Take the pistol or leave it in the SUV?
I left it behind.
BIRDY SWALLOWED a Benadryl but refused to dress until I had searched every inch of her slacks, blouse, and shoes to prove there were no scorpions hiding there. I had done the same for myself but not as carefully.
She was cutting the timing close, although we didn’t know it. The archaeologist would soon surprise us by rapping on the door.
“Poison crabs,” Birdy said and made a guttural sound of disgust. “That’s what they remind me of. Crabs with stingers. And bristly legs. One of those bastards ran right up my forehead. Like tiny robots-they remind me of that, too.”
I didn’t see a connection between scorpions, crabs, and robots but let her talk while I rubbed Benadryl on her neck, the sting mark swollen but displaying no red lines to suggest she needed a doctor. No constricted breathing either. “Does it still hurt?”
“Son of a bitch, if I was a better shot, I’d go in there and shoot every one of them.”
Several boxes of shells would be required to complete the job, but I didn’t say it. I had returned to her room alone, scorpions on the floor and walls, too, not just the rafters. If they were in the walls, they were in the rest of the house, but I had closed the door as if that would keep us safe.
Something else I did: checked every window I passed to confirm it was nailed shut, no sign of the peeping man outside. And I had retrieved Birdy’s semiautomatic pistol from beneath her pillow. Her overnight bag, which lay open on the floor, was another matter. Examining clothing and extra shoes would take time. Her bag was the only reason she had agreed to return to the house.
We were by the fireplace in the parlor now, where I had been told not to build a fire but had anyway. The slow flames softened the hiss of a Coleman lantern in the middle of the floor. No furniture in a space with twelve-foot ceilings and marble-manteled windows and a chandelier too high for teenagers to steal. Cobwebs and dust, a cigarette pack crumpled in the corner with beer cans, in a house that had been built by a Virginia cattleman. Charles Langford Cadence, a man who had been murdered or had shot himself.
I had done some research since we’d met with the attorney, which is why I knew a lot more about the property. I also knew that John Ashley, the gangster, might have done the killing. An old newspaper clip I found rumored that he was guilty, but Ashley was legendary in the region by that time and legends are rumor magnets.
On the other hand, John Ashley was a proven killer. Between 1914 and 1924, he had terrorized Florida and the Bahamas. He and his gang-which included a girlfriend named Laura-had robbed trains and banks and murdered innocent people. They became international outlaws when they raided the Bahamas, killing several and hijacking shipments of rum.
After each heist, Ashley escaped into Florida’s interior. The TV show was right about that: he had grown up in the Everglades and could live off the land. The wild country between Palm Beach and Fort Myers was familiar to him. There was no evidence he had murdered cattlemen along the way, but Ashley had been charming and talkative. He was certainly aware that Charles Cadence had built a grand house on the Telegraph River-and had married a much younger woman, a beauty named Irene.
In 1928, during a hurricane, the Lake Okeechobee dam burst. The torrent swept over central Florida and killed nearly two thousand people-probably more. Many bodies were never recovered or identified, but the Cadence house survived. The same year, a Chicago developer bought the property but was left penniless after the stock market crash. The next two owners also went broke. The tax debt was satisfied by foreclosure and the house was converted into a school. Children of farmers and cowhands attended, but the school was closed abruptly after only six years.
Why?
The Internet didn’t offer an answer. My best guess was that around the same period, a disease called deer tick fever caused a panic in the Everglades. A bounty was placed on deer-animals that played no role in spreading the disease, as it turned out-but Florida’s deer population was decimated anyway.
I discovered two interesting journal entries from a lady who might have taught at the school. If true, it was my introduction to a ghost or apparition that was associated with the Cadence house in later years-the woman on the balcony, I came to think of her. Or young Mrs. Irene Cadence.
In January 1939, the teacher wrote: “I am much vexed by the tantrums in recent days of otherwise good children who are from good homes. Today, Mary, a subdued girl who earns fine marks, excited the class when she ran outside, pulling at her hair and screaming. She did so without cause and despite the frigid weather. This incited other children to follow, some who claimed to hear a woman crying on the balcony. I blame this on deer fever, not the tragedy said to have occurred in this house. Girls at a certain age are sensitive and such stories impress deeply. Mary’s temperature, however, was normal when we finally calmed her and warmed her near the fire…”
Another entry, dated February 1939: “Five children have now been sent [home] by a blistering of the skin, mostly of the hands and wrists but thrice in the appearance of blisters or carbuncles on their faces. A painful tenderness near my cheek warns that I, too, have been infected, as do recent nightmares. How wretched the screams of that poor woman on the balcony! We expect a visit from Dr. Hansen of Ft. Myers most any day now…”
The producers of Vortex Hunters had found these same lurid tidbits. I confirmed it by downloading an episode entitled “The Malediction of Cadence Place.” Most of it was sensational nonsense but did include some history that was useful-especially a few facts about Charles Cadence’s wife, Irene. That’s how I knew she’d been considered a woman of great beauty with skin the color of “parchment” and raven-black hair.
The house had remained empty until the 1960s, when it was remodeled by an artist-a member of New York’s avant-garde and a friend of LSD proponent Dr. Timothy Leary. One December night, he fell from the balcony and died. The coroner’s report listed alcohol and “other drugs” as contributing factors.
I had shared this information with Birdy. She had delighted in the stories because they were fun to hear, the two of us alone in the empty house, but she wasn’t frightened-until now. I lifted her chin and asked, “Does it still throb?”
“Like I got jabbed by a hot needle. The thing crawled from my cheek into my hair-I can still feel it. What I need is a mojito and a bath. How far’s the nearest hotel? I bet they have a bar.” She finished buttoning her blouse, the starched collar unusual for camping, but it looked good, the way it framed the angles of her face.
I said, “On the bright side, we don’t have to worry about palmetto bugs.”
“Enough with the palmetto bugs. They’re cockroaches, only bigger and they can fly,” she said. “Just a nicer name. I hate roaches, too. In college, there was a garbage strike and roaches took over our dorm. Middle of the night, a girl would scream, I didn’t even wake up, it got to be so common. That was before I switched to law and moved out of the liberal arts wing, which had a lot of flaky people to begin with.” Birdy paused. “Cockroaches, scorpions-I’m not sleeping in that room anymore, so forget it. Just wait until one bites you.”
I knew we needed another hammock and a box of bug bombs if we were going to spend a night or two in this place. Bunny Tupplemeyer’s attorney had said overnighting wasn’t a must but could be useful. He had decided that evidence the house was not haunted would help prove his claims were based on law, not superstition.