Gone at Midnight

To begin this morbid tale, I will have to fill in the pertinent details as told by my husband, Officer Luke Greaves. My name is Elaine Greaves.

We’ll meet again soon but first you must prepare yourself...

What I am about to tell you is a true tale.

SEPTEMBER 3rd, 1933

Raining. It was raining. As if the night was not black enough, the storm that lingered above the hillside mansion shaped it a terrifying silhouette looming above him. Jesus Christ. This call should be run of the mill but Officer Greaves was bereaved to get wet. Of course Lieutenant Harrison was the last to arrive, leaving him to soak in the rain and his misery.

The storm had knocked out the electricity. When the Lieutenant finally arrived at the behest of the husband and home owner, they each drew their flashlights, weapons against obscurity, and entered the home through groaning oak doors.

The rolling of rain filled the silent house, smothering the tick of the great grandfather clock in the foyer. When lightning struck, the house would illuminate into shadows that made even the most experienced uniformed officer check in with the Man upstairs.

“The phone’s been dead for hours and by the time I got home I couldn’t see a thing!” the husband insisted, rather manic. Lieutenant Harrison remained at the base of the grand staircase with him, allowing Officer Greaves and Officer Aarons ahead to search the house.

“When is the last time you heard from your wife or daughter, sir?” the Lieutenant inquired.

“This morning, when I left. My daughter was still asleep and my wife was in the kitchen speaking with the cook,” the husband replied. His eyes were erratic, his hands wrung nervously in front of him.

“I understand, Sir. I’m sure they’ve merely hunkered down for the weather,” Lieutenant Harrison assured him, his fingers looped into the front of his belt in a hypocritical mix of cocky and unresolved social anxieties.

“Lieutenant!” Officer Greaves called** from the top of the stairs.

“Stay here, Mr. Morris,” he addressed the fretting husband before taking the stairs two at a time. His two officers were three steps from the top landing. Aarons crouched down and poked his flashlight into a wet mass.

“Cut that out!” the Lieutenant ordered, shuffling him out of the way so he might lean down and get a better look, “Now what do we have here?”

“Don’t know…can’t be good. I accidentally stepped on it, Sir… it’s wet spongy slop,” Greaves informed him, hanging onto the ornate banister for support.

With care, the Lieutenant used a seasoned hand to better inspect this wet spongy slop. The rain battered the stained glass window above them, pressing the Lieutenant in urgency.

“Oh god,” the Lieutenant paled. His flush was hidden by the darkness, his lips shriveled beneath his mustache in shock. He quickly retracted his hand and stood again, both officers looking to him for answers.

The Lieutenant glanced down at Mr. Morris pacing at the foot of the stairs before he leaned in to very carefully and very quietly instruct his men, “Gents, that there’s an eye. Aarons, go to the car and call for back-up and the ambulance,” As the Lieutenant spoke, his fingers brushed across the cold handle of his pistol at his hip, looking further up the stairs into the darkness, wondering what horrors awaited him, “Greaves, you’re with me.”

The ascent up three steps was the brother of climbing Everest. Lieutenant and officer walked side by side, still in relative darkness. Neither man spoke, Greaves was suppressing a wave of nausea from the knowledge of what he had stepped into and the Lieutenant was, to put it frankly, trying not to shit his trousers.

“Do you hear that?” Lieutenant asked under his moustache, their steps slowing in response.

Squish. Squish. Squish.

“I do, Sir,” Greaves replied. With a deep breath and stomach clenched, he turned his flashlight onto the oriental rug beneath their feet.

Blood.

And tons of it.

Greaves looked next to his Lieutenant who was so pale he was reflecting in the peripheral flashlight glow. The men remained silent for many moments.

“Son,” the Lieutenant began, “I hope you’re ready for what we’re about to find.”

Greaves nodded (although there was no way he was ready; in all his years combined with the Lieutenant’s even combined with mine, no one could be ready for what my husband and his commanding officer were about to discover.)

**(Narrator’s note: my husband’s voice is deep, not the gravel-type you hear about in those harlequin novels but more akin to the baritone of a jazz tune. This is not relevant to the details of the crime, however, how could I pass up a chance to express what a lucky woman I am?)