Poison to Purge Melancholy (7 page)

Noah sat at the table, slapping a hand upon the documents before him. “Make sense of this, lad—show me profit—and I shall be able to host such affairs and invite you.” With a laugh, he took up his own pint and touched the drink to his lips. “So, good sir, shall we commence my music lesson?”

Downstairs, I found the
front door wide open, left that way by Beth Ann, no doubt. I didn’t stop until I was over the threshold and cold air slapped my cheeks, knocking sense into me.

What was I running from?

I looked back over my shoulder, as far up the stairway as I could see from where I stood. Muted gray light from the window above bathed the landing. Nothing there a coat of fresh paint couldn’t fix.

I felt like a complete idiot.

Luckily, no one had noticed. Out in the street, Foot was maintaining that a tourist trap like Williamsburg ought to have more than one taxi serving the train station on any given afternoon. And that he should be compensated not only for the half hour he’d waited at the station, but for having to share the cab, wasting yet another fifteen minutes dropping off an elderly couple at a motel way up on Capitol Landing Road.

Horse was paying off the driver, who was whining that he had to get back to the train station. Glad was trying to placate everyone with a lot of “Now, now”s and other useless utterances. Beth Ann stood back from the group a bit, hands still in her pockets. I couldn’t see her face, but her body language wasn’t happy. Not that I blamed her—Foot
was
putting a damper on the Christmas spirit.

Glancing back into the house, I recalled what I’d heard that afternoon about the place being haunted. Were my panic attacks courtesy of Nick’s trick-playing ghost? “Nothing scary,” he’d said. Ha! Or is this what Zela meant by “feeling ill”?

At any rate, this wasn’t like any haunting I’d ever experienced. My prior spook sessions had never been frightening—at least, never in the sense that I’d felt personal danger.

It dawned on me that settling the question might be as easy as going back inside, up the stairs to that first room, and closing my eyes. This was my way of politely introducing myself to any fleshless residents. If, in my mind’s eye, I “saw” some piece of the past, then yes, I was dealing with a ghost. If not, I had out-of-control hormones.

But I didn’t move, thinking instead of my promise to Hugh that I’d say no to the paranormal. I now embraced that promise. With it, I didn’t have to admit I was chicken.

I heard footfalls come up the wooden steps behind me and Beth Ann passed by, bound for the doorway.

“Where are you going?” I squeaked out, suddenly afraid for her, too.

She swung her head around, eyebrows rising into that Are-all-adults-this-stupid-or-just-you? look she gets. “Inside. It’s, like,
cold
out here?” She rolled her eyes, breathed out a “Duh,” and proceeded into the house.

I cast a glance at the street. The taxi was pulling away and Foot was wheeling his suitcase toward the curb. “And if that imbecile cab driver weren’t bad enough,” he was saying, “all the way up here on the train the woman next to me was jabbering to someone across the aisle. I was trying to speak to my secretary on my cell phone and could barely make myself heard. When I asked the woman to keep her voice down, she said she couldn’t hear her friend because of me.”

I suppose I should have stayed to be formally introduced to him. Instead, I followed Beth Ann inside, not wanting her to be alone in the house. Sure, she could be exasperating, but I cared about her enough that if the danger I’d sensed upstairs materialized, I’d throw myself between her and it.

To my great relief, Beth Ann headed through the dining room to the kitchen, grabbing a box of Swiss Miss hot chocolate mix off a pantry shelf en route. The smell of roast bird welcomed us, raising my spirits, though the room was dreary because the fluorescent light was out. I assumed Horse had turned it off as we left on our tour, so I tried the wall switch by the door, an antique with two buttons, one out, one already in. I pushed the outtie in, the innie popped out, and the top light went out.

Beth Ann glared at me as I switched the light back on. She started opening cupboards until she found cups. While she filled a mug at the sink, I wandered over to the oven.

“Don’t open it,” she said, bringing her water to the microwave. “We’re not allowed to look until—dammit, the microwave’s not working.”

Resisting the urge to censor her language, I glanced at the appliance in question, which was when I noticed that the lamp over the stove had a dingy white cord trailing down the wall, behind the long table. I bent over to take a gander below counter level. Sure enough, both the light and microwave were plugged into the same outlet on the baseboard. “Another fuse. At least it’s not the stove this time.”

“I
hate
this house.” Abandoning the cocoa idea, Beth Ann opened the refrigerator and inspected its contents.

I had a good enough view to be scandalized. To me, holiday dinners meant refrigerators so stuffed with food, you had to leap back when you opened the door lest a Cool Whip container full of black olives should fall on your toes. Oh, this fridge wasn’t empty by anything but Italian standards, but all I could see were basics like milk, eggs, drinks, and sandwich fixings. Hugh had said his mother would throw two lavish dinners: one tonight, one tomorrow. Before I could stop myself, I blurted out, “Where’s the food? For dinner, I mean.”

Beth Ann chose a can of Pepsi and closed the door. “Locked up in Grandmom’s other fridge, wherever she hides it in this house. We’re not allowed to see the contents until dinner. Like the turkey. Although we always have the same things: ham, turkey, yams—”

Glad came back into the room with Foot right behind her. His coat, suitcase, and brother were all missing, but he was still talking. I got the impression he hadn’t stopped, nor taken a breath, since he got out of the cab.

“. . . the salesgirl was downright rude. Didn’t want to answer my questions because other customers were waiting. I asked for her manager and he gave me a run-around about Christmas crowds. I said if they couldn’t handle it, they ought to hire more help. God knows they’re pulling in enough money . . .”

I guess I could have waited until he was finished, or until Glad found out about the fuse on her own, which would more likely come first. But I grew up in a family where everyone talked at once, and where not interrupting was considered a socialization disorder. Besides, Foot would be turning blue soon, so breaking in was a humanitarian gesture.

With a loud “Excuse me,” I told Glad about the microwave.

“Oh, bother. Now where did Ev put the new fuses?” A rhetorical question, because she went straight to the hutch beside the back door, picked up a brown paper bag, peeked inside, and pronounced them found.

Foot shut up as his mother bustled out of the room, Beth Ann in her wake, soda in hand. I thought he’d follow, too, but he didn’t. I wondered if
I
should, though by now, the fear I’d felt earlier seemed absurd. Beth Ann wasn’t in any danger. And my knees wanted me to sit down.

But first, I introduced myself to this new brother. “Hi, I’m Pat Montella.”

Giving me the LAG—his default expression—he took my offered hand in a dry, apathetic grip. “You’re Hugh’s, er, friend.”

Funny how he could make a nice word like “friend” sound so indecent. “Right, and you’re his, er, brother.” I hadn’t spent twelve years in corporate America without learning how to parry.

Horse came through the doorway. “I put your suitcase and coat upstairs in the first bedroom, Foot. Where’s Ma?”

“Fixing a fuse.” Foot’s tone equated that with shoveling manure.

“Apparently the fuses blow out a lot,” I said, resuming my seat on the bench. “Evelyn was fixing one when we arrived.”

Foot let out a grim sigh. “This place is a dump.”

Horse nodded. “Yes, brother, but it’s the dump of our ancestors and therefore sacred ground.” He crossed to the fridge and, like his niece, scrutinized the contents.

“We need to talk some sense into Mom this weekend,” Foot said.

“You always were the optimist.” Horse took out a carton of eggnog and, pinching the top shut, shook it. “Where’s your wife, by the way?”

“Irene’s working late tonight. She’ll drive up tomorrow morning and we’ll go home together. That’s why I took the train.”

“I swear, you keep getting married just so you’ll have a chauffeur. Be easier to buy a second car for yourself.”

“I
have
a car.”

“A collector’s edition ’Vette that you never take out of your garage.” Horse turned to me for an aside. “He never buys anything that depreciates.”

“And
he
doesn’t know the meaning of the word ‘investment.’ If he did, he’d be upset about Mom selling the house.”

I felt like the little target ball in bocce. Not that I have anything against family bickering. On Grandmom Montella’s side of my family, disagreement was an art form and calling a loved one
stupido
was a gesture of affection. But bringing in a third party wasn’t kosher. The sport of it was in direct confrontation.

“I never said I wasn’t upset.” Horse went over to the cupboard Beth Ann had left open and began pulling down punch glasses.

“Knowing our mother, I’ll bet she put the money in her
savings
account.” Foot shuttered as he said it.

“Calm down. We discussed all this last weekend. As soon as Hugh and Acey get here—”

The fluorescent lamp blinked a dim orange twice, then came on full. Grabbing the excuse to leave, I said, “I’ll go tell them they found the right fuse,” and hurried out.

Of course, my decision took me through the dining room. I put on the brakes in the hall doorway, realizing that here I was, alone, just beneath where I’d been spooked earlier. And I felt something. I can’t describe the feeling other than to say I was loathe to walk past the base of the stairs.

“This is silly,” I whispered. Nothing talked back, so my confidence was bolstered. Still, the creepiness remained. Well, I told myself, I’d handled this kind of thing before. And I didn’t have much time until Hugh arrived. “Okay,” I said, my voice soft so I wouldn’t be overheard by any of the Lees I wanted to impress this weekend. “Okay, if you
are
a ghost, give me some idea of who you are and what you want.”

I closed my eyes to wait for a vision, which is how it always worked in the past. My lashes were barely together for two seconds when I was kissed. On the mouth. Hard.

Backing away as fast as my feet would carry me—so fast I tripped on a chair leg and ended up sitting on the floor—my eyelids snapped open.

The doorway was empty, except—

Except for the sprig of mistletoe that dangled from the lintel.

Go to the kitchen
, Zela had said, and at that moment my one thought was to do just that, and stay there the rest of the weekend.

I would have, too—I was halfway there—when I heard Beth Ann behind me. “What was that noise? Sounded like something fell.”

I turned and there she was, in the doorway, right beneath the mistletoe. “Don’t stand there.”

“Why?” Half inquiry, half defiance. Her specialty.

In lieu of an answer, I went toward her with some notion of pulling her to safety. “Where’s your grandmother?”

“Still downstairs. She sent me up to see if the fuse was working.” With that, to my relief, Beth Ann moved into the dining room, until she could see through the pantry into the kitchen.

“The light’s back on,” I said. “I was coming to tell you.”

“You were going the other way.”

What could I say to that?

Luckily, she was too impatient to wait for an explanation. Spinning around, she said, “I’ll go tell her.”

“No! I mean, I’ll go with you.” The last thing I wanted to do was go into the hallway, but I couldn’t let Beth Ann cross what I’d begun to think of as “the war zone” by herself. And stranding Glad downstairs by the fuse box didn’t seem like a good idea if I wanted her to like me.

But out in the hallway, the creepiness had vanished.

“Grandmom?” Beth Ann called from the top of the cellar steps, which were lit by a bare bulb hanging from the ceiling at the base of the stairs. A full basement opened out to the right, with a dirt floor, but to the left was a dark crawl space, ending less than three feet below the rafters.

Beth Ann repeated her call, louder. Still no response. Glad was either a bit deaf, or something was wrong.