The Gallery of the Dead (Tropical Breeze Cozy Mystery Book 3) (2 page)

“Where did you see the ghost?” Teddy asked warmly.

“Oh. In the gallery. Upstairs. You know, where the
thing
happened.”

Teddy turned to me to explain the suicides nearly a hundred years ago, but since I was the one who had given him the local gossip in the first place, I was naturally impatient. I didn’t interrupt, but I probably didn’t manage to hide my irritation, because I found Misty glaring at me.

“I see,” I told him shortly. Then I turned back to Misty. “And were you aware of the house’s tragic past before you came here with your real estate agent?”

“Oh, no, not at all! The first time we walked through it, I simply fell in love with the place, and there was just that one little shiver I had in the gallery, which I didn’t understand at the time, so I made an offer on the house right away – not what they were asking, of course, because you never do that in a down market, and the house needed some repairs – but we bargained back and forth and came to an agreement and I bought the place, because how was I to know what was to come?”

“What was to come?” I asked, jotting down a reminder to talk to Rocky Sanders.

She stared at me blankly.

“What’s happened since then?” Teddy asked. Warmly.

“Oh! It was about two months later, after I had been living here about a week. I was remodeling the house before opening the inn, and the
noise
and the
dust
were just
exhausting
me. When I finally got into bed that night I just lay there, kind of regretting that I would have to share my new home with lodgers, but of course, I had always intended to run it as an inn, and I do love entertaining. I don’t really think of it as providing
rooms
to
let
; I shall think of it as entertaining. And with Paul to help me, I’m sure we’re going to be a great success. I’m an excellent chef, you know, and I was experimenting in the kitchen, getting my breakfast menus settled, deciding which little temptations to make for afternoon tea, and of course, making the larger decisions, such as whether or not to serve hard liquors as well as wine with the cheese trays for the evening soirees. I think not –“

I found it necessary to interrupt. “And the incident took place in the gallery at the top of the stairs? Was this during the daytime?”

She looked at me blankly.

“We know how difficult this must be for you,” Teddy said tenderly. She didn’t look to me like she was having difficulty with anything but staying on point, but my approach was only making her mind go blank, so I decided to continue my note-taking and let Teddy take the lead. Realizing that this was going to take all day, I looked at my watch, and Teddy frowned. Then he smiled at the lady, flicked a glance at me that clearly said, “Watch and learn,” and went to work.

When I conduct an investigation, I maintain certain standards of ethics. Teddy has a different approach, and in order to get results, he’s prepared to use his considerable charm. I have no charm. I’m aware of it, but I feel it doesn’t matter and I don’t let it concern me. I simply state it as a fact.

Teddy’s method appeared to begin with small talk: leading the subject to think of pleasanter things; engaging in mindless banter, punctuated with laughter when, as far as I could see, there was nothing to laugh about. This was how he proceeded, anyway. While he verbally wandered around with her, I reviewed the little information I had been given ahead of time.

Teddy’s notes were vague, but on the second page he did state Misty’s age at 48. She looked older.

The house had been built in 1899 by one Ephriam Whitby who had at least one daughter, Cassandra. At the time of Misty’s purchase, the house had still been known as the Whitby House, though it had had other owners. As the other two prattled on, I made the following observations about Misty McBain:

“Physically she seems to be suffering from exhaustion, but there are no obvious signs of illness or dementia. She is tall, close to six feet, and somewhat plump. Bad posture. Medium-brown hair turning to gray. She has chosen to wear a floral print dress of the hausfrau variety, not shabby, but not chic, along with a ruffled apron. Women in this geographical area tend to wear jeans or slacks this time of the year (late spring), so the fact that she is wearing a dress either reflects the way she feels a female innkeeper should appear, or denotes excessive femininity of an old-fashioned type. Apron: ditto.

“She has a rolling walk, as if her feet hurt, but not what I would term a limp. Shoes: pink slippers. She seems short-sighted, but does not wear glasses. This could be vanity in the presence of Teddy, but there are no indentions on her nose where glasses would rest, so perhaps she is simply confused much of the time. This would make her
look
short-sighted.

“Paul resembles her physically, even as to height and weight, but has not assumed the innkeeper persona. Simply appears to want to please Mother. Dresses as an average young American male: cargo shorts, sandals and a tee shirt which is emblazoned with surf boards, beer bottles and a large hamburger. Speculation: he tends to wear billed caps when outdoors, sometimes with the bill turned backwards. Young for his age. Lacks self-confidence.”

After ten or fifteen minutes, Teddy began to get actual information out of Misty and I stopped making observations and listened.

Out of thin air, apparently, he asked, “Are you married, Misty?”

“Widowed,” she said.

“I’m so sorry. Recently?”

“A little more than a year ago.” She paused mistily and gestured at the walls. “He left me with a little nest egg, and there was insurance. And so . . . I was able to buy my dream house.”

“How wonderful. And did you and – I’m sorry, what was his name?”

“Albert.”

“Did you and Albert have any children besides Paul?”

“No,” she said, touching her son’s arm affectionately. “It’s just the two of us now.”

The death of a spouse can affect a subject’s perception. I made a note to sound her out later about how she’d taken her husband’s death. Now we were getting somewhere.

“Have you lived here in Tropical Breeze all your life?”

“Oh, no, I’m not a Breezer.”

“A what?”

“A Breezer. It’s what people from Tropical Breeze call themselves. No, I grew up just down the road in Flagler Beach. But of course, I shopped in Tropical Breeze, and I went to school with kids who lived here.”

Aha!
, I thought. Lie number one. If she’d lived in the area her entire life, she knew about the suicides. That kind of thing becomes local lore. And the first thing she did when she had money was buy a dream house. Therefore, she’d been the kind of little girl who wanted to live in a castle. I grew up among many such girls, though I never understood them. Who did they think was going to mop all those floors? Ergo it was doubtful Misty did not know anything about the house before she bought it, yet she denied knowing its history. Of course I was speculating, but knowing the kind of women those dreamy little girls grew into, I felt I was on solid ground. Naturally, I made a note to confirm my suspicions.

“Were you ever in Whitby House as a child?” Teddy asked.

“Oh, no.”

“Never?”

“I didn’t exactly grow up in high society.”

Teddy gave her a comforting smile. “Had the house been abandoned by the time you bought it?”

“Not entirely. A family named Allen had owned it for a number of years. They brought their family here for the summer for a while. Eventually, when the old folks died off, they stopped coming and put it up for sale. It had been on the market for ten years or so when I bought it. As you can imagine, it needed a little sprucing up. The Allens had updated it when they got tired of waiting for it to sell. But a home needs to be lived in to really stay alive, don’t you think? Leave a home sitting empty for a few years and it begins to die. First it’s little things like a bad electrical outlet here and a fogged window there, and then the oven won’t work and the kitchen tap burps and gives you rusty water, and the next thing you know it’s got rats and the roof leaks. I can always tell when a house is sitting empty, without a family to love it,” she said wisely. “It’s just something you
know
.”

I quickly made another note: Misty was given to confabulation, as evidenced by her tangential ramblings.

“I absolutely agree,” Teddy said. “Some things you just know. Shall we go to the gallery and you can show us the spot where you had your encounter?”

Finally!

We were about to make progress, I thought, and I grabbed my notes and the voice recorder and had just stood up when the doorbell rang.

“Now, who can that be?” Misty said.

“Are you expecting anybody?” Teddy asked.

She smiled. “An inn is a public place. The innkeeper must always be prepared to open her door to strangers.”

She swept out of the room, and I looked at Teddy and said, “Damn.”

“Are you always this impatient?” he asked.

“I like to stay focused,” I told him, straightening my glasses.

“Is this how you guys always work together?” Paul asked.

I looked at Teddy, but he just looked back at me, so I said, “This is our first collaboration.”

“Yeah. It kinda shows.”

Regardless of the fact that the subject’s son was sitting right there, Teddy began to lecture me. “When you’ve conducted as many investigations as I have, Ed, you’ll know that the people you’re dealing with have to be treated gently. They’ve been traumatized. They may even have been ridiculed by ignorant friends. We are here to believe them. We are here to listen to them. My policy is to believe first and then check it out later. People know if you’re wondering whether or not they’re lying.”

“Then we’re coming at it from two different directions,” I said crisply. “In my opinion that’s a good thing. Your motto: ‘Believe everything.’ My motto: ‘Trust no one.’ And wouldn’t it be better to have this discussion later –“

I had to stop because Misty was back, and she had a drab young woman with her, a stranger.

“Gentlemen, you have brought me luck already,” Misty said radiantly. “This young lady, um –“

“Jane. Jane Holowell,” the girl said in a flat, nasal voice. She reached out shyly to shake the hands we were offering, then recognized Teddy, froze, and said, “Oh!” in a surprised little voice.

He reached his long arm out a little farther and took her hand in his while she nearly passed out.

“Teddy Force,” he said gratuitously.

“Edson Darby-Deaver,” I told her, as she continued to gaze in wonder at Teddy. My voice played about her ears without being able to get into her head, and I finally let my hand drop, since it was obvious she wasn’t going to shake it. Paul hadn’t even bothered to stand up.

Jane was not a prepossessing young woman. She was somewhere in her twenties, with a reasonably nice figure, but her clothing was dark and shapeless and she gave the impression of carrying everything she owned in the world in a large backpack. Her hair was limp and thin and of a tired brownish color, and her one attempt to groom it, (the injudicious use of styling gel), had only made it worse.

Misty was consulting a piece of paper in her hand. “Jane, here, is answering my ad in
The Beach Buzz
for housekeeping staff. Paul and I have been simply running ourselves ragged trying to keep up with things, and I see by your resume here, ah, Jane, that you have experience in the field. I won’t even have to train you – just acquaint you with our little house rules. Isn’t that nice!”

Jane looked at Misty as if she’d just materialized (she was still holding Teddy’s hand), blinked, and said, “You’re hiring me? Just like that? Oh – I didn’t mean it to come out like that. I’m – I’m just so grateful. I really need the job. Really. I won’t let you down, honest.”

“I’m sure you won’t. And I really need you, too. We’re going to be just fine, I know it. This is my son and partner, Paul.” Jane gazed at him blankly, then looked back to Teddy as Misty hooked her arm and began to steer her out of the room. “Now let’s just go into my office and get some paperwork done, and – oh! – can you boys go up to the gallery by yourselves and I’ll be up shortly? Won’t take me but a minute.”

Pure physics dictated that Jane would have to let go of Teddy’s hand or haul him over the table, but he managed to release himself from her grip before he could lose his balance. She lifted the hand he’d been holding and looked at it as if he’d left a little magic in it.

As she passed through the doorway with Misty, she said, “The gallery? Like a picture gallery? Is it, like, haunted?”

“Oh, no,” Misty told her. “It’s the railed hallway that runs around the second floor. And don’t worry about the haunting, dear. The boys are going to take care of it.”

“Okay.”

Misty stuck her head back in the room a second later and whispered, “Sorry, but I can’t let this one get away. You wouldn’t
believe
the trouble I’ve had getting help. Paul, will you take care of them?” She disappeared.

I wondered in my cynical way if she was playing for time to polish up her ghost story. She had been iffy as to the details when I tried to pin her down. Most haunted people will describe precise encounters: time of day, location in the house, the entity’s sex, even its name. Still, the time had arrived to view the hot zone, with or without our witness, and I tried to control my excitement. At least we had her son to describe what had happened.