The Feud: Backdrop
Shoreline 104
Generally, people associate the full moon with odd or unusual events. Around this area, it is the reverse! The empty dark of the moon is when weird things stir in the night. This is when we hear of hikers lost in the trails around the lighthouse Shoreline 105. Or the mysterious biker bell rings near our rental cabin. The water currrents, which normally flows clockwise with the wind suddenly switch to counter-clockwise. As if something is stirring in the waters.
It was November 21st, 1900 when Jules Donovan disappeared. A night of the new moon (look it up). And it was exactly a month later on December 20th, when she was found, drown, on the beach below Shoreline 104. And that lighthouse was set ablaze in the ugliest feud in recorded history.
Jules Donovan?
An eccentric girl of 17, born in upper New York State, to Agnes and Sebastian Donovan. Her mother was daughter to naval Cmdr Sheridan (builder of the lighthouses) and niece to Doctor Sheridan (builder of the institute bearing his name). The Sheridan brothers moved here together when Congress approved funding. The Donovans came along, to find greener opportunities.
It is said Jules had an artistic touch, a bit of a dreamer. We speculate it was she who painted the dolls we keep in storage (doll room). Her water-logged sketchbook was found near her body, but has since vanished while in the possession of the police.
The Sheridans came from old money and some prestige in New York. Being from the upper crust, as it is, they apparently didn't mix well with the locals. The Herringtons and such, were more down to earth folk. Tensions between the groups were high off the bat when the Sheridans arrived 8 years prior.
Rumors about the Donovans
The rumors are both true and false. Mr. and Mrs. Donovan followed her family to the area from Albany, New York. According to the scant police records from there, Sebastian Donovan worked various jobs to provide for his family but was often taken in for disorderly ("drunken") behavior. He appears to have stayed on the straight and narrow after the move. He started a small goat dairy which kept him too busy to get into trouble. Or if he did get inebriated, he didn't stumble far from home.
Agnes Donovan was another matter. Quite the opposite. Once in the region, she took to unsavory hobbies. She looked after patients her uncle deemed beneath him. Her treatments were medicines concocted from forest plants or herbs. Her knowledge of the surrounding wild lands was uncanny, knowing every tree and shrub. She was probably also the abortionist young women sought out in a crisis. As such, she was known to put the "evil eye" on the men responsible. Her silent curses troubled more than a few men. Her public outbursts would invoke the forgotten Old Ones.
Jake "Tall-Tale" Fern?
Fern's background is unknown. He was a resident of these parts, descended from the settlers associated with the Herrington side of town. In his early 20s, he became a hired hand to Mr. Donovan. And shortly thereafter, he got on the wrong side of Agnes. Why, nobody knows. It just happened that way. She never believed a word he said, so she gave him the name Tall-Tale. Unfortunately, it stuck.
His close family and friends ignored the slur. However, he was reduced to living as a semi-recluse in the shed beside the goat pens. To most observers, it was an unfair situation but little could be done about it.
Keep in mind, this was a hard time to scratch a living. By living cheap, he started a slow savings with the intent of moving to Okaso.
And, like clockwork, Fern and Jules began a secret relationship which ended with both of these star-crossed lovers dead and Shoreline 104 burnt to the ground.
How and why all this relates together, and the annual celebration named "Ghosts of Lighthouse Past", held on December 20th, will become clear in the next part of the story.
