Valeria instantly tried to calm herself. Seeing the child Natalia in her pajamas at the door of her hotel room, some six to eight miles from her Pacific Grove home--and in the middle of the night, came as a powerful shock. The fourteen-year-old seemed distant and silent as she now sat stiffly in the chair before the posh hotel room picture window. Natalia's safety, both physical and psychological, was foremost on Valeria's mind. She reached over and took the somnambulistic girl's cold hand and tried to see some recognition or reaction in her. There was none.
From the girl's trance-like demeanor, Valeria was certain she was still sleeping. And knowing she might respond to her inquiries in this state, Valeria attempted to communicate with her.
"Natalia? . . . it's good to see you again," she said calmly. The indirect lighting was dim, and the girl appeared almost as a silhouette.
"I'm not Natalia . . ." she suddenly responded, starkly and confidently. It was shockingly an adult woman's voice. " . . .My name is Ruby."
Again, a wave of fear came over the young researcher's whole body.
"And why have you come here? . . . All the way to Carmel to see me . . . Ruby?"
"I have come to instruct you . . ." she said in a monotone voice. "You must give a message to someone. Here, tonight."
"Who, Ruby. What message?"
"Someone who lives with torment . . . eternally. You are to release her. To take her from a curse she has suffered too long. A curse . . . caused by me."
"How so? Who is she?"
"She must know the truth of a story which you must tell her. So she can rest in peace."
"But who? And why me? How am I and my family connected to this curse?"
The young girl, as merely the host of the voice, spoke clearly and deeply, with inflection as if she were much older. Valeria looked down and could see the girl had several small rivulets of blood around both bare feet. Injuries obviously caused by her walking barefoot the long journey to Carmel on the asphalt roadway through the forest.
"Natalia? May I get you some water? Shall we wash and care for your feet?
"No!" the voice said emphatically. "You will soon call Lupe and Ortencia, to come and take me home. But first I must give you the message you are to share."
Valeria was stressed and ever fearful. Though in some way she felt closure might be coming through this remarkable event. At the same time she felt responsible for the young girl's well-being and welcomed that she would be calling Natalia's family.
"Ruby . . . I will do whatever I can for you. But please. Just tell me who you are. And whom I am to give this message to."
The frail girl remained stationary in the chair, only her mouth moving. Yet she was fully engaged in the unworldly dialogue which Valeria had begun. Her diminutive figure in the chair was incongruous with the maturity and powerful voice that filled the room from her.
"Your grandmother Maria was a very special person," the voice went on. "But you were never allowed to know her well. Neither her great gifts, Valeria. You grew up well. And with your Grandmother Maria's spirt of wonder and courage. Very much like mine. Her own mother."
Valeria nodded back, pensively.
"And now, these years, you have shown the desire to study what she and I both carried since birth. Gifts little understood by most."
Valeria was now in a state of deep intrigue. So much of what had recently plagued her, through a storm of mystery, now seemed to be hanging on the words of this young girl in the dim room.
"And what is Maria's and Luciana's relation to you, Ruby? How did you know my grandmother and great grandmother? And so much about my family?"
"Our family, Valeria . . . For I am Luciana . . . the one they would call Ruby. I am very proud of Maria's life. For she was my daughter. She had Olivia, your mother. And then she of course, had you, Valeria. We are all a strong line of very special women."
The revelation that Ruby was her own great grandmother, Luciana, came as total shock!
"Yes. You see, I am your great grandmother, Maria's mother. And I was born with the name Luciana from our proud family in Santa Fe. But here, in the spiritual realm, I am known, as Ruby, just as I was secretly, when alive and practicing the dark arts."
Valeria's head was swimming. The details were astounding and the emotion of it all was beginning to overwhelm her.
As once before, she thought she might be losing her mind. She then forced herself to shift concern back to Natalia, the innocent girl from whom the informative voice effortlessly spoke. It was imperative that she call Natalia's mother and grandmother to immediately come rescue their daughter. They would no doubt be terrified as to her whereabouts by now.
Yet, Valeria could not resist digging ever deeper onto the enigma of it all.
"So . . . Luciana, what then is your connection to me, here . . . and to this girl, Natalia?"
"I have created all this for the message you must deliver. This beautiful little girl has our gift herself. The power which I and your grandmother once had while alive. She will grow up to be a phenomenon in the realm which you now study. Ours is a little understood power. And rejected by most. But that is aftercall, an old story."
Valeria simply nodded again.
"The girl will be fine once back with her loving family. I only must now give you the message, and all will be settled. Completed."
"Settled? Completed? How so? What is it I must do for you, Luciana? I feel close to you . . . but at the same time . . . so far away."
"It is expected, my child. You hardly knew my daughter, Maria. And never me. Though I watched over you many times when you were a little one. Watched as your good mother Oliva kept you at a distance from Maria's words and instruction."
A slight chill ran up Valeria's back with this haunting revelation of those stories and little memory of them.
"You already know the story of the lovely woman, Alida, who haunts this place. Who took her own life out in that deathly sea."
"Yes, I have learned of the story."
"Of course you have. I have made sure you would learn it"
"So you have had control of Natty . . . and even Travis to inform me of it?"
"Yes. As i said, I have arranged for this night. When you shall give a long-awaited message."
"You mean to . . ."
"Yes. to Alida Ghirardelli herself."
"My God!"
"It will release her from her hauntings of this place."
"But Luciana, how are you connected to Alida? Did you know her? Those many years ago?"
"This was a grand house at that time. Home to a wonderful couple. The young Alida, their niece, was talented and sensitive, Innocent to what was to befall her."
"Yes, she was an artist. Like her uncle. A painter of fame."
"She herself painted mothers and children. And lovely was her work, as I had seen it. But for over a hundred years now she has been sad. Sad in death. Grieving over the loss of a man whose bad nature she did not come to know. Grieving with a pain that too quickly took her life."
"Yes, Alida's short life was a tragedy. But how were you involved with her?"
"Valeria, quite simply . . . I was the other woman."
Again, a colossal shock overwhelmed her with this unraveling.
"You mean . . . you . . ."
"Yes. I was twenty-three at the time. She was twenty-eight. Her fiancé . . . Ramon, had followed her here to California from France. They had planned to marry once he became established in San Francisco as an art dealer. But in the interim . . . he met me. By chance. Hiking in the woods of Big Sur."
"Incredible!"
"We spent the whole day together in that enchanting wilderness. And unfortunately, we were beguiled by its overwhelming charm. The attraction was just too intense."
"But you said you were . . . like all of us . . . from Santa Fe."
"I had come here that summer in 1909 to the coast. To escape the pettiness and hostility towards me in Santa Fe. It was a community that plagued me for my independence. And my dark ways as the 'medium,' known as 'Ruby.' It was just as they would later treat my daughter, Maria. Your misunderstood and 'crazy' grandmother."
"Oh my gosh . . . so this is how and why Alida . . ."
"Yes. I have lived with the guilt of Alida's death for over one-hundred years. Even after my own death, and a marriage to a different man. And having a beautiful family."
The pajamaed form of the young Natalia was still sitting erect in the low light. While speaking, her eyes stared blankly now out the window at the even darker Pacific Ocean.
"But it is now up to you, Valeria, to speak to Alida," the voice continued. "To give her my message. A message that will release her from her pain."
"But what must I say? How will I tell . . ."
"I have orchestrated this over many years. It must be carried out by you, my own great great granddaughter. Someone with the power and understanding . . . Tonight. Tonight you will tell it. Directly to Alida herself."
"But when will I . . . when will she . . ."
"You will have the opportunity. Trust me, Valeria. Alida will be here."
Cold chills came over the young researcher. Feeling ever stronger for Natalia's parents and the girl's tiring condition, she resigned herself to comply with Lucian's request. She waited silently for the exact message.
"You will tell the lovely woman who frequents this hotel at night, simply this. Ramon's choosing to be with me was capricious . . .and wrong. As was my decision to be with him. He never loved me but truly adored her. She must know that."
"God, that is so sad," Valeria said under her breath.
"But there is more. Something that will hopefully release Alida's poor soul from her chains of a century of grief."
"But what more could that be?"
"The true evil nature of the man she thought she knew."
"What? I don't understand . . . How could she have truly known that . . . so early?"
"It was something no one ever knew. And it involved another life. A life almost taken by force senselessly."
"Whose life, Luciana ?"
"My own. And just two months after meeting him. One month after Alida's body had been found."
"How? Why?"
"You are to tell Alida that in the end, my own life was almost cut short as well. By Ramon himself. And it was only due to fate that this befell me and not her. For it spoke to everything about Ramon's disturbed nature. And had she known it, that perverse and violent nature, she would never had loved him so deeply. And certainly not ended her young life."
"Please, Luciana, Go on . . ."
"As it turned out, the man she loved had a character she was fortunate to have never known."
"Yes, I understand."
"Tell her with all my sincerity that if she were ever to know what the young gentleman from Paris had tried to do to me, after two months together, she would have surely left him. Recovered from him. And never taken her life. The tragedy, you see, is that she perished out of sadness and not me. I would only shortly after almost lose my own life by Ramon's murderous hands!"
"But how did he . . ."
"In a rage one night. He tried to strangle me and then cut my throat with a knife. I was seriously injured but was able to escape and recover. I later made it home to Santa Fe. There, no one ever knew of my terrible saga in California, or how I was related to the celebrated Ghirardelli chocolate heir's drowning off Carmel Bay . . . all so long ago now."
Valeria was totally stunned.
"So you see, Valeria, I have chosen you, someone with our power to tell the restless spirit of innocent Alida something tonight which I never could myself in either of our lifetimes."
"Yes . . . I now see."
"That she goes on endlessly as a spirit, needlessly pining over someone who was deranged and not worth her love or life dreams, is the true tragedy of Alida's story. The guilt of this has lasted me a century. And long beyond the grave. For Alida, it has been an unwarranted yearning for a man she never should have loved so deeply. A man truly unworthy of her"
"My God. . . I'm so sorry for what had happened to both of you."
"Do not be sorry, Valeria. And do not be sad. These things in the spiritual world have their own lives and outcomes. Sometimes they are timeless in their eventual solutions. And sometimes the solution goes unexecuted. That is what I seek tonight with you . A solution. A resolution for Alida."
"But what ever became of Ramon? Was he caught?"
"I had heard before my own death. later in life, that he had died aged and lonely. To my knowledge he was never charged or convicted of his attempt on my young life. Or any others he may have killed or attempted to kill in his wicked path."
"My God. How unfair."
"Not nearly as unfair as what the celebrated "ghost" of this hotel has endured for so long."
"Alright. But how and when, Luciana, shall I be able to tell Alida of all this."
The young girl momentarily turned her gaze from out the window directly back into Valeria's eyes. "Tonight," the young face said. "You will have that opportunity . . . much later tonight."
With this last frightful comment, and out of a deepening sense of responsibility for Natalia's wellbeing, Valeria slowly stood up and took out her cell phone to dial the Leon residence.
"Hello, Lupe? I know it's terribly late . . . and you must be worried sick about Natalia right now."
"Oh Valeria! Yes we are! Do you have her with you?"
"I do. She managed to find me here. Where I'm staying in Carmel."
"Carmel? My God!"
Yes. We're both safely here at the La Playa Hotel. Can you come pick her up? She seems to have had a long night of walking in her sleep. But aside from pretty sore feet, I believe she's alright. We just need to get her back home. To bed. And then lots of rest."
"Oh, thank God, Valeria! We only noticed she was missing a little while ago. I had thought Ortencia was up watching over her tonight. We were all just so panicked. Soto was going to call the police."
"No need for that. She's here, Lupe. Just come soon. We'll be in the lobby waiting for you.
"I'm on my way!"
The phone clicked off and Valeria took a deep breath. She could only now stare at the young girl sitting next to her, but now looking back vacantly out the window at the vast and treacherous ocean.
* * *