A New York Haunting: Pt. 05

Anders had always considered himself a cautious person, but the time had now come when discretion was not the better part of valor. Moreover, he (and the girl) would have to forge the way alone in this endeavor --- he could not seek guidance from Dr. Schuller for three fundamental reasons.

Firstly, after what he had witnessed, he understood plainly that Ondine's problem was not a matter that fell under the rubric of psychoanalysis --- no disrespect intended to the science.

Secondly, to report to the doctor that he had seen a ghost fornicating in every possible manner with a spellbound girl seemed the surest way to land Ondine --- and no doubt himself --- in an insane asylum.

Thirdly, he refused to share these intimate scenes with a man he now knew desired to bend his own husbandly attentions to the young lady. Recalling the overheard conversation between Schuller and Mrs. Cornelissen, Anders was seized by a sense of urgency in helping her before her family pressed her into marrying.

And speaking of which, how was he going to help the haunted girl when he no longer had sanctioned access to her? His clerkship in Dr. Schuller's clinic was finished. Knowing her aunt's (unfounded) concerns about him, he could hardly present himself at the front door of the mansion and request an audience with Ondine.

Nonetheless, it was essential to see her again, both to secure her participation in any attempt at 'treatment', and to reassure her she was not mad. He had experienced it too!

A thought occurred to him. What was the extent of her awareness of what transpired during the ghostly visits? She had described the encounters as her husband choking her and commanding her to never remarry. From his observations, Anders could neither confirm nor deny her account. No voice or sound had he heard attributable to the ghost --- but it was evident that its spell over Ondine differed from the spell that had paralyzed him in the chair. Perhaps the spirit did speak, but its voice was audible only to the girl.

As far as 'choking' went, he had observed no deformation of her neck to suggest the pressure of a hand. His eyes widened --- was that description a reference to the act of cock-sucking?

Was it possible that, despite her apparent trance state, she was fully aware of all the activities unfolding during these visits? Perhaps she was cognizant of everything but had been too mortified to recount the unsavory details to Dr. Schuller. If so, did it mean Ondine knew he had watched her ravishment?

Anders realized --- until he knew otherwise ---he would need to assume she was unaware and to inform her of what he had witnessed, and he mulled over how best to proceed. To tell a young lady you had seen her mouth, vagina, and anus agape as they were ploughed and doused by a ghostly cock --- no matter how tactful your tone --- seemed a violation of good manners. The last thing he wanted was to embarrass her or distress her. When the moment for the disclosure arrived, he would have to tread most carefully.

Prior to recent events, Anders' only experience with so-called ghosts had been attending a séance years ago during one of the Fordyces' parties back in Rochester. Everyone had gathered around the medium in the darkened drawing room to watch as she and a handful of guests 'communicated' with the spirits using a Ouija board. Skeptical, he had considered whether to offer up his dead mother as the next 'dear departed' subject, reasoning that if she communicated in English instead of Norwegian, then it would prove the medium a fraud. But at the last minute, he had panicked at the possibility of actually contacting her.

Apart from that, Anders had no knowledge of occultism. Thus, he tackled the present problem in his usual manner: methodical research.

The Monday after the weekend in the Cornelissen mansion, he started his next clerkship --- in surgery. Every evening after rounds on the ward, he betook himself to the library --- Tuesday and Wednesday to the medical school library, and Thursday and Friday to the public library --- to read anything he could find about ghosts and spirits.

To his surprise, he discovered the subject had long been of interest to science as well as the lay public. Throughout the centuries, numerous respected scientists including physicians, biologists, geologists, physicists, chemists, and astronomers had attempted experiments to either prove or refute the claims of mediums and other spiritualists --- both camps proclaiming success in the endeavor.

There were even organizations dedicated to investigating supernatural phenomena: the Ghost Club (founded in 1862) and the Society for Psychical Research (founded in 1882). Among its members, the Ghost Club counted esteemed scientists, author Charles Dickens, and author and physician Arthur Conan Doyle, whose Sherlock Holmes stories Anders had loved as a boy.

He read about Spiritualism --- the belief that spirits of the dead could communicate with the living. The Spiritualism movement had experienced a remarkable rise in the past fifty years, --- catalyzed in 1848 by the Fox sisters, a trio of celebrated mediums who claimed to communicate with spirits through rapping noises. Spreading from its hotbed in the counties around Rochester, New York, fascination with Spiritualism had grown to a fever pitch, undeterred by one of the Fox sisters eventually admitting that their séances were a hoax, with the rapping sounds actually produced by cracking their toe joints.

But Spiritualism was only the most recent term for a timeless human belief that spirits are real and carry messages for the living --- detectable through a variety of methods such as tapping, Ouija boards, table turning, automatic writing, sealed letter reading, and spirit photographs. Indeed, hypnotism had originally been promoted by Franz Mesmer as a method for facilitating contact between humans and supernatural beings.

A more specific take was offered by fellow Scandinavian scientist, Emmanuel Swedenborg, who believed spirits are intermediaries between God and humans. He shook his head upon reading this. Whatever else the ghost tormenting Ondine was, Anders could not reconcile the acts of unnatural sexual congress as godly messages.

He flipped through the pages in his notebook, reviewing his scribblings. An alternative theory about ghosts was that they originated from the overstimulated mind of the 'haunted' person --- a neurological misfiring. This belief most closely echoed Dr. Schuller's hypothesis about the case.

After what he had witnessed, Anders dismissed this out of hand. He trusted his eyes and knew he had not been asleep during the two ghostly visits.

No manner of stage trickery could produce all the effects he had seen --- a fire extinguishing and relighting without the screen being moved, the volatile fluxes in temperature and air pressure in the chamber, a human body floating in the air. And although the girl might have faked the act of mouth fucking, she could not have simulated the effects of the other two routes of copulation. He could conceive of no device capable of invisibly splaying open the muscular channels of her vagina and bottom hole... not to mention the emission of jets of vaporous green spunk.

What if he had had a camera in the room to document the evidence of the ghost's presence? The excited blood surged throughout his body at the thought of the lurid images that would have been captured. The specific acts occurring that night offered further proof he had not been dreaming or imagining it --- how would he have conjured up the final enculade when it was something he had never seriously considered?

Thus, notwithstanding the fact that the encounters flew in the face of everything he considered rational, Anders was prepared to suspend his credulity and investigate the matter with all earnestness. Moreover, he was prepared to accept the subject might not be amenable to scientific analysis --- one either believed or didn't. For Ondine's sake, he must believe.

Although he had been unable to see the spirit apart from the hazy, green flare of a male figure during its orgasm, he had no reason to doubt Ondine's claim it was her husband. It was undoubtedly the most reasonable explanation, given its first appearance after the marriage and the activities which unfolded during the visits.

Monday --- the first day after taking his leave of the Cornelissen residence --- Anders went after school to the chemistry lab. There on a clean counter, he unfolded the handkerchief with which he had collected the emerald vapor swirling out of the girl's cunny. He stared at the spotless white cotton square. Naturally, he had not expected the substance to remain in a gaseous state, but perhaps some trace had attached itself to the fabric fibers. With careful fingers, he brought the handkerchief close to his nostrils.

By God! The faintest scent of gunpowder was detectable. Gunpowder! He recalled the source of Peter Van der Veen's fortune: gun manufacturing. Was this a telltale clue? Or did it merely confirm as true the myth of the sulfurous odor of Hell --- no doubt the home of this lustful demon.

Using scissors, Anders cut the center of the handkerchief into multiple small swatches which he first submerged in a variety of liquids --- saline, alcohol, acids, and bases --- stirring vigorously to release the mysterious substance from the fibers. The resulting solutions he then subjected to every test he knew for semen, including the Florence test and two different stains for spermatozoa.

Most intriguingly, crystals did indeed form with the Florence test, but they were green. Human semen was expected to form white crystals, and he was uncertain what to make of the test result. As a control, he repeated the test on a swatch of the clean handkerchief in his pocket --- no crystals were produced. Neither carmine nor iodine stains revealed spermatozoa under the microscope.

The investigation at least confirmed the presence of something tangible on the handkerchief and only further provoked Anders' zeal for the investigation.

On Wednesday morning between classes, he raced across the park on his bicycle and waited around the corner from Dr. Schuller's mansion at the same hour Ondine had emerged from her past appointments. For a quarter hour he watched the door --- no sign of the girl did he spy. Was she still a patient of Dr. Schuller's? Or had the doctor managed to transfer her care to another physician that quickly? If so, was he already presenting himself to her as a suitor? Anders' grip on his handlebars tightened as a knot formed in his throat.

But it was not only the psychoanalyst who roused his jealousy. Irrationally, Anders found himself brooding every night about Ondine receiving a connubial visit from the ghost of Peter Van der Veen. How dare the bastard take advantage of her vulnerability and use her lovely body to satiate his demonic appetites!

Ironically, or fittingly, he himself was now haunted --- haunted by the beseeching current in her big, hazel eyes. Throughout the day as he moved from the ward to the operating theater to the lecture hall, his thoughts again and again veered to her: what she was doing and how she was faring?

But every night before retiring, he succumbed to the dark beguilement of erotic yearning. Vivid images flooded his mind as he stroked his overheated organ --- Ondine's nubile, bare body kneeling... doubled over... bouncing... lasciviously arched... her tongue wiggling and lips tugging... her wet petals and swollen clitoris... her little female orifices open, distended and distorting with powerful thrusts. But it was his throbbing piston stuffed into those glistening, palpitating holes, him making her pant and moan, his spunk filling her --- Oh God! Ondine...!

In the week following the extraordinary scene in Ondine's bedroom, the turbulence of Anders' thoughts manifested outwardly as an agitated tension in his body. Come Saturday morning, the coiled need served him well in at least one regard --- in the last, all-club, rowing regatta of the season.

With every vigorous thrust of his legs and grunting flexion of his arms working the oars, he forced from his mind --- at least temporarily --- the disturbing images of the spellbound girl in her bedroom. When the boat shot under the Washington Street bridge, his dream of rescuing her from the pickle sign and fucking in the rowing shell resurfaced momentarily before he squelched it with a growl and powerful oar stroke.

The Scalpel advanced through two heats to the coxless four final where they bested the New York Athletic Club boat by a foot, attended by screaming and cheering watchers on the riverbank. Also triumphant was their club's entry in the coxed eight race. A raucous celebration ensued among the Nassau Club men, eventually relocating to a nearby tavern to continue carousing.

At length, Anders recalled he was due to pose for the Art Students League class that evening and curtailed his alcohol consumption lest he later topple over while posing on the platform. On the El train back to Midtown, a satisfying exhaustion overtook his well-worked muscles.

But the easeful distraction of his mind was soon infiltrated by a resurgent preoccupation with his mission --- and a disquieted admonition against neglecting his studies and the article with Dr. Mullenix.

All his readings about ghosts and spirits this past week suggested their restlessness resulted from unsettled concerns in the earthly sphere. Thus, the evident first course of action in Ondine's haunting should be an attempt to communicate with the ghost. Anders realized he must speak to the girl posthaste to present his theory and gauge her desire to participate in some manner of exorcism.

How the devil could he speak to her? If he wrote a note requesting an audience and sealed it in an envelope addressed to her at the mansion on Fifth Avenue, would it reach her hands unopened? He knew not the answer. Perhaps he could watch the house and catch her as she left. Then he remembered something --- the pathologist Dr. Prudden had stated that Ondine stopped by his office regularly to review cases. Dr. Prudden might be able to tell him when she was next expected on the medical school campus! Anders' current surgery clerkship largely kept him at Roosevelt and Bellevue hospitals, but he could run over to the medical school building if need be.

Yes, he would speak to Dr. Prudden on Monday.

*****

That Saturday evening at the life drawing class, instead of a medical textbook, Anders brought The Night Side of Nature, a library book about wraiths, apparitions, and haunted houses. From the props in the room, he selected a taller column upon which to rest the book for the standing pose in which the instructor Mr. Bridgman placed him. Presenting a three-quarter profile to the class, he stood with his legs braced some two feet apart, one hand on his hip and the other holding upright a long wooden pole with the end resting on the floor, evoking the stance of a warrior holding a spear.

As the class got underway, Anders realized one of the regular students was not there tonight. In general, he did not interact much with the artists apart from courteous pleasantries, but usually seated at an easel in the first row was a man named Phineas who was an aficionado of the sport of rowing. At the beginning of every class, Phineas and he usually chatted briefly on the subject --- had the man been there tonight, no doubt they would have shared observations about the regatta earlier today.

But the easel did not go unoccupied. Lifting his gaze from the book to turn a page, Anders noticed it had been taken by a slightly built young man he had never seen in previous classes. Like most of the students, his modest means were evident in his plain, ill-fitting clothing. A moment later, Mr. Bridgman appeared beside the easel. "Welcome to the class, Mr. Sellers."

"Thank you, Mr. Bridgman."

The conversation between the new student and instructor faded in the background as Anders' attention returned to an account of a house in Rochester haunted by two different ghosts. Dimly he marked Mr. Bridgman waving a hand towards his motionlessly posed body as he described to Mr. Sellers the relative proportions of head, torso, and limbs. After a few minutes, the instructor resumed his rounds among the students.

By-and-by, when he once more turned a page, Anders glanced around the classroom at the rows of easels and engrossed men, pencils busy as they looked between him and their paper. As his eyes swept back to his book, they paused on the new student, Mr. Sellers, who was lifting his face towards him. Andalusite irises met his.

Anders' gaze froze. For a brief moment, they stared at each other, then she averted her eyes to her easel. Spots of vivid color burgeoned on her cheeks as her sketching hand continued to move. Ondine Van der Veen sat a mere eight feet away, studying his naked body --- and she was aware he had recognized her.

His unseeing eyes swerved back to the open book, even as his heart pounded and a wave of heat fluxed over his body. Struggling to maintain the pose, his eyes darted back to 'Mr. Sellers' --- yes, it was undoubtedly Ondine. He recognized those lush, dark eyebrows and lashes, the pulpy pink mouth, and the small figure under the male garb. But what had she done to her hair?! Short hair covered her head.

With his quick glance, he saw the girl's eyes shift from her paper to his form --- unmistakably directly to his groin. Herregud! His naked musket and bandoliers were plumb level with her face! Too abruptly to forestall it, his mind was possessed by the image of naked Ondine kneeling --- open mouth and agile tongue pleasuring a ghostly phallus. Anders felt the hot flush in his cheeks --- then, to his horror, a surge of blood to his cock.

Shit! Shit! Shit!

Fighting to control his panic and stirring organ, he broke the pose and grabbed his robe from a chair. "Excuse me!" he managed through the constriction of his throat. Cock bobbing as he swung the garment around his shoulders, he decamped to the lavatory off the adjacent antechamber and locked the door. At once, he seized his expanding stanchion and capitulated to the onslaught of erotic images --- from Ondine's face to her bouncing breasts to her secret openings --- vagina and asshole --- spread wide around his shaft...

In short order, he was smothering gasps as the heated jism spewed forth.

Washing and composing himself to re-enter the classroom, Anders shrugged at his reflection in the mirror. Ondine had already seen him stark naked, had already examined his accoutrements --- modesty was pointless at this juncture. He recalled the art instructor's comment about his 'excellent physique'. At least he could reassure himself he had no cause for shame... and perhaps, if such things mattered to females, it might be a point in his favor with respect to the girl's possible amorous regard.

Then he upbraided himself --- no hope should he be entertaining of her notice. Even if they worked together to free her from this demonic spell, she was essentially still a patient and should not be confronted with his tormented desire. But all this was moot --- irrespective of what the girl felt or didn't feel, he must resume his nude pose in front of the class. It was a job for which he had accepted payment.

Stepping back onto the raised platform and doffing the robe, he grinned sheepishly. "Nature's summons. Too much beer at lunch," he jested. Warrior stance re-established, Anders kept his eyes upon his book for the remainder of the class. But he was unable to concentrate upon the text. Although he still felt jittery knowing she was gazing at his nakedness, it was more a nervous awkwardness than arousal, and his momentarily satiated cock fortunately remained quiescent.