in the afterlife really. But Harry wasn’t 100% sure. So we came to an agreement awhile back.”
Bess wandered over to a small table covered in alcohol. She poured herself a drink.
“Which was?”
“When one of us died, if we found ourselves in an afterlife, then that one would try to get the other a message. In this case, ‘Rosabelle believe’. That was our favorite song.”
She downed the drink and dropped to the chair by the table. She started to cry again. I spotted a box of tissues over by Fairweather and signaled for him to get them. He did so and took the box to Bess. She accepted without even a nod.
“Two days ago I got a call from a stranger in Chicago,” she continued. “Didn’t give his name, only said ‘Rosabelle believe.’ No one knew of that phrase but Harry and myself.”
She hopped to her feet. A wild look overcame her face.
“That means Harry made it! There is an afterlife and Harry’s there! He’s there!!”
A somewhat crazed laugh escaped her mouth as Bess went back to the drink station. Now I was raised Catholic so I had a pretty good understanding of the afterlife. Didn’t believe much as a kid but that changed a bit after ‘he’ showed up. I still wasn’t quite sure what she wanted us to do.
“We tried to contact Harry ourselves after that but to no avail. And I don’t know why.” Bess said before I could. “But I know he’s out there.”
I nodded and let out another breath. I looked to Fairweather but saw that he had drifted over to the various contraptions in the room. He probably hadn’t heard anything Bess had said. I shook my head and stepped to her.
“So…you want me to find Mr. Houdini?”
Her eyes rotated up to me with a look that suggested she had forgotten I was there. She shook her head.
“I want you to find out who called me and how he heard from my husband,” she said. “Perhaps he can only be contacted in Chicago. I just have to know he’s truly okay.”
My first thought was to say no. But before I could voice that thought, a very intense shock hit the base of my neck. It was all I could do not to yell. I’m not sure how my ‘friend’ could read my mind but he could. The shock also forced me to nod forward. A huge smile covered Bess’s face. She wrapped me in a big hug. She then spun back to her original chair and grabbed her purse. She pulled out a wad of cash and thrust it into my hand.
“Thank you so much!” she said. “There’s your full fee plus an extra 20% for expenses. And I got more if you need it.”
I stared down at the money. It wasn’t often we got paid for our adventures.
“How much is it?” Fairweather whispered. He stood at my shoulder, eyes glued on the cash. Of course his attention was renewed when money was mentioned. I had no idea why she was paying us, or why we were really here, but I had long ago learned that you don’t toss away a generous gift so I pocketed the cash and pushed Fairweather away. I turned to Bess.
“I think we can probably find the guy that called you but well, we don’t have much experience with speaking to the, um, dead.”
“That’s hard to believe but not a problem!” Bess replied, a joyful disposition having replaced her previous doldrums. “Oh Rosemary! You can come in now!”
A door opened on the other side of the room and a young woman came striding into view. She was on the short side, you could almost call her tiny, and wore the flapper style of clothes so popular in that day. She had short hair and large eyes that just teemed with excitement. She practically skipped over to Bess’s side. She hugged the woman and faced me.
“May I present Ms. Rosemary Dupris,” Bess stated. “This is Mr. Ramirez and his assistant.”
I smirked at her characterization of Fairweather as my assistant. And the fact she didn’t mention his name. While I shook the young lady’s hand, Fairweather only stared. I figured he would’ve been annoyed but then I saw that his gaze was not on me. That made me smirk as well.
“She is a medium I hired after I got the call. She will go with you.”
That statement took me aback. I did a double take then turned away so they couldn’t see the confusion on my face. Nor my growing irritation. I glanced at Fairweather then back to the women.
“I’m not sure if that’s a great idea,” I said, trying to choose my words carefully. “Chicago is a dangerous city, not a place for a young lady. Plus, Fairweather and I have a way of working…”
“I’m afraid I must insist!” Bess stated. “You said yourself that you had no experience in this realm. Rosemary does. She’s quiet talented.”
“Excuse me but I thought you didn’t believe in this type of thing,” I said.
“I didn’t until I got that phone call,” Bess said. “Rosemary will be of great help to you. I included enough in that cash for her expenses as well.”
The mention of money and the sudden shock to both my legs told me that Rosemary did indeed need to come along. I stifled a groan and nodded. I looked at the young girl.
“Welcome to the team.”
After we ironed out a few details Fairweather went with Rosemary to retrieve her things. Well, I really should say he followed her like a little puppy. I was about to go to the car when Bess pulled me aside.
“Please watch out for the girl,” she said in a low voice. “My husband had a lot of enemies as you can imagine so it might get dangerous out there.”
I stared at Bess for a bit too long before looking away. I know she said that some spiritualist group killed her husband. Couple things with that. One, I had read in the papers that Houdini had been killed by an accident, some guy kept punching his gut to test his strength or something. He died a few days later. Second, I knew that most of the spiritualists were con artists but they weren’t what you’d call violent. Now I couldn’t tell Bess this so I simply nodded and patted her hand.
“She’ll be safe Ms. Houdini.”
At the time I figured it would be a pretty easy promise to keep. Boy would I be wrong.
Well, Runner and Fairweather have themselves an interesting case! What will our team find in Chicago? What was Runner wrong about? How’s Rosemary going to fit in with our boys? Find out next week in Runner Ramirez & The Great Ghost War – Chapter 2!