Dead Level (35 page)

“Oh, Sam, have you ever heard anything so rich? So … so … 
perfect
?” she asked, her face streaming tears.

Sam climbed down from the ladder. He put his arm around his mother, whose shoulders still shook with emotion. He’d tried out a lot of feelings about what he’d seen.

But it hadn’t occurred to him to laugh about it. Or cry, as she seemed now to be doing.

“Wade saw him, too,” Sam said. “I’m sure he did. Like Dad was … 
warning
us, or something.”

His mother nodded. “So did Bella. It was why she was grouchy all the time. She was terrified, didn’t know what to believe, and didn’t want to admit it.”

But then his mother looked serious. “The thing is, though, Sam, we were all thinking about him. We all knew his … his …”

“Deathiversary,” Sam supplied.

“Yes. We all felt that date looming, in some way. So—”

“So it could’ve been, like, a mass hallucination? Just our thoughts fooling us? But you don’t think so, do you?”

He could see that she didn’t. But before he could say more, Harold Brautigan came in, his step by now so familiar across the back porch that the dogs didn’t even get up.

“Hi,” the young man said shyly. He’d been staying here in the guest room since it all happened. “Just thought I’d say so long.”

Tall and stoop-shouldered, with messy brown hair and an odd kind of irresistibly loose-lipped grin, Harold had a backpack in one hand and a big bunch of flowers clutched in the other.

He thrust them at Sam’s mother. “And thanks,” he added. “You all have been really great to me.”

“We’ve enjoyed getting to know you,” Jake replied.

But now the shy young man was going back to Manhattan to quit his terrible job, then apply to the community college in his hometown in upstate New York. His big goal, he’d confided to Sam, was a degree in criminal justice.

They walked to the door, while Sam’s mother got a vase for the flowers. “Listen, Sam,” said Harold. “The little guest room I stayed in. Anything unusual ever happen in there?”

Not unless you count my dad dying in it
, Sam thought. After a short illness, the newspaper obituary had said.

Short but not sweet. “Nothing I know of. Why?”

No sense in getting Harold going on that subject just as he was leaving. Although—the thought struck Sam suddenly—if Harold had seen something, too, without knowing anything about Sam’s dad or the deathiversary, then …

Harold frowned. “Ah, no reason. Just … no. Nothing at all. Forget it.” He looked up, smiling genuinely at Sam.

“Take care, buddy.” Then he was gone, across the porch and down the front walk, his step jaunty.

From the doorway, Sam watched Harold stride off through the crisp, fallen leaves, downtown to where the cab would get him and take him out to the bus stop. He stood watching for as long as he could stand it. Then—
something unusual
—he called out:

“Hey, wait a minute!” Sam took off running. Harold turned curiously.

“Wait,” Sam called, feeling happy suddenly, as light as a feather. “Wait up, there’s a question I want to ask you!”

ALSO BY SARAH GRAVES

The Dead Cat Bounce
Triple Witch
Wicked Fix
Repair to Her Grave
Wreck the Halls
Unhinged
Mallets Aforethought
Tool & Die
Nail Biter
Trap Door
The Book of Old Houses
A Face at the Window
Crawlspace
Knockdown

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

SARAH GRAVES
lives with her husband in Eastport, Maine. She is at work on the next Home Repair Is Homicide mystery.