©1 April 2025 Levite
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1.
I had a case from County Personnel that I had to look into. An employee in another agency had been accused of committing several online crimes, including extortion. Of course he had denied any involvement. It was my job to determine how much, if any, involvement he had in the crimes that had been committed.
I started with the computer he used when at work. And found the first inconsistency in the case against him. The information from Personnel had several outside files as evidence. I had been through several computer related cases and knew to check the MAC address of that computer, and then later of his home computer that he sometimes used to check his work email, and found that the numbers were different as well.
Then I started digging into the information about a couple of the incidents, and looking at the network routing.
"Somebody is good," I said to the screen, and realized that I was fast getting out of my depth as far as the use of VPN and IP masking went.
I saved everything I had and the next day showed Personnel that not only had the employee not done what he was accused of, I wasn't sure that the crimes had been committed by anybody in this country.
"The trail leads straight to a network router in South Korea, but then it vanishes. You can see here that the trace goes on for at least two more hops, but the next number is gibberish. My guess is that it originated in either China or North Korea. Or maybe even Russia."
The personnel manager looked at the evidence, "Well, I guess that takes it out of our hands." Then she thought about it for a second, "but how did they get access to his account to begin with?"
"He opened the wrong spam message. That's all it takes."
She nodded, "Then I guess I'm lucky they didn't use mine, I'll open some of those just to see what they've got."
"They don't have anything you want, I can guarantee it." I said and tapped on the routing printout.
2.
After I left the world of high tech crimes, I went out to a very low tech lighthouse tender's cottage, next to where the lighthouse used to be along Gardiners Bay in the Mashomack Preserve on Shelter Island.
The old building was as lonely as anyplace on Long Island can be as this stretch of the island isn't scenic, and is mostly composed of brackish swamps that tend to stink in the summer. But ages ago the working boats needed a light on the short peninsula to keep them out of the stinking swamp.
When I read about the history of the place one of the attractions for those that worked the light was the occasional case of malaria, and all the advantages of having your water supply contaminated by swamp runoff. Which was why the house was so small, the keeper used to ride a horse out from town every night to check the light. But they got tired of the horses dying of various illnesses, so then he'd either rode a bicycle, or, later, drove a Model T. Then in the morning, he'd go back to town.
Needless to say this light was one of the first to be automated when that became an option. Now the light was on a buoy offshore and there was nothing left of the house's original purpose.
But while the actual light tower had been removed many years ago, the old house was left standing, and was still in occasional use by those that would come out to a swamp to study marsh grass and frogs. And insects. Last year a group led by a professor from a college in the City came out and stayed in the cottage, and in a few tents on the ground, and spent a couple of days splashing around in the marsh to capture mosquitoes test them yet again for malaria. The notes I had didn't say whether or not they found it.
The notes did state that while several of the students stayed in the house the first night, by the second night they found room in a tent, or in their car.
"Something kept shaking my cot and saying 'hey, hey'." One of them reported.
Another student said that while they were in the house working with the sample jars that contained the unlucky insects that somebody would tap them on their shoulder. Or once, one the side of their head.
There were similar reports from the fifties when it was used as a hunting lodge for those that fancied going into a malarial swamp to hunt for geese and ducks.
"Somebody is trying to get their attention," I said to the report, "I wonder why."
I drove out to Shelter Island, and then through the Preserve gate and wound off the main road to the east, and then, south, then east some more, and so on. The lane up to the cottage was blocked off with a chain and a sign. And several downed tree limbs, and a lot of overgrown grass and weeds. But I managed to get there.
There was a bit of graffiti on the side of the place, but the door was secure, and my key worked. Then I let it air out for some time while I walked around and looked at the area around the cottage that, at some point, had been reduced from three rooms to about a room and a half.
The light tower had stood just up a slight rise from the house, and on the other side of the rise was Gardiners Bay. I was pretty sure I could see all the way to Gardiners Island because there was a narrow dark line due East across the water.
The offshore buoy had been converted to solar power several years ago, and since then the electric service to the place had been removed. Not only had the meter been taken off the place, one or another hurricane had seen to it that the wires and poles along the lane had been removed as well.
Not only that, when I checked my phone, the only way to get any cellular signal at all was to walk back down the lane and face the closest town.
"I'm glad I brought supper with me," I said to the house as I walked in with the bag, "How do you feel about an Italian Sub? I've got some chips to go with it." I left it on the table and made one more trip out to my car.
I carried in my brand new camping cot and set it up in the cabin. Then I put out my recorders, I didn't need a recording of me trying to remember how to unfold the cot even though I had done it at home in my living room yesterday. The only furnishings in the place was two old, very old, very solid, and I found out later, very uncomfortable, wooden chairs. And an equally old and solid wooden table. Outside was what was probably one of the last 'one holer' pit toilets on the Island which I knew I'd have to use before I got back to civilization, but I also knew I wouldn't enjoy the experience.
I turned the recorder on and told it where it was, then I spoke to the room, "OK, It's getting dark and I don't want to try to drive back down that road tonight, so I'm stuck here. OK?"
There was no response, but I could feel somebody in the building checking me out. I took several pictures with every camera I had, and set a motion sensor camera up, and then I sat down to supper.
I thought that maybe if I relaxed a little, whoever was standing over in the alcove that had probably been either the bedroom or kitchen for the place would as well. So I took off my jacket, and then loosened up my shoes.
No, really. I could sense a person standing there. They were just standing there watching me eat my sub. They didn't move, they didn't respond, but they were there.
Finally I got out my laptop, and the portable power supply, I had made sure that both were fully charged, and checked the audio that had been saved on the recorder.
I could hear what sounded like muttering and whispering, then there was something that sounded like a wooden door on a cabinet or closet. Except there were no cabinets or closets in the building. But there was nothing in the audio that was a clue as to who was here.
I reset the recorder and finished my sandwich, then wiped my hands and face on one of the napkins and shifted in the chair.
"These are the worst chairs ever. Were they here when you were tending the light?" I asked the room.
I could see the recorder and there was no indication of any sound.
Then I bagged up my sandwich wrapper and finished my chips, then I bagged that small bag and as well. "I need to walk this out to my car. If you want to say something to the recorder while I'm out that's OK. Maybe tell me your name so I'll know who I'm talking to. My name is Elaine. Tell me yours."
Later I checked the recorder again. I could hear the door shut when I went out, and then dead silence until I could hear the car door shut, and then I came back in. There wasn't even the half audible whispering.
It was getting dark quickly out along the Bay, and I needed to make sure I had what I needed for the night. I had a small battery lantern, and some other gear, so I walked around the place outside one last time, and then went back in.
Before I tried out the cot I checked the recorder again. The murmuring was back, but it was still indistinct.
It was almost dark, and I thought I'd take a walk down to the end of the lane where the chain was across to make sure I was as alone as I thought I was. I stood in the gravel and dirt road with no light on and looked back toward where I came in to see if there were any cars on the road. It was deserted, and I really was as alone as I'd ever been.
On my way back up the lane my phone chirped. So I took it out and looked at it. It wanted to know if I wished to connect to the wifi hotspot.
One of the features I had forgotten about on the car was its ability to use satellite internet if there was no other signal available. It had connected without asking when we got out here, and now, my phone saw it as the only option to stay in touch with the world at large.
When I got back to the house I checked the recorders before I unrolled my old summer vacation sleeping bag. I sat at the table and checked the charge on my laptop and decided that it'd make it through one more session before I had to plug it in to the power supply that I'd brought in earlier.
" ... anatolijus ... ... anato lijus ..."
I stopped the playback and played it again. It was the first clear word I'd heard since I'd been out here. But I didn't know what it meant.
Fortunately, both my phone and my laptop now had an internet connection thanks to my car. So I was able to look it up, and found out that it was a Lithuanian man's name.
I smiled and tried to be friendly to my house mate for the evening, "Well, Antolijus, I hope I pronounced it correctly. It's good to know you're here. Can I help you with something?"
I watched the indicator on the recorder, and then after about five minutes played it back. The only sound I could hear was my breathing, the chair creaking, and some birds outside.
I don't like sleeping in my clothes, but here, tonight, there really wasn't another option. I made a trip out to the little building on the side with my flashlight and my roll of paper, and then settled into my old sleeping bag for the night.
It really is an old sleeping bag. I bought it when I was in college for an outing to a wilderness camp with some friends. And since then I've taken good care of it and it has served me well. The reason I still have it is that I've never seen another quite like it that is as comfortable, without being so warm that I'd spend all night sweating even in cool weather.
The building was pitch black, so I turned my smaller flashlight, which had a three position switch with a setting that generously said it was 'dim', and set it on the table. Then I snuggled into my sleeping bag and fell asleep to the silence of gentle waves not that far away.
I woke up about two AM and didn't know why.
The building was dark and cool, and very quiet, and my dim flashlight was slightly dimmer than it had been earlier. I got up and looked outside without a light, nothing was moving in the fog that was rolling in off the bay. So I plugged my laptop into the battery pack and made sure it was charging because I didn't want it going dark in the middle playing the audio file, then I downloaded several hours of audio and opened the program.
While I was doing that, something, or rather, some body, whispered in my ear, and I think they said "bell". But I didn't have a recorder running. I quickly disconnected the digital recorder from the computer and started it again.
I had the file of information on the building on my computer, and as soon as I opened it I searched for whether or not it had a fog bell. And, sure enough, this location was one of the first in New York to have an automated two hundred pound bronze fog bell that was driven by a clockwork system, that had to be started by the keeper and would run for 24 hours before it had to be rewound. Later, it was driven by an electrified system, that had to be started by the keeper.
I looked outside again, and it was foggy enough that somebody would be starting the bell. I sat at the table and looked at the trace of the recording, then I looked at my notes and found the name that had been whispered earlier. "Anatolijus," I said, "did you mean that the fog bell needs to be ringing? If it is easier, you can answer into this little thing, then I can play it back and hear you."
I looked at the trace of the recording. And found where I had been sighing in my sleep, and where some sort of bird went squawking by at about midnight. But then, just before I woke up, I heard something on the recording. I had to turn the volume all the way up and play it about three times to hear it.
"... elecric out... no bell .... fog gie" and then it repeated "... electric..."
The voice was soft, and heavily accented, but what it said was clear instead of the muttering and murmuring I'd heard before. And when it said "electric" the second time, it sounded close to the recorder.
The recorder had been on the table next to my cot. It sounded like Antolijus was right there next to me telling me the fog bell needed to be started, but that the electric service wasn't working.
Well, no, the electric service hadn't been working for at least forty or fifty years. And as far as that goes, the buoy itself had been removed after the last big storm damaged it, and it hadn't been replaced yet, and it may never be replaced.
But I wasn't sure I could explain that to Antolijus.
"Or can I?" I said to my computer screen. I checked the charger and decided to give it a go.
The information on this lighthouse, or for that matter, any of the inland waterway lighthouses, was sparse at best. But I had a name, and it was a name from since electrical service had been run out here in the nineteen teens and twenties.
I didn't know anything about the Lithuanian population of Suffolk County. I still don't. All I had was the idea that a Lithuanian man, or rather, a man with a name that was usually from that group, had been out here during that time. I could find no mention of any of the keeper's at this light. Only some third hand stories of the perils of serving out here.
I spent some time taking various photos inside and out. And from the outside looking in, and inside looking out, and so on.
At about three o'clock I tried to go back to sleep, and did get another couple of hours of what my grandfather called 'shuteye', where I'm not sure if I was asleep or not.
But as the sun cracked the horizon, I was packing up and getting ready to go.
"Antolijus," I said as I put my cot back in its bag, and it went in a lot easier than I was expecting it to. "Antolijus, I'm going to see if I can find a way to help you. But it may take me a while. Stay here until I can get back out here, OK?"
Because of the patchy fog it took me longer to get back to a real road than it had to get out there.
My first stop was my apartment for a shower and an hour or so in bed. Then I got up, took another shower, got dressed in clothes that I hadn't slept in, and went to the office.
3.
I was intently listening to part of a recording when I realized somebody was staring at me.
"Yes, sir?" I asked the Sheriff as I took off my good headset. "I'm just trying to figure out what a lighthouse keeper named Antolijus was saying."
"How long has he been dead?"
"I don't know, if I can figure out when he was there by what he's telling me, I might be able to find out more about him." I held out the headphones, "wanna listen?"
He shrugged, "sure."
I played it once for him, "I can hear it," he said, "play it again and turn it up a little." I did, he listened intently, "I think I hear him saying 'Fitzsimmons didn't come out', play it once more."
I did, and smiled that was almost exactly what I had heard.
"But there's something else at the end," he said, "can you put it on the speakers and let it go?"
"Sure." I clicked a few things then played it again.
I had backed it up a few seconds further so we were treated to some silence, then the voice said what it said, then there was a different sound.
"Was there anything mechanical in the place? Like an old clock or something?"
"No, not that I saw. And I didn't hear that when I was out there. And there's no power or water or anything else in the building."
"It almost sounds like a grandfather clock, something that ticks really slowly."
I looked at the trace, it was all through it, but I had been focused on the voice.
"Here's some more of it." I pointed to where you could see the sound register several more small spikes on the recording.
It was a regular, almost metallic, clicking. And it did have a mechanical feel to it.
"I think I would have heard that." Then I noticed something else. "It comes and goes. But it sounded like it was in the room. And not too far from the recorder."
He nodded, "Well detective, you have another mystery on your hands. Who was Fitsimmons, and why is there a ghost clock in the place."
I wrote the name down, "I think the voice that was speaking was Antolijus, so now I've got two names to work on. And the clock. They probably had a wind up clock out there..." Then I remembered something, "That rings the bell." I held up a finger, "Before they went to electricity the fog bell operated by a clockwork mechanism. Antolijus said in another EVP that the electricity was out. Maybe he started the clockwork for the bell." I smiled at my boss, "thank you for noticing that."
The Sheriff seemed startled by the conclusion, then he thought about it and agreed with me. "Well done, Detective Elaine. I think that's exactly what it is."
"But now I've got to go out there and convince Antolijus that Fitzsimmons is never going to show up for his shift, and that he doesn't need to worry about the fog bell any more, because its in the museum in town now."
"Do you think he'll listen to you?"
I thought about it for a moment, then I looked from the audio trace of Antolijus speaking up at the Sheriff, "No, probably not, but I have an idea of who he might listen to."
4.
The Sheriff walked up the dune and looked out at the Bay while I unlocked the building, "Well, Elaine, you certainly know the most remote parts of Suffolk County."
"I actively look for them."
"Just in case you need to dump a body that will never be found?"
"You never know. Ready to make your speech?"
"His name is Antolijus."
"Yes, and I think that is how it is pronounced."
"Then let's do it." He looked down at his phone, "I'll probably have a dozen voice mails when we get back to town."
"None of them will be from me. Mine's just as dead."
I opened the door to the old building and walked in and the Sheriff followed me, "Antolijus, remember me? I was just here last night."
The Sheriff stood in the middle of the room and looked around, he was looking up at the rafters when he said, "There's simply nothing in here that could make that ticking noise."
"I didn't think there was, and I know I don't have anything that sounds like that." I started my recorder and put it on the old table.
"Then I guess we should do what we came to do."
"Yes sir. I'll do the introductions, you may want to show him your ID so he believes me."
He nodded and reached into his inside pocket.
"Antolijus, this gentleman is the County Sheriff, he's got some news for you." He showed his badge and ID around the room. "OK, Antolijus, this is for real, Mister James is the Sheriff, so you know can believe what he says. Right?"
I gave Antolijus a minute to comprehend what we'd said.
"All, right, you're on." I said to the Sheriff.
"I verified that this light and its fog horn, I'm sorry, fog bell, was decommissioned and taken out of service and replaced by buoys out in the bay fifty years ago. The marina that's nearby uses a different channel out and the fishing boats and all don't come by here any more."
He was more at ease standing in the old building talking to the former light keeper than he had been in the auditorium telling us about the change in official uniform headgear.
The Sheriff continued, "You did an excellent job taking care of this facility, but it isn't an active Coast Guard Light Station any longer, and the only people that come out here are hunters and researchers that are looking at the animals in the marsh. So, thank you for your service, you stand relieved."
I smiled and nodded, then I looked around, "If you understood you can say so in that little box like you did last night. Then I can check it and hear you. OK?"
We waited a couple of minutes. Then I checked the recorder.
We listened to the last of the Sheriff's speech, then when I asked if he understood.
There was dead silence on the recorder for a good minute, then "... yes, sir. ....thank you."
I was driving us back to town when the Sheriff asked me the question I know he had wanted to ask me since I'd started all this.
"So, now tell me honestly. Did that really happen? Did I just tell a ghost that he'd been relieved of duty?"
"Yes, sir. And I'll come back out here sometime and make sure that he stays off duty."
The Sheriff sat silently for several miles.
"So, tell me. Does everybody become one of those?"
"No sir. Think about it, if they did, I'd be a lot busier." I checked my mirrors and changed lanes, "And I do not know why some spirits stay attached to some places and not others."
"Well, then, I guess this would be the right time to ask you if you'd be interested in a case that somebody mentioned to me. It's not a county property, or for that matter, owned by a city. It's privately owned, but it is leased by a state office."
"What's going on?" I asked him as we sat at a traffic light.
"It's just off to the left up ahead. Do you want to stop and hear it right from their office manager."
"Sure." I nodded, "But remember, we solved the last case before we started another one."
"You solved it. I was just along for the ride."
"Yes, sir."
-end bell-
[NOTE: The above story were written as adventure fiction, and is to be taken as such. While most of the features of Long Island exist, including the Shelter Island Preserve and Gardiners Bay, the rest of the setting is fictional.
Thank you, Dr. Leftover, TheMediaDesk.com]
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