by Tamara Berry
“There weren’t any flights?” I ask doubtfully.
“I didn’t ask.” Rachel shrugs. “Besides, Uncle Nicholas thought you’d prefer to go this way. So you’d have time to prepare your incantations.”
“He said that, did he?” I ask in a purely rhetorical spirit. That sounds exactly like something Nicholas would say, if only because he believes in my incantations as much as he does Santa Claus. “Of course he did. He wants me to suffer.”
Rachel watches me under knit brows. “You don’t mind, do you, Ellie? Perhaps I could skip my art class next week and come with you—”
I hold up my hand to stop her before she can finish. “If you came with me, who would stay at the cottage and watch over Beast and Freddie?” I ask, and not only as a way to keep Rachel from rearranging her plans on my behalf. I’ve been worried about leaving my two cats behind ever since Nicholas first broached the idea of going on vacation together. Beast, an all-black cat who occasionally masquerades as my witch’s familiar, has been with me since the start of my sojourn in England. I have no doubt that she’ll view my absence as nothing more than an opportunity to glory about, catching mice and letting in evil spirits, but Freddie is still just a kitten. And considering the way both Beast and I coddle her, she’s not a very self-sufficient kitten, either.
“It’s best this way,” I say with a decisive nod. I left my fur babies curled up before a banked fire, but it won’t be long before they’ll need Rachel to get the flames roaring again. I’m not the only one who finds this fall weather chilly. “Besides, your uncle is right. I do need time to prepare, and it’ll be lovely to see something of the country. The ride up to Scotland is supposed to be beautiful.”
At this, both Vivian and Rachel cast a doubtful look out the nearest window. The gray drizzle of a ceaseless rain isn’t up there with, say, the azure skies over a Mediterranean archipelago, but what can you do? There’s a ghost somewhere in the Outer Hebrides that needs my attention.
“Well, is one of you going to drive me to the train station, or do I need to call a taxi?” I ask. “Spirits don’t lay themselves to rest, you know.”
“I’ll take you,” Rachel offers, and once again reaches into her capacious pocket to extract the keys to the family’s Land Rover. She twirls them on one finger. “But we’re stopping for breakfast on the way.”
“Are we?” I ask without surprise. Keeping this girl fed is practically my second job—and one that doesn’t pay very well.
She knows this, which is why she flashes me the ten-pound note. “And for once, it’s my treat. To repay you for your predictability.”
“I am not predictable, thank you very much,” I retort as I gather up my bags and follow her out the door. In the name of fairness, I pause to add, “But the day I say no to hunting a ghost is the day I am one myself. And even then, I’m not making any promises.”
Chapter 2
Incantations—at least, the kind of incantations I’m used to performing—don’t require much preparation, so I spend the first half of my trip to Scotland pouring over the letter Nicholas gave me.
He’s never been the kind of man to overindulge in details, so the fact that I have nothing to go on but two handwritten pieces of paper isn’t as strange as it sounds. In all honesty, these papers tell me a lot more about what I can expect at my destination than any number of long conversations could.
For example, the fact that Nicholas’s friend Sid sat down and penned a letter to ask him for help is a marvel in and of itself. People don’t write letters in our day and age—and if they do, they’re not done in this florid style of handwriting. There’s even a seal on the outer envelope in bulbous red wax. This tells me that Sid is either a lover of history and tradition, or he’s a pretentious windbag. It could go either way.
There’s also the little matter of just how little matter is divulged. Instead of giving me particulars about the death of Glenn Stewart or the ways in which I might reach out to his ghost, the letter focuses mostly on reminiscent stories about the boarding school Sid and Nicholas once shared. From everything I can glean from the rest, it seems that Glenn hid a small fortune’s worth of family heirlooms before he passed. No amount of searching has uncovered them, which is why they’ve resorted to a woman like me. When logic and common sense fail, only communion with the dead will work.
Or so they believe. The only dead person I’ve ever been able to talk to is Winnie, and she’s much more like a sarcastic commentator on my life choices than a helpful spiritual guide.
Gee, thanks. And here I was going to tell you exactly where to find the money.
I can’t help a grin from spreading across my face. I’m never entirely sure when or where my sister will reach out to me, but her visits are always welcome.
“That shows what kind of help you’d be,” I say, heedless of the impression that talking aloud to myself on a train might give the other passengers. There’s a gentleman in a kilt the next aisle over who’s busy clipping his fingernails. I’m obviously not in the classy car. “It isn’t money that’s missing. It’s family heirlooms.”
Um, hello? Money can be an heirloom.
I tamp down a snort. “Only if you’re some crass American. These are fancy people, Winnie. They own an island.”
What about gold coins? Those are both currency and collectible.
She has me there. I’m about to dig deep into my upholstered seat and settle in for a long chat when a loud, deeply fluting voice interrupts from the doorway between the train cars.
“This is the one,” it announces. When I glance up, it’s to find a tall, gaunt woman standing on the threshold. “There’s no need to keep following me about, young man. I’ll sit here or nowhere.”
“But, ma’am . . .” The young man she’s speaking to is wearing the blue uniform of an employee, his face flustered as he struggles under the weight of the carpetbag in his arms. “You have to sit where your ticket says.”
“There.” She lifts a finger and points at me. “I’ll sit there, or I’m flinging myself out of this train at full speed. Try explaining that to your superiors.”
I blink, thinking at first that she wants my exact seat. The train car is only half-filled, which means there are plenty of open places—some of which are well out of the way of the flying fingernails of my nearest neighbor. I’m about to point this out when the woman starts making her way down the aisle toward me.
As she draws nearer, I blink again. Now that I’m seeing her in her full glory, I’m able to take in the full spectacle of her appearance. This is marked primarily by a pair of eyebrows so thin and arched they look as though they were drawn on with a pencil, a row of glittering rings on each of her ten fingers, and a sweeping purple robe with a fringe that drags along the floor to hook on each passing seat. She seems blithely unaware of this, causing the porter with her bag to fumble to release the strings every few steps.
“No, no. I’ll take that,” she says as the man makes a motion to stow her bag overhead. She drops into the open seat next to me and lifts her arm to take it from him. Each movement she makes is accompanied by a waft of patchouli-scented air. It’s not an unpleasant smell, but it is a strong one. “Thank you, young man. I’ll be quite comfortable now.”
He pauses in the manner of an underemployed worker expecting a tip for services rendered, but the woman makes no move to pay him. He looks so crestfallen that I reach into my own wallet and extract a bill. Since Rachel paid for our breakfast with her honeyfall, I’m feeling generous. I also get the impression that he thinks the two of us are traveling together. If I want my tea later, I’m going to need to smooth the waters.
“Thank you,” I say. “You’ve been a big help.”
His shy nod is enough to convince me that I made the right choice. Since there’s little likelihood of Winnie returning to chat now that I have a real person to talk to, I turn my attention to the woman by my side.
She’s no less alarming now that she’s up close. Her eyebrows are, in fa
ct, drawn on with a pencil. So too is a line of lipstick well outside the physical boundaries of her mouth and, unless I’m very much mistaken, a mole placed at a jaunty angle on her cheekbone. Something about her feels vaguely familiar and unsettling, and it only takes me a moment to figure out why.
She looks exactly like a puppet that Winnie and our brother, Liam, had as children—a gift from a neighbor who’d probably wanted it exorcised out of her own house. We were terrified of that puppet. Its limbs were so loose and poorly jointed that it had a tendency to shift and settle in the night. No matter how we stored it, we’d go to bed only to wake up and find it in a new position every morning.
I barely manage to suppress a shudder at the memory before the woman speaks, once again in that low, musical voice. “I thought I’d find you here,” she says, and zips open her floral-patterned bag. “Terrible weather for our trip, isn’t it?”
“Um.” I’m not sure how to take her familiarity, but I decide that bland acceptance is best. “I rather like the rain. As long as I’m indoors and warm, I find it soothing.”
She hands me two plastic tumblers and continues rummaging inside her bag. “There will be nothing soothing about it when we reach the Western Isles. The rain has a tendency to go sideways once it hits the ocean.”
I’m careful not to show any of the surprise I feel. The train we’re on is bound for Oban in western Scotland, at which point I’m supposed to transfer to a ferry that will take me to the island of Barra in the Outer Hebrides. From there, Nicholas’s instructions have informed me that a fishing vessel will carry me the rest of the way to Airgead Island, where his friend Sid’s home is located. In other words, both the Western Isles and rainy ocean views are in my immediate future.
But unless this woman somehow managed to pick the letter from my pocket in the two minutes she’s been sitting here, there’s no way she can know that.
“Don’t worry.” She finally finds what she’s looking for and pulls out a tin water bottle. “It’ll be calm for our crossing. I made sure of that. Hold those still, would you?”
I’ve seen too many weird and wonderful things in this world—and met too many weird and wonderful people—to feel alarm as the woman proceeds to open the bottle and pour its contents out into the tumblers. That alarm comes into play once I realize that what she’s pouring isn’t water but a gin and tonic, the piney scent of it at odds with her patchouli.
She lifts one of the tumblers from my hand and touches it with the remaining one. “Cheers,” she says, and takes a long sip. Glancing over at me, she adds, “You might as well have some, dear. The train is going to be delayed for several hours outside Shap.”
“Is it?” I sip delicately. “That’s too bad. It’s already such a long trip as it is.”
“Not nearly as long for us as for the poor man who’s going to have a heart attack. His journey, as you and I both know, will have only just begun. He’ll have a hard time finding his way home again after a passing like that.”
“A passing like that?” I echo, starting to feel a little queasy. I’m not sure if it’s the movement of the train or the fact that this drink is much stronger than I was anticipating, but a tight, queer feeling settles in the pit of my stomach.
“I don’t think he’s in this car.” She casts her eyes around the train, taking a moment to appraise each male she lands on. “It might be that gentleman in the tweed cap near the front, but I expect he’s only dyspeptic. Most of the vibrations are coming from the next car up. What say you?”
For once in my life, not a lot. In the ordinary way of things, knowing what to say—and how to say it—is a large part of what I do. If one’s name is Nicholas Hartford III, one might argue that it’s all I do. However, this woman isn’t asking for my advice or even for my comfort. She’s asking me to pick out someone on the train who’s going to die just outside of Shap.
That’s a trap I know better than to fall into. It’s never a good idea to put a certainty like that on the line.
I place a hand to my head and take a deep breath. This signature move of mine is useless, since the only thing I can see when I close my eyes is the inside of my eyelids, but I feel as though I should put on a good show.
Don’t do it, Ellie.
I jolt, startled to hear my sister again so soon—and at a time when I’m supposed to be concentrating on the great hereafter. One of the hallmarks of my ability to communicate with Winnie is that it’s always on her terms. She comes when she wants, stays as long as she feels like staying, and nothing I say or do or concoct in my huge, showy cauldron is able to change that.
Get out of your seat and get off this train. Do not pass Go. Do not collect two hundred dollars.
I’m about to laugh at Winnie’s obvious attempts to mess with me when a sudden image flashes across my vision. It lasts for only a second, almost like a slideshow picture turning on and off, but I see it as clearly as if it’s taking place in front of me.
A man in a train car similar to this one but with red seats clutches his chest. His paper cup of tea falls to the floor, the thick, chalky liquid splashing all over his brown Oxford wing tips.
My eyes pop open again, and I turn to stare at the woman next to me. She’s watching me curiously. “Well?” she prods.
“The red car,” I manage, even though the last thing I want to do is say the words aloud. It’s almost as though I’m no longer in charge of my own tongue. “Oxford wing tips.”
She checks for a moment, her gaze intent. “Yes. Wing tips. I think you’re right.” With another long, careful sip of her gin, she adds, “It’s a shame, really, but what can you do? Death comes for all of us in the end.”
A chill moves through me—through the entire train car, in fact, sweeping down the aisle like a gust of arctic air. It’s the exact kind of thing I’ve fabricated in the past through the use of fans, portable air conditioners, and natural draughts, but no one else seems to notice it.
No one except my companion, that is. She shivers and pulls her fringed purple robe tighter around her.
“What did you say your name was?” I ask.
She glances at me with wide-eyed astonishment, her already arched brows practically reaching her hairline. “Oh, dear. Don’t you know?”
I shake my head. There are countless ways to glean information about someone’s identity—I might ask unrelated questions, make casual references, or, if all else fails, take a quick peek in her bag while she slips off to the restroom—but I’m in no mood for games.
The tea was still warm. I can practically feel it seeping into the toes of my tights.
“Should I?” I ask.
She shifts to face me, her gin sloshing onto her lap in the process. Since I’m still holding my own tumbler, there’s little I can do to help her as she dabs and wipes at the spill, muttering to herself all the while. By the time she’s done, the chill has left the train car, and I’m starting to feel as though the vision was a figment of my imagination.
But then she speaks. “Why, I’m Bridget Wimpole-White.”
The name is as familiar as her face. It nags at me, tugging at some long-distant memory, but I can’t seem to pull it all the way out. To buy myself time, I extend my free hand. “It’s lovely to meet you, Bridget. I’m—”
“—Madame Eleanor Wilde,” she finishes for me. “I know that. But please, call me Birdie. All my friends do.”
The memory snaps into place. “Birdie White?” I ask. “Not—”
She nods, pleased to find that her fame precedes her. “The one and only. I can’t tell you how excited I was to hear that you’ll be joining our little party up at Airgead Island. I’ve been dying to meet you.” She rolls her eyes toward the front of the train and adds, “That’s a touch gauche, considering our poor friend in the Oxfords, but you know what I mean.”
“But I don’t . . . I can’t . . .” I take a deep breath and a fortifying gulp of my gin before speaking again. Don’t and can’t are words that belong nowhere near a medium’s v
ocabulary—a thing both I and Birdie White know full well. More composed this time, I say, “I was under the impression that I’d be the only medium helping out the Stewart family. There was no mention of anyone else joining the party.”
“Oh, as to that, I doubt the family knows I’m coming. Terribly rude of me, I know, but I was invited by Glenn himself.”
I have to hold the drink firmly in my hand to avoid downing it in one incredulous gulp. The last thing I want is to be drunk on a train with Birdie White. Her name might not mean much to a layperson, and her fame is restricted to a rather select circle, but I’ve been studying her methods for years.
When it comes to faking communion with the dead, no one does it better—or more convincingly—than she does. Her ability to cold read a stranger is the stuff of legend. In fact, I’ve probably inadvertently given her enough information to tell my entire life story from start to finish.
“Mr. Stewart invited you directly?” I ask in what I hope is a politely noncommittal tone. Birdie might have taken me by surprise, showing up as she did, but she’s not the only one who knows how to read a person. Not only do her fringed shawl and terrifying eyebrows make sense to me now—I own quite a bit of fringe myself, and have been known to darken my already black eyebrows for effect—but her noisy arrival to this train car is a tale unto itself.
It would have been very easy for her to sneak in when no one was looking, to carry her own bag and come find a seat next to me with the porter being none the wiser. But she wanted to be seen, meant to be heard. Even the contraband gin is most likely for show—and I am her intended audience.
“I had no idea he was already reaching out,” I say as though it’s perfectly ordinary for ghosts to invite people to their former homes. “It usually takes spirits a few months to realize they’re dead.”
“Oh, of course, of course,” Birdie agrees, perfectly bland. “It took me by surprise, too. I have an incredibly full schedule right now, but when the spirits call, you know . . .”