Landweir House Chapter 18 - Tony Lane's Blog

Landweir House

Chapter 18

The Seldom Seen Jean Breen Comes Clean

When the hosts and director of the HGTV show, Renovating History, arrived in the master suite along with the home owners, they saw the mummified skeletal remains of a woman in a nineteen fifties style party dress. It was inside a little bump-out in the closet that everyone had assumed had been built to hold the lady of the house’s shoes. Now it was quite clear that it was intended to hold the lady of the house.

Terry Marshall’s head was spinning and for a brief second he thought to look around to see if there were hidden cameras somewhere. Perhaps this was all part of some elaborate joke and Ashton Kutcher was about to come out from behind the wall with a big dopy grin on his face. He waited but it never happened. Why were so many bodies being turned up and secondly, how many more would be found?

“I think that this house is cursed.” Terry said as his eyes opened wide with inspiration.

“Come again?” Host Bart said to him as he bent down to get a closer look at the body.

“Look, how many more bodies do we need to find before this whole project is shut down? We’re going to lose everything that we’ve been trying to build up here. The original owners were involved in murder, the second owners were also involved in murder and now, a body from the fifties can only mean that either Richard or Robert Breen was involved in a murder. Everyone who has ever owned this house has been involved in murder.” Terry theorized.

“Maybe Robert fed Richard to the gators in order to get the house and then killed the wife to shut her up.” Molly guessed.

“Let’s get Mortimer going on this. Maybe he can turn something up. But the closer it gets to Halloween the more I think we can turn these revelations into a creepy, haunted house with a curse on it, kind of a thing.” The wheels were spinning in Terry’s head.

“I’m not sure I want to take that angle on this.” Donald said as he started to put it together.

“No, let them my love. It will work out for us.” Lisa Marie said in an almost a whispered tone.

“I suppose so. People are suckers for that kind of stuff.” Donald said with a little surprise in his voice. He had been trying to soft sell things to Lisa Marie so she would find them more palatable but now she seemed to be pushing for things to happen.

“Let me in. Get out of the way.” Dr. Mortimer Jacobs said as he pushed his way into the room. The crowd parted as he put on a new pair of latex gloves and went over to the body.

“Who is she Doc?” Bart asked as Dr. Jacobs edged the body out of the small space in which it had been confined.

“She is Jean Breen, wife and only true love of Richard Breen.” He said.

“That’s amazing, how were you able to deduce that Dr. Jacobs?” Terry asked.

“By reading the front cover of the script.” Mortimer said as he pulled out a type written script that had been tucked under the body.

Inside the script, Richard/Robert Breen had written out in screenplay format, the events that had led to the death of Sam Hart and his own true love Jean. He confessed to becoming his own twin brother and then outlined his decent into madness. The hero in the story kept referring to a force that had clouded his thoughts and made him do the things that he did. Like he was just an actor following a script. As if he was under a spell.

“We’ll hire some actors and we’ll shoot this scene just the way he has it written. The network is going to go wild over this.” Terry Marshall could feel the weight of the Emmy in his hands.

“Shouldn’t we call in the police?” Dr. Jacobs asked.

“Maybe tomorrow, or the next day. Let’s get the footage first. Let’s do this right.” Terry said as he held up his hands for emphasis and then framing the imaginary shot.

“Besides, we already know that the murderer paid for his crime by giving up his mind.” Lisa Marie said with an unsettling smile on her face.

“I just hope that no more bodies turn up.” Donald said as he tried to figure out her smile.