Emily's Ghost (20 page)

"I banged on your door and
no one answered," she managed to say amid the cries and shouts and
what's-going-on's of her guests. She turned back to the confusion
and counted heads. "That's everyone, then. Everybody out now.
Please!"

Trucks were arriving,
their sirens wailing, their red lights slashing the length of the
entry hall. Emily never got a chance to respond to Maria's
challenge; she was gathered up with the rest of the group and
herded out by a fire fighter approximately twice her size. They all
huddled on the lawn, clinging to themselves not so much with cold
as with anxiety, and watched black-slickered men move through the
house and grounds with purposeful efficiency.

Maria joined them in a
little while and was instantly set upon by her guests while Emily
hung back. Maria murmured a few things that Emily couldn't hear,
but she had the sense that she was being discussed as the Obvious
Suspect. Which was of course crazy. If anything, it was Maria who
had some explaining to do.

Why couldn't I get out
through the new door?

The closeness of the call
began to sink in. She could have died of smoke inhalation. Who
would have heard her calls for help? After all, she and Maria
hadn't heard the telephone ringing when they were in the tower, nor
had they been able to hear Mrs. Gibbs at the front door. Of course,
there were the neighbors. Maybe they would have got to her in time;
maybe they wouldn't.

Emily walked a little way
apart and stood on a grassy knoll that overlooked the orderly chaos
taking place alongside the tower. The fire truck was in position,
its turntable aligned, its hydraulic lifters sending the ladder
skyward. A tiny burst of flame from the tower drew a cry from the
crowd on the street and sent a shudder through Emily.

"What is going
on?"
she whispered to
herself.

"Ye're a damn fool, that's
what."

She turned to see the
ghost standing between her and a lilac tree. "Fergus!" She was
incredibly relieved to see him.

But Fergus was blistering
with anger. "How could ye be so
stupid,
marching into a house of
iniquity once I said not to?"

"You didn't tell me not
to," she said, taken aback by his fury. "You only said
you
couldn't. I assumed
you were barred from entering by some kind of ghost regulations. Or
that -- well, never mind."

"Jee-sus, woman, that
ain't a tearoom ye went into. The house is
empowered."

"To do what?" she asked
without thinking.

He stood there, dark and
shadowy, his anger dissipating into an ominous stillness. "I don't
know. I only know that there is a power there. I can sense
it."

She shuddered again.
"Don't, Fergus. You're frightening me."

His anger erupted anew.
"I'd like to shake ye till yer teeth rattle! Don't ye
understand?
Ye could
have been killed. I'm
trying
to frighten ye, goddammit!"

"Excellent work, in that
case," she said, plunging her hands in her pockets and drawing her
arms close to her sides for warmth. "Naturally I know why you're
concerned," she added with sullen nonchalance. She was watching the
fire fighters go through their paces: Two were inside at windows,
and a third was on the ladder, snaking a hose through to one of
them. he saw no flames, only small curls of smoke billowing from
the open casements. "You're concerned that I won't be around to
figure out who killed Hessiah," she said to Fergus. "Because where
would that leave you -- literally?"

There was an iron garden
bench nearby. Emily sat down wearily on it, idly fingering the
crumpled photograph still in the pocket of her skirt. Fergus came
and took a place beside her; his silence spoke volumes. She knew
she shouldn't care whether or why he cared, but she did.

In the pale cast of
moonlight he looked truly spectral, as did every other player in
the drama that was playing itself out on the stage below them. She
stared at the pallor of her own arms in the silver light and
thought,
What difference is there between
us that a speck of time won't settle?
She
felt very alone, and very mortal.

"Fergus ... I think Maria
Salva tried to kill me," she said quietly.

"Ye couldn't get out of
the room, I take it."

She shook her head. "If
she didn't lock me in, I don't know who did. I suppose it's
possible that when I rattled the door in my panic, the bolt on the
other side dropped down into place. But I didn't start the fire. It
seems too coincidental."

"She may be an instrument.
Or she may have had nothing to do with it. The house is empowered,"
he repeated.

"I won't ask to do what,
anymore," Emily said with a short laugh. "I don't want to know."
She drew in a deep, deep breath and exhaled, clearing her lungs
once and for all, and then forced herself to stand up. "I guess
I'll thank my hostess for her hospitality and head home after all.
Is there anything," she asked dryly, "you'd like to see while we're
still attached to each other in Newarth?"

He thought about it, then
shook his head no. "'Tomorrow is another day,'" he said with an
irrepressible look.

She smiled despite
herself.
"Gone With the Wind.
Was that on TV, too?"

"TNT," he said at once.
"And a glorious film it is."

"So now you're a cinema
buff, too. Let's hope you don't get hooked on the daytime
soaps."

"Not damn likely," he
answered with distaste. "They're too unrealistic."

****

When Emily arrived at her
desk the following morning, the first thing she saw was an
open
Newsweek
with the following tidbit highlighted in yellow marker:
"There is talk that Massachusetts Senator Lee Alden, whose
paranormal pursuits are becoming an open secret with his
still-doting voters back home, may be challenged for his Senate
seat. Congressman Boyd Strom, who wants to see 'dignity and good
judgment restored to the office,' has been gathering political and
financial support for a run in the primary this
October."

The second thing she saw
was a while-you-were-out message telling her to call about the
parakeet, price reduced.

The third thing she saw
was a handwritten note from the managing editor, Phil Sparke,
telling her to be in his office. Now.

She was dialing the number
to Lee Alden's Washington office when Stan Cooper came back to his
desk, balancing a cellophaned crumb cake on a cup of vending
machine coffee. He gave her a sly and sleepy good morning and said,
"Which one are you tackling first: the rumor, the bird, or the
boss?" He tore open the crinkly wrapper. "It looks like you're
going for the bird."

Emily dropped the phone
like a hot brick. "No, it looks like I'm going for the
boss."

"A wise choice." He said
it casually, brushing crumbs from his cotton sport coat, but then
he caught her look and held it before adding, "Want to talk about
it yet?"

"Talk about what, Stan?
I'm on to an interesting story, not my usual thing, but a nice
summer piece. Light and easy."
Ha.
"When I get a little farther along, I'll clue you
in."

"You're in over your head,
kiddo," he warned. "National politics is big time."

"Who said anything about
national politics? This one's about a little history, a little
mystery, that's all."

"Nothing to do with your
upcoming interview with Senator Alden?"

"Nothing at
all."

Obviously he didn't
believe her. "I'm telling you again, you're in over your
head."

"Everything's under
control, Stan. I gotta run; Phil's waiting."

She walked away with the
uneasy sense that Stan was not only professionally jealous but
determined to sabotage her interview with Lee Alden in some way,
possibly by putting in a bad word with the news editor. Too bad she
couldn't just tell Stan that she'd decided to kill the interview.
How could she
not
kill it? She'd been to bed with the interviewee, and her
emotions were in a state of chaos. The longing she felt over their
time together caused her actual physical pain whenever she thought
of it, so naturally she tried not to think. She needed desperately
to come to terms with that night, but with a ghost running around
demanding justice, who had the time?

Not to mention she didn't
care to be humiliated about her own work. Originally -- it was true
-- she'd had hopes of getting the senator to embarrass himself. But
Fergus had made her a believer and changed all that. Besides, if
the
Newsweek
rumor were true, the senator would no doubt play it safe in
an interview, and safe wouldn't move her career along at all. No,
the best thing she could do would be to let Lee Alden off the hook.
In every way. She wondered whether the parakeet call was about the
interview. She didn't dare hope it'd be about anything
else.

Emily saw the editor
through the glass walls of his computer-laden office before he saw
her. Phil Sparke looked exactly like his name: a balding, energetic
dynamo who liked to clamp cold cigar butts in his teeth while he
made reporters' lives hell. So far Emily had managed not to get the
cigar butt pointed at her face. Until now.

"What the hell is going on
here, Bowditch?" the editor demanded. "I just got a call from
Senator Alden's office canceling your interview with him next
week."

What nerve!
"Did he say why?"

"He's going with
60 Minutes
instead."

What nerve!
She shrugged and said, "That's it, then, sir.
Television. More exposure."

"
I don't wanna hear that!
You
should've had that interview nailed down tight as a drum. What the
hell kind of reporter are you? We don't shrug off exclusives around
here, Bowditch. Christ, the guy's in
Newsweek,
a campaign fight's brewing
-- I want that interview!"

Emily stared down the
barrel of a cold cigar. "But he canceled," she said in a tiny,
fearful voice.

"Well, uncancel
him!"

"How?" she asked in a
tinier, more fearful voice.

"Call the son of a bitch.
There's the phone. Here's the number."

She stared at the slip. It
was the number. "Now?"

"Now,
goddammit."

As far as Emily could
tell, there were only two ways out. She could throw herself through
the plate glass window and be carried off bleeding on a stretcher,
or she could feign a stroke and be carried off unconscious on a
stretcher. Phil Sparke would settle for nothing less. She let him
hand her the phone while he punched in the number.

This was it, the
professional low point of her life. The ditch. The sinkhole. The
lowest rung of the limbo pole. Crawling back to a man she hadn't
even had the chance to reject, just because another man was
standing there telling her to.

"Hello, Senator?" she said
faintly at the sound of Lee Alden's voice. "This is Emily Bowditch.
I was wondering, Senator. Would you ... reconsider ... granting me
the interview?"

That was it, her entire
speech. It was all her pride would allow. If the result was
dismissal and foreclosure on the condo, so be it.

After a brief but
agonizing pause the senator said, "I canceled because I got the
distinct impression the other night that the less you saw of me,
the better. Was I wrong?"

"In some ways," she said,
squirming under Phil's baleful eye.

"You sound like you're not
alone. Okay, we'll talk about it later. Actually ... I'll be in
Boston Friday night for a fund-raiser at the Copley Plaza. I'll
FedEx a ticket to you. Emily, I've got to free up this line. I'm
expecting a call from the White House; they need my vote on a bill,
which makes now a good time for some serious horse trading. I'll
catch you on Friday night."

Catch me? Does he think
I'm falling?

"Well?" asked her boss
after she hung up.

"Probably," she
answered.

Phil Sparke beamed. "I
knew you could do it." Now that he'd got his interview back, he
became almost kindly. He asked Emily what project she was working
on, and she told him the story of Hessiah Talbot, omitting some
things -- notably Fergus -- and fudging others. He thought the
feature had possibilities. He made a suggestion or two, and Emily
left him in a very good mood.

For the rest of the day
she worked on her consumer complaint column. Every once in a while
her glance strayed to the open
Newsweek
still on her desk, but she
refused to ask Stan whether he'd put it there. No doubt Stan
thought she was the one behind the paranormal rumors. Maybe even
Lee Alden thought it -- was that why he'd canceled? Still, the
truth was it could have been anybody, from Jim Whitewood (an
opportunist if ever there was one) to the chatty Mrs. Lividus,
Kimberly's mentor.