Delia's Shadow (37 page)

My unease grew on the way down to breakfast. Ghosts lined the staircase and clustered on the landing. Most sunk back into the wall to avoid touching me, projecting fear that penetrated the edges of my defenses. The air chilled far beyond what was normal for July, becoming cold enough that I saw my breath.

My attempt to cling to reason shredded and vanished. Something was wrong. The number of spirits confronting me was far greater than I’d imagined left in the house. I’d though the majority of the ghosts had gone, banished and laid to rest with the discovery of their bones.

Aileen’s ghost stood in the entryway, hands folded at her waist and her shawl draped neatly over her shoulders. She stared intently, asking for my attention. I’d shut her out the night Matt died and had no intention of opening the door for her. Before I braved letting Aileen inside again, I’d need Isadora near.

I swept past, ignoring the pleading in my ghost’s eyes, and growing more anxious by the minute. That I was still angry and a bit frightened of her might speak ill of me, but Isadora taught me ways to protect myself for good reasons. Ghosts weren’t to be trusted. I’d deal with Aileen Fitzgerald on my own terms, not hers.

The kitchen held more restless dead, strangers who’d died at Ethan’s hand as well as the two haunts I thought of as Esther’s ghosts, Teddy and Blythe. Teddy seldom allowed me to see him, Blythe almost never. They stood in the open with the other spirits, radiating the same fear and turmoil.

That everything appeared normal didn’t ease my mind. Annie stood at the sink, washing dishes and singing one of her favorite hymns. The kitchen was empty but for her, a rare thing with all the men guarding the house and how much joy she took in feeding them. Rare, but not ominous.

“Annie … where is everyone?” Sadie wasn’t upstairs; I’d expected to find her in the kitchen with Annie. I swallowed, trying to moisten a mouth suddenly gone dry. The ghost’s fear took root and became mine.

She smiled over her shoulder, mischief twinkling in warm brown eyes. “Well, you certainly took your time coming down this morning. Gabe’s been gone to work for hours. You missed having breakfast with him.”

I’d grown used to having him in the house and she’d every right to tease me. Annie couldn’t know how terror gnawed at my middle or how the ghosts’ silent regard affected me. How much I needed Gabe here, right now, right this moment, startled me. I braced my hands against a kitchen chair and held tight. “I’ll see Gabe at supper. Sadie wasn’t with Mama Esther when I peeked in. Where is she?”

Annie grabbed an old towel and wiped her hands. “She went out nearly two hours ago. Marshall went along with her. That dressmaker’s helper called first thing this morning and said there was a problem. Told Sadie to get right down there or she might not have a dress for tomorrow. She was upset and rightly so.”

“Who else went with them? I’ve forgotten who’s on duty today.”

“No one. Two of the other boys came down sick last night and there’s only three of them to keep watch this morning.” Annie frowned. “Marshall argued with Sadie about waiting until he could get somebody else out here, but you know how she can get. Once she started crying, he ended up agreeing to take her to the dressmaker on his own.”

Pressure built in my head and in my chest, making me dizzy. Aileen’s ghost appeared and crowded me up against the table. She stared, angry and baleful one instant, and imploring me to do something the next. Her emotions battered me, real and impossible to shut out.

“They shouldn’t have gone alone. Gabe needs to know.” I couldn’t deny that something was dreadfully wrong or that Marshall Henderson had disobeyed orders. Understanding why was more difficult. Aileen attempted to touch me, but I stumbled backward to stay out of reach. “And Dora … she’ll help me. We have to call both of them right now.”

The temperature in the kitchen plummeted. Frost formed on windowpanes, the rim of the sink, and ice crystals crazed the wet countertop. A frigid wind, sharp-edged and smelling of pine, slammed open the swinging door, and bounced it off the wall. Dishes rattled on the shelves and a glass tipped, rolled off, and fell, shattering on the linoleum.

Annie hugged herself against the chill, narrow-eyed with anger. “That ghost’s acting up again. I knew right from the start letting her stay was a mistake. No good ever comes from letting a spirit linger.”

Other ghosts appeared around Aileen, standing in a half-circle behind her. She drew power from the other spirits, but Aileen Fitzgerald was the center and the focus of the chaos whirling through the kitchen. Accusation burned in her eyes. I’d failed somehow and she held me responsible.

My fingers went numb, cold creeping up my arms to lodge over my heart, and I dropped to my knees, shivering. Darkness crept around the margins of my vision and my throat closed, leaving me unable to breathe. The ghost meant to kill me.

“Stop it. Stop!” Esther appeared in the doorway, a specter in her own right. Arms braced against the doorjambs, her white cotton nightgown flapped around her ankles in the phantom wind and milkweed-pale hair whipped around her face. “Teddy, make them stop. Force that girl to leave Delia alone or I’ll never forgive you. Do it!”

The wind diminished to a whisper and died, taking the cold away as well. Annie helped me stand and brushed the hair off my face. “Speak to me, sweetheart. Tell me you’re all right.”

A strangled croak was all I managed the first try. I coughed and cleared my throat, but my voice was still rough and barely recognizable. “See to Esther. I just need a moment and I’ll be fine.”

Annie hesitated, but Esther’s frailty decided her. She slipped an arm around the older woman’s waist, preventing her from sliding to the floor, and ignored the way Esther continued to rail at people who weren’t there. “Let’s get you back to bed, Miss Esther. I think we’ve both had near enough excitement for one day.”

“I want that girl out of my house.” Esther strained against Annie’s hold, reaching for Aileen’s ghost. Her small, fragile hands appeared skeletal, fingers hooked into claws. She began to weep. “This is all her fault. Don’t make excuses for her, Teddy! That barmaid led the jackal to my Sadie and Delia. If he hurts either one of them, I’ll drop that girl’s bones into the bay myself. Get out, the lot of you! Find my Sadie and bring her back.”

“Take her upstairs, Annie.” I held in panic, smothered grief newborn and refused to believe. Belief would make Esther’s raving real. “I’ll call Gabe.”

The kitchen door swung closed behind them. One by one, the ghosts around Aileen came apart. Motes of dust sparkled in sunbeams and rose toward the ceiling, the last visible evidence of how many haunts had filled the kitchen. The last to go was Teddy, Esther’s champion. He went reluctantly, sharp-eyed and aware of me in a way I’d not sensed before. I was left alone with Aileen’s ghost, serene and mild without the others at her back.

Dora had been right from the first. I couldn’t afford to trust the motives of a ghost or allow sympathy to creep into how I dealt with spirits, especially one as powerful and determined as Aileen.

She might have killed me, with no more thought or remorse than Ethan Brennan showed his victims. I hardened my heart, finally seeing the ghost for what she truly was and not some lost, maligned soul. Aileen Fitzgerald wanted revenge far more than justice or peace.

My defenses thickened as well. That internal awareness of Aileen, and the pulse echoing my heartbeat that I’d grown accustomed to, disappeared. Being alone in my own head after so many months was an odd sensation. I shoved through the kitchen door and ran to the parlor, praying that the desk sergeant would summon Gabe to the phone without questions or delay.

And once Isadora arrived, I could decide about banishing my troublesome ghost for good.

CHAPTER 20

Delia

Furniture in the parlor wasn’t meant to be comfortable. The thinly padded, high-backed chair I sat in near the front window was no exception, but I’d chosen this seat for the view of the street and the front walk. Policemen milled about the front yard aimlessly or clustered in small groups to talk, the entire squad waiting for orders of where to go and where they might begin to search for Sadie. The cheerful, smiling young men I knew all wore angry scowls.

Jack stood alone off to one side of the front yard, faced closed off and fists clenched. The squad had stern orders not to allow him farther than the front gate. As long as he stayed put, not one of the men approached him. As tight as Jack was wound, I couldn’t blame them.

I’d never waited well or gracefully. As time passed without word, my annoyance rose and my tolerance vanished. I needed to do something, to feel useful, but anything I might do required Dora’s help. Waiting for her strained what little composure I’d maintained. My mood was a carefully balanced house of cards and the threat of collapsing into inconsolable weeping too real.

Gabe had given up all pretense of patience. He paced the room from end to end, pausing at the window to brush aside lace curtains and peer out, repeating the circuit again almost immediately. Frustration at not knowing where to begin, and fear of what might happen if delayed too long, chased him around the room.

Annie had tried to explain and make excuses, but that only fueled Gabe’s anger and fed his guilt. Marshall Henderson was a rookie, inexperienced. He’d put too much responsibility on Marshall’s shoulders, too soon.

Esther’s heartbroken crying echoed through the house. Her sobs were punctuated with angry shouts, commands to do something, and for someone to bring her daughter home. Annie’s repeated attempts to soothe her came to nothing. Esther’s distress tore at me, but in an odd way her pleading gave me hope. The ghosts spoke to her, conveyed information I wasn’t privy to, and she’d understood what was happening long before I was sure. If she believed Sadie was alive to be rescued, so could I.

The phone jangled, sounding two long bells and one short, the ring for our line. Gabe spoke to the operator briefly and she connected him to the person calling. He ran fingers through his hair and said little, listening hard to catch each word over the static on the line and Esther’s cries.

“Thank you, Polk. Canvas the street and see if anyone saw anything.” The call was bad news. His pained and stricken expression said as much before he spoke. “Sadie and Marshall never arrived at the dressmaker’s shop. A foot patrolman found the car abandoned on a side street a mile or so from the shop. The rear wheel had come off.”

Ethan’s handiwork. I laced my fingers together tight, hiding how my hands shook and pretending calm wouldn’t slip away if I trapped serenity in the palm of my hand. “What now?”

“I have every available man in the department out on the streets. They have orders to keep an eye out for Ethan’s cab. I have a dozen men checking every location mentioned in Sam Parker’s files and another ten poking around the taverns Ethan’s wife said he frequented. That’s all I can do for now.” Gabe pulled aside the curtain, watching Jack as I had. He was always in control around his men. Only with me did he let down his guard, letting his worry and sense of futility show. “It doesn’t feel like enough, Dee. Not near enough. We’ve covered this same ground a dozen times or more, and I don’t have much faith this time will be any different. Ethan has the knack of vanishing when he chooses. I’m starting to believe Isadora’s theories of guiding spirits.”

Another patrol car pulled up to the curb. Dora barely waited for the car to stop rolling before leaping out and striding toward the house. She stopped long enough to embrace Jack and exchange a few words before continuing up the front steps. Baxter trudged behind her, struggling with a large picnic hamper.

“Dee … Isadora’s here.”

“I asked her to come.” I took a breath, my fingers clenching tighter before slowly relaxing. “Dora and I spoke on the phone after I called you. She suggested something and I agreed to try. There are … there are ways we might be able to find Sadie in time. I know you believe that the ghosts are real, but I need more from you than simple belief. I’m asking you to trust that everything I tell you is true. And I need a promise you won’t interfere.”

“I trust you.” Gabe offered his hand and I took hold. “But I’d like to at least know what you have planned before I give my word. You wouldn’t be asking for promises unless this was dangerous.”

Dora strutted into the room, heels clicking on the wood floors and silk shantung summer coat swirling around her ankles. Even in a crisis, Isadora dressed to the nines. Baxter followed a few steps behind and she pointed him at the settee. “Put the basket there, Noah. Now be a dear and keep Sergeant Fitzgerald outside. I’ll call if I need you.”

She plopped down on the settee, as tired and worn as I’d seen. Dora crossed her legs, one foot jiggling at a furious pace as she peeled off her gloves and shrugged off her coat. “Life is dangerous, Gabe. Dee and I need to take a calculated risk in order to reach Sadie in time. The danger to either of us is miniscule compared to what Ethan will do. Once we know where he’s taken her, you and Jack can do your job.”

Isadora was right, but I saw Gabe struggle with accepting. We asked much from him in terms of faith and trust. That he gave it said a lot about Gabe’s character. “I agree, we have to find Sadie quickly. But I still want to know what you’re going to do and why it’s dangerous.”

“Nothing for you to fret about, Lieutenant. It’s simply a matter of control.” She smiled, bright and guileless. Gabe’s expression made it obvious that he didn’t believe for an instant. Neither did I. “We have an overabundance of powerful spirits connected to this house and the people who live here. Dee and I are going to send two of them out to seek Sadie. This only becomes dangerous if control slips away from either of us. You’ve my promise, I won’t let that happen.”

“I don’t understand.” Gabe frowned, more annoyed than bewildered. He knew Dora well enough to sense when she kept secrets. “How can you find Sadie, but not Ethan?”

“Sadie is anchored to this house. So is Delia for that matter. Ethan isn’t. It’s the unique combination of spirits and place that gives this a chance of working.” Dora rummaged in the picnic hamper, coming up with white candles, a large square tablecloth, and bundles of dried herbs. “Be a pet and hold these for me, Dee. I’ll take them back as soon as Gabe and I clear a space on the floor.”