The House on Mercer Lane

There had been other calls of suspicious lights around the old house, barn, and storage buildings. This was the third night in a row that such a call had come in. Every night the location of the lights was different and every night the times changed. Not by much, usually between 0130 and 0300; but the lights were seen the first night inside the old barn. When Mac and his back-up unit, Steve Franks arrived that first night there were no lights to be seen and every door on the barn was padlocked. Steve was a career patrolman who held neither the desire nor the personality to be a shift supervisor. As usual, they found a couple of the windows were cracked; but, not enough to let anyone through and the cobwebs hadn’t been disturbed probably since Mac was in Junior High. As they expected, there were no tracks visible in the hardened snow. The second night, the caller, who had refused a name each time and the cellphone numbers were blocked, claimed the lights were on the second floor of the old house. Again, no lights on when Mac and Franks arrived and no signs of forced entry to the house. By the third night, Franks radioed to Mac that he was out at the local all-night convenience store for coffee and just to radio him if he needed him for anything. On this night, the caller, always the same male voice that sounded like it should have been on an old-time radio broadcast for a mystery theater, claimed he saw a light up on the very pinnacle of the roof of the old house on Mercer Lane, as if it were outside on the widow’s walk. Mac thought it strange that the caller would use the term widow’s walk because that was a term usually meant for the railed platforms on houses along the coast where supposedly the wife of a fisherman would watch for her husband’s ship to come back to port and, if he died in a sea-faring accident, the widow would walk a lonely vigil on the platform waiting for a husband who would never return. Madison, Ohio was a long way from the sea, but not far from Lake Erie, one of the five Great Lakes and sea-faring ships travelled the dangerous waters regularly. As he pulled onto Mercer Lane, Mac killed his headlights and stopped, hoping to get a view of the house before coming in and perhaps scaring the trespassers, if there were any, into dousing their lights and hiding from him. What Mac saw from seventy-five yards or more, visible with the bright moon, was a macabre sight that sent a chill down Mac’s spine and he felt the hair go up on the back of his neck. Mac imagined it would be the worst he would ever see. One thing was certain, if the house on Mercer Lane wasn’t a source for ghost stories before, it would be after this night! It was nearly noon. Mac was still at the station trying to get his report completed. He knew that the state’s crime scene unit was still out on Mercer Lane and every time the phone rang in dispatch, he’d hear the senior dispatcher, Connie, cuss and then clear her throat and answer “Madison Police” in her sweet how can I help you voice. Next, he’d hear, “No Ma’am; there’s no further information, the Chief will have another press conference at 3 p.m. You can check our website for details … and please tell the other reporters there that this is our emergency line.” Mac could tell that this was not the time to ask Connie for any favors! Instead, he took a break, headed for the squad room where he slipped a dollar into the vending machine and let a can of Coke drop to the ledge. He grabbed a Styrofoam cup with a lid, because open drinks were verboten near the computers, and carried the gift to the bear’s cage. Mac slipped it down onto the desk in front of Connie, gave her a wink and left the nearly 35-year veteran of communications alone to deal with the media! When Mac finally got home, well after four o’clock, Cindy was home from work and she could tell by the look on Mac’s face, this was not the time for questions. Everyone at her work had been buzzing about the events of the night and early morning and they pressed Cindy for inside information, assuming she had talked with Mac and had all the details. She hadn’t spoken to him; not that she didn’t try; but, his cellphone had gone dead by 10:00 and she wasn’t about to call the station looking for him, expecting what kind of day Connie would be having! She had seen the first news conference in time for the noon news broadcasts and she hoped to get a chance to see what the five o’clock news carried but she wouldn’t push it if Mac didn’t want to watch. They had been married almost since Mac became a cop and she knew him well before. She could wait until he was ready to talk. Cindy was surprised that right after dinner, which he barely touched, Mac pushed away from the table, went to take a short run and when he got back not only did she notice that he went to the shower and straight to bed but when he pulled off his running shirt, his S&W .40 caliber Shield was around his waist with the stretch band and Velcro closure holster she’d gotten him last Christmas and he’d hardly ever worn. He always said he felt weighed down when he was in plain clothes and had to carry a firearm. That was especially true when he was wearing his running shorts, but not today. Not only did he have his 40 with him, he had two extra magazines tucked into the holster band in the pockets made for them. Whatever Mac had seen last night, it had him on edge.