Tonight on New Hampshire Crossroads, a thrilling whodunit in Intervale.

Some down-to-earth advice from a Manchester ghost hunter and a spine chilling New England ghost story.

Hi, I'm Eloise Daniels, and this is New Hampshire Crossroads.

Theme Music Presentation of New Hampshire Crossroads is made possible in part by Shaw's Supermarkets.

Keep New Hampshire beautiful.

Recycle your aluminum cans at Shaw's, where you're someone special.

You've decided to spend a quiet weekend in the New Hampshire mountains away from your hectic daily life.

So you check into the New England Inn in Intervale, and you begin to relax.

Suddenly, things become complicated.

The guests are being murdered.

The police are asking questions, and so are the other guests.

But this is no ordinary murder mystery.

It's all part of an elaborate theatrical production.

That's one of the newest twists on the hospitality scene.

The name's Nelson.

I'm an investigative reporter from New Hampshire Crossroads, trying to uncover the story behind this murder mystery.

Weekend.

Hosted by the New England Inn and Murder á la Carte, a professional acting company from New York.

Word on the street is that these murders are a good time.

A lot of laughs.

Well, that's a first.

Fortunately, I'm not trying to figure out this mystery alone.

Along with 60 or so guests trying to solve this puzzle, I have the help of a very interested third party.

I used to work for the Baltimore Police Department, and a couple of years ago, budget cuts, one thing or another, the city threw me out on my keister.

That's when I started working privately, independently.

Meet Detective Robert E. Lee Custis, an actor by trade and an investigator by script.

He told the guests an intriguing story on what brought him to the Inn.

Two years ago, a very charming elderly couple from Baltimore were shot to death by a man named Homer Moreno.

Homer Moreno was quickly apprehended, except the arresting officers failed to read him his rights.

And then later on, in the rush to get him behind bars, a form wasn't filled out correctly, and three months later, Moreno's out on the street.

The flip side?

Well, someone read about the case.

A sicko, I'd call him.

Someone who read about the case and decided that even though Moreno might escape due process, he wasn't going to escape justice.

This is the guy we call The Samaritan Killer.

So The Samaritan killer went after Moreno, slashed him to death with a knife.

Well, my partner Bill didn't like the idea that anyone should escape justice, whether they were trying to do a good deed or an evil deed.

So he's been on the trail of The Samaritan killer and up until Thursday night.

Something was odd, and he couldn't tell me on the phone.

He just said, I had better come up here as soon as I could.

So I hopped on People’s and flew up into Portland, and the owners here had a limo meet me.

And well, before I got here, Bill was shot and Bill was dead.

The guests have been told that everything's a clue.

Everyone a suspect.

All the clues end up in a central location so everyone can see them, and they're told to keep their eyes open at all times.

But that's difficult to do when the lights suddenly go out in the middle of dinner.

(screams) (inaudible) I’m afraid there's nothing for you to do here, Lieutenant.

The man is dead.

Okay.

What happened?

Anybody see what happened here?

Who shot him?

Who is here?

Someone came out of the kitchen and shot him in the back.

Who came out of the kitchen?

How many shots were there?

Three.

Three.

Three shots?

At least two.

Two?

Two?

Three.?

Two or three?

Three.

Three.

Does anyone know who he is?

He's a waiter here.

What’s his name?

Does anybody have a bobby pin or a hairpin?

His name is Mark Edmond and he works here.

Wait, wait, wait a minute.

Wait.

Hold on.

Step back, please.

Sure.

It’s not a wine list.

Yeah.

Looks like, an appointment book.

Oh, what have you found there, Lieutenant?

This is your appointment book?

Would you look at it?

It's not.

Come on.

It's your appointment book.

What's this man doing with your appointment book?

All right.

I don't know.

I don't know, I've never seen him before.

How did he - I don't know.

May I have your name, please?

This is my wife.

This is your wife?

What are you looking for?

This is your wife?

What are you looking for?

And you’re the doc?

Yeah, right.

You know, doc, you're doing okay for yourself.

You bet your sweet life I am, and that’s none of your (censored) business Now, doc, relax.

So what do we have here?

We have a woman's gun.

We have an appointment book.

Your appointment book.

And we have a dead man.

What woman’s gun?

Where is it?

You know, I know a gentleman wouldn't ask this question, but then I'm no gentleman.

The dearly departed here is rather young, isn't he?

And he's rather.... And what?

Handsome.

And what?

And what?

Nothing, I was just wondering.

And what?

What are you implying?

Come right out, come out with it!

I'm wondering if you’re sensitive about the age issue doc?

All right.

Relax, will you?

I had to ask the question, boy.

Boy, the questions you ask belong, you know where they belong?

In the - Tom Chiodo is president of Murde á la Carte.

Everybody loves a good mystery.

Children, adults, seniors, you name it.

Mystery is a lot of fun.

Playing an armchair detective is exciting, but being there and part of it is a lot more exciting.

Well, we went through the appointment book, didn't find too much, gave it back to Mrs.

Case this morning we’re no sooner finished the last drop of coffee at breakfast until the maid comes running over to the dining room, screaming that she's found a body in that building over there across the street.

Now we all hightail it over there.

And who do we find but the lovely Mrs.

Case?

So - What’s everybody doing here?

Where's my wife?

Where’s my wife?

Why don't, why don't you come on outside?

You'll, you’ll - Where's my wife?

Oh.

Oh, for God's sake.

What happened here?

Billie, Billie, baby Wake up!

It’s me.

It's me.

Donny.

Billie, Billie, wake up.

What happened?

Who, who did this?

We don’t know, Doc.

Billie, no!

Oh, God!

(sobbing) Can he (inaudible) No!

Oh God, don’t leave me!

In less than 24 hours, two murders have taken place.

This mystery has consumed not just the detective, but all of the guests.

We've already started to formulate some theories.

You see, if a guest can solve the mystery, they'll win a hopefully somewhat more relaxing weekend at the inn.

People who say they're from Key West but they’re not.

Both know nothing about my home office.

Know nothing about marathon.

And both of their names, first and last, are spelled backwards.

Susan is Susan Nasus, which is Susan spelled backward, and Paul is Paul Luap, which is Paul spelled backwards.

Which all may not mean anything, because when it comes to a to a weekend like this, you don't know how many red herrings you're got.

That's true.

I mean, I've seen already a half a dozen red herrings.

People who observe other people watch other people's behavior.

People who have good eyes, good noses.

They're the kind of people that do help.

They're the kind of people that, that should call in anything suspicious to the police that they see in their own communities.

Then we have the other kind.

People who are here to have a good time, and also to try to bust my chops as most they can and to lead me down the garden path, as it were.

Well, my instincts tell me to keep an eye on Doctor Case.

Seems to figure: beautiful young wife has an eye for a younger man.

The doc finds out and offs the guy and then does in the wife.

He was in the shower when they found her body, right?

Maybe cleaning up after his deadly deed.

Then he throws a big scene when he discovers the body, taking the suspicion off himself.

Since then, it's been pretty quiet around here.

Everyone slipping into their costumes for this evening's Animal Farm party.

At which, for my own sake, I hope not too much happens.

But at this point, it's pretty hard to tell.

One of the guests, former opera star Vivian Elizabeth Hughes, wanted to sing for the crowd.

Little did she know that this was almost her big finish.

Standing by (gunfire, screams) Oh, God.

(crying) What happened?

They tried to kill me!

The doc escorted her away, and minutes later, we were summoned to the room of an hysterical Vivian Elizabeth for an unsuspected twist to this mystery.

Well, so much for my theory.

Back to the drawing board.

Some of the guests have worked hard to accumulate clues and develop theories.

And the Murder á la Carte folks have worked just as hard in offering a realistic adventure.

What's exciting about the work, for those of us that are actors, is that the guests that come to it are really adventuresome people, and we all like a little fantasy in our lives, and we like to forget our problems every once in a while.

And we know that you just can't take life all that seriously all the time.

And this is a chance to forget your troubles.

Go away for a weekend, meet new people and have a good time doing it.

This creates an attraction.

This creates a good, happy clientele out there who indeed, through word of mouth, will tell other people.

Some of them aren't that happy this weekend, though.

Some of them won't be with us by the end of the weekend.

Well, the weekend was almost over.

And by counting heads, it looked like everyone made it through the night okay, although the guest register is considerably lighter than it was after check -in Friday night.

The lieutenant says he has enough information to draw some conclusions.

Mrs.

Hughes, you want to tell us how you knew Doctor and Mrs.

Case?

He operated on you, didn't he Mrs.

Hughes?

Yes, he did.

The operation was a failure.

(inaudible) Doctor Case finished your career with one stroke of his scalpel and you wanted him dead.

Oh, by the way, what was the name of your last opera?

Jezebel of Babylon.

Jezebel.

Your partner in crime had betrayed you.

He wanted out, but somehow you found a way to keep him interested.

The same way he found out how to keep Phil Mulligan interested.

Jezebel.

You are a liar and I am not going to stay here and listen to any more of this.

You have nothing on me.

Oh no, no, no!

One more word and I will sue you.

Don't touch me.

Not one more word outta me, Mrs.

(inaudible) Sit down.

You spent the night in my room last night, remember?

Couldn't stand the sight or even the illusion of being in the same room where poor Doctor Case got offed.

So I let you stay in my room.

What you didn't know was that I had a little something stashed under my bed.

And I don’t mean a bottle.

I mean a tape recorder.

And, honey, I picked up some very interesting conversation.

Tomorrow night.

Perfect.

Do we need to hear any more?

Yeah.

Peter Smith, alias Meg Watkins, alias The Samaritan Killer.

Peter Smith?

I thought this guy was an employee of the inn.

How could I have missed him?

Oh, you monster!

(inaudible) Oh, you evil man!

(screaming) (audience murmuring) (laughing) This way.

You have the right to remain silent.

Anything you say Well, so much for this murder mystery weekend.

Joe and Linda want to have another one in March in case this is your cup of tea.

Me?

Well, I'm going to find a nice, quiet place in the mountains.

Somewhere where I can go and forget about life for a while.

Say, isn't that how this whole thing started?

If you're seeing things or hearing things in your own home that are unexplained, that don't make any sense, Who do you call?

In New England, It's Norm Gauthier of Manchester.

He's a nationally recognized ghost hunter who's visited and researched some 140 haunted buildings over the past six years.

He's agreed to tell us how to learn about and how to live with your ghost.

Sometimes people contact me because they’re having what they consider to be rather frightening experiences in their home, and they want to be reassured that they won't get any worse.

Most often it's people who just want to share their experiences with me.

And what I do, quite frankly, is very simple or very basic.

I will interview the people.

I will research the house by going through old town records, old newspapers, contact historical societies, interview previous owners or tenants who may have lived in a building.

And the way that people contact me is, either through attending any of the lectures that I put on throughout the state or they may end up being a student at any of the seven different colleges and universities that I teach an adult education course at called Researching the Psychic World.

Behind me is Vose House in Atkinson, New Hampshire.

I met the owner's wife, when doing another house here in Atkinson, New Hampshire, and she asked me to come and discuss some of the experiences that that they've been having here.

Has the initials RJ on it.

Some of the experiences that have occurred in this particular building are the sound of doors slamming, I believe there were footsteps that were heard once.

On another occasion, a Bible and a small jar containing some change was knocked off a table.

There's also an incident of a a tombstone that was found behind what is now a garage, but at one time used to be an old barn.

All it has is two initials on it.

No date.

It appears to be that of a child.

And we don't know who it belongs to at this point.

It looks like this (inaudible).

There was also the feeling, a rather horrified feeling of a presence in the downstairs portion of the house, off the living room going towards the hallway.

We were down in this room one night and we heard footsteps.

And created a certain amount of terror in Mrs.

Palasma only because I suspect, it's the first time she had ever experienced that kind of thing and and just didn't know how to handle it.

It was when I heard someone sneeze upstairs one evening when I was downstairs and the children were both asleep, and I knew they didn't have colds.

And, so just a number of things.

Now, did, you told me one time something about you felt a presence.

Can you show me where that happened?

Yes.

Was right over here.

And I was just getting ready for bed and I had all the lights out.

And as soon as I got to about here, I stopped because I, I just all of a sudden I felt someone was here.

And like when you're playing hide and seek and you know someone is there but you can't see them.

And I said, are you there?

Because I thought it was my husband and then I heard him upstairs in the bathroom, and I knew that no one else was down here but myself.

So I quickly ran upstairs.

My initial ghost hunting, has already started, as you all know, with the interview of Mrs.

Palasma, who lives in this house where different occurrences have been experienced.

You now see me standing before the Atkinson Town Hall, where I'll be going inside and checking death records, hopefully finding somebody who's lived in that house, who may have died of murder, or suicide, or perhaps a traumatic death, like a heart attack or what have you.

Hi Miss Jetty, I'm Norm Gauthier from Manchester.

How are you?

Fine, thank you and you?

Oh, very well thanks.

I'm wondering if I might be able to see the town death records for the years beginning around the mid-1800s.

Certainly.

I'll get that for you.

Thank you very much.

And then also what I'll be doing at some later date is contacting some of the people who lived in that house prior to the present owners, and some still live in the area, while others have passed on or moved on.

And I'll interview them in the hopes of finding stories that may parallel those that are presently happening.

This is the tombstone of the Honorable John Vose who passed away in April of 1840.

Mister, in 1795, Mr.

Vose was appointed as the 6th preceptor of the Atkinson Academy.

Cemeteries are just one of the places that I go to to get information regarding deaths.

From there I may go to a town hall to get records regarding why they died or, you know, specifically how they died, where they died.

I may go to an historical society to get information about the building itself, go to the county seat to look at records regarding the transference of property from one owner to another, so I can get a continuity of owners and thus, also a continuity of information.

What I'm hoping to do by gathering all these little bits of information together is come up to finding somebody who died in the building, either traumatically or violently, be it heart attack, murder, or suicide, which seems to be about the the common denominator of most haunted buildings.

And what happens at that point is that that person who has passed away repeats some portion of their life over and over again because they really don't know they're dead.

They're still in the building, still doing some portion of their life over and over again, whether it's knocking on doors or, or walking or pacing or, or what have you.

As you might suspect, I'm far from having reached a conclusion as to why this particular house is haunted, though the people naturally have, have found that they can live with this situation.

And, quite frankly, it becomes a great conversation piece.

I've been to some 80 haunted buildings throughout New Hampshire, and I have files of perhaps another 100 or 150 more.

Every week, somebody calls me or writes me concerning a haunted house here in New Hampshire.

What I do is something that you can do.

It's fun.

It's fascinating.

It's, it's a piece of New Hampshire history as much as anything else that one would would dream about.

And I suggested you just go out.

If you live in a haunted house, go out and get the information.

Try it.

It's going to be a fun thing for you, I promise.

While Norm Gauthier’s job is to make sense out of ghost stories, Odds Bodkin’s job is to spread those stories around.

Odds Bodkin, who hails from Henniker, makes his living telling stories.

He's performed tales from his Wisdom Tree collection all around the world, and next, in a 200 year-old setting, Odds Bodkin performs his enchanting version of the New England folk legend, The Storm Breeders.

My name is Jonathan Dunwell, and it was in the year 1820.

I had sailed from New York to Providence and was looking to hail a carriage to take me the rest of the way to Boston, and I found a carriage driver, and he allowed me to climb up beside him on his empty seat.

Why, thank you, driver.

Oh it’s all right sir, it’s all right.

And so out of Providence, we rode.

It was a beautiful day in New England.

The sun was shining and suddenly the horses reared up and their ears flattened to their heads.

I say, driver, which is wrong with your horses?

Oh dear, sir.

Do you have a raincoat, sir?

A raincoat?

What would I need a raincoat for?

It's a sunny day.

Oh, sir, it's, It's a storm breeder, sir.

Oh, I've seen him a hundred times.

Him and his little girl in their carriage.

No one knows what he is, sir.

50 years, he’s been on the roads here.

And, and always, when he comes, a storm follows him, sir.

Indeed, is this so?

I said, and suddenly Look, there, there up on the crest of the hill!

See him?

That’s him!

And I heard a crack of a whip, and I looked and saw, and there a dark carriage came with a man whipping the horse, and a little girl clinging to the rails, and they came closer toward us.

And the driver said, don't tell nothing to him, sir.

It won't do no good.

He never finds a way to Boston.

I said he was a good man once.

But he'll never find the way to Boston.

50 years, sir, 50 years.

Don’t say nothing to him.

And the carriage pulled up beside us, and from beneath the brim of a hat Would you know the way to Boston, sir?

Don't say nothing to him.

Don’t say nothing to him.

I've been traveling in bad weather all day, and I'd appreciate the directions to Boston, sir, please.

Won’t do no good, it won't do no good, sir.

And then the strange apparition whipped his horse and disappeared down the road.

Curiosity aroused in me.

I elected when we arrived at the tavern, a fierce thunderstorm following us, to ask questions about the strange being upon the roads.

And so it was, I gathered news that indeed his name had been Peter Rugg, and he had lived in Middle Street in Boston.

But he had uttered one night during a fearsome storm a fateful curse, a curse that would make any Christian man's blood run cold.

And ever since that night he had been galloping, riding endlessly the roads of New England.

And so, for years I gathered stories of the storm breeder, until my curiosity in him, I must confess, became an obsession.

And so I hired a carriage, and one day rode up into New Hampshire.

It was a little village outside it.

I cannot remember its name, at a lonely crossroads, the leaves lay limp and dying upon the wet road.

And then I heard it.

The sound of the carriage.

And I looked.

It’s coming over the crest of the hill.

There indeed he was, whipping his horse relentlessly, the little girl beside him, their black cloaks flapping in the wind, and I jumped out of my carriage as I pulled it across the road and called out, stop, sir!

Stop!

I know the way to Boston!

The strange man would not stop, and relentlessly came toward me until, just before crashing into my carriage, he pulled up his horse.

And I said, yes, sir, I know the way to Boston.

Do you now?

Why, yes, but I wish to see your face before I tell it to you, sir.

You hide it from me beneath your hat.

Do you, now?

You’re a curious man.

All right, then.

Come a little closer.

There you are, that’s right, a little closer.

Yes, there you are.

Just a little closer.

Yes.

And I walked toward the apparition, the hackles on my back standing and a tingling running up my spine.

That's right, a little closer.

Yes.

Then suddenly a hand shot out and he grabbed me by the collar and pulled me up under the brim of his hat.

Oh, and I saw him.

It was a skull!

No eyes.

And the bony hand rubbed above my collar and I called out, unhand me, unhand me!

And then he suddenly exploded in a bolt of lightning in his carriage and looked up at the sky.

(screams) He called, the storm!

And he dashed down the road and I fell back into my carriage, gasping for breath.

Guitar Music And so, as I recall these events in this old age of mine, I swear to you, it is true.

(silence) And so if any of you kind people find yourselves at a lonely New Hampshire crossroads one night and you hear the crack of a whip And the rolling wheels of a carriage.

Roll up your windows Music Our special thanks to the Meetinghouse Restaurant in Henniker for providing that great location.

That's our show for tonight.

We hope you enjoyed our spine chilling journey into the mysterious side of the Granite State.

For New Hampshire Crossroads, I'm Eloise Daniels.

Theme Music Presentation of New Hampshire Crossroads is made possible in part by Shaw's Supermarkets.

Keep New Hampshire beautiful.

Recycle your aluminum cans at Shaw's, where you're someone special.

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