The Ghost and Mrs. Mewer (A Paws and Claws Mystery Book 2) (3 page)

“A mayor can take a vacation, no? While I am gone, you will handle anything that comes up.”

I was pretty sure that there were no rules of familial succession when it came to governing, but I figured we’d take that up when the time came. After all, she was only an interim mayor, and I had a hunch that while she liked the idea of a cruise, it might be difficult to talk her into actually leaving Wagtail, even for a few weeks. The woman was as stubborn as I was.

“You are settled in, Holly?” she asked.

“I wouldn’t exactly call it
settled
. But now that I’m here, I can take my time unpacking. I think a few pieces of furniture will have to go across the hall into the storage attic. Is that okay?”

“Yes, of course.” She gazed at Trixie. “I cannot get over the change in Trixie.”

“You mean her fur?” I asked.

“It is so soft now. And almost white!”

I knew just what she meant. When Trixie adopted me, she had been abandoned and living outdoors, eating what she could scavenge. Her fur had been yellowish and harsh to the touch. I thought her fur was becoming silky, but it was hard to tell because I was with her every day.

Her sweet, dark eyes reminded me of a seal. Trixie often wore an earnest look, like she was worried. I assumed that was the result of being homeless and fending for herself so long. Her black ears flipped over in a very sweet way. Other than her ears and cute little nose, a black spot on her rump that went halfway up her tail was the only other bit that wasn’t white. No one had docked her tail. About ten inches long, it usually curled upward.

Zelda knelt to pet her. “It’s amazing what a difference decent food can make. She says she feels better, too.”

I tried hard to hide my grin of amusement when Zelda relayed Trixie’s thoughts. I imagined she did feel spunkier though. If her fur had improved, it only stood to reason that her general health had, too. “Should I help Shelley with the welcome reception?” I asked Oma.

“That would be good of you. She is a pro and probably needs no help, but check with her, yes? And I would appreciate your assistance tonight at the bonfire.”

“We’re having a bonfire?”

“Not the Sugar Maple Inn, the whole town. It’s one of our Howloween events, along with a hayride through the haunted woods. You’ve arrived at just the right time, liebchen. There are events planned every day to draw visitors to our Howloween celebration. Rose is in charge of it.”

That explained a lot. Rose Richardson was Oma’s best friend and like another grandmother to me. If she had planned the Howloween events, Oma and I would be right there by her side, helping out.

“It gets bigger and bigger each year,” Oma continued. “All the rooms and rental cottages are sold out this week. Isn’t that wonderful? Do you have a costume?”

“You mean like a Halloween costume?”

“Of course.” She smiled at Trixie. “I have just the thing for you, my little one.” Oma led the way into her office, pulled a costume out of a bag, and held it up.

It took me a moment to figure it out. Longish white ruffles flared from both ends. The center was a deep brown with white lettering. “A Tootsie Roll?”

Oma laughed. “Isn’t it cute? It would never work for Gingersnap, but it is perfect for Trixie’s body shape. Do you have a costume, or should I help you put something together?”

Until my move to Wagtail, I had worked in fund-raising and had attended more than one costume gala. “I have some things. It’s just a matter of finding them in all the boxes.”

I left to help Shelley, pleased to see that Trixie and Twinkletoes alternately followed and raced ahead of me, feeling quite at home. But when I neared the grand staircase, Mallory of the coppery hair, coauthor of the ghost book, intercepted me.

“This would be such a perfect place for a wedding!”

“We host quite a few of them.”

She gazed at the grand staircase, her face lighting up with bridal euphoria. “He would love a Halloween wedding. No lights, just candles. At midnight! The witching hour, when spirits are the closest. I could walk down these stairs in a long ivory gown. Oh! A pumpkin wedding cake with cream cheese frosting, and martinis with olive eyeballs in them. Wouldn’t that be fantastic?”

“Would you like to book the inn for next Halloween?”

“Hmm?” She swung toward me. “I’d like to do it
this
Halloween.”

“That’s not much time. It’s only days away.”

She gazed past my ear at the stairs. Blotches of red flashed up on her face, and I thought she stopped breathing. The corner of her mouth twitched. “Well, maybe next Halloween would be more realistic, but I’d rather not wait that long.”

Felix, Mark, and Grayson ambled down the stairs with Casper in the lead.

Mark headed for us with a distinctly unhappy look. “Excuse us, Holly.” He gently touched Mallory’s elbow and ushered her a few feet away.

“Sweetie,” she cooed in a tone that even I knew was saccharin-fake, “where have you been?”

There was no sweetness in his tone. “Knock it off, Mallory.” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “I thought I made it very clear that you are not involved in this project.”

She batted her eyelashes at him. I almost laughed. Who did that? Had she watched too many old movies?

Mallory’s eyes strayed like she sought an escape hatch. They landed on Grayson and floated to Felix. “Felix!” She skittered over to him. “You don’t mind if I come along for dinner, do you?”

Felix blinked in surprise. “Uh, sure. It’s okay by me, but I . . . I’m not in charge.”

She flashed a pleased look at Mark.

Eva arrived from the other direction with Mrs. Mewer on a leash. Her mouth open, she stopped dead.

Mark lowered his head, but I could see his jaw twitching with anger. Clearly annoyed, Mark hustled after Mallory. “It’s not fair to put Felix on the spot. I’m sorry, but this is a private reception and dinner afterward. I’m not footing the bill. We have reservations, and I can’t just start adding people. I was very clear about this with you, Mallory.”

“You’re such a doofus sometimes.” She pecked Felix on the cheek. “I’ll see
you
later, Mark.” Mallory started for the front door. She stopped mid-step at the sight of Eva. “Well, isn’t this interesting?”

Mark barked, “Mallory!”

“I’m going,” she sang. With a wicked smile and a twist of her shoulder at Eva, she finally left the inn.

Eva appeared paler than when she checked in. I rushed to her side. “Are you all right? Can I get you anything?”

“I’m fine, thanks. Just a little shock at seeing a ghost from my past.” She flicked an angry look in Mark’s direction. “Excuse me. I’d better hurry over there to meet Mr. Luciano.” She picked up Mrs. Mewer and made her way to the sitting room, her head held high.

I kept wineglasses filled while Shelley circulated with miniature salty Virginia ham biscuits, herbed goat cheese crostada topped with caramelized red and yellow peppers, and cheese-straw witches’ fingers with almond-slice fingernails at the tips.

Most of the conversation revolved around ghost hunting. They swapped stories, and I heard them exclaim as they discovered they had mutual acquaintances.

When the ghost hunters left for dinner, I helped clean up and finally trotted upstairs to my apartment.

An hour later, it looked like it had been ransacked. I thought I’d been careful about marking all the boxes when I packed them, but evidently not.

We developed a ritual. I sliced a box open with Trixie sniffing it. As soon as I determined that it wasn’t the correct box, Twinkletoes jumped inside it to investigate. I had never seen such a snoopy cat. She was adorable, hiding in boxes and raising her head just high enough to peer out. Inquisitive green eyes dominated her white face. Just above them, it looked like she had shoved sunglasses up on her head with one lens of dark chocolate and the other of caramel. Her body had the typical calico pattern of dark chocolate and caramel patches on white. Even though she was still just a kitten, her tail bushed out in a fancy dark plume.

I did manage to place a few items on the bookshelves and fireplace mantel, but I didn’t have time to unpack each box. Maybe when the Apparition Apprehenders had left, and I had become accustomed to a daily routine at the inn, I could focus on unpacking in an orderly manner.

A shriek of glee escaped me when I located my flapper outfit—a heavily beaded red dress with a black feather boa and a red headband adorned with more black feathers. Hah! I had even packed the bead necklace with it. Perfect.

Twinkletoes grabbed the boa with determined claws, as if she thought it the best toy ever. It wasn’t easy to remove it from her clutches. In the end, she escaped with a black feather, and I tucked the boa neatly in a drawer for safekeeping until I dressed.

*   *   *

At seven thirty, I followed Oma’s instructions to prepare for the bonfire. I loaded one of the inn’s electric golf carts with lanterns, urns of hot cider, chocolate bars, marshmallows, graham crackers, three carved pumpkins with candles, and a flashlight. Dressed as a flapper, I took my wagging Tootsie Roll companion and drove through the quiet streets of Wagtail to the opposite end of the pedestrian zone. The golf cart barely hummed, but dried leaves crackled under the wheels as I drove up to the creepy Wagtail Springs Hotel—the perfect backdrop for a Howloween bonfire. Many of the leaves had fallen, and as though it had been ordered, a not-quite-full moon shone through gnarled tree branches. No one else had arrived yet.

I was a little spooked just looking at the two-story hotel. Moonlight gleamed on the white building. Front porches ran across both levels. I could imagine people rocking on them in the hotel’s heyday, much as they did at our inn. Chimneys shot up the side on each end. Dark and forbidding, the windows of the old place almost begged for stories of ghosts. No wonder the Apparition Apprehenders would be investigating it.

A large white gazebo off to the side and set back on the lawn seemed eerie alone in the dark. It housed one of the original mineral baths from the days when Wagtail had been a spa resort. In the 1800s, Wagtail had thrived on visitors who came for the waters.

I tried to shake off the dismal feeling and hopped out of the golf cart, but Trixie wouldn’t come. She sat on the golf cart seat, fixated on the old hotel. And then she barked like crazy.

I had only heard her bark with such intensity once before. That time, someone appeared out of nowhere. I scanned the hotel but didn’t see anything unusual.

She kept up the wild barking. I seized the flashlight, turned it on, and aimed it at the hotel. On the second-floor porch, the beam caught a movement. I held the light steady.

An older man with silvery hair rose slowly and disappeared into the building. I double-checked my cell phone. Did it work here? Wagtail was notorious for poor signals. Only one carrier worked at all, and reception was sporadic at best.

One bar. That was better than nothing.

The man emerged from the front door. He walked toward us leisurely but with an able gait. I trained the flashlight on him. He wore jeans, a red plaid flannel shirt, and heavy boots. I put him in his seventies. As he approached, I realized that he was laughing and was actually fairly attractive. A black Labrador followed him, almost hidden in the dark.

He patted Trixie. “I’ve heard about
you
. Bet you’re a great hunting dog.” He reached a calloused hand toward me. “Doc Kilgore. Sorry if I spooked you. I was waiting for my scout troop to arrive with wood. They’re building the bonfire.”

My heart was still pounding, but I relaxed a little bit. “Who is this?” I asked, stroking his dog, who wagged his entire rear end as though I was his new best friend.

“Siggie. Named after Sigmund Freud because I think he calms my patients.”

“So you’re a people doctor, not a veterinarian.”

“Exactly. Some folks ’round these parts think I should retire because my hair isn’t black anymore, but I’ve still got my wits about me. Can I give you a hand here?”

“That would be great! There’s supposed to be a table set up somewhere.” I gazed at Trixie. It wasn’t going to be easy to unload everything with her on a leash.

“What’s wrong?”

“Trixie hasn’t been to dog school yet, so I was debating whether to let her off her leash.”

“She’s got a GPS collar on her. I bet she’ll be fine. Siggie will keep her around.” He spoke with such confidence that I wanted to believe him.

With some trepidation, I unlatched the leash. “Stay close by. Do you understand?” She wagged her tail, but I knew that was meaningless. Maybe Doc was right and playing with Siggie would keep her from roaming.

Doc Kilgore and I set the lanterns on the table and lit the wicks so we could see better. The scouts arrived just as we finished setting up the last urn.

I thanked him for his help and watched as the young boys crowded around him, each one shouting for his attention. They obviously adored him.

Trixie and Siggie danced among them, sniffing the wood they piled into a pyre and snatching particularly enticing pieces to drag away.

I finished setting out the marshmallows, graham crackers, and chocolate bars. I placed pumpkins at intervals along the table and lighted the candles. “Hey, Doc,” I shouted. “Did the scouts bring branches for the s’mores?”

He had them build a small campfire for cooking so no one would get too close to the bonfire. The scouts arranged a lovely heap of branches near the end of our table.

Visitors to town drifted over to see what was going on. Before long the bonfire blazed. Oma and her best friend, Rose, joined me to hand out hot cider laced with cinnamon.

Just behind us, a tractor pulling a hay wagon rolled away. People and their dogs sat on hay bales for a nighttime hayride by the cemetery and along a road through the woods.

“Will there be ghosts on the hayride?” I asked Rose.

She laughed. “Of course. And maybe a vampire or two!” Rose made a darling Miss Marple in a dowdy gray wool hat with a short brim. Her hair fluffed out beneath it. She wore a heavy tweed jacket over a fussy lace blouse with a large cameo brooch clasped at the throat. I felt as though Miss Marple had walked off the page and into Wagtail.

I studied Oma for a moment. Tidy blue suit, white button-down shirt, sturdy shoes, a magnifying glass hanging around her neck. Had she cut her hair or was that a wig? I didn’t want to offend her by asking what was going on. Her taste usually ran a little more to what she called country elegant.

It wasn’t until a man said, “Thank you, Mrs. Fletcher,” that I realized she was in costume. She had always loved mysteries. I should have known.

I watched the bonfire and the happy people in costume, most of them with dogs or cats in costume, too. I recognized Mr. Luciano and his bulldog, Gina, and waved to them. Mr. Luciano always made me think of the movie
The Godfather
, no doubt due to his deep, gravelly voice and prizefighter build.

Felix, Mark, and other ghost hunters milled around him. The glow from the fire reflected on Mallory’s coppery hair. She tossed it back seductively and appeared to be flirting with Felix. Eva, on the other hand, stood apart, looking lonely.

I excused myself and brought her a cup of cider. “Where’s Mrs. Mewer?”

“Oh, thank you! How thoughtful of you.” Eva sipped the cider. “I took Mrs. Mewer back to our room. I loved taking her to the restaurant. They even had a feline menu. I thought she might be too nervous to eat but she snarfed their salmon. Still, she’s never been anywhere except the veterinarian, and I thought the big fire might scare her, so she’s taking a catnap to recover from all her new adventures today.”

A yellow lab with three heads dipped her middle nose toward Trixie, who pinned her ears back and edged away toward the safety of my legs.

I did a double take myself. Eva and I exchanged a look and giggled.

The lab’s owner had attached an additional head made out of felt to each side of her collar. No wonder Trixie was confused. The three-headed dog appeared very real.

I bent over to reassure Trixie. “It’s okay. Two of those heads are fake.”

Casper, the Weimaraner, buddied up with Trixie like they were old pals. Emboldened by the presence of Casper, Trixie joined him in sniffing the mysterious extra heads of the yellow lab, who waggled happily at all the attention.

Flames from the bonfire licked up at the velvety night sky. In the mountains, the stars always seemed closer, and tonight was no exception.

In the distance, a glow-in-the-dark skeleton walked a large dog wearing a glow-in-the-dark dog-skeleton outfit.

Eva had turned her attention to Mallory, who clung to Felix, laughing and flirting.

“Everything okay?” I asked.

“If I had known she was going to be here, I never would have come.”

“If it’s any comfort, I gather she’s not part of the Apparition Apprehenders.”

Zelda joined us. “If Mallory is with Mark, would someone please explain to me why she’s flirting with
my
Felix?”

Eva gave a jolt, spilling her cider. “
With Mark
?”

“Didn’t she say they were an item?” asked Zelda. “They wrote that book about Wagtail’s ghosts together.”

“Ughhhh.” Eva closed her eyes and pressed a palm on the top of her head. “I am so stupid.”

“I don’t get it,” said Zelda.

Eva adjusted her glasses. “Once upon a time, Mark and I were a couple. When he invited me to join this group we exchanged e-mails and talked on the phone, and it”—she sighed hard—“it seemed like old times again. He was charming at dinner, but now I see why he wanted to include me. That devil.”

I shot Zelda a questioning glance.

She shrugged.

Eva caught our moment of confusion. “Sparks! Fireworks! If Mallory and I engage in a cat fight it will boost the ratings of the show.”

Now I saw where she was coming from. I would have been furious, too. How dare he dupe her that way? “But wait—Mallory isn’t part of the show.”

Eva peered at me over her glasses. “Then what is she doing here? Why is she hanging around? No, no, Holly. It’s the same reason Mark put Brian and me together. He knows we’ll have some disagreements.”

“What if you don’t?” asked Zelda.

Eva snorted. “Impossible. Brian always pulls childish tricks. I’m bound to catch some of them.” She eyed Mark. “But two can play this game.” Eva smirked at us. “Give me a few minutes, Zelda. I’ll lure Mallory away from Felix so you can move in on him.”

Eva strode toward Mark and Grayson.

“I like her!” Zelda fluffed her hair. “Now all we have to do is fix you up with someone.”

“No, thanks. I’ll sit this one out.”

“Aww, pining for Ben?”

It was my turn to snort. “That relationship is dead in the water.”

“How can that be? He asked you to marry him.”

“In a text, Zelda! That’s not a real proposal. Besides, once I decided to move here, he was so miffed that he acted like I was already gone. I’d hardly call that love.”

“Look, look,” Zelda whispered.

I couldn’t tell what kind of magic Eva had worked, but sure enough, Mallory abandoned her grip on Felix to hurry toward Mark and Grayson.

Zelda was already moving in on Felix. I chuckled to myself, happy for Zelda. I hoped Eva was wrong about Mark’s motivation for including her, though. Inviting her so she and Mallory would spat seemed even worse than a texted proposal. I returned to my job of handing out cider.

“Wow! Great costume!” Felix’s friend was as animated as a kid who’d eaten too much candy on Halloween. A little on the tubby side, he held a half-eaten chocolate bar in his left hand. He straightened his baseball cap that said
I’d rather be ghost hunting
, leaned toward me, and reached out his beefy hand. “Brian Anderson. Holly, right?”

“Right. Are you enjoying Wagtail?”

“Sure am. What a dinner! Luciano is pulling out all the stops for us. And everybody has been so nice. Like they’re excited to have us here.”

I filled a cup of cider for him. “They probably are. It’s not every day that someone makes a TV show in Wagtail. What do you think of the ghastly old hotel?”

Brian accepted the cider. “I can’t wait to get inside that place.”

“Does Casper go with you?”

Brian nodded vigorously. “He’s our ghost dog. Weimaraners are called ghost dogs because of the gray color of their fur. Sometimes in the dark, Casper looks kind of like a ghost. We even call him Ghost as a nickname.”

I laughed. “That’s an appropriate breed for a ghost hunter. Has he ever sniffed out a ghost?”

“Yeah! Dogs see things we can’t see. Or maybe they smell them. They don’t close themselves off to possibilities of another realm. They just react to what’s there. Casper is pretty good. He’s not much of a barker, but he senses things and alerts us to their presence.”

Brian reached down to stroke Casper’s back. “I wish you had alerted me to Eva’s presence,” he grumbled, looking toward the fire where Eva chatted with a group of ghost hunters.

Felix and Zelda had drifted over for cider.

“Don’t let Eva get to you.” Felix sighed, then said to me, “Brian had a little run-in with Eva last year.”

“Oh?”

Brian yanked at his ear. “Aw, she’s a pill. If I had known she was coming, I might have reconsidered.”

“No, you wouldn’t have!” Felix clucked at him. “There’s no way you would have missed out on this.”

Brian grinned. “Yeah, you’re right. But I would have known what I was getting into. Catch you later, Holly.”

The three of them wandered off to gaze at the old Wagtail Springs Hotel. Casper sprang ahead of them looking a bit ghostly as they left the glow of the fire. I was very pleased that Trixie chose to stay by my side. She was probably worn out.

We closed down at eleven. Oma and Rose helped me pack the food service items into the golf cart and rode back to the inn with Trixie and me.

After unloading, I headed straight to my grandmother’s private kitchen—not the tiny one in her apartment near the registration area or the professional restaurant-style kitchen for the inn, but the big kitchen next to the dining area. Off-limits to guests, it was our private retreat in the inn and doubled as a private dining and sitting room. When I was growing up, my parents had shipped me off to Oma and the Sugar Maple Inn every summer vacation. I had spent many happy hours in that kitchen.

Unless I missed my guess, Oma’s fridge would be packed with leftovers from breakfast and lunch. Trixie bounded ahead through the pet door that led to the kitchen. I pushed open the door to the dark room. My hand was on the light switch when Trixie growled at the ominous shadow of a person at the door that led to the garden.