True believer - Nicholas Sparks [11]
I don’t know if you’ve ever heard about the cemetery in Boone Creek, North Carolina, but legend has it that the cemetery is haunted by spirts of former slaves. In the winter—January through early February—blue lights seem to dance on the headstones whenever the fog rolls in. Some say they’re like strobe lights, others swear they’re the size of basketballs. I’ve seen them, too; to me, they look like sparkly disco balls. Anyway, last year, some folks from Duke University came to investigate; I think they were meteorologists or geologists or something. They, too, saw the lights, but they couldn’t explain them, and the local paper did a big story on the whole mystery. Maybe if you came down, you could make sense of what the lights really are.
If you need more information, give me a call at Herbs, a restaurant here in town.
The remainder of the letter offered further contact information, and afterward, he flipped through the brochure from the local Historical Society. He read captions describing the various homes on the upcoming tour, skimmed the information concerning the parade and barn dance on Friday night, and found himself raising an eyebrow at the announcement that, for the first time, a visit to the cemetery would be included in the tour on Saturday evening. On the back of the brochure—surrounded by what seemed to be hand-drawn pictures of Casper—were testimonials from people who’d seen the lights and an excerpt from what appeared to be an article in the local newspaper. In the center was a grainy photograph of a bright light in what might, or might not, have been the cemetery (the caption claimed it was).
It wasn’t quite the Borely Rectory, a rambling “haunted” Victorian on the north bank of the Stour River in Essex, England, the most famous haunted house in history, where “sightings” included headless horsemen, weird organ chants, and ringing bells, but it was enough to pique his interest.
After failing to find the article mentioned in the letter—there were no archives at the local newspaper’s Web site—he contacted various departments at Duke University and eventually found the original research project. It had been written by three graduate students, and though he had their names and phone numbers, he doubted there was any reason to call them. The research report had none of the detail he would have expected. Instead, the entire study had simply documented the existence of the lights and the fact that the students’ equipment was functioning properly, which barely scratched the surface of the information he needed. And besides, if he’d learned anything in the past fifteen years, it was to trust no one’s work but his own.
See, that was the dirty secret about writing for magazines. While all journalists would claim to do their own research and most did some, they still relied heavily on opinions and half-truths that had been published in the past. Thus, they frequently made mistakes, usually small ones, sometimes whoppers. Every article in every magazine had errors, and two years ago, Jeremy had written a story about it, exposing the less laudable habits of his fellow professionals.
His editor, however, had vetoed publishing it. And no other magazine seemed enthusiastic about the piece, either.
He watched oak trees slide past the windows, wondering if he needed a career change, and he suddenly wished he’d researched the ghost story further. What if there were no lights? What if the letter writer was a quack? What if there wasn’t even much of a legend to build an article around? He shook his head. Worrying was pointless, and besides, it was too late now. He was already here, and Nate was busy working the New York phones.
In the trunk, Jeremy had all the necessary items for ghost hunting (as disclosed in Ghost Busters for Real!, a book he’d originally bought as a joke after an evening of cocktails). He had a Polaroid camera, 35mm camera, four camcorders and tripods, audio recorder and microphones, microwave radiation detector, electromagnetic detector, compass, night-vision goggles, laptop