What Hunts Me

Chapter 3

Chapter 3My flight from Oahu had arrived late the night before, and I wanted nothing more than to sleep-in, something I was denied by the annoyance of my relentlessly ringing cell phone. It was Phil James.

Phil and I had met a little over a year ago. When the ghosts first appeared to me, I needed to find out what was happening and why. My research led me to a ghost tour that was conducted four nights a week in Lower Pacific Heights, and guaranteed the patrons they'd see or at least experience a ghost. Phil owned the business, and after the tour we talked. He had figured out what I was, because there was indeed a ghost on his tour and I saw it and he knew it. Although Phil couldn't see ghosts—well, he'd seen one or two, but he couldn't do it regularly—he was well versed on them and what they did. Moreover, he was well aware of the ghost killers and the Watchers. He helped me a great deal back then, and now he helped the Watchers. He'd also become a good friend.

After he'd rung me for the third time, I finally answered. I was grouchy; Phil didn't care.

“Hey man, how are you?” Phil's cheerful demeanor tended to be contagious, even when the recipients were exhausted.

I lightened up and yawned. “Good. Sleepy still. What's up?”

“Well, I thought we could grab a beer or two at the old haunt, catch up on things, you know?”

I glanced at my bedside clock. It was almost 11 a.m., probably time to get up anyway. “Yeah sure. But I got in late and I need to do some things around the house. How about I meet you there around 3:30 this afternoon?”

I spent the next few hours doing laundry, sorting through mail, and getting myself presentable, then I went next door to visit my much loved neighbor and Billy's aunt, Justine Wilkinson. Justine and I share the top floor of an art deco building in Pacific Heights. There's one other occupied apartment on the floor as well, but she's an elderly lady we rarely see. The building was originally an apartment building, and was converted to condos sometime in the 1950s. Justine's wealthy father purchased not one, but three units for her, and consolidated them into one apartment. Hers was by far the largest and most luxurious unit in the building.

As usual, Margie, Justine's companion, chef, and sometimes chauffeur, and a retired ghost killer, answered the door when I knocked. She's a tall, sturdy woman in her mid-fifties, with salt and pepper shoulder length hair that is always neatly pulled back. Her apparel never changed; khaki pants and polo shirts, she wore them like a uniform. She's very protective of Justine, and that made her A-Okay in my book.

“Hello, George,” she said with a slight smile. “Welcome home.”

“Hi Margie, how's things?”

She gave me a quick rundown, which mostly consisted of Justine's recent activities, but not much of her own. Margie wasn't too interested in a personal life…she just wanted a quiet existence after years of coast to coast ghost killing. I'd been encouraging her to join a softball league for months now. She's a huge baseball fan, and I even invited her to play on my league. Much to my delight, she informed she'd finally done just that. I was pleased and her smile, which brightened when she described her new teammates, told me she was also pleased.

“Justine's on the terrace; go on out and I'll bring coffee.”

Justine was reading something on her iPad, and looked up when I stepped through the French doors. “George, dear.” She reached out with her hand, and I took it and leaned down to kiss her well powdered cheek. Justine is in her eighties, but one would be hard-pressed to believe she's a day over sixty-five. She's aged beautifully, and would probably out live us all.

Taking the chair nearest her, and still holding her hand, I asked, “How are you, Justine?”

She smiled. “Oh, wonderful dear, as usual,” she winked mischievously. Justine is excessively wealthy, and donates a great deal of money and time to many different causes. She also chairs at least a dozen charitable committees, and is constantly shaking things up to be sure the money is spent wisely and not wasted on shindigs and bashes (her words, not mine) that don't actually benefit the needy. Her mischievous wink and grin probably meant she'd been upsetting the social/charitable entertainment circles of her peers.

“I received a call from Billy this morning. She was….” Justine paused, a smile gracing her lips. “Uncharacteristically cheerful.” Her eyes brightened and she patted my hand. “That was a lovely thing you did for her, dear.”

I gave her a modest shrug. “To be honest, it was partially selfish too.” Her eyebrows rose curiously and I grinned. “We both need a vacation. So by putting her on leave, I'm free to take one too.”

“Ah, bravo George! Where do you plan on going?”

“Remember I told you about the letters and diary Phil found in the Lincoln Way attic?”

The Lincoln Way house was a large, old Edwardian, located across from Golden Gate Park in the Sunset District of the city. It was used for housing visiting ghost killers, training new ghost killers, and more recently, it was the location of Phil's sanctum, which was his term for the large and mostly unused living room he'd converted into a library of sorts. He'd spent the last several months contacting other Watcher groups around the country, and world, in the hopes of collecting and centralizing all the diaries, journals, and other missives written by those from our worldwide supernatural community. There's only one other location similar to what Phil was creating. It was in London, though, and apparently it was filled to capacity, so the Watchers were more than happy to allow Phil to gather what they couldn't and create an additional archive.

I'd only briefly mentioned the find to her, but I hadn't gotten around to giving her the details.

She nodded. “I do recall. However, I do not recall the contents. Remind me if you would, dear.”

The box Phil had found in the attic contained a number of letters dated in the summer of 1915, a diary of sorts, and a few old photographs. Not an unusual find, as the Lincoln Way house had been in the Watchers' hands for almost a hundred years, and many ghost killers had come through its doors, some leaving behind their diaries and other correspondence. What was unusual was the author of the letters and the diary, and the pictures. The author's name was George Sinclair, and my father bore a striking resemblance to the man in the pictures.

My paternal grandfather had been adopted by a nice childless couple back in the 1920s. No information was available as to where he'd been born or who his birth parents were, though. His name was John George Sinclair, and I was named (partly, at least) after him. The diary was a montage of sketches, some mysterious writings, and a few photographs. The last entry was a bit cryptic, but it also indicated that this man was not only a ghost killer, but he was being hunted by someone or something. And more importantly, he wrote that he had a son, who he needed to hide from those that were hunting him. Ghost killing is genetic, and I'm one of the most powerful ghost killers to have been born in a very long time. My mother was also a powerful ghost killer, but no one on my father's side—that we knew of—had displayed any ability, so we had to assume it went back further, to my unknown genetic great-grandparents. Phil thought this find was a direct clue to that unknown lineage. The letters were all posted to an address in Houtzdale, Pennsylvania, a place I'd never heard of.

After explaining all this to Justine, she looked thoughtful. Before she could respond, Margie arrived with a tray, and poured coffee for both of us before retreating back through the French doors.

Justine asked, “I assume you plan on exploring the origin of these letters?”

I nodded. “Yep. I'm taking Phil with me. After all, he found them, and he eats this kind of stuff up. I told him my plans before we left for Oahu, and knowing him, he's probably already done a ton of research.”

Justine smiled. She knew Phil too, and nodded her head in agreement. “Tell me about the diary and the letters, dear. What exactly do they contain?”

I explained that the letters appeared to be a chronological account of a bicycle trip 1915 George took from Pennsylvania to San Francisco. The diary was odd though; what little writing there was, was for the most part nonsensical, and it had been damaged by moisture at some point, so some of the entries were illegible. Other pages contained drawings, well done and detailed, but mysterious and unidentifiable. One recurring drawing was a face, part human, part monster. The human portion was different in each drawing, but the monster portion appeared to be the same creature, just with a different human counterpart. The last entry was the most coherent. Young George wrote that he was being hunted by evil men and their demons, and that part screamed ghost killer. He also wrote that he had a child, and in order to keep him safe, he gave him to his cousin Charles.

She only nodded in response and sipped her coffee thoughtfully. “You said the letters were posted to a Pennsylvania address. I wonder how they made their way to San Francisco,” she pondered. It was something I wondered too.

Justine and I chatted for another half-an-hour, then I took my leave to meet Phil.