The big windows gave a great view of the back of the mansion, and through the darkness we could see the ghosts out in the rain.
A crack of lightning sounded overhead and my mom’s face tightened. “Well,” she breathed.
“That can’t be good,” said Kip, gazing out at the rain and the frolicking ghosts.
“It most definitely isn’t,” said my grandmother. “But it happens from time to time. Nothing to worry about. You young folk are so dramatic.”
“Of course we’re dramatic. That’s at least a hundred solid ghosts,” said Lizzie.
The back field was filled with them, all hanging out in the rain, just floating around.
“Think they’re going to attack us?” asked Meg.
“I doubt it,” I said, smothering a yawn. “Why would they do that?”
“Right, nothing bad has happened to the ghosts yet, it’s just the skeletons we have to worry about,” Pep said.
“Exactly,” I said. There was a lump in my throat.
“I don’t like that they know about what happens when they stand in the rain,” my mother said. Her voice shook a little.
“They probably knew before,” I said. “I think it’s fine . . .”
We waited a few more minutes watching the ghosts, but everybody was too tired to stand there doing nothing.
My eyelids drooped and I wobbled a little on my feet. As Lizzie and Cookie turned to leave I saw Gus through the window.
He turned around and gave me a little wave. I gave him a little wave back.
I did wonder about what would happen if it rained more often.
Something was wrong.
Something was very wrong.
I had come home just in time.
Chapter Thirteen
Despite how late I’d been up, I was up bright and early the next morning. The world looked fresh and shiny as it only can after a night of thick rain. The grass gleamed and the sun shone. Scarcely a breeze stirred the old trees, which had just started to lose their leaves. The world smelled like fall.
Everything appeared peaceful, and it should have been. But the actual fact was that there was an investigator at the mansion, and that meant that the peacefulness was an illusion.
I’d had a hard time sleeping, and I was remarkably hungry for first thing in the morning. Since my stomach wouldn’t stop rumbling, I had finally gotten out of bed and gone in search of breakfast. Even if Audrey had yet to prepare her usual spread, I could still have a muffin and some cereal to tide me over.
Still in my PJs and not totally awake, I wandered into the cavernous old kitchen, ready to enjoy the peace and quiet. Outside, there was no hint of the storm from the night before.
I was halfway to the counter when I saw that somebody was already sitting there in the pale yellow early-morning sunbeams streaming into the kitchen.
I came to an abrupt halt in a strip of bright warmth.
My hackles went up. How dare anyone disturb my quiet coffee run?
Coffee was worth a lot. But talking? I wasn’t ready for that.
“What are you doing here?” I demanded.
“Eating my breakfast,” said Grant, glancing over his shoulder. He was dressed in his gray uniform and he looked like he’d been up for a while already.
I was acutely aware that I was in Winnie the Pooh pajamas. Hey, Winnie the Pooh was classic. I tried to order my eyelids to open all the way, but they needed the strength of caffeine to accomplish the feat, and someone was sitting between me and my goal.
“Good morning, by the way,” he said. He was clearly far more of a morning person than I was.
Morning people can’t be trusted.
“Good morning,” I said. I grabbed a cinnamon muffin, poured myself some orange juice, found the biggest cup we owned, and filled it with coffee. Then I sat and ate and drank in silence until I felt like a human being again.
Grant appeared to be eating a broccoli and spinach omelet. I wondered where he’d hidden the greens so Audrey wouldn’t see them. I saw him look with interest at my muffin choice, but excellent deducer that he was, at this stage of the morning he knew better than to comment.
“That was quite the show last night,” he said.
“Yeah, the haunted house is really popular,” I said.
“I meant the ghosts,” he said.
“Oh, those. The rain makes them solid,” I shrugged.
“I know, but I’ve never seen it in person before,” he said.
“You haven’t?” I asked.
“Clearly you’ve been spoiled here. I usually deal with skeletons. They’re the troublemakers,” he said. “You have an exceptionally large group of ghosts here at the mansion, you know that, right?”
I nodded. My family prided itself on keeping the best haunted house around, and the only way to do that was to have lots of ghosts. Until now it had never been a problem. They’d unionized, which had annoyed my mother, but Gus had pointed out that workers had rights too.
“You should go through the haunted house sometime when it’s open and see what it’s like inside,” I said, taking another bite of muffin.
Before Grant could comment further, our quiet tête-à-tête was interrupted by the arrival of my brother in the doorway.
“You ready to go?” Cam asked.
He wasn’t talking to me, but when he caught sight of me he said, “You look horrible. Haven’t you showered yet?”
I mumbled at him to shut up.
“I’m ready,” said Grant, pushing his chair back and standing up. Every time he stood up I was reminded how tall he was.
He took his dishes to the sink and washed them before he headed out. He was cute and he cleaned up. Need I say more?
Good thing Lark wasn’t there to comment. Or even worse, Lizzie.
My mind was whirling. It had been so long since an attractive warlock had come into my life that I wasn’t sure I knew how to handle it.
As he was walking out the door he said to me, “I moved the skeleton remains, by the way.”
“Can’t imagine why you think I’d care,” I said, putting all my focus on my muffin.
Today was a big day for me. Sunday was Shimmerfield Market Day.
We would rarely have gone into town, except that Uncle Taft insisted that we not close ourselves off entirely just because we were witches and ran a real haunted house.
“They need to be reminded that we’re here so they won’t think we’re weird,” he explained whenever we challenged him on the point. “Or at least so they won’t think our weirdness is that bad.”
So every Sunday, some contingent of my family went to the local farmer’s market. There were cheeses and breads, vegetables in season and cider during the fall. Usually there was a lady who knitted and a woman who made baskets. As Uncle Taft always said, it was a way to see and be seen and a way for us to stay a part of the “warm community atmosphere” to the extent that we could.
“Is Uncle Taft coming this week?” I asked as I met Lark and Pep in the foyer. Lark’s hair was wet and she was just tying off her fishtail braid.
“I think it’s just us today,” said Pep, pushing up her glasses. “Uncle Taft doesn’t come anymore. Last time he went he started telling a lady that the end was near and she got really upset about it. Poor lady didn’t know not to believe him.”
“Kind of like what he was saying to us on the roof?” I said.
“Yeah, he’s getting nuttier all the time,” muttered Lark.
“I’m not nutty! Look at the clocks!”
All three of us jumped as Uncle Taft came dashing into the foyer with his customary battered sword at his hip and an eyeglass hanging out of his eye. He was pointing at the grandfather clock next to the massive oak door.
“It looks the same as it always does,” I commented.
“That’s what you think,” he intoned.
“Is there anything you’d like us to bring back from the market for you?” Pep asked.
“A date scone would be very much appreciated,”
he informed us.
“Sure thing,” said Lark. “We’ll see you later.”
We didn’t live close enough to town to walk to the market, and anyhow, we always bought a lot, so driving was the easiest way to get all the goodies back to the house.
Out in the driveway, Grant’s fancy black vehicle was sitting next to our family’s car.
“Think that could withstand a skeleton attack?” I asked.
“I think it would do as good a job as anything,” said Lark.
We piled into the car and five minutes later found ourselves in downtown Shimmerfield. The market had already started.
“What are we looking for today?” I asked as we parked and headed down the sidewalk.
“Scones, for one thing,” said Pep, leading the way to the bakery booth. We came away with plenty of bread and muffins to last us the week. On top of a collection of scones, we also selected a supply of cookies.
“We should really buy some vegetables,” said Lark, looking around.
We spent the better part of an hour picking up everything we could imagine. Several of the townsfolk had been at the haunted house the night before.
“Nice opening weekend at the mansion. The SpookyBooSpectacular should be incredible! Your show gets better every year,” said Mr. Gray, Shimmerfield’s Chief of Police, stopping us as we struggled along with our bags full of supplies.
A zing of fear went through me whenever this happened, even though Chief Gray had always been friendly with our family and we hadn’t done anything wrong. Housing ghosts wasn’t illegal, after all. That would have required the wider world to acknowledge that they existed in the first place.
Still, somehow I always worried that I had a sign saying “The Garbos are witches” hanging from my neck for the police to read.
“Thanks for coming out to see it,” said Pep.
“Wouldn’t miss it,” said Chief Gray. “Been going there since I was a kid. It’s the best part of Halloween if I do say so myself.”
“We try to make it as fun, I mean scary, as possible,” Lark grinned.
“You all do an excellent job. That fat ghost is really something, and those skeletons always seem very real,” he said. “I don’t know how you do it. I guess makeup has gotten pretty good these days, not that I would know.”
“Yeah, it’s the makeup. We spend a lot of time getting the costumes ready,” Pep lied.
“You all should be featured in a magazine or something,” he said. “If anyone ever asks me what feature story I think should be done on Shimmerfield, I’m going to say your haunted house.”
“That’s very kind of you,” I said, trying to sound like I meant it.
“By the way, did you get a new car?” he asked.
“A new car?” I repeated.
“Yeah, the fancy black number in the driveway. I notice cars because I’m the Chief of Police,” he said.
“Oh, no, family friend is visiting,” I murmured.
“I can see why friends would come visit you on the busiest weekend of the year. I bet they love the show. All that rain last night . . . Oh, sorry, the wife is calling.”
Chief Gray’s wife was standing by the apple cider and waving him over. After he left, Pep breathed a sigh of relief.
“You’d think after all these years the lying would get easier,” she murmured.
“Funny, I don’t find it that difficult,” said Lark.
“Shocker,” Pep confirmed.
Lark grinned, baring teeth.
We packed all our groceries into the car and headed out. I glanced back at the market once, wondering if anyone in town knew anything about the smashed skeletons. Someone had done it, and it was either someone already staying at Bluff Mansion or someone in town. If it was someone in the house, that was terrifying. If it was someone from town, I wondered how on earth we were ever going to catch them.
What we really needed was a suspect.
I got home and helped my cousins put the groceries away. After that it was time to figure out exactly what had crushed the skeletons, because I knew it hadn’t been a hammer.
There was no sign of the police visitors anywhere.
Pep had to check some things in the gift shop, but she wanted to help hunt for whatever had obliterated the Skeleton Trio when she was finished.
We kept her company in the gift shop as she did inventory. It was a convenient spot, because we knew we’d be safe from prying eyes, meaning Cookie.
“First, where were they found?” I asked, hoping to brainstorm some clues.
“They were found outside. Where, by the way, they weren’t supposed to be,” said Lark. “Usually they just stay in the haunted house, but they were over by the carriage house, which is unusual for them.”
“That place is so full of old stuff, we’ll never find anything in there,” said Pep.
“Still, we should check it out,” I said.
One thing about living at Haunted Bluff was that there was always something new to be explored. The mansion was so large I still got lost from time to time, as in that secret passageway I had stumbled into before breakfast on my first full day back home.
As we left the gift shop and headed toward the back of the mansion, a closet door swung open, practically in our faces.
“What is the meaning of all these rumors! I demand to know!” It was Steve, confronting us in the dark hallway as usual.
“What rumors are those?” I asked him.
“All the rumors about skeletons being smashed and ghosts being next,” he said. “As a ghost myself, I’m downright perplexed.”
“Ghosts can’t be smashed,” I pointed out. “I don’t think you have the same thing to worry about.”
Steve was momentarily silent.
“You’ll be fine,” Pep said, trying to soothe him. “I’m sure the investigators will get to the bottom of it.”
“We cannot rely on them,” Steve warned us. “We must solve this as a family.”
“We’ll keep that in mind,” I said dryly.
“Where are you going now?” he wanted to know.
“We’re just taking a walk. Got to keep our circulation healthy,” I explained.
“Ah, very good. Keep those legs moving,” he said. “It’s so sad when the circulation stops.”
All of us looked uncomfortably down at his porous legs, then nodded goodbye and went on our way.
“I didn’t want to say this in front of him, but does he realize that whoever smashed the skeletons is very likely on the property as we speak?” Pep whispered as we left the house and headed outside.
“I don’t know,” I murmured. “I just don’t know.”
The carriage house didn’t house ghosts or skeletons, or for that matter bats, who mostly stayed in the cave in the cliff until we were ready for them during the haunted house nights.
The outside of the carriage house had once been white, but it had faded to a dull gray as weather and age had battered the exterior. Now the paint was peeling and the windows were covered in a thin layer of dirt, making it difficult to see inside and creating a very dim interior.
“This place is creepy,” Pep said as she tried the carriage house door, which rattled in response to her efforts. “I think it’s locked.”
“It’s probably just jammed,” said Lark.
Pep dusted off her hands while Lark tried the door, and with a little extra shove it reluctantly swung open.
“It was stuck on the floor.” Lark pointed to the concrete floor as we stepped inside.
It was a large space, dimly lit and very cold. I felt like I was entering another world.
“I haven’t been in here in years,” whispered Pep. “Look at that set of dining room chairs. You remember when Cookie insisted we get new ones?”
“I think she broke all the old ones just so mom had no choice,” Lark murmured.
“Mom keeps everything,” I said. “She always thinks we might have a use for something again someday.”
“Which is great un
til we’re trying to find something in particular,” said Lark, looking around at the mess.
I nodded absently as we made our way further into the carriage house.
“Should we split up or stay together?” Lark asked.
“We should probably split up,” said Pep. “We’ll cover more territory that way.”
With that agreed upon, we spread ourselves throughout the building.
The carriage house was larger than I remembered it, so large that I soon lost track of where my cousins had gotten to. I decided not to worry about it and tried to focus on the task at hand.
“There are so many boxes,” Lark yelled, sounding downright concerned.
“I don’t see anything heavy enough to crush skeletons,” I yelled back.
It was true, unless one of the boxes had been used as the weapon. I doubted that was possible, because the box would have had to be filled with something as heavy as gold. Even with all the clutter in the carriage house, there was nothing remotely like that.
We needed a lot of furniture to make Shimmerfield Mansion functional, but some of it still ended up out here. I examined things quickly, but everything I saw had dust under it and around it, and there were no bone fragments. The bureau pushed against the far wall clearly hadn’t been moved in years.
I kept going.
“Jane, where are you?” Lark called again. She sounded close, but I couldn’t see her around all the stuff in the way.
I yelled back to orient her to the sound of my voice. A second later my cousin came around the corner and said, “There’s nothing but boxes over there. I thought I might come search the furniture with you.”
I nodded gratefully, and we started working systematically through the furniture, looking for any clues.
“I don’t see anything,” I said at last, squinting through the dimness. The windows were covered in grime, letting in only enough light to see by.
Lark shook her head. “No one has been in here in years.”
It didn’t take long for Pep to join us. She had also come up empty.
“Aren’t you glad you came back here to search through piles of old boxes with us?” said Pep. “Way more fun than being in New York.”
“The gladdest,” I muttered.
Spooky Business (Jane Garbo Mysteries Book 1) Page 10