The Elaine Investigates index page.
©1 February 2025 Levite
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1.
It had been about three weeks since my last night sitting on the bench at the driving range waiting to see if a light that couldn't be there appeared.
There hadn't been an unusual case come in, so I was back to the routine matters that came in to the office. I had one assignment that wasn't routine, but instead of a Colonial era ghost or a UFO, it involved some field training for the new officers in the department. As I had had a lot of recent experience with various sorts of sensors, high level cameras, and even metal detectors, as well as the taking of unusual types of samples for analysis, that's what I was asked to spend a couple of days with our new deputies showing them how to do the things I did.
"But don't tell them about how you used the electromagnetic one to look for a nature spirit," the Sheriff advised. "At least not right away."
"I'll remember to not do that."
But Miss Cynthia had other ideas when I joined them in the conference room. "Oh, you've got to tell us about the ghost hunts."
I looked from her to the other probationary officer named Jacob, who shrugged, and said "we've heard about it. But I kinda didn't believe it. Did you find one?"
"Yes. And no. It depends on the case. We really don't live in a mundane world, and something the things most people deny the existence of show up, and sometimes they show up in full spectrum photographs or on electromagnetic field detectors. Which is why I use them on those cases, and on other cases as well."
"What other cases?" One of them asked like they thought that was all I did.
"Well... there was a case with a woman who had bought a house that, according to a local legend, a former contractor of the US Mint had secreted some proof bullion. Silver and copper bars, and then reported it missing. Having a good metal detector with a target discrimination function was crucial to solving the case. Otherwise, I would have still been out there digging test holes in her back yard."
We walked out to my car and I showed them my tech kit. They had never even seen a EMF detector before.
"I thought it was something fake for the ghost hunt shows, you know, a prop to make it look like they were doing something," Mr. Jacob said.
"Oh, no, it's real. This can detect electrical voltage, changes in the magnetic field, and radio transmissions. It came in real handy to prove that one so-called haunting was mostly a hoax to try to get a lady to sell a house."
He was staring at the screen while he moved it from us to the side of the car and back. The numbers on the screen changed as they were supposed to.
Then we took my metal detector out to the open field next to the office.
"There's an irrigation pipe buried out here," I said to Miss Cynthia, "see if you can find it."
She needed some coaching on how to keep the head level with, but not touching, the ground, and how to sweep it back and forth slowly and evenly. But then she got a satisfactory beep and readout jumped.
"Ferris metal, down, it says eightteen."
"Centimeters. That'd be it." I nodded.
Mr. Jacob got a turn, on the other side of the clearing, "There's an underground conduit across here to power that gazebo."
He swept back and forth until he got the beep, then he knew to backtrack and make crisscross the spot and soon he had located the conduit. "Ten centimeters."
"Yeah, they buried it a bit too shallow. Well done. Let's go take some pictures."
"And see if something unexpected shows up in them!" Miss Cynthia said.
I didn't know they had hired a prophet.
The following Monday the Sheriff came in with a folder. I opened it and found it to contain a series of eight by ten color photographs. I recognized the pretty smiling woman just to one side of one of the more picturesque locations on the island, but in two of the later images, there was another woman, who was also smiling, that I didn't know.
"Ms Leondra sent it to you specifically," he said.
"That's wonderful, but why?" I said.
"The other lady in the photos wasn't there when they took the pictures."
2.
I called Miss Leondra, as she preferred to be called, and then met her for lunch near where the photos had been taken in Stony Brook.
I had never eaten in the place I met her. For one, if you went a little overboard on the order, you could drop next month's car payment on your meal.
"Oh, don't worry about it, I'm putting it on my expense account as an official outing," her smile was gleaming and a mile wide, "just to show them I can go someplace besides the Burger Shack."
"I've been there, but I usually end up in a pizza place."
"I think I've been in every eatery on this end of the island, and about half of the rest of them."
We settled into our seats at the table and waited on the server to acknowledge that we were there. Finally they did and we went through the high end fancy restaurant ordering ritual.
"I can't wait to tell you about it," Miss Leondra said, "We were just around the corner, on the walkway near the Yacht Club taking photos and shooting video, to promote their regatta in a few months."
"Yes, I saw them. You looked nice."
She smiled and thanked me, "But then back in the office, she appeared in some of the photos, and in one part of the video."
"Did she, what do they call it? Photo bomb you? Walk into frame when they know you're taking a picture."
"No, that happens all the time, and we just delete most of them. No, Ken said he didn't see her before or after he took the shots. And I didn't see anybody at all. We were out here early, to avoid traffic for that reason. As soon as it was light enough we did the shoot."
"I didn't see the video, it wasn't in the envelope."
"I know, I wanted to show you myself." She reached into her purse and pulled out a tablet and turned it on, "Just give me a minute."
She got it working and played the first video for me. No mystery woman.
"Now watch, this one was taken about five minutes later."
This time the camera started with a shot of the marina, then it panned out to the inlet, and finally over to show Miss Leondra. Except standing just to one side of Miss Leondra, was the woman from the other photos. The video ended with Leondra mentioning the outstanding visitor facilities available to fans of the regatta.
"And you didn't know you had a co-host for the spot."
"No ma'am."
I played the video and stopped it just as the woman came into view. It was the same woman that was in the still photos. "She looks real. You're not trying to pull one over on me are you?"
Miss Leondra laughed, "Oh, no ma'am. Not after everything you did for me with that other business."
I let the video play for a few seconds and noticed something. I said, "I'd like to see this on a larger screen."
"And here you go. Copies of all the photos, the videos, and even the shooting schedule and script," she handed me a flash drive. "And you can keep the thumb drive. Do you want to walk over to where we did the shoot after lunch?"
"Sure." I said and we waited on our meals.
The food was good, even maybe really good, but after seeing the prices on the board outside, I'm not sure it was that good. But as Miss Leondra put it on her expense account, I didn't worry about it, as she had said.
Then we took a walk down the road along the marina to where they'd been doing the shoot. Finally we stopped where she had been and she pointed to where Ken had been standing to take the video.
I stood where Ken had been and looked around. There was no way for the woman to conceal herself from him unless she could literally hide behind a lamp post.
"Where were the other still pictures taken?" I asked her.
"Most of them right around here."
"That's what I thought but I wanted to make sure."
"And do you want to hear what made me think about calling you about it?" I waited knowing she'd answer her own question. "When I mentioned it to the lady in at the reception desk," she nodded toward the yacht building, "she said it happens all the time. That they have photos in there with the same woman in them."
"I'd love to see those."
"Let's go!"
Captain Joyce, as her name tag stated, said that after Miss Leondra mentioned that she'd be calling in an expert.... I assume she was referring to me, although I am by no means an expert .... that she went and found a couple of the framed photos that she knew of with the same smiling woman in them. And then she remembered seeing her in another photo.
"This club yearbook is from 1953. They didn't put one out every year, but when they did, they did it right." She opened the old book and turned to a page of a wide angle view of the area around the club building with several of the members posing in their boating regalia.
I looked from the picture in the book to the printed photo Miss Leondra had given me. The same woman, with the same hairstyle, in the same clothes, and with the same smile, was there. Over seventy years ago.
"Ladies," I said, "you've got yourself a mystery."
"Can you solve it?" The Captain asked me.
"I'll give it my best shot."
The Captain had made very high quality copies of the other photos, as well as the page in the yearbook. And then she told me about an amateur photographer with a weekend place across the creek in Long Beach that said that he'd had some photos ruined because of an intruder that could well be our mystery woman.
"Here's his card," she said and handed me a very upscale, full color glossy card.
"I'll call him."
3.
From my desk phone I called the photographer and agreed to meet with him when he came out from the City that weekend. In the mean time I watched Miss Leondra's video on my high resolution monitor. Then I did a frame by frame advance of the video to the spot where I'd noticed something on her tablet.
The smiling woman appeared at just before the forty five second mark. When the camera panned over to Miss Leondra at that point in the video, the woman was just to the left of the hostess.
She was still there at the forty six seconds.
But as the timer on the video counted through the forty seventh second, she began to fade around the edges. Frame by frame. And as the camera finished recording Miss Leondra's speech about the amenities available to visitors, her lower body was almost transparent. And then she was gone at the fifty-first second.
To me that said that whoever she was. She probably wasn't on the payroll of the yacht club any more. If she had ever been.
A couple of days later I met Syd the Photographer at his place along the Sound and found him to be somewhat hard to like.
He was, I don't even know the word for it, and remember, I've dealt with a Broadway showman who drove a gold car. In any case, Syd the Photographer specialized in photos that the Yacht Club probably wouldn't put in their yearbook, and ones that Suffolk Tourism wouldn't use to promote Family Friendly events on this end of the Island. Although I'm certain that some of the ones that I did see in Syd's portfolio would get the attention of a certain segment of the population. Some of them certainly got mine. Except, unfortunately, I don't think most of his subjects would like me, for a number of reasons.
"Oh, I take pictures of women as well. And nature, you know, birds, whales, all that. If it is legal, and there's a market, I'll shoot it. But these pay the rent." Syd the Photographer said and tapped the photos of really buff men.
"So when a fully clothed woman appears in the photo, there's no market for it?"
"There's been some that I used anyway, and sold as editorial and stuff. And others that I cropped her out of. Otherwise, if I knew who she was, she's nice-looking, I'd make her an offer. And get her to sign a model release."
"So she appears often enough that your just work with it?"
"Yeah. Basically. There's times when it seems she shows up more than others. And almost always with somebody else in the frame."
I looked at her, "How old would you say she is?"
He took a good look, "I'd give her, maybe thirty-five. There's no lines around her mouth or eyes. Maybe a bit younger, but not by much. Like I said, she's good looking, I could work with her."
"How about where she shows up?"
"All along the coast here. From down by the Mansion by West Meadow all along here almost to Short Beach."
"How far inland have you seen her?"
Syd the Photographer thought about it. "I don't think I've ever taken a picture she's in more than, say, a block or two inland. She's always right by the water."
I nodded and looked at the examples Syd had laid out of photos he'd taken over the last dozen years or so with the woman in them. And then I noticed something odd. Especially given the primary subjects of Syd's photos that she appeared in.
I opened Miss Leondra's envelope and laid out those pictures, and then the ones from the Yacht Club...
"Ken took these didn't he?" Syd the Photographer asked me about Miss Leondra's.
"Yes, I believe that was his name."
"He's one of the best for that kind of thing, that's for certain."
"I'll relay that to Miss Leondra."
"We know each other. She used to work for me now and then. She's good as well."
I filed that footnote away and asked Syd if he noticed anything about the woman.
"All the same clothes. Really, nineteen forties, maybe real early fifties, I'd say."
I agreed with him. He kept looking.
"She's always in about the same place in the photo. Just left off center."
"I didn't realize that, yeah, that's right," I agreed.
"And she's always looking dead on into the camera. At the viewer. Not off into the middle distance or up and away like I have them pose." He pointed to her in the photo, "to me that says she's not a professional."
"She's always smiling and staring at the camera. No matter what is going on or who else is in the picture."
"Odd."
"Yes it is."
4.
I had an area to focus on, and an approximate date, she hadn't been in any club photos prior to the one taken in the summer of fifty-three, so that was a good place to start. Back in the office I began combing through old newspapers and other records from the North Shore.
The woman in the photos appeared to be in her thirties, but it was hard to say. She certainly wasn't much older, and didn't appear to be a teenager.
I began looking for obituaries and death notices for a woman that matched her age and general description, working backward from 1953 into the middle forties.
I didn't find anything. Then I started looking for reports of accidents and other issues that might have caused serious injury to her here and she might have died elsewhere.
It took awhile.
Finally. After a lot of virtual legwork, and a couple of phone calls. And an actual fax came in, I felt certain that I had enough information to call Miss Leondra, Captain Joyce, and even Syd the Photographer, and set up a meeting the following Friday at the same restaurant I'd met Miss Leondra in to open the case.
Syd the Photographer was the last one there. He'd just came in from the City and was a bit frazzled by the train trip out and then the drive up to Stony Brook.
Even Ken, Miss Leondra's office photographer was there.
They all knew each other, so once they got reaqauinted and settled into the corner table we'd been given for the afternoon, I thanked them for meeting me and said I had some information for them about the mystery woman in the photographs.
"It was in 1947. Which explains the style of clothes she's wearing." I nodded to Syd the Photographer.
Then I continued. "There was a group that came over from Bridgeport on one of the ferries that was operating then to Port Jefferson. They had come over to the marina over here to check out a boat show and sale, and to generally get away for a day." I passed around two pictures of the group that had been sent over from Bridgeport. "Anybody look familiar?"
Syd answered immediately, "The woman, second from left." The others looked at her and agreed.
"That's Nancy Estes."
"What happened to her?" Captain Joyce asked.
"I talked to one of the other women in the photo. Unfortunately, most of the others are gone now. It has been a long time. But the lady in.... this photo, third from the right is still with us. That's Florence Davies. She remembered what happened."
Nancy had been with the group all day, and didn't want to be down here any more. She had come just for the outing, but wasn't really interested in boats, she was tired of a couple of the guys flirting with her, and just wanted to go home. By about noon she'd had enough, but they kept begging her to pose for "just one more picture".
Mrs. Davies said that Nancy had talked one of the guys from the Marina to let her borrow his motorcycle to ride back over to Port Jefferson. She'd leave the bike there and catch the next ferry home, and he would pick it up later.
The others didn't want to let her spoil their fun so they kept going.
Mrs. Davies broke down in tears when she relayed the rest of it to me over the phone.
"We didn't know until we got back to Bridgeport what happened. Nancy didn't get very far on the motorcycle. She apparently didn't know how to ride very well. Anyway, out there on the road to the ferry landing she got ran over by a truck of some sort. They said she was dead at the scene. The motorcycle was actually jammed under the truck with her still on it."
"I'm so sorry to hear that."
"Thank you. It was a long time ago, but talking about it brings it all back. I think I cried for like three days. Here we were clowning around pretending we were going to buy a fishing boat or something and she was dead on the road." She took a long pause. "We all went to her funeral. I think one of the guys said something about how nice she had been. I don't know. Does that help you any?"
"Yes ma'am. It does. It fills in the details on a very old case. Thank you, so much."
The group at the restaurant sat in stunned silence. A couple of them wiped their eyes.
"Why is she always on the left in the pictures?" Syd the Photographer asked me.
"I did ask Mrs. Davies that, she said that Nancy felt that that showed her best side. I didn't mention why I wanted to know."
"That's probably for the best. If the lady found out what was going on it'd probably break her heart." Miss Leondra said.
"It did mine." Captain Joyce whispered.
"She's posing for one last picture." Syd the Photographer said softly. "Damn."
"I think that is exactly it." I answered. "Maybe. Just Maybe. We can work with that. But I'll need all of you to help."
We set it up for the next morning.
Both photographers had all all sorts of gear, I had my full spectrum camera.
Miss Leondra was dressed to kill, and Captain Joyce had a clipboard full of information to read about the Regatta to make it look official.
We'd all taken all sorts of pictures of boats, the Captain, Miss Leondra, the inlet, and then around again.
"Got her." Syd said finally as we reviewed our photos on the camera's small screens.
On my full spectrum's monitor screen there was only a murky shadow. She only showed up in detail on Syd's high resolution camera.
I walked down to the spot where Leondra was standing with the Captain. Nancy had appeared just to the Captain's right, on the left side of the photo, across from the Tourism lady.
"Nancy." I said in a slightly louder than conversational voice. "That's a great shot. That's the best photo we've taken all day. Thank you. Look at this Leondra, isn't that the one you want to use?" I showed her the image on Syd's camera.
She took the hint and made over it like it would win the Pulitzer. "This is the one, Joyce. We'll put it on the flier for the Regatta."
"Oh, yes. Look at that. Who could resist the three of us? We'll have them coming in from all over the East Coast."
"Thank you so much Nancy."
It's now been a couple of weeks since the staged shoot.
I've touched base with them a few times, and turned down an offer from Syd the Photographer to do some informal work for him.
None of them have seen Nancy in another photo.
So, until she shows up again, I'm considering the case closed.
-end smile -
The Elaine Investigates index page.
[NOTE: The above story were written as adventure fiction, and is to be taken as such. While most of the geographical features of Suffolk County exist, such as the Stony Brook marinas, the rest of the setting is fictional.
Thank you, Dr. Leftover, TheMediaDesk.com]
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