By Familiar Means

by Delia James

  “So, are you going to tell me what happened?” asked Val, as soon as all the teacups had been distributed and everybody had helped herself to a muffin. Alistair had finally got the hint and had curled up on my lap instead of on the table.

  Of course, that was when the doorbell rang.

  9

  “Sorry,” I said to the room in general. Alistair grumbled and thumped to the floor as I got up to go answer the door.

  It was Sean McNally.

  “I heard,” Sean said by way of greeting and explanation. “I was on my way in for my shift, and I wanted to stop by and make sure you were okay.” He raised the cardboard tray he held. “I brought coffee.”

  “Young” Sean McNally is one of the bartenders down at the Pale Ale, the tavern and restaurant where my friend Martine Devereaux works as executive chef. He’s a wiry man, about five years younger and ten inches taller than me with sandy hair and a neatly trimmed beard and a smile that’s pretty much guaranteed to charm the socks off the susceptible. I am, of course, not one of those.

  “Thanks, Sean,” I said. “But I’m fine, really. Do you want to come in?”

  “Thanks.” Sean ducked automatically as he came through the door, like tall guys tend to do. He also took off the very snazzy two-tone fedora he was wearing.

  Grandma looked up as we came into the kitchen. Alistair was sitting on the table getting his ears scritched and washing what might just have been muffin crumbs off his whiskers.

  “Sean!” announced Val. “What a surprise!”

  Sean had been the subject of a lot of (pointless and unnecessary) speculation since I got to Portsmouth. Some of my friends seemed to think there was something special in the way he looked at me and in how he brought me coffee when he found out I was having a bad day, and how he and his dad, Old Sean, came around to fix the loose boards on my porch without being asked and without accepting payment. Some entirely misguided people might have even believed this was all a sign that he would like to take me out.

  I didn’t believe this. Even if I did, I wouldn’t actually consider it. Yes, Sean is very nice, and I will admit (in a completely objective way), he’s cute, and a snappy dresser and fun to be around, and a good listener. But since a little incident involving my last boyfriend and a nineteen-year-old blond from Vegas who showed up at our door at three in the morning, I’d sworn off dating for good. Val knew that. I’d certainly told her often enough.

  “Hi, Val.” Sean set the tray of coffee down next to the muffin plate and held out his hand to my grandmother. “And you must be Grandma B.B.”

  “And you have to be Sean McNally.” Grandma B.B. clasped his hand in both of hers. “You look exactly like your father, although I will say, I knew him when he was somewhat younger.”

  “Apparently Grandma babysat half of Portsmouth,” I told Sean. “So, if you want the good dirt on any old kids’ stuff, I’d be very nice to her.”

  “Anna. You know I do not indulge in gossip.”

  I looked at Sean and Val. Sean and Val looked at me. We all nodded gravely and did not smile.

  “Apple muffin?” I pushed the plate toward Sean. “Roger’s finest.”

  “If I’m not butting in . . .”

  “I’m sure you’re not,” said Grandma promptly. “Anna was just about to tell us what happened to her this morning. Please sit down.” To emphasize this, Val scooted over on the bench to make room.

  “If it’s okay?” said Sean to me.

  “Sure, but only because you brought coffee.” I tried to smile to let him know I was joking and that, yes, I really was okay with his being here. The only problem was, I didn’t entirely mean it. I couldn’t tell, though, if that was because I didn’t actually want to talk about this morning or because of all the amused and meaningful glances Grandma and Val kept shooting at each other.

  Sean, though, decided to take me at my word and settled onto the empty space Valerie made on the bench. Alistair curled around Sean’s ankles a couple of times before jumping back up onto my lap.

  Sean took a muffin, and I opened a coffee. I may have felt some petty satisfaction in the way Valerie inhaled the forbidden aroma of perfectly roasted beans.

  “So, Anna,” said Val pointedly over the rim of her teacup. “You were going to tell us what happened?”

  I was. And I did. If I did it while awkwardly breaking my muffin into pieces, I think that’s understandable.

  I will say that muffin was delicious and perfectly baked, with cinnamon streusel on top, because Roger McDermott is that kind of guy.

  I told them about Jake’s certainty that the old drugstore was haunted. I glossed over the part my Vibe played because Sean was here. But when I got to the part about the steel door at the end of the tunnel, and the body in the dirt pile right beside it, a very uncomfortable look crossed Sean’s face.

  “Did . . . How long did it look like he—it—had been there?”

  I shook my head. “Pete Simmons said it was probably a week. Why?”

  “Something my father said.” In addition to being a handyman and a bartender the senior McNally was Irish down to his little toenail, which meant he had the gift of the blarney and the love of a fine story, to be sure. “I actually had been kind of wondering—”

  “Don’t tell me you came here with ulterior motives?” I raised both eyebrows at him.

  “No. Well. Kinda. Maybe. Do you mind?” Sean pulled out his phone. We all nodded for him to go ahead, so he hit a speed-dial button and waited while it rang.

  “Yeah, hi, Dad,” said Sean when the voice on the other end of the line answered. “No, everything’s fine. I just had a question. That guy from the hotel you said walked off the job about a week ago? Did anybody ever hear what happened to him?” He listened. “Yeah, okay, thanks.” Sean hung up.

  “A guy from the hotel?” I prompted. Alistair’s purring had stopped, and he oozed out of my lap, in that spineless way cats have, to sit bolt upright on the windowsill. “As in the Harbor’s Rest?”

  “Yeah,” said Sean, turning his coffee cup around a few times on the tabletop. “Dad does a little bartending there and helps with the drinks ordering. They like him because he can track down some unusual spirits that their guests enjoy. Anyway, Dad told me there was a huge stink maybe a week ago when this guy, Jimmy Upton, didn’t show for work. He was the sous chef in the hotel kitchen, and one night he just ups and vanishes after his shift and doesn’t come back. Not even on payday.”

  Val whistled.

  “Well, we shouldn’t jump to conclusions,” said Grandma, but it was too late. Everybody at that table, except Alistair, had worked an odd job or three. We all knew nobody would leave that last paycheck hanging if they could possibly help it.

  “Jake thought the tunnel ended at the hotel,” I said. “So did Pete Simmons.”

  “But Dale said he didn’t know anything about the tunnel,” said Grandma. “My goodness, he looks exactly like Gretchen.”

  “You’re on a first-name basis with Old Mrs. Hilde?” said Sean. “Wow.”

  “Don’t tell me you babysat her, too?” I put in.

  “Babysat Gretchen Hilde? Oh, good heavens, no. We graduated the same year from high school and we always spent the summers together when we were all home from college. Although, for a while, she thought . . . Well, that’s neither here nor there. The point is, how could this Jimmy Upton find a hidden tunnel that Dale Hilde, whose family has owned the hotel since it opened, didn’t know about?” Unless they were all lying.

  “That’s a good question,” said Valerie. “You don’t suppose—”

  Her cell phone buzzed, cutting off her question. Val sighed and pulled the phone out to check the caller ID.

  “Roger,” she said, to the phone and to us, as she hit the Accept button. “Yes, darling, I’m still here. Yes, everything is just fine. And everybody loves the muffins.” She loo
ked toward us and we all nodded in confirmation. “Yes, I will be completely fine while you go talk to Archie Walsh about catering the dinner.” “Baby Fund,” she mouthed at us. “Yes, I promise. Yes. Yes . . . you are and I love you anyway.” She hung up and sighed. “I need to get back and mind the store.” She rubbed her tummy. “Come on, baby girl.”

  Sean got to his feet and picked up his hat. “I’ve got to get going, too, or I’ll be late for my shift at the Pale Ale. Walk you out, Val?”

  “No, that’s okay, I’m going out the back. But you can help me up.” She held out her hand so Sean could pull her to her feet. “See you tomorrow night, Anna?”

  I had a magic lesson scheduled tomorrow, and Julia always insisted on at least one other coven member being there to help cast the ritual circle and enforce the wards. Usually, that person was Val.

  I agreed she’d see me and Val left by the kitchen door and headed across the garden to the back gate at a healthy clip. Alistair, apparently having picked up some of Roger’s nervousness, ducked under the table. In the next eyeblink, he was outside, trotting along behind Val like a furry gray shadow.

  “I’ll walk you out,” I said to Sean, partly to distract him from Alistair’s Cheshire cat imitation. “Back in a sec, Grandma.”

  When we got to the front door, though, Sean paused and turned his fedora over in his hands a few times. “Are you sure you’re all right, Anna?”

  “Yes, I’m sure,” I told him. “Thanks for coming by, though, and bringing the coffee.”

  “You’ll call if you need anything?”

  “I will. I promise.”

  Sean settled his hat back on his head, snapped the brim down like Marlon Brando in Guys and Dolls and flashed me a smile just before he walked away. I won’t say anything melted inside, although maybe there was a slight softening around certain emotional edges. Not that it was at all significant. There was absolutely no need for Alistair to make an appearance at that moment.

  “Merow?” my cat inquired.

  “Don’t you start in on me, too,” I snapped. I also turned on my heel and headed into the kitchen without looking back.

  10

  It was a long night.

  Alistair curled up on my chest and let me scratch his ears as I lay awake in bed staring at the ceiling. I kept telling myself that whatever had happened to the man—who was probably Jimmy Upton—down in that tunnel must have been some kind of tragic accident. That roof was not stable. It had collapsed. It was sad, and of course I was upset, but when it came down to it, the whole thing was now in the hands of the police, which was where it belonged. The corpse, and its history, was not my problem. My problem was my mentor was mad at me. Well, that was one of my problems. Another problem was that the coffee shop where I was supposed to paint the murals, which were supposed to bring in the money I needed to start paying rent so I could keep living in this house I had fallen in love with, was now classified as a crime scene. Yes, I had other possibilities out there, including a chance at one of those adult coloring books that had gotten so popular, but I had no idea when, or if, any of them were going to come through. My only solid offer at the moment had been from Jake and Miranda.

  I rolled over on my side and tried staring at the wall. Alistair obligingly curled up in the hollow by my tummy. I did not want to be awake. I wanted to be asleep. If I was asleep, I could stop thinking about how I was in the middle of yet another mystery and it was all because of my magic. Again.

  “Maybe we’d be better off trying somewhere else,” I murmured to Alistair. “Someplace quiet, or maybe noisier, but definitely with fewer witches and stuff.”

  Alistair uncurled himself and pressed his head under my chin.

  “Merow,” he informed me. He also jumped over onto the pillow.

  “I know, I know.” I sighed. Portsmouth had become comfortable in a lot of ways. I had made so many good friends. I wanted to be here when Val’s baby was born. I wanted to decorate the cottage for Halloween. I wanted to invite my family up for Christmas and be there when Martine threw her New Year’s party. Those were always an event and a half.

  But the life I was leading here came with a lot of strings, and upsets, and people I really was not sure about. Did I want to stay in the middle of it all?

  I didn’t know, but there was one thing I was absolutely sure about.

  “I’d take you with me, big guy,” I said as I rolled over onto my back again. “No matter what.”

  Alistair licked my cheek and snuggled into the hollow above my shoulder so he was purring right into my ear.

  That, weirdly, was when I was finally able to go to sleep.

  * * *

  When I woke up the next morning, the sun was shining in through the window, the birds were singing in the trees and my left ear was numb from having a cat purr in it all night. But not so numb that I couldn’t hear the sound of dishes and glasses clinking down below.

  Grandma B.B. was already up and about. I showered and pulled on my jeans and my favorite sweatshirt, which was covered with colorful squiggles and the words LIFE’S TOO SHORT TO COLOR INSIDE THE LINES, and headed downstairs to the kitchen.

  “Good morning, dear!” said Grandma. “I’ve been rummaging. I hope you don’t mind.”

  “Of course not.” The coffeemaker was going, and the carton of orange juice was on the table alongside a plate of toast and the remaining apple muffins. Alistair was eating something from his bowl by the back door that looked suspiciously like tuna.

  Grandma saw my frown. “Yes, I know, dear, he should be having cat food, but I thought, as a special treat, just this once.”

  “I’m going to have to get that cat a gym membership.” I poured us both mugs of coffee.

  “Have you got plans for today, Anna?” she asked me.

  I sighed. I also looked over at the calendar I’d hung on the wall by the old landline phone. I’d bought it specifically so I could circle the twenty-third in red and write LEASE UP in the middle of the day’s square.

  That red-letter day was arriving in less than two weeks, and my only current clients had just found a dead body practically under their floor, and my grandmother and my magical mentor had had a shouting match instead of the touching reunion I’d been hoping for.

  “Is this what it’s going to be like if I stay?” I murmured, but not softly enough, because Grandma glanced at me sharply.

  “Well, I don’t exactly know what you mean by ‘this,’ dear,” she said. “But it’s never going to be entirely easy. When you care for others, it never is.”

  I hung my head. “Maybe I don’t want to care so much.”

  “I think you’d find not caring much more difficult, not to mention much lonelier.”

  “Do you ever regret leaving Portsmouth, Grandma?”

  Grandma B.B. was silent for a long time. “That’s a complicated question. I have had such a good life. My time with your grandfather, my children and grandchildren and now the next generation coming along . . . How could I possibly regret any of that? I’ve seen so much, and there’s so much more . . . But I do very much regret how I left.”

  I stared out the window like I was looking for answers in the autumn-faded flower beds.

  “Would you like to go outside?” Grandma B.B. said. “You did promise to show me the garden.”

  “Sounds great,” I told her, grateful for a chance to put off answering her question about my plans. She probably knew that, too. It’s the sort of thing grandmothers pick up on.

  I swapped my slippers for the old pair of Keds I keep by the kitchen door. I carried the plate of muffins and toast out, and Grandma followed with the coffee cups into the crisp morning.

  The garden was sheltered by stout privacy fences and thick beds of flowers and herbs. Purple and gold asters stood out defiantly above the rest of the spiky brown stems. The two apple trees stood guard by the back gate t
hat led to Val and Roger’s bed-and-breakfast. Their leaves had already started to turn gold, even though there was still a pretty healthy crop of red fruit on the branches—and on the ground. The real showpiece, though, was the spiral walkway. It wound through the center of the lawn and was lined with curving flower beds. At the very center, where another garden might have had a statue or a fishpond, mine had a covered fire pit.

  Closer to the house, there was a little flagstone terrace with a suite of white wicker furniture. I set the muffins on the table and settled myself into one of the chairs. I breathed in the scents of fall and mint and sun-warmed apples and instantly felt better. Alistair prowled the perimeter, looking for threats, stray birds or escaped K.T. Nibbles.

  “So, Anna.” Grandma handed me a coffee mug. “You were going to tell me about your plans for today.”

  I should have known the subject was not going to stay dropped. I sighed, drank some coffee and took a bite of muffin. What I really needed to do was get out here with shears and a trowel and probably some burlap or something. At the very least, I needed to go to the library and find some gardening books, so I’d know how to put the place to bed for the winter.

  “Anna?” prompted Grandma. “You were saying?”

  No, I wasn’t, but I also wasn’t getting out of it. “Well, I should probably check in on Jake and Miranda. They were pretty upset about what happened yesterday.”

  “And who can blame them?”

  Not me, that was for sure. I took another sip of coffee. “This is not exactly the homecoming I planned on for you, Grandma.”

  “Oh, don’t worry about me, dear. I’ll be fine.”

  “But you and Julia—”

  “That is between me and Julia,” she said firmly. “Did I ever tell you about the time your grandfather and I were in Manila?”

  “Which time?”

  “This would have been, oh, let me see”—Grandma’s nails clinked as she drummed them against her mug—“seventy-nine, I think. Well, we were staying in a marvelous little hotel, but your grandfather got the idea that we should see more of the actual country, and, he decided, the way to do that was by bicycle.