by Lisa Unger
When Eloise got home, there was a dead girl on her porch. She was wet, hair spread about her in a halo of filthy ringlets. She wore a lacy pink bra and panties; her skin was moonstone blue.
Eloise stood over her. Even in hideous death, the girl was a beauty. In Eloise’s experience, physical beauty was quite rare. Many people were attractive enough—maybe pretty or stylish or with a nice figure. Maybe even some combination of all of those things. But there was a particular brand of beauty: the union of a perfectly symmetrical face, a lithe, thin, and toned body, a certain kind of flowing hair.
It was the ideal toward which every woman strove, and almost none ever attained. God given, never earned by any means, beauty could be a powerful asset. But to possess it was a dangerous thing. Women despised you; men wanted to own you. A certain type of man raged when you asserted ownership of yourself. True beauty was a prize. And everyone wanted it.
Eloise sat on the porch and watched the girl for a while.
“I’m sorry for what happened to you,” Eloise said.
Sometimes that was all they wanted, just someone to acknowledge their pain. But Eloise suspected that there was more to this visit. The girl looked very young, maybe in her early twenties. She was petite, wore a silver chain from which hung the broken half of a heart. The girl’s toes were painted a sparkly hot pink, pedicured.
Eloise closed her eyes. The wind chimes sang their delicate, discordant little song. The Whispers were loud today. There was a mood.
She was thinking that when she saw local private detective Jones Cooper pull up in front of her house in his maroon SUV. She felt the usual mingling of pleasure and fatigue she always experienced prior to a visit with Jones. They had a long history together. Longer than he even knew.
He climbed out of the vehicle and walked, in that way he had, up her drive. It was a confident amble, manly but somehow humble. He had his hands in the pockets of his barn jacket. He was looking well, thinner. Though he hadn’t mentioned it, Eloise knew that he’d been struggling to lose weight since his doctor told him that he was too big, that with his high blood pressure it was a health concern. He had to lose thirty pounds. He’d lost ten, and Eloise figured he’d probably lose about five more. But that was it. The man liked to eat. Junk food was the only drug he had, and he wasn’t going to be able to give it up completely.
“How are you?” she called.
She looked down, but the girl was gone.
“I’m okay,” he said, sounding mildly surprised about it. For Jones Cooper, that was a rave.
He came to stand before the three steps that led up to her porch. He toed the loose piece of wood there. He was like that. Always inspecting, figuring out what needed to be fixed. Then he fixed it. That was his way.
“Got a minute?” he asked.
She stood and opened the door for them; it creaked on its hinges. Jones inspected it. She half expected him to pull an oiling can out of his pocket. She walked inside and he followed.
“Are you here about the girl?” she asked, casting him a glance in the hallway mirror as they passed.
He squinted at her, turned up the corners of his mouth. They had a strange relationship. She made him very uncomfortable. He didn’t want to believe in her. But he did.
“I’m here about a girl,” he said.
They had worked together on and off since Ray had gone traveling to spend time with his kids, to make amends, build the relationships he hadn’t when they were small. Ray hadn’t closed down the business that he and Eloise shared, but they were taking a hiatus. He was checking messages and emails, keeping in touch with Eloise. They were making referrals to other people who did the kind of work they did. It was a good thing; he was happy. But she missed him. He wanted her to come meet him in San Francisco, see how she liked it out there. She was thinking about it. Finley had taught them how to Skype, which they did a couple of times a week. She dreamed about him a lot.
Jones Cooper’s private investigation business occupied the space that Ray Muldune had left. The Hollows didn’t like a void. It filled in empty spaces. And it wasn’t about to let Eloise off the hook. Not yet.
“You’re looking good, Eloise,” Jones said.
He sat at her kitchen table while she brewed some coffee. He meant that she didn’t look as if she were on death’s door, which is how she’d been looking for a time. She had gained weight, was stronger overall. She was off the various medications she had been taking. Since Ray had gone, and Finley came, she had been working less. The visitors she had now were the first to come in a while. Agatha called it a Breather—a break in the visions, the visits. Sometimes whatever it is gives you a little time off, usually when you’re right about at the limit of what you can endure.
Jones laid a photograph out on the table, turned it toward her when she brought the coffee over. It was a professional image—a beauty shot, as they called it—of the girl Eloise had seen on her porch.
Eloise stared awhile, got a little more information. The girl had been a model. Not a runway model, but someone you might see in catalogs or in advertisements. The girl had been disappointed about it, thought she’d be one of the superstars. All her life, she’d been told how gorgeous she was—by her parents, strangers, and, of course, boys. The modeling agencies were the first ones ever to point out her “flaws”—too short, could lose ten pounds, face too heart-shaped, breasts too large. Pretty, yes, but in a common way. Nothing special. All those words, they stung, they stayed. She felt like meat—not filet, but chuck.
“What?” asked Jones, interrupting her thoughts.
“She was disappointed,” said Eloise. She touched the photograph. “Unhappy.”
He gave her that look he had, a kind of annoyed puzzling. He ran a hand over his brown hair, which was rapidly growing gray.
“Depression,” said Jones with a conceding nod of his head. “She suffered from an anxiety disorder.”
Yes, Eloise could feel that. “Who’s the client?”
“Her father,” said Jones. “He said that the man who killed her got away with it. The father has been tracking the suspect for a year, and it led him to The Hollows.”
“What does he want?” asked Eloise. She always asked that question. Because people wanted all sorts of things, not always what you might expect.
Jones was looking at the water stain on her ceiling.
“He says that he’s spent the last year gathering evidence,” said Jones. “Apparently there’s a detective and a prosecutor who both want the guy for it, they just don’t have anything on him. There’s no physical evidence tying him to the crime. The father—Roger Asher—wants me to tail the suspect.”
Help him, said the voice that wasn’t a voice.
“It sounds pretty straightforward,” said Eloise. “What’s your hesitation?”
Jones wouldn’t be sitting at Eloise’s kitchen table if there weren’t a problem. He only came to her when something was bothering him.
“The father sounds,” said Jones, pausing, searching for the right words, “consumed. Consumed to the point of being unstable.”
Eloise considered this.
“Would you not be consumed if you were looking for justice for your murdered child?”
He nodded his head musingly, looked off into the distance.
“Yeah,” he said. “I would. But there’s something off.”
Eloise remembered all too well how consumed she’d been with seeing the man who’d killed Emily and Alfie brought to justice. She’d been able to think of little else. Night after night, she’d lain awake, thinking the darkest thoughts, imagining the most heinous fates for Barney Croft. In the end, she’d found her way to forgiveness. And Barney Croft had been sent to prison. But what if he’d gotten away with it? Who would she be today?
“I’m worried that he wants something other than justice,” said Jones. “I’m worried that he wants revenge.”
“Help him,” said Eloise.
“Help him get revenge?” asked Jones with a frown.
Eloise locked Jones in a look that she hoped properly conveyed her annoyance. But Jones just smiled at her in the sheepish way he had. He was a charming man—when he wanted to be.
“Just help him,” said Eloise.
Jones held her eyes a moment, then looked away. He wasn’t stupid or an oaf. But like most men she’d known (not Alfie), he was slow to understand some of the finer points, the more delicate layers.
“Why did you come to me?” she asked.
Jones looked down at his cup, clinked his gold wedding band on the rim. He didn’t want to answer.
Then, “I just had this feeling that I should come talk to you.”
Now it was her turn to smile. When they’d first met years ago, he’d politely kicked her out of his house, basically telling her that he thought she was a crackpot or a fraud. He’d come a long way since then.
He took something out of his pocket and set it on the table with a soft click. It was a silver necklace. Dangling from the chain was a small broken half heart. It was cheap, the kind worn by teenagers, a trinket that best friends or a boyfriend and girlfriend might exchange. She picked it up and felt a terrible rush of sadness. She put it back down quickly.
“This belonged to her?” asked Eloise. As if she had to ask.
Jones nodded. “Her name was Michelle Asher. They pulled her body from the East River. She was wearing this.”
They both stared at it a minute.
“Will you help?” he asked. “Do you want to?”
He was always respectful that way. Ray always just assumed that she was in for whatever came his way.
“I’ll help,” she said.
He smiled briefly, then it vanished from his face. Back to that impassive, hard-to-read expression that was his default.
“I’ll split the fee,” he said. “As usual.”
They didn’t usually talk about money.
“You started billing?” she asked. She knew he didn’t like taking payment for what he did. He didn’t need the money. He had his retirement pension from The Hollows Police Department. And his wife was a successful therapist. Accepting money cheapened the work for him. It also made him beholden to the client. And Jones Cooper was not a man who liked being beholden to anyone.
“Maggie made me,” he said.
His wife, Maggie, really was Jones’s better half. A child and family psychologist, a native of The Hollows, and just a good, strong woman, she’d helped a lot of people find their way. Maggie and Eloise also had a long history. Longer than Maggie knew—until recently.
“How’s your mother-in-law doing?”
Eloise knew that Elizabeth Monroe, former Hollows High School principal and longtime friend, had been ailing. After a bad fall some years back, she hadn’t been the same.
“Old and cranky as ever,” said Jones. “But she’s holding her own.”
Elizabeth was a tough old bird, and she and Jones knocked heads quite a bit, but there was love there, too.
They sat a minute. Jones drained his cup.
“You do your thing?” he said. “I’ll do mine?”
“Sounds like a plan.”
Jones looked at her oddly. That was Finley’s phrase. Since the girl had moved in, Eloise had found herself using new words like, “Seriously?” delivered in that flat, sarcastic way. And, “Whatevs” supposedly to indicate a disdainful laissez-faire attitude.
“You sound like Ricky,” said Jones. “Of course, I’m not supposed to call him that anymore. It’s Rick now.”
Ricky was Jones’s son who was just about to graduate from Georgetown University.
“Did I tell you?” asked Jones. “He wants to be a shrink like his mother.”
There was a twinkle to Jones that wasn’t there a moment ago. It was fatherly pride.
“That’s wonderful,” said Eloise. “You must be so proud of him.”
She could see it in Ricky, that concern for others that Maggie possessed. Jones had it, too, but the energy was slightly different. He wasn’t a Sensitive. But he was a man who saw everything. He was a fixer, a controller.
Jones got up and carried their empty cups over to the sink, rinsed them both, and put them in the rack on the counter.
“I’m just glad we didn’t dump a quarter mil into that place only to find out he wanted to join a rock band.” Now he wore a bit of a frown.
Ricky was also an accomplished guitar player, and he did in fact play in a semisuccessful band that worked around the DC area. Ricky was musical, a creative. Free in a way that Jones had facilitated but couldn’t understand. He was threatened by it, envied it. What did you want to do, Jones Cooper, that you pressed down deep? Eloise wondered.
He moved toward the door, and Eloise followed. Out on the porch, the girl was gone. Usually, Eloise had to go looking for people. If Jones hadn’t showed up, she’d probably have found herself seeking him out not really knowing why. It was rare that the answer came to her doorstep. Her relationship to Jones was evolving and influencing her work. It was that way with Ray, too. But her occasional work with Jones felt different. In fact, a number of things were changing. She needed to talk to Agatha.
“I saw that grandkid of yours,” said Jones. He moved down the steps and stood on the path, looking up at Eloise. “She drives her bike too fast.”
Eloise sighed, gazed up at that cloudy sky, felt the cool air on her skin. “I know,” she said. “I know.”
• • •
The woman in the black dress was getting louder, stomping a bit more. Eloise had to listen to her pacing the hallway all night. And when dawn broke, she felt exhausted from her fitful night. This morning, the woman in the black dress was standing in the kitchen pointing at Eloise. And Eloise was starting to lose her patience.
“I don’t like her,” said Finley.
“It’s better if we don’t judge,” said Eloise.
Finley swallowed a bit of eggs, then looked over at the woman in the black dress. “She has a bad vibe. Tell her to go.”
Agatha had told Finley that it was within in her power to ask people to leave. Of course, she had told Eloise the same thing. But Eloise didn’t do it very often. Only once, in fact. She’d asked The Burning Girl to leave. But over the years, The Burning Girl had visited a number of times. Eloise had tried to help her, even though she knew she shouldn’t. The Burning Girl was a black hole; she’d suck Eloise right in if she could.
Eloise sat down at the table with the plate Finley had made her and began eating.
“Mimi,” Finley said after a moment. She put down her fork on the plate with an annoyed clink. “You can’t just let her stand there like that.”
It was getting a little uncomfortable. Still, there was a reason for the visit. It was Eloise’s job to figure out what it was. Finley pushed her chair back and stood in front of the woman in the black dress.
“Please go,” she said. “Now.”
“Finley.”
But the woman in the black dress turned her back and walked away. She began pacing the hall again, stomping those hard little heels. Finley sat back down, continued her breakfast.
“She can’t just stand there like that, pointing,” the girl said. “Who does she think she is?”
“She’s angry,” said Eloise. “Somebody took something from her.”
The image of The Three Sisters came vividly to mind. Eloise saw them: Abigail, the wild one; Sarah, the one who asked too many questions; Patience, the beautiful one. They were the daughters of the Reverend Good, and they lived in The Hollows in the late 1600s. It was not a good time to be wild, to ask questions, to be bewitchingly pretty.
“Why is she just getting an attitude about it now?” asked Finley. “She’s obviously been around awhile.”
Eloise didn’t know the answer to that. “Everything has its season.”
Eloise got up and took the manila envelope she’d left on the counter, walked it over to Finley. She slipped the drawing out and handed it to her granddaughter.
“Whoa,” said the girl. She stared at it for a long time.
Eloise cleared the dishes and waited. Finley didn’t say anything until everything was done, and Eloise had poured more coffee and returned to her seat. Then she turned those glittery eyes on Eloise.
“I know them,” said Finley. “I’ve dreamt about them. They were witches.”
“So-called, yes,” said Eloise. “But they were probably just like us.”
Finley shook her head. “No,” she said. “They were different from us.”
Eloise frowned at her granddaughter. “How so?”
Years ago, at Agatha’s insistence, Eloise visited The Hollows Historical Society for the very first time. The HHS had just moved into the Victorian, and Joy Martin had just taken her place as president and head librarian, though she’d been doing the work for some time. Agatha had been certain that Eloise would find a host of colorful characters in her genealogy. Eloise’s power had almost certainly been passed down through a long line of mystics, Agatha insisted, and was certainly not the result of a head injury, as Eloise had believed. Agatha had not been wrong.
Eloise learned about The Three Sisters. Another distant cousin had been a fortune-teller. Her mother had been diagnosed with schizophrenia, which Agatha said was often the case when people didn’t understand what was happening to them and didn’t accept it. It drove them insane. Eloise’s aunt, who helped raise her and then disappeared, worked as a psychic healer in New Mexico until her death. Eloise had also discovered that her lineage crossed with Jones’s mother-in-law, hence the connection there.
“Abigail was a telekinetic,” said Finley now. “She could move things with her mind. Sarah could predict the future. And Patience, she was more like us. She could communicate with the dead, had visions.”
Eloise didn’t say anything, just let Finley go on.
“Their mother taught them to hide their powers,” said Finley. “She knew how dangerous it was. They were very, very powerful.”