The Diary of Nellie Mill

By Robert French

What could four members of the New York Mob and a nineteenth-century London debutante have in common?  Absolutely nothing, except a ghost.  Stuck in a semirural suburb on the west coast because some "business" has to be straightened out, the bored men have nothing better to do than engage in confrontations with neighbours and visit a haunted mansion on the anniversary of the ghost's appearance, an event that always draws a crowd.  According to legend, the fashionable beautiful Nellie Mill jumped to her death one night in 1888 because of her tyrannical father, who brought her out to a small rural community to isolate her and then kept her from the man she met there and grew to love.  One of the mobsters finds her diary, hidden in the mansion.  In it she describes her father's slow descent into insanity.  She begins to find out how he destroyed her mother.  And she discovers that the man she has begun to love has become part of her father's plan to destroy her.  Trapped in the mansion, she has to find a way out.  As you come to know her, you realize that the last thing Nellie Mill would do is jump off a cliff.  What about the ghost?  Legends have a way of inventing themselves.  So who haunts the mansion?  I think I know.  And my guess is as good as anyone else's.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Robert French
• Release date: Oct 30, 2020
• ISBN: 9780995267145

Book preview

Also by Robert French

Passion of Shadows

Josephine Littletree

Lynch

Sigurdsen

The Diary of Nellie Mill

Robert French

The Diary of Nellie Mill

Copyright © 2017 Robert L. French

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

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Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 1

They took a taxi from the airport. Three of them sat in the back, one in the front. Two in their late twenties and two in their forties, they wore tailored suits with muted pinstripes, silk ties and pinkie rings. The one in front held a cell phone. After repeatedly punching numbers and waiting, he frowned.

No answer.

Got the right number?

Think I’m stupid?

Was asking, that’s all.

You want to try?

You’re doing fine, Mike.

A little over medium height, Mike was beefy but not fat. His black hair was thinning out along the top of his head. Tony, the man he was talking with, had olive skin and a large aquiline nose. He was sitting between a skinny man with sandy hair receding in tufts along a narrow head and a round-faced man whose slightly lopsided grin looked permanent.

He know the flight number? the skinny man said to Mike. They were the older two.

Told him we’d be getting in Saturday afternoon and I’d call on our way.

The round-faced man leaned forward to speak to the skinny one.

Could be he’s tying flies, Joe.

Real comedian, huh, Frankie? Mike said.

Frankie shrugged. A little joke.

Very little. Mike stared out the front window.

Their destination was thirty miles away and took almost an hour to reach through late afternoon traffic. Office buildings and motels gave way to suburbs and then pasture along the freeway. Finally the semirural suburb of Spruce Grove, part of Hastings Township, was directly across on the north side of an overpass. After crossing, the taxi skimmed along a mile of strip malls and duplexes and apartments, here called townhouses by an inflation-minded real estate mentality. It turned north again, into a subdivision of twelve-year-old houses. A minute later a left turn and it headed up a street of large houses. It stopped in front of a house of sand-colored stucco with an aggregate driveway separating a scrappy brown lawn overgrown with weeds. Dwarf pines and clusters of heather lined both sides of the driveway, which split into a walkway to the left and led in a curve to the front door, the wider section ending in a two-car garage built into the house. The men got out and looked around. Mike paid the driver, who had opened the trunk and taken out their luggage. He drove away and they carried the suitcases to the front door. Mike pushed the doorbell button several times. Nobody came. He turned the doorknob. The door opened and they stepped inside. It had been an unusually muggy August for Hastings and the humid heat locked inside was stuffy. Along with the heat was something else.

What a stink, Frankie said.

They were standing in the foyer. The living and dining rooms were through adjoining arches to their left. A winding staircase led to the second floor and the bedrooms. A hall went from the foyer past the staircase to the kitchen and the family room. The smell seemed to be coming from the family room. The others followed Mike. In an upholstered easy chair sat a large man, eyes bulging and mouth open. His swollen face was dark, tongue protruding from his mouth, a length of piano wire twisted into the folds of his neck. A butcher knife was sticking out of his naked abdomen and yards of intestines had spilled out between his hands and onto the carpet. He had been disembowelled before the strangling. Flies buzzed around the tangled entrails, bloated like coils of tainted sausage.

Dead for a while, Joe said.

Phew, Frankie said.

You gonna be sick? Tony said.

Nah, that don’t bother me. You feel like puking?

Did I say phew?

You making a big deal out of that? If you feel like puking, go right ahead.

No fucking way am I gonna puke.

Cut it, Mike said.

That the man? Joe asked Mike.

I dunno—talked to him over the phone. I’ll go upstairs, make a call.

Come here to go fishing, Tony said. Some fucking vacation.

Show some respect, Mike said.

Suppose he’s not the man?

That’s what I’m gonna find out.

A few minutes later Mike returned.

I talked with the man. This guy’s the Slav. Leftover business. The man was called away before he could clean up. He knew we were on our way. Didn’t have my number or he’d have let me know. Figured we’d fix things when we got here. He expected the call.

Guess it had something to do with this, Tony said. This guy hold back? Try to muscle in? Why make the hit here?

Mike pointed a finger at him.

You don’t ask what, why, when, where, how, unless you’re up there with the man.

I didn’t mean nuthin’.

What about the stiff? Frankie said.

The man says there’s a sleeping bag in the garage, Mike said. Dump all this in. Says there’s a river north of here, near a park. We’ll rent a car.

Get the fish around here thinking, Frankie said.

Fish don’t think, Tony said.

Like certain people.

You mean me?

Did I say you?

But you meant me.

If I meant you, I would’ve said you.

Go get the bag, Frankie, Mike said.

Frankie returned with a green, rolled-up sleeping bag on his shoulder. He dropped it on the carpet.

The man’s car is in the garage. Keys are in it.

Frankie and Tony looked at each other. Mike saw Joe raise his eyebrows.

What do you think?

The man didn’t mention his car.

So what? Took a taxi. Told me about the bag. And the park.

Sure you spoke to the man?

I got two numbers. Here, and one I’m supposed to call if something goes wrong. Sounds like the same guy. There a picture around?

Be hard to tell. Whoever this is, he’s blown up so bad looks like a monster. ID on him could be planted. This whole deal is wrong. Nobody answers the phone, front door unlocked, dead man sitting here, car in garage. You’re talking to a guy you never seen. He’s the man out here, but that’s not saying much. He says he’d have called but he didn’t have your number. You’ve talked to him before. He should have it. We’re invited to go on a fishing trip. Now we’re supposed to dump a stiff. And we’re not sure who it is. Up to you.

Let’s take the first plane back, Tony said. New York, New York.

Getting homesick? Frankie said.

You like this shithole? Middle of fucking nowhere. Maybe you should move here. You could milk a cow.

Who says I like it? But I’m not against seeing new places.

I’ll call the other number, Mike said and went upstairs.

Mike’s taking a long time, Tony said a half hour later.

He and Frankie and Joe were sitting at the kitchen table. They had slung their jackets over the railing separating the kitchen and family room and were drinking. Tony had opened the well-stocked refrigerator and found a shelf crammed with cases of beer. Frankie had opened the window across from the table and the searing afternoon air had taken away some of the suffocating stench. Tony wiped the sweat off his face with the back of his hand.

Need a air conditioner. Didn’t know it got this hot up here.

Mike returned after an hour and sat at the table.

Called New York. Calls were made. The situation’s cleared up. Forget about fishing. The man has been replaced.

He jerked his thumb at the family room.

Who’s the Slav? Joe said.

He’s the new head guy out here. When I called, he thought I knew. That’s how come he told me about the bag and the park. I said, ‘Who’s sitting pretty?’ He figured I was after his name.

What about us?

Be a while before things are cleared up. The house is rented. Used as a cover. Rent’s paid. There could be some leftover business for us to take care of. We stay till we get the word. Tonight we dump the fisherman. Tony, Frankie, fill the bag. Take any ID off him. Look for heavy stuff to weigh him down. Don’t want him coming up before we go.

Not going to be easy getting him into a bag, Frankie said. Sitting like that, all stiffened up.

Do what you can. Use a shovel for the guts. Wrap a blanket around the bag. Look in the garage for some rope or wire to tie it all up.

Following directions Mike had received, Joe drove the dead man’s luxury car to Fort Hastings, a small town taking its name from a nearby nineteenth-century trading post. The town and fort were four miles northeast of Spruce Grove. The park, to the west and bordering the south bank of the Hastings River, was too full of campers and beach parties. Joe doubled back and drove east on a paved road running alongside the river. Farms stretched back from the road and there was little traffic. After a while the roadside was barely three yards from the water in places. It was deep twilight. Joe parked near the bank and they got out of the car. Joe opened the trunk. Frankie and Tony took out the bag, weighed down with a towing chain and a crowbar, and carried it to the bank. Each holding an end of the bag, they heaved it out into the sluggish water as a pickup pulled over onto the roadside, headlights dipping towards them. Mike turned and put up a hand to shield his eyes from the anonymous glare.

What are you doing? The voice was that of a middle-aged man.

We’re tourists, Mike said. We got lost. Looking for the main road. Back there, is it?

You’re not supposed to dump here.

We’re not dumping.

What are those men doing in the river?

Taking a leak.

What?

Having a piss. That all right with you?

The driver backed up and drove away.

Let’s get the fuck out of here. Can’t go for a drive without some prick poking his nose into your business.

The house was stifling after the air-conditioned car. It was past ten o’clock. Jet lag setting in, they sprawled on couches in the family room after ham sandwiches and beer. A dog began barking in the yard next to the back fence. There were no alleys and the backyards in that subdivision were small. The house was the second from the corner and looked out over the backyard of a house in the crossing street. The barks were loud and came in bursts of four and five. After fifteen minutes the barking stopped. They carried their luggage upstairs and unpacked. Every window was opened to let in the cooler air. By one the only sound besides snoring was water dripping from a running toilet downstairs.

It was a cat or a rat from the green belt a block away, or something moved or a sound or the darkness. The barking started again, in furious volleys roaring through the open windows and fiberboard walls of the house like an insistent madness in the night. The men were up quickly and went to the windows and looked out at the blackness in the next yard, where the air was exploding in nonstop detonations. Tony and Mike went downstairs to sleep in the living room. Frankie and Joe closed their windows and put pillows over their ears. The barking continued through the night. It began to slacken at dawn, stopping with the daylight. The dog, exhausted and thirsty, drank out of a bowl of water before falling asleep.

The men slept in but not for long because the dog began barking at nine. As they ate a breakfast of fried eggs and bacon the barking continued, intermittent but in bursts of impatient sound blotting out all others. It went on throughout the morning and into the afternoon. Then the sound of mowing replaced it. Mike went to a kitchen window, and through the crisscrossed latticework running along the top of the fence he could see a woman mowing. He called the others. They came over, Frankie chewing on a piece of toast. They watched as the woman pushed the lawnmower over to the far side of her yard.

That a broad? Tony said. Got no ass.

Walks like a faggot, Frankie said.

How could she be queer if she’s a broad?

Could be a dyke. Workshirt, jeans. Butch haircut. What she be, about fifty?

Got to be sixty. Dog’s following her. Sniffing her ass. Big fucker.

Not putting up with this, Mike said and sat down at the kitchen table. The others drifted away from the window.

I didn’t get much sleep, Joe said.

Me neither, Tony said.

Frankie yawned.

The barking went on erratically throughout the day and evening and stopped at sundown. The day had been hot and close and the night air was humid. The sky was clear and full of wilted stars but there was no moon. The men sat in the family room. The ceiling fan was on. The stale wind fanned their sweat-sticky skin and at the armpits of their shirts were dark crescents. Droplets ran down wet bottles of beer on the coffee table. The heavy air smelled of beer.

The problem was the dog run, an elongated wire cage of chain link fencing and metal pipe the dog was put into every night. It was topless, twenty-five feet long and five wide and eight feet from the fence. Mike got up and went into the kitchen and opened the door under the sink. He went into the laundry room, searching through the cupboards, and into the garage. He returned with a box.

What did you find? Joe said.

Rat poison. Piece of meat. Throw it in. Eat up, pooch.

The barking began at one, seemed louder than the night before because of the open back door. After a few minutes Mike got up from the sofa. Kill the lights. He went to the refrigerator and took out a steak wrapped in a paper towel. He unwrapped the paper and sprinkled poison on the meat. A dark shape slipped across the lawn to the fence. The dog smelled him. Its barks became a pounding noise. Its muzzle shoved through the chain link fencing. Mike tossed the steak. It caught on the top of the run and hung there. The dog leaped at it. The sweaty darkness bellowed.

The men got what sleep they could and gathered in the kitchen early next morning. Tony noticed activity in the neighboring yard.

She called the cops.

They could see through the latticework the peaked cap and the head of a member of the local detachment that enforced law in Hastings Township. The woman’s head was next to his. They were talking, she more than he. An older man standing nearby said something, ignored by them. He turned and walked across the yard and into the house. The woman’s face was rigid, lips drawn back. Almost accidentally, her eyes glanced towards the new neighbors once.

Minutes later the doorbell rang and Mike went to the door. It was the constable. He was lean and close-shaven and looked Mike over without seeming to, noting his day-old five o’clock shadow, pinstriped suit, silk tie and pinkie ring. Not the usual suburban householder sporting a polo shirt, tennis shorts and a garden trowel. The constable was formally polite.

Morning. I’ve come from the next yard over. An attempt was made to poison their dog, probably late last night. You see or hear anything?

Nothing. Watched TV and went to bed early.

The constable became more official after hearing the imported accent.

You the owner here, sir?

We’re guests, staying till the owner gets back. Plan to do some fishing up the coast.

I’ll take a look around the back.

The constable went around the side of the house and the men inside watched.

What’s he doing? Tony said.

Poking around in the grass, Frankie said.

What’s he looking for?

Grasshoppers.

Broad’s still out there, talking over the fence to the cop.

The old guy must be her husband.

He’s nobody’s husband now. She seen to that. Cop might ask in. What about the stuff, Mike?

He’s hanging around for her.

She’s looking in here.

Stare back at the cunt.

Joe sat down at the kitchen table and looked at the suburban newspaper he had picked up from the front door mat. The Hastings Advertiser reported that a 105-year-old record for consecutive days over 90 in August in Hastings had been broken yesterday. And today it would be 39˚C, 102˚ F. As the men ate breakfast they heard a gas lawnmower. It sounded like the relentless drone of a giant heat-drugged insect looking for a place to land.

Bitch’s mowing, Tony said. How could grass grow in this heat?

It can’t unless you water it, Joe said. There’s restrictions. You can only water two days a week. Two hours before noon, same at night.

How come you know?

It says so in the paper here.

You read that shit?

Nuthin’ else to do.

Mike got up and went to the window across from the table.

The fisherman told me once where he keeps his piece. Got a silencer.

Rifle with a telescopic sight would do it, from the roof when the moon’s out, Tony said.

Got no rifle with a telescopic sight. Fuck the moon.

Could climb over and run up and blast it, Frankie said.

Gimme a boost, huh, Frankie? And I need a lift up after, but don’t tear my suit on the fence. Could wear my fishing outfit. Say I thought it was a salmon.

Bedroom window’s the best, Joe said. You’re shooting down. Less chance of hitting wire. Take out the bug screen. Cage’s about six feet high. This chickenshit yard’s about twenty-seven, the cage eight more. You’re looking at less than forty feet. Rest your arm on the sill till you can get in a good shot.

Wait till the moon’s out, Tony said. Plenty of time, pot shot.

Rover gonna get his, Mike said. Fuck the moon.

In the bedroom with the best view of the run the mosquito screen couldn’t be removed easily except from outside, and a ladder would have been conspicuous. In the master bedroom there were two small windows with screens that could be lifted from inside. Though the windows weren’t in a direct line of sight with the run, the view from the nearest one was good. It was chosen over the window in the other room despite a sharper angle. Immediately after sunset Mike went upstairs in the darkened house and took his position. He was the best marksman of the four. The dog howled a few times and barked incessantly for half an hour and then was quiet. Stray combings of cloud drifted down the sky to a dim horizon and left the stars clear and without a moon. A bulky shape trotted the length of its confinement and back again and again. At ten o’clock two post lamps in brackets on the back wall of the house were turned on, the bulbs glowing amber through the glass. A deterrent against further attempts on the dog’s life, they lit up the backyard. The handgun rested on the sill, the cylinder shape of the silencer visible outside and pointing down. At the chosen moment two soft pulls on the trigger, sounds like bursts from an airgun, and a bullet bit into the dog’s shoulder, knocking its sideways. A second smashed through an eye socket, killing it instantly. There was only a yelp.

The next morning the constable was at the front door. He pushed the doorbell button several times. With him was a policewoman. She was frowning.

The dog in the yard in back was killed last night, the constable said. I’ll have to ask you and whoever else is residing here for identification, and these premises will have to be searched.

Don’t you need a search warrant? Mike said.

I have probable cause to search for the weapon used. Getting a court order would allow the disposal or secreting of evidence.

Go ahead, look. We’re here for some fishing, like I said.

He stood aside to let in the officers.

Hey, you guys. Get out your passports.

The officers left an hour later, after searching from crawl space to attic without finding the gun. The men had shown their passports and sat waiting in the kitchen. Within their sight but in darkness the weapon lay hidden. When they were alone again they joked. Tony mentioned the policewoman as he reached into a case of beer at his feet.

Not bad for a lady cop.

Frankie snickered. Your brain’s fried.

Mike looked across at the neighboring yard. There’s a real dog.

The next day it rained.

You guys want to hear something? Joe said Wednesday morning after breakfast. He was sitting on the sofa in the family room with a copy of the Hastings Advertiser. Half asleep, Tony lay on the smaller couch. Mike and Frankie were playing blackjack at the kitchen table. Joe read out loud the feature article in the Of Local Interest section in the Tuesday edition.

Will the Slinker Walk?

The Saturday after next, within minutes following sunset, the ghost of Nellie Mill is due to walk by the gates below the nineteenth-century mansion on Blear Hill. Among the oldest houses in Hastings Township the mansion, built between 1884 and 1886, lies in ruins at the top of the hill. Now owned by the township, the property has been officially designated a historical site. The ruins, slated to be cleared and replaced by a marker, will be part of a park. The daughter of the original owner, Henry Theobald Mill, an Englishman, Nellie fell deeply in love with a trading company official at Fort Hastings. Her father broke off the forbidden relationship by keeping her locked in her bedroom. She escaped and threw herself off the cliff on the east side of the hill. Since that night in 1888, she has appeared on the anniversary of the tragedy. Recognized as the official ghost of the township, Nellie has been dubbed the Slinker for her walk in a flowing nightgown. Every year a crowd gathers near the entrance gates on Pioneer Road to see her. Many claim to have seen a white shape drift between the trees and slip in a shapely rhythm past the no trespassing sign and barbed wire fence. In 1995 some university students who wanted to prove Nellie was a hoax visited the ruins the night of her walk. Their bodies were found days later at the bottom of the cliff. The township council had the sign and fence put up afterwards. There is an old story that a dwarf with supernatural powers lives on the hill. According to the story, he is in love with Nellie. Over the years drivers on Pioneer Road have reported seeing a light at night on the hill.

You believe that shit? Mike said.

I dunno, Joe said.

Wouldn’t mind seeing her, Tony said.

Giving up on real women, Frankie said.

I had more than you’ll ever see.

From what I seen, you can have ’em.

Wonder what happened to those guys? Joe said.

They got drunk or lost and fell off the cliff, Mike said.

What about the dwarf?

Could be there’s a dwarf cult up there that don’t want nobody nosing around.

Wouldn’t mind going, Frankie said.

Me too, Tony said.

You guys crazy?

Mike threw his cards on the table. Joe folded the newspaper.

Something to do if we’re still stuck here.

You too? I’m staying here.

Could take a look later on at that mansion, Frankie said.

Take the piece, Tony said.

Can’t shoot ghosts.

We got enough trouble with cops, Mike said. Piece stays here. Nuthin’ there’s gonna hurt you. ’Cause there’s nuthin’ there.

Tony sat up on the couch.

Wonder if ghosts go to the bathroom or have sex?

You got to have a body to do that, Frankie said. But you don’t need a brain.

You talking about me?

Talking in general.

But you mean me.

If I meant you, I would’ve said you.

Hey, you don’t have to say me to mean me.

You telling me what I’m thinking?

You want to play cards or yap? Mike said to Frankie.

During a