Lightning Strikes
Even when she was a young girl, Mattie Montgomery had a fear of thunderstorms. On more than one occasion, a bolt of lightning or crash of thunder sent the child scurrying under her bed for safety. This adolescent fear, however, was no match for the sheer terror she was to experience years later, as an adult, while temporarily staying on Naumkeag Island.
Clark Montgomery, once Mattie's high school sweetheart and then her husband, was a tenured professor of archaeological science at the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology; however, he dreamed of one day leaving behind the lecture halls to head a major archeological dig of his own. His wife secretly believed Clark envisioned himself as Indiana Jones, traveling to exotic places and battling evil forces while uncovering rare and valuable antiquities. Although there was no Holy Grail, Sankara stones or Ark of the Covenant to be found on Naumkeag Island, Professor Montgomery nevertheless took a leave of absence from MIT to lead an excavation of the small Massachusetts island.
"And just what do you hope to find out there?" Mattie asked him. "Fossils? Dinosaur bones? Native American pottery?"
Clark laughed and shook his head.
"Something far more interesting, if we're lucky. Back in the late seventeenth century when the Puritans on the mainland were running around, pointing their fingers at their neighbors and crying 'witch,' a group of men and women from a small settlement not far from Salem Village packed up their belongings and moved to the island. Legend has it that they were not Christians and that they secretly adhered to the pagan beliefs of their Celtic ancestors. Once on the island, away from the ever-watchful eyes of the Puritan Church, they were free to worship as they chose. It is only a legend, mind you, but there might be proof out there somewhere."
"What if you do find proof? What good will it do?"
"Then the pagans of Naumkeag Island will cease to be legend and become part of New England's history. That's what archaeology is all about. Not unearthing buried treasure, but finding answers to support or refute established beliefs."
* * *
In 1926 a Boston-born entrepreneur built a seaside inn on the eastern shore of Naumkeag Island, with hopes of making the area a retreat for the wealthy. Unfortunately, the Wall Street crash of 1929 wiped out his fortune and put an end to his dream. Some years later a fire destroyed the abandoned inn. Since then no tourists have journeyed to the shores of Naumkeag Island.
Mattie and Clark tied their motorboat to a small pier that jutted out into the bay. Their food supplies, archaeological equipment and personal luggage had already been shipped to the island on a larger vessel. While they were on Naumkeag, the professor and his wife would live in the abandoned caretaker's cottage. Meanwhile, the students who had volunteered to work at the dig would camp around the perimeter of the site in tents.
The first several days on the island were like a vacation for Mattie. Other than keeping the small cottage clean, she had few responsibilities. Every afternoon after her household chores were finished she would apply a coat of sunscreen to her pale skin and take a book, lounge chair and beach umbrella down to the island's sandy beach.
After a week of sunshine, however, the island was hit with a storm. While Mattie lay in bed late one night listening to the thunder, she heard a loud crack, as though a tree limb had snapped. She got up and went to the bedroom window to investigate the sound. In the brief interval of time that the lightning lit the sky, she glimpsed an old-fashioned horse-drawn vehicle heading toward the house. She let out a startled cry that woke her husband.
"What's wrong?" he asked sleepily.
"Someone is out there."
Clark got up and joined his wife at the bedroom window.
"Is it one of my students?" he asked anxiously. "Has something happened? Is someone hurt?"
"No, it was a strange man driving a horse-drawn wagon. He was coming up the old dirt road from the eastern shore."
Another flash of lightning lit the night. No one was there—man or animal.
"Where did he go?" Mattie cried.
Weary from his day's exertions, Clark shrugged his shoulders and returned to bed.
"There was someone out there. I saw him."
"Well, there's no one there now. Perhaps you were dreaming. You know how much these storms upset you."
"I wasn't dreaming, and I didn't imagine anything either."
"What would someone be doing out in a wagon on a night like this? And why would he be coming along the dirt road? There's nothing out that way but the charred ruins of the old inn."
Although Mattie saw the logic of her husband's argument, she could not deny the evidence of her own eyes.
* * *
The following night Mattie was awakened by the approach of another storm. Her nerves tingled as she heard the distant rumble of thunder. When she looked out the bedroom window and saw the trees bending in the wind, she knew the rain would soon fall. Rather than remain in bed listening to the approaching storm, she got up and walked into the living room. There she curled up on the sofa with her book, hoping it would take her mind off the inclement weather outside. A few minutes later the first scattered drops beat a staccato on the slate roof of the former caretaker's cottage. As the storm intensified, the tempo of the raindrops increased, the thunder grew in volume and the lightning flashed nearer to the house.
Suddenly, the power went out, and Mattie was left sitting on the couch in darkness. A flash of lightning illuminated the front yard, and once again she saw the man and the wagon. Only this time the vehicle was stopped right on the cottage's circular driveway. In the brief moment before darkness was restored, she could see that the horse-drawn conveyance was no ordinary wagon, that it was, in fact, an old-fashioned, horse-drawn hearse.
"I know you don't believe me," a hysterical Mattie cried to her husband only moments later, "but I did see it."
Professor Montgomery was physically exhausted from the long, hard day he had spent at the dig site. He wanted only to sleep, not to listen to his wife's preposterous claims.
"What I think is that you ought to see a doctor," Clark suggested.
"Are you suggesting I'm crazy?"
"No, nothing of the sort. I think the storms upset you and trigger your overactive imagination. I want you to see the doctor on the mainland and get a prescription to help you sleep."
"But I don't want sleeping pills."
"We both need the rest," he insisted. "I can't work on only a few hours of sleep."
* * *
The visit to Dr. Merriweather's office was a unique experience for the city-bred woman. Both the good doctor and his nurse, who was also his wife of nearly fifty years, resembled those down-to-earth, small-town New Englanders found in so many of Norman Rockwell's paintings.
"No appointment necessary," the kindly old nurse assured Mattie with a smile when the young patient walked into the reception area. "Doc will be with you in a few minutes. He's just gone down the street to check up on the Wilson boy. Mother said the poor child's been throwing up. Probably just had too much cake and ice cream at Susie Cabot's birthday party," she laughed.
"The doctor makes house calls?" Mattie asked with surprise.
"Ayeh," the nurse replied in proper New England fashion. "I suspect half the time he does so just so he can get out of the office."
Mattie took a seat and began looking through back issues of Yankee Magazine that were kept on the end table. Meanwhile, Mrs. Merriweather looked over the information Mattie had supplied on the doctor's new patient questionnaire.
"You're from Boston, huh?" the nurse asked. "And are you just passing through or are you here on vacation?"
Before she realized it, Mattie had told the woman not only about her husband's work on Naumkeag Island but also about the horse-drawn hearse she believed she had seen in her driveway.
"That's why my husband wants me to get a prescription for sleeping pills," she concluded. "He thinks I'm imagining things."
"I wouldn't be too sure of that. Not many folks go out to Naumkeag Island, and those who do don't stay there very long. First, there were those legends of Druids and human sacrifice—nothing but a bunch of nonsense, if you ask me—and then that fool Harcourt Updyke built an inn on the island, hoping to attract his rich friends to the place. He figured they would sail up from their grand mansions down in Newport."
"Did they?"
"When the place first opened in the early Twenties, it was a popular spot, but then came the Depression. Many of those wealthy people were broke. Of course," the nurse said, leaning over as if to divulge a confidence, "when they were there, those society people were nothing but trouble."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, for one thing, they liked to drink even though Prohibition was the law of the land back in those days. The worst, though, was that the rich, single men—and some of the married ones, too—often got a bit too friendly with the local girls. More than one young woman here in the village found herself in dire circumstances if you know what I mean."
Before Mattie could reply, Dr. Merriweather returned from the Wilson house and showed his new patient into his office.
"Has my wife been filling you in on our local gossip?"
"She was telling me about how the rich men who stayed at the inn on Naumkeag Island sometimes took advantage of the local girls."
The doctor shook his head and smiled.
"That's been a sore subject in her family for several generations. You see, her great-uncle Walt was a fisherman who lived out on Naumkeag, and he was in love with a real pretty young girl, Bess Osgood, who worked as a waitress at the inn. They were engaged to get married, but then Bess ran off with a rich banker from Boston. My wife's great uncle never got over being jilted. He took to drink, and one day he went out in his boat and was never seen again. Some people around here like to think he sailed for Boston to find Bess."
"And what do the others think?"
"They believe his boat capsized and old Walt drowned, which is probably the case."
Twenty minutes later, Mattie paid her bill and left the doctor's office with a prescription for sleeping pills.
* * *
Clear weather returned for the next several days, and Professor Montgomery and his wife both got plenty of sleep. Then one night, the rumble of thunder again woke Mattie. She immediately got out of bed and headed toward the bathroom to take two sleeping pills. As she was walking back to the bedroom, a bolt of lightning struck, and in its eerie brightness, she could clearly see the horse-drawn hearse on the circular driveway.
Mattie screamed in terror when the lid of the coffin in back of the hearse was thrown open and a ghostly hand emerged from the casket.
"Honey, are you all right?" Clark cried, lightly slapping his wife's face in an attempt to rouse her after she fainted.
"It's coming for me: the hearse. It must be some sort of premonition I'm having. Oh, Clark," she wailed, burrowing her face against her chest. "I don't want to die."
It took the professor nearly an hour to calm his hysterical wife, but eventually—thanks to Dr. Merriweather's prescription—she fell into a deep, untroubled sleep.
Late the following morning, Mattie awoke and discovered her husband had not gone to the dig.
"We need to talk," he informed her. "I'm sending you to stay with your mother until my work here is done."
Clark's decision displeased his wife.
"We've never been apart before, and this project could take months," she protested.
"Yes, and if we do find something, it could go on a good deal longer. But if you stay here, you're bound to have a nervous breakdown."
"Please don't send me away," she begged. "I'll do anything. I'll buy shades for the windows, so I won't have to see anything outside during a thunderstorm."
Clark's determination faltered.
"Well ...."
"Please, darling, give me one more chance. If I see the hearse again, I promise I'll go to my mother's without any protest."
"All right," her husband agreed, "but I want you to go to the mainland today and get those window shades."
* * *
Whether or not the shades would have helped Mattie is a moot point, for she was not inside the house the final time she beheld the horse-drawn hearse.
The day started out sunny and breezy, and the weather forecast had called for more of the same. The professor and his students were at the dig site on the western side of the island. Mattie had finished her novel and decided to take a walk. Her curiosity took her down the dirt road toward the charred remains of the old inn. The dimensions of the ruins were much larger than she expected. She had envisioned a quaint country inn similar to the bed and breakfasts that dotted New England, but the inn on Naumkeag Island was more the size of a modern resort hotel.
This must have been quite a place, Mattie thought as she walked along the sandy beach that separated the Atlantic Ocean from the inn's once elegant lawns and gardens that were now overgrown with weeds and littered with debris brought in during high tides.
Mattie circled the perimeter of the ruins, and as she neared what was once the rear of the inn, she stepped on a rock and twisted her ankle. She tried walking a few yards, but the pain was too great, and she silently cursed herself for running out of the house without leaving a note for her husband, telling him where she was headed.
Clark will come looking for me when he gets home tonight and sees that I'm not there, she reasoned. He shouldn't have too much difficulty finding me. After all, this isn't a very large island.
Preparing herself for the long wait, Mattie sat on a patch of grass under a shade tree beside the dirt road. Eventually, the sound of the waves breaking on the beach lulled her into a light slumber. When she woke up, the sun was beginning to set.
It's getting dark out, she realized with a shiver. Oh, Clark, please come and get me soon.
The wind picked up, and Mattie could smell rain in the air.
Oh great! she thought, looking around for some form of cover from the storm. Just when I thought it couldn't get any worse.
As she hobbled toward the old gazebo on the far side of the beach, the first raindrops began to fall. Her progress was slow and painful. Soon the sun was gone and all around her was dark. Then the rain began falling steadily, and Mattie tried to quicken her pace.
A sound from the direction of the dirt road lightened her heart.
"Clark!" she cried and turned to peer into the night, sure she would see her husband's Jeep driving down the dirt road.
But there were no headlights, and soon she could determine that the sound was not that of an engine but rather one of horse's hoofs beating against the dirt road.
Mattie screamed and tried to run to the gazebo, but it was too far away. The hearse raced down the dirt road, and the frightened woman headed toward the rubble of the inn. The ghostly driver reined in his horse, and the hearse came to a stop a few yards from her. She cringed in horror as again the lid of the coffin was thrown open and a pale hand emerged. Then, a beautiful young woman, white as newly fallen snow, got out of the casket and turned toward Mattie in supplication.
"Please help me," the wraith pleaded.
A bolt of lightning ripped across the sky and struck the vehicle. Instantly, the wraithlike horse, the hearse, the driver and the beautiful woman all vanished. A cloudburst sent Mattie scurrying toward the inn. She moved a few of the burned boards and found a staircase leading down to the cellar. Wincing with pain, she climbed down the stairs, huddled in a dark corner and waited for the storm to pass.
* * *
"Mattie!" Clark called. "Mattie? Can you hear me? Are you out here?"
"Clark," his wife replied with joy. "I'm down here in the old cellar. I've twisted my ankle, and I can't put any weight on it."
"Just stay right where you are, darling. I'll come and get you."
A beam of light from Clark's lantern danced around the room as he descended the cellar stairs. Mattie's happiness at being rescued vanished when the lantern's light revealed a skeletal hand protruding through the earthen cellar floor.
"There must be a body buried under there," Mattie declared.
"Never mind that now," Clark answered, taking his wife in his arms and carrying her up the cellar stairs. "Whoever is down there has been waiting a long time to be found. He or she can wait until tomorrow morning. I'm taking you home now."
* * *
"Just stay off your feet until the swelling goes down," Dr. Merriweather instructed as he finished applying the bandage to the swollen ankle.
"I can't thank you enough for coming all the way out here to take care of me," Mattie said gratefully.
"The pleasure was all mine. I enjoyed meeting your husband, and I can't wait to get back to the office and tell the wife about the body that was uncovered in the cellar of the inn."
"Do you think the police will be able to determine whose body it is, Doctor?"
"I might be wrong, but I think if the state police get a DNA sample from the corpse and compare it to a sample from Bess Osgood's family, they'll discover that the poor girl never ran off with that rich banker from Boston, that she never left the island at all."
"If that's true, then wouldn't that cast suspicion on your wife's great uncle? The police might think he killed Bess in a jealous rage."
"I'm not a detective, mind you," the doctor declared, "but I don't believe Old Walt was the killer. If he was, why would he bury Bess in the cellar of the inn? Why not just dump her body in the sea? No, I think it was Harcourt Updyke who murdered her. It stands to reason. Not only was Bess buried in the cellar of his inn, but he was the one who told everyone she ran away with the banker. I suppose in the long run, though, it doesn't really matter much who killed her since everyone involved in the case has long since died."
Dr. Merriweather snapped his medical bag shut and reached for his jacket.
"While I'm here," he said, "do you think you'll need any more sleeping pills? If so, I can write you another prescription."
"That won't be necessary," Mattie replied, remembering the ghostly entreaty of the dead woman, who would finally rest in peace now that her body had been discovered. "I don't think I'll be disturbed by phantom hearses anymore."
Dr. Frankenstein used lightning to bring his monster to life. Look at the monster I created with it!
