The Stubborn Schoolhouse Spirit (The Penelope Pembroke Cozy Mystery Series)

by Nickles, Judy

  “I’m not sure I ever did. Not completely. Anyway, that’s not all. Mary Lynn told me that when she’s in the building, she gets the feeling she’s not alone. And the other day she was looking to see what might’ve been left behind in the storage area and thought she heard voices.”

  “Ghosts?”

  “Do you believe in them?”

  “My granny did.”

  “But do you?”

  “Let’s just say I don’t want to get on the wrong side of a spirit.”

  “Oh, come on.”

  Shana shrugged.

  “Shana, you’ve got an MLS—a master of library science, not superstition. The former trumps the latter, don’t you think?”

  Shana chewed her lip. “I guess so.”

  “This is blessed crazy!”

  “Here’s another string of lights.” Shana held them out. “You liked Sam, didn’t you?”

  “Not all the time.”

  “What about now?”

  “I think about him. A lot. And if you tell anybody I said that…”

  “I know. You’ll cut my tongue out.”

  “With dull pinking shears. Shana, I don’t want to be a two-time loser.”

  “You weren’t the loser, Penelope. Travis was. He knew he’d lost Brad, and it really bothered him.”

  “It’s done now.”

  “Maybe Sam really is one of the good guys. Maybe he was playing both sides of the card.”

  “I’ve thought of that. Hoped it was that way, as a matter of fact.”

  “You’re too young to spend the rest of your life alone, Penelope.”

  “Better alone than miserable.”

  “You don’t look much better than miserable right now.”

  “I swear, you and Mary Lynn are going to blessed drive me crazy with that sort of talk!” Penelope got to her feet. “Come help me with these lights, and shut up about Sam.”

  ****

  Jake watched his daughter hang a sprig of mistletoe in the door between the parlor and the foyer. “Planning on kissing somebody, Nellie?”

  “No, Daddy, how about you?”

  “I might sneak a little sugar from Shana. She’s a sweet girl. She won’t mind an old man getting fresh at Christmas.”

  “Not you anyway.” Penelope climbed down from the ladder and folded it up. “Bradley’s bringing Rosabel Deane tonight.”

  “She’s a sweet girl, too. Make a nice daughter-in-law.”

  “I’m keeping my fingers crossed.”

  Penelope stored the ladder on the service porch beyond the kitchen. “You going uptown to meet the Toney Twins today, Daddy?”

  “Thought I’d have coffee with my daughter this morning.”

  “No, you didn’t. You saw the peach kolaches I brought home from Rose’s Bakery last night.”

  “Busted.”

  “When did you start talking like today’s adolescent?”

  Jake poured two cups of coffee and took them to the table. “When I decided I didn’t want to be yesterday’s old man.”

  “You aren’t. You won’t ever be.” Penelope brought the white box containing the pastries and set it in the middle of the table. “Daddy, you went to the old school, didn’t you?”

  “Sure did. Eleven years.”

  “Eleven?”

  “Only three years of high school back then. Most places had gone to twelve, but Amaryllis was always a little behind the times.”

  “How was there room for all the grades in one building?”

  “There weren’t that many of us. Only thirteen in my graduating class.”

  “Nineteen forty-two.”

  “Right. All the boys went down and enlisted the next day.” He blew on his coffee. “All six of us. Two of us came back.”

  “I didn’t know that.”

  “Three died in the Pacific and one in Europe.”

  “That’s awful.”

  “Wars are awful things, Nellie.”

  “The school was old even when you went there.”

  “I guess it was.”

  “Did you…I mean, were there any stories about…well, odd things happening?”

  Jake chuckled. “Was it haunted, you mean?”

  Penelope nodded.

  “Where’d you get that idea? From Mary Lynn?”

  “Was it haunted?”

  “Now that you mention it, yes.”

  “And you never told me?”

  “You never asked.”

  “Well, I’m blessed asking now.”

  Jake helped himself to a kolache and pulled it apart so that some of the filling dripped onto the plate. “Jeremiah Bowden built the first two-room school in 1880. The original rooms were bricked in as the school expanded, but they’re still there in the back. Seems to me like they were used for storage--janitor’s supplies, books, ink for the mimeograph machine.”

  “Storage.”

  “Well, they weren’t all that big as I recall.”

  “Why did people say the school was haunted?”

  “When the school was enlarged, they put in radiators for heat, so there was a boiler in the basement, and it was always going out. We used to say the ghost of Jeremiah Bowden was down there making trouble ‘cause he didn’t like changes.”

  “Mary Lynn filled up the fuel tank, but she can’t get the boiler working.”

  “I guess not. It’s been years since anybody tried to fire up that thing.”

  “She said the guy who brought the fuel said everything looked to be in good shape.”

  “Maybe. Did she run into Jeremiah Bowden?”

  “No, but she said she thought she heard people talking.”

  “Okay.”

  “Daddy, there’s no such thing as ghosts.”

  “If you say so.”

  Penelope shook her head. “Go uptown and spin your yarns with the Toney Twins.”

  “I just might. They were a couple of years ahead of me. They might remember something.”

  “And get lunch somewhere, too. I don’t have time to cook at noon with the party tonight. Mary Lynn and Shana will be here at one to help me in the dining room.”

  “Throwing your poor old Daddy out into the cold.” Jake pretended to shuffle toward the door where he kept his grey tweed cap and new suede jacket.

  “It’s sixty-one degrees, the sun’s shining, and you need the exercise.”

  Jake slipped his arms into the jacket with something akin to reverence and put on his cap. “I’m going.”

  “Bye, Daddy. Have fun.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  “The house looks terrific, Pen.” Mary Lynn turned to straighten her husband’s tie as he heaved his bulk out of his all-weather khaki coat.

  “Sure does,” Harry echoed. “This party is a nice idea.”

  “I thought so,” Penelope said. “Go help yourself to a plate in the dining room, Harry. Daddy and Bradley are already grazing.” She leaned toward Mary Lynn’s ear. “Bradley brought Rosabel tonight.”

  “I think she’s perfect for him. Is Shana here?”

  “Hiding out in the kitchen. She talks a good talk, but she’s scared to death of who she’ll run into and what they’ll say.” As Penelope spoke, Shana emerged from the kitchen arm-in-arm with Rosabel Deane, who wore a red turtleneck over cream white pants and accented with gold jewelry. Shana presented almost a mirror image though her sweater had a V-neck and a pattern of snowmen around the bottom. Both young women were smiling.

  “Looks like the long-lost twins found each other,” Penelope said.

  “Didn’t we?” Rosabel’s olive complexion, inherited from her Lebanese immigrant grandparents, gleamed in the candlelight, and her dimples seemed even deeper. “Shana told me what you’re planning for the old school, Mrs. Hargrove. I’d like to help, too.”

  “All hands welcome,” Mary Lynn said.

  The doorbell pealed. “I hope that’s our new folks,” Penelope said. “I told them to come early so they could mingle at a leisurely pace.”

  Penelope
threw open the door to the Dancers who held hands and wore almost identical leather jackets in a soft walnut hue over white cable knit sweaters and pressed Levis. “Merry Christmas,” Millie said. Her salt-and-pepper hair seemed whiter in the light from the foyer.

  “Come in this house,” Penelope said.

  “All the old homes on this street are gorgeous,” Millie said. “Mike and I want to buy if one ever comes up for sale.”

  “They come on the market all the time,” Mary Lynn said as she came up behind them. “People are always dying out, and their kids don’t live here and don’t want to hang onto the houses.”

  “That’s cold, Mary Lynn,” Penelope said. She turned to Millie. “Did you call your husband Mike?”

  Mike Dancer’s dark eyes literally danced in the younger face beneath his curly gray hair. “My mother, God rest her, named me for her grandfather, but after I got into two or three fights at school, I went by Mike. Even the Duke didn’t go by Marion too long.”

  “John Wayne sounds blessed better for a movie star,” Penelope said.

  “I agree,” Mary Lynn said. “Come on in the dining room and get something to eat before Harry decimates the spread by osmosis.”

  Millie stayed behind while Penelope hung up their jackets in the deep coat closet. “Thanks so much for inviting us tonight.”

  “It’s a good opportunity for you to meet folks.”

  “Everybody’s been friendly, most people anyway, but I guess new faces in a small town like this are always suspect.”

  “Not so much suspect as just a curiosity. And after what happened here a few months ago…”

  “I heard about that. It must’ve been awful for you.”

  Penelope shrugged. “I’ve moved on,” she lied.

  “Mike and I hope to be open New Year’s Eve.”

  “So soon?”

  “We’re doing most of the work ourselves, and Mike’s already been in touch with a plumber and an electrician. The bathrooms are awful.”

  “I never used them.”

  Millie grimaced. “You wouldn’t have wanted to.”

  As the chairs filled up, the younger guest curled up on the stairs with their plates, or plopped down in any available space on the floor. Though Penelope had specified come and go, most people came and stayed. She had to pull more quiche out of the freezer and bake another batch of icebox cookies. When Jake and Bradley went out for beer, Penelope turned a blind eye, rationalizing they didn’t cart home enough for anybody to get drunk on.

  The grandfather clock under the stairs chimed midnight as the last guest left. “Go home,” Penelope told Mary Lynn before she could tie an apron over her best slacks. “I’ll clean up tomorrow and there aren’t many left-overs to put away.”

  “That’s for sure,” Shana said. “I never saw people eat so much in my life.”

  “Holidays and parties do that to people,” Mary Lynn said. “Pen, it was great.”

  “Glad you enjoyed it. You’d better take Harry home and put him to bed while you can. I think I hear him snoring in the parlor, and I don’t want to find him still there in the morning.”

  Mary Lynn waved and headed for the parlor.

  Jake paused in the kitchen on his way to his apartment. “Late hours are okay once in a while,” he said, “but these will last me ‘til next year.”

  “It was fun, wasn’t it? I think everyone had a good time.”

  “They did, darlin’, but I’m more pleased you had a good time.”

  “I did, Daddy.”

  “Good.” He kissed her cheek.

  “The Dancers are nice folks, but they may have bitten off more than they can chew if they plan to open New Year’s Eve.”

  Jake paused in the door. “The way Mike tells the plans, I’m betting they can do it. Did you know the Sit-n-Swill was built where the schoolteacher’s house used to be?”

  “Which one?”

  “Jessie Ruth’s mother, Daisy Bowden Ives. She was Jeremiah’s sister. Anyway, the house burned down.”

  “When?”

  “Mike wasn’t sure. He got the other information from the abstract office. Jessie Ruth sold the lot after her mother died, which was in the early twenties sometime. It’s always been a bar since then.”

  “I didn’t know that.”

  “Last one was the Short Creek Bar. Then Roger bought it.” He rubbed his eyes. “Well, night-night, Nellie.”

  “Goodnight, Daddy.”

  She turned off the light over the sink and stepped through the swinging door into the foyer.

  “Hello, Nell.”

  She was sure her feet left the floor.

  The man who emerged from the shadows of the parlor, where Mary Lynn had turned out the lights after retrieving her husband, wore a thick white turtleneck under a navy blue pea coat.

  “Nice party?”

  Penelope managed to catch her breath, but she couldn’t stop the pounding of her heart. “Yes, and you weren’t invited.”

  “I invited myself.”

  “So what happened? You get sprung? Paroled? Pardoned?”

  He shook his head. “None of the above.”

  “You never saw the inside of a jail, did you?”

  “Well, not one I couldn’t walk out of whenever I wanted to.”

  “You blessed worthless fraud.”

  “Comes with the territory.” He took off his jacket and reached for her hand. “Let’s go in the parlor. It smells nice in there.”

  “Candles and potpourri.” She broke away from him and hurried around the room switching on all the lamps. He followed, turning them all off again except for one. She sat down in a wing-backed chair. He sat on the sofa and patted the empty space beside him.

  “Come over here.”

  “It’s safer here,” she said, but before the words were out of her mouth, she was close enough to feel the warmth of his body.

  “Now this is nice,” he said, putting his arm around her.

  She stiffened but didn’t pull away.

  “Missed you, Nell.”

  “I didn’t miss you. And what’s with the Nell business?”

  “A good old-fashioned name for a good old-fashioned girl.”

  “Oh.”

  “Well, let’s get business out of the way first. Did you tell your friend what I said about the school?”

  “No. Give me one reason why she should do what you say.”

  “I know things, remember?”

  “Excuse me for forgetting, Mr. Eastwood.”

  “So she’s going ahead.”

  “You bet she is. Shana’s going to help, and so am I. And Rosabel Deane.”

  “Officer Deane.”

  “Right. We’ll have police protection.”

  He sighed. “I wish you’d wait.”

  “How long?”

  “Can’t say.”

  “Can’t or won’t?”

  “Can’t.” He pulled her against him and put his lips against her hair. “I like your hair.”

  “Mary Lynn thinks I should do something different.”

  “Uh-uh. I like it this way.” His lips moved to her temple and down to her lips.

  She knew she should throw him out—or at least go upstairs and lock herself in her room, but she couldn’t move. The terrible, wonderful feeling in the pit of her stomach got worse and better all at the same time. “Sam…”

  “Don’t talk.” Before she could react, his lips had moved down to the V of her emerald-green silk blouse.

  She pushed him away and pulled the edges of her blouse firmly together. “Don’t, Sam. Please don’t.”

  “You know you like it.”

  “That’s the problem.”

  “Were you a virgin when you married, Nell?”

  She wanted to tell him yes, but it would be a lie. Travis had seduced her weeks before their wedding.

  “So you weren’t. Well.”

  “Travis…”

  “Was he good?”

  She sat up and pushed him away. “What b
lessed business is it of yours what went on in my bedroom when I was married?” She clutched the edges of her blouse even tighter.

  He leaned his head back against the sofa. “Things were going so well.”

  “For you maybe.”

  “I’m good, Nell.”

  “I’m sure you’ve had plenty of practice.”

  “Enough.”

  “This is crazy, Sam. I don’t even know who you are.”

  “Is that important?”

  “I think so.”

  “Sam’s not good enough?”

  “No.”

  “Well, all I am is Sam.”

  “I don’t care if you’re the President.”

  “I need a place to stay tonight.”

  “The front room is available.”

  “I was hoping the back room would be available.”

  “That’s my room, and no it’s not, and if you stay, you better believe I’ll lock my door.”

  He stood up. “Okay. What are you going to tell Jake when I show up at breakfast?”

  She felt her face get hot. “Then leave before breakfast.”

  “No clown waffles?”

  She sprinted for the stairs. “You know the way to the front room.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Penelope locked her door and put a chair against it. Then she undressed without bothering to turn on the light. She could still feel Sam’s lips and hands and how she hadn’t wanted to pull back. She didn’t have to imagine what would have happened if she hadn’t. She’d always regretted that she hadn’t pulled back from Travis that night in the backseat of his new car.

  “Darn you, Sam,” she whispered into the darkness. “Who are you, and why do I even care?” She ripped back the quilt and slid into bed. The sheets were cold. What would it be like to snuggle against a man’s body on a cold winter night? After they’d heated things up, of course.

  Stop it, Penelope. Age is no excuse for the sin of lust.

  She sat up, clutching the covers around her. Had she really heard a knock on the door?

  “Sam?”

  Silence.

  “Sam?”

  This time she heard his low, rumbling laugh moving away down the hall. Curling herself into a tight ball, she buried her face in the pillow and wept.

  ****

  In the morning when she went downstairs, the kitchen was empty, but her eye caught a note propped

  against the sugar bowl in the middle of the table. She ripped it open.