A silence fell over the Schroon Falls town square. The final, agonized, five-voiced scream had echoed off the brick facade of the town hall and then vanished, leaving a ringing void in its place. For a long, breathless moment, the entire town was still. The thousands of twinkling festival lights, which had seemed so cheerful and magical just minutes before, now seemed to mock the horrifying tableau on the stage. They glittered down on the crumpled heap of a man in a long black coat, lying motionless under the harsh, white glare of the stage lights. The crowd, which had been a living, breathing entity of gasps and laughter, was frozen, a collective portrait of shock and horror.
Then, the spell broke. The first mover was not a panicked official or a screaming audience member. It was Dr. Julius Elliott. With a grim, determined purpose etched onto his face, he vaulted over the low, velvet-rope barrier that separated the audience from the stage. He landed on the stage with a soft thud, his movements not panicked, but filled with the sharp, focused urgency of a man running toward a problem, not away from it. He ignored his expensive recording equipment, his digital camera still standing silently on its tripod, its mission of documentation now secondary to a new, more immediate purpose. His only concern was the still, broken figure lying on the stage.
From the wings, a pale-faced, trembling Mayor Taylor and two volunteer EMTs rushed onto the stage. The EMTs, a man and a woman in matching blue uniforms, were carrying a large orange medical bag and a folded stretcher. They were moving with the practiced haste of small-town first responders, their faces set in masks of professional concern.
"Sir, please step aside!" the male EMT said, his voice loud and authoritative in the silent square. "We need to assess the patient!" They tried to push past Dr. Elliott, their focus entirely on the collapsed figure of Donnie Keller.
Dr. Elliott, however, did not move. He put a firm, steady hand up, physically blocking their path. "Do not touch him yet," he said, his voice calm, but with an undercurrent of immense authority that stopped the EMTs cold. "You are not equipped for this."
Mayor Taylor, his face a mess of panic and political desperation, rushed forward. "For God's sake, Doctor, the man collapsed! He could be having a heart attack! We need to get him to a hospital!"
"This was not a seizure or a heart attack," Dr. Elliott said, his gaze fixed on Donnie's still form. His voice was steady, certain, the voice of a scientist presenting a new, terrifying thesis. "This was a violent psychic event. A trauma-induced schism. You moving him improperly, without understanding the fragile state of his psyche, could cause immense, irreparable psychological damage."
The authority and sheer, unshakeable certainty in the doctor's voice, combined with the strangeness of his words, had their intended effect. The EMTs stopped, their professional training giving them no protocol for a "trauma-induced schism." They looked at each other, then at the doctor, their expressions now a mixture of confusion and deference.
Dr. Elliott knelt beside Donnie's unconscious form. Donnie was not entirely still. He was muttering softly, his lips barely moving, his voice cycling quietly, randomly, through the fading echoes of the personas, like a radio scanning through stations.
A soft, childlike whisper, a sound of pure fear. "...'m scared..." The voice of Benny.
A low, gravelly humming, a faint, almost inaudible bar of a forgotten sea shanty. A remnant of Terence.
A single, soft, tragic sigh, a release of air filled with a century of manufactured sorrow. The last echo of Amanda.
The ghosts were not gone. They were just quiet, the dying embers of a fire that had consumed its fuel.
Dr. Elliott listened to the quiet, fragmented whispers, his expression one of dawning, fascinated, horrified comprehension. This was the raw effects of a shattered mind. He looked up at the bewildered EMTs and the panicked mayor.
"The man is not haunted by spirits," he said, his voice quiet but clear. "The man is haunted by echoes. By himself." He looked directly at Mayor Taylor, his gaze sharp and unwavering. "He needs a psychiatric facility, not an emergency room. But first," he said, his voice softening slightly, "he needs quiet."
In the crowd, the frozen shock was beginning to thaw, melting into hushed, horrified whispers. The supernatural spectacle, the thrilling, spooky show they had all come to see, had unraveled, revealing a raw, painful, and deeply human tragedy. The myth had shattered, and in its place was a broken man.
Mrs. Janson, her face wet with tears, turned to her friend. Her amethyst crystal lay forgotten in her lap. "Oh, that poor, poor man," she whispered, her voice thick with a pity that was far deeper than her earlier spiritual excitement. "All that time... all that pain... it was just his own."
Near the front, Tim and Sonia, the goth teenagers, just stared at the stage, their faces pale under their heavy eyeliner. Their cool, fan-like reverence was gone. Only the wide, frightened eyes of kids who had just seen something far too real remained. Their dark, romantic fantasies about ghosts and tragic mediums had been replaced by the brutal, unglamorous sight of real, profound suffering.
On the stage, Dr. Elliott took control. "Alright," he said to the now-deferential EMTs. "We're going to lift him. Gently. No sudden movements. No loud noises. I'm coming with you."
The EMTs, following his lead, carefully, gently, placed Donnie Keller onto the stretcher. Dr. Elliott took off his own tweed jacket and draped it over Donnie's still form, a gesture of both warmth and concealment from the prying eyes of the crowd.
As the stretcher was lifted, the first flashes from local news cameras began to pop from the edges of the crowd. Dr. Elliott, moving with a surprising speed, positioned himself between the stretcher and the photographers, shielding Donnie's face with his own body, glaring at the cameras with a fiery, academic fury.
The procession moved off the stage and through the stunned crowd, which parted silently, respectfully, to let the ambulance crew pass. The whispers died down as they moved through, the entire town of Schroon Falls now a silent, somber witness to the end of their famous haunting.
The ambulance doors closed, sealing Dr. Elliott and Donnie inside, a sudden, muffled silence in the wake of the festival's noise. The vehicle pulled away from the curb, its siren and lights blessedly silent, leaving Mayor Taylor alone on the empty stage to face a town full of questions, a ruined festival, and the uncomfortable truth that their greatest tourist attraction was, in fact, their greatest tragedy.