Corrie glanced at her watch. "Yeah. I thought I'd make it to the early service. I guess I'd better go." She finished her coffee and got up. "If Ben doesn't come down by nine, you can close the kitchen, clean up, and go home.
"I'll take care of straightening his room if he hasn't come down by the time you're ready to go." Corrie sure hoped Vanessa would be able to take care of it. She wasn't sure how she'd feel handling things as intimate as the sheets he'd slept on.
Not after the dreams she'd had last night.
****
"Cory!" The disapproving tone of Ham's voice was unmistakable.
Executing a dramatic sigh, Cory turned. "What, Ham dearest? Really, you are getting quite tedious lately." She smiled at the way her husband seemed taken aback.
"You went to see him last night." It wasn't a question or a statement. It was an accusation.
"Oh, Ham. You make it sound as if I were having an assignation. We merely had a friendly conversation." Cory crossed her arms over her chest and challenged him with a look.
"I thought we agreed to leave them alone. Not to force them to do anything they might not want to do."
"I don't recall agreeing to anything; however, I do remember you doing a considerable amount of ordering. I am not a soldier for you to order about, even if you did serve in Cuba.
"I was restless, Ham. I can't lie on a bed and pretend to sleep as you do. And, I didn't mean to wake him at all." Cory felt her lower lip begin to tremble and the itch of tears that threatened, but would never fall.
"Why did you go there, then?" Ham's tone, though still stern, softened.
"I just wanted to feel the comfort of my own things about me, so I went to my old room and closed my eyes tight and wished for everything to be as it used to be. When I looked again, the room was as it was when I was a child.
"Except that Dr. Chastain was sleeping in my bed."
"So you thought you'd wake him up and talk?"
"I did not mean to wake him. All I wanted to do was sit in my old rocker until I felt contented and safe as I had as a child." Cory sighed. "I had just begun to rock when I realized he was awake. He spoke to me first," she added defensively. "Called me by name."
"He wasn't surprised or frightened?"
"No. It was almost as if he expected to see me — us. He asked about you, by the by." Cory shrugged. "He also offered a suggestion about why we're here now."
"You must have had quite a lengthy conversation." Ham's tone became forbidding again.
"No. Not too long. But it was long enough that I believe he's willing to help us."
Obviously agitated, Ham stepped back and motioned for Cory to do the same. "Look. He's coming. Do you think he can see us?" Cory couldn't tell by Ham's expression whether he wanted Ben to know they were there or not.
She reached out toward the man, heedless of Ham's disapproval. "Benjamin?" Cory called after him, but Ben hurried on. She sighed as she watched him take the stairs two at a time. "He must not have heard me," she commented needlessly. "Perhaps, it only happened last night because he was half asleep."
"That may be so," Ham murmured thoughtfully. "I wonder what lengths he will be willing to go to, to help."
Cory wondered that same thing, but she knew exactly what she wanted him to help her with. "That I cannot say, but he did make an interesting proposition as to why we might be here now."
Cory had Ham's full attention as she told him what Ben had had to say.
****
Ben couldn't wait to tell Corrie about his ghostly visitor of the night before. Following the aroma of freshly brewed coffee, he burst into the kitchen.
"You'll never guess who came into my room last ni—" Ben stopped so quickly that the heavy swinging door came back and smacked him on the backside.
"Let me guess. It was Corrie," Vanessa answered dryly.
"Yes. How did you…?" Then Ben realized what Vanessa must be thinking. "No. Not Corrie." He covered his face with his hand. How did he dig himself out of this one? How did he explain to Vanessa without sounding like a complete jerk? He wasn't sure how much Corrie had told her about what they'd seen and he suspected was going on, but he figured he'd best play it safe. He managed a sheepish smile as he advanced toward the coffee pot. "I had a dream about Cory Venable," he explained, hoping Vanessa wouldn't press for details.
"I'd hoped you'd meant that our Corrie had finally come to her senses." Vanessa had apparently accepted his improvisation hook line and sinker. Without batting an eyelash, she went on. "And what did ol' Cory V. have to say?" Her tone was challenging as if she dared him to put his foot in his mouth or say something refutable.
And suddenly Ben felt as though he just might. "She was sitting in a rocking chair that she said had been in her room when she was a child."
"Humph. There's no rocking chair in your room."
"I know. The room I saw was different. The same, but slightly off. And there was an old bentwood rocker in one corner."
"Well, I can say one thing for you, Dr. Chastain. You have an imagination. Why don't you just write your dream up in that book of yours?" She propped her hands on her hips and shook her head slowly, tut-tutting like a mother hen.
His integrity insulted, he answered sharply. "I would never make something up and pass it off as fact."
"Humph. You write ghost stories, don't you? They're just one step up from fairy tales, as far as I can tell."
Obviously, he didn't agree with Vanessa's spin on the subject. "I don't write about anything I can't confirm with reliable witnesses."
"Well, unless Corrie is seeing things too, you don't have anybody to corroborate your… theories. I sure haven't seen anything strange around here." She handed him a steaming cup of coffee. "Help yourself to breakfast. I'll go upstairs and straighten your room."
"Thanks," Ben said as he flavored his coffee. He was more than happy that Vanessa had changed the subject. "Isn't Corrie up yet?"
Vanessa grinned. "The ghost or the real one?"
"Corrie Wallace," Ben said, trying to hide his pained expression.
"She's been up, ate breakfast, and now she's gone to church."
"Oh."
"Well, you don't have to look like a whipped dog. She'll be back soon."
Already wondering how much he could and should tell Corrie about what he'd seen last night, he almost forgot to reply. "Sure," he mumbled absentmindedly.
"Do you think Corrie would mind if I spend some time in the library this morning?" When no answer came, Ben looked up.
Vanessa had already left the room.
****
Corrie stopped at a roadside vegetable stand for tomatoes and fresh cucumbers. There was nobody about, but the prices were marked and a large mayonnaise jar sat on the crude, wooden counter. Corrie smiled at the proprietor's trust and thankfully used the honor system, tucking her crumpled dollar bills into the jar. The detour had delayed her return to the inn briefly, but looking at the wonderful, fresh vegetables, she decided that the short delay was well worth the time. Sure, the inn didn't serve lunch or dinner to the guests — guest, she amended — but she certainly enjoyed fresh produce. And she still hadn't quite decided what to do about Dr. Ben Chastain. The extra few minutes would give her more time to think.
For now, she reminded herself, she had an inn to run. Who knew? If things went well, there was always the possibility of expanding their serving hours to include other meals. But first they needed to get on their feet with one meal a day.
She placed the light, wooden baskets on her car seat and climbed in. Maybe next year she'd have time to put in a kitchen garden. She glanced over at the baskets of perfect fruit. Yes, she would do it. It would be well worth the hard work to have fresh herbs and salad ingredients at her fingertips.
Corrie eased the car off the shoulder and back onto the paved road and steered toward home. By the time she'd crunched onto the ground shells of the road to the inn, she'd already plotted her garden, a potting shed, and maybe even a greenhouse.
Ben's car was still in the lot, she noticed as she pulled into the drive. She couldn't decide whether she viewed that as a blessing or a bane. She couldn't explain her ambivalent feelings about the man, and she very much hoped that today would serve to help her sort them out.
Oh, she liked him well enough. But sometimes he scared her half to death. No, that wasn't it, she thought, shaking her head. Her passionate responses whenever he touched her terrified her. Not the man, she realized. The feelings.
She shut off the engine and found herself glancing into the mirror to check her hair. Corrie laughed at the subconscious gesture. She hadn't thought about silly things like that since Darrell had all but left her waiting at the altar. She flung open the car door.
Slinging her purse over her shoulder, Corrie stepped outside. She took a moment to shake the wrinkles out of her skirt, then leaned back inside to collect her purchases. She would put the produce in the kitchen then seek out Ben.
Swinging the two baskets, Corrie hurried up the flagstone path. She tugged open the heavy oaken doors and stepped inside. Loving the feeling of welcome she got when she came home to the inn, Corrie drew in a deep breath of the cool air, scented with furniture polish and old wood and smiled with satisfaction. It had been the right decision to shuck her high-tech job in Huntsville and open Venable Inn.
She closed the door and headed for the kitchen.
"Corrie? Is that you?"
Corrie turned in the direction of the sound. From what she could hear, she assumed Ben was in the library, so she headed that way. "Yes. Do you need something?"
"No," he answered, but Corrie could detect a strange current in his voice that for some odd reason sent chills running up and down her spine. "You have to come see what I found." This time the excited tone in his voice was undeniable.
Corrie paused only long enough to deposit purse and produce on the reception desk, then she rushed to see what he wanted.
Chapter Nine
Ben sat at the scarred, wooden library table surrounded by books, his notepad lying open in front of him. He had leafed through many of the books that dated from Cory and Ham's time and uncovered quite a bit of useful information. But the book that had told him the most, still rested in his hand.
His morning alone had been remarkably fruitful; although, at the beginning, he had been annoyed that Corrie had skipped out on him. Then, after stewing about it over his breakfast, he'd realized that she owed him nothing. If anybody owed anybody anything, it was he. No matter how well-intentioned he'd been, he hadn't been able to control what had been happening between them. Sure, he wouldn't have minded continuing on the track they'd started. But Corrie had been obviously frightened, he mused as he fingered the small leather-bound book.
He listened to the sound of Corrie's footsteps on the polished parquet. He wasn't disappointed to notice that the cadence changed as she neared the library. Ben tried to act as though he hadn't been waiting for her but, there was no way he could hide his smile of pleasure as she entered the room.
Corrie greeted him with a brilliant smile of her own. She hurried into the room and slid into the seat across the table from him. "I see you've been quite busy this morning," she murmured, nodding toward the piles of books. "And, judging from the excitement in your voice, you must have found something significant. Did the ghosts drop you another clue?"
Ben started to say no, but then he thought about the stroke of luck that had happened to make him reach for that particular book of poetry. "I suppose they might have," Ben answered, tempering his excitement as best he could. "I found this." He showed Corrie the small, bound volume of Dickinson.
"Oh, you don't mind that I appropriated the key and went through the old books?" he remembered to ask only as an afterthought.
Corrie shook her head absently and glanced at the book. Then she looked back up. "Yes. It's a poetry book. What's so special?" She took the book from him, and she didn't try to hide her impatience.
Ben sighed. Apparently, Corrie hadn't made the same connection he'd made. But then, she probably hadn't opened the book before. "You've never seen this?" If she hadn't, maybe Cory or Ham had left it as a clue.
"Sure, I have. It's just an old poetry book. I took a complete inventory of the old books, for insurance purposes before we opened." She started to hand it back to Ben, but he held his hands up to keep from accepting it. "This particular Dickinson's not really valuable."
"Then you've never read it."
Corrie shrugged. "In school. Poetry's not my thing. Give me a good mystery and I'm happy."
"Then you've not looked into this one? Never noticed the inscription?"
Corrie raised a pale eyebrow and shook her head. Taking the hint, she opened the book to the inside cover and ran a slender finger over the spidery writing. "'To my Dearest Cory. I never fail to think of you when I read 675,'" Corrie read. She paused. "'Your loving Ham.'" She shrugged again. "Sweet. So what's the big deal?"
"Look at 675." Ben tried not to show his impatience. He'd wanted Corrie to draw her own conclusions as he had, but she had proven very hard to lead.
"Is that a page number or something?"
It took every bit of will Ben had to keep from groaning out loud. Obviously, she hadn't paid much attention in American Lit class. "It's the number of a poem."
"Oh, right. Like the numbers in a hymnal. Emily Dickinson never titled anything." She flashed Ben a look accompanied by that endearing tilt of her chin. "I told you I wasn't much on poetry."
Ben said nothing, but gestured for her to open the book to the correct page. He watched as Corrie flipped through and stopped to read.
"Oh. I remember this one. It's about how they squeeze rose petals to make perfume." She looked up, beaming.
Well, she was a math and science person, Ben reminded himself. "Close enough," he told her.
Corrie handed him the Dickinson, still opened to the designated page.
"You don't see it," Ben stated dully.
"Oh, you mean that smudge on the page. Sure, I saw it. Is it important?"
Ben guessed he was going to have to spell it out. And he'd tried so hard not to feed her his own conclusions. "Yes. I think the smear may have been from a rose pressed within the pages of the book. If you sniff at it, you can just get the tiniest whiff of fragrance. I think Cory must have worn rose water or some sort of rose scented perfume."
"Probably, lots of women did. There weren't all the hundreds of fragrances to choose from back at the turn of the century. What's that got to do with our possible ghosts?"
How could she miss what he'd been trying to tell her? Ben rubbed his eyes wearily. "None of this is connecting."
"I guess not." Corrie had the grace to look apologetic. "I guess you'd better spell it out for me."
But first, he had to ask. He had to know. "Do you ever wear rose-scented perfume?"
She shook her head. "It's too light for me."
Ben smiled, satisfied that another piece of the puzzle had slipped into place. "I've smelled roses several times, odd times, since I've been here." He didn't mention the times he'd noticed the scent when Corrie had asked him to kiss her. "I think Cory used that fragrance. And this inscription seems to prove it."
"Yes. Of course. Ham was making a reference to Cory's perfume when he mentioned that poem." Corrie stopped. "What do you mean you've smelled it around here?"
Omitting nothing except his growing conviction that Cory and Ham wanted — no needed — them for something, he explained.
****
Corrie started a pitcher of automatic-perked iced tea and tried to assimilate what Ben had told her as she put together sandwich fixings for a quick lunch.
She'd tried to be as excited as Ben had been about the discovery of the poem. She suspected that he could have dreamed about Cory Venable sitting in the rocking chair in his room and thought that he was really seeing her. But, how did he know about the rocker? She'd seen that old chair many times, and had debated whether to keep it.
But it had been so rickety that she'd decided to throw it away rather than risk injuring one of her guests on it.
But the bit about the rose scent confused her. Ben had insisted that he'd smelled roses when he'd spoken to — dreamed about — Cory Venable in his room. But when he'd held that musty old book to her face, all she'd noticed was dust and mildew. And when he'd taken her upstairs to show her the lingering fragrance in his room, all she'd detected was the heavy scent of the disinfectant air freshener Vanessa had sprayed when she'd done up the room.
Maybe Cory had worn rose water, but so had half the well-to-do girls in Mobile County back then, Corrie suspected.
Corrie laid out the luncheon meats and lettuce leaves on a porcelain platter. She lined the meats and cheeses up with mathematical precision, each pile having equal numbers of slices, then turned to slice tomatoes. She might not be a professor of literature, but she could add two and two up to four as well as the next mathematician. And what Ben had come up with hadn't come anywhere close to four.
Imagine him thinking that Cory and Ham had come back to life on some sort of mysterious mission. Where did he dream up those ideas?
She sliced away at a tomato, only realizing when she'd ended with a juicy, pulpy mess that she'd let her aggravation show in her rough treatment of the delicate fruit. Disgusted, she scraped up the mess and dumped it into the disposal unit and turned it on. "Who does he think he is? Upsetting my apple cart like that?"
"Did you say something?"
Corrie switched off the grinder and turned around. She felt a flush rising to her cheeks, and she wondered just how much he had heard. He couldn't possibly have heard anything over the racket from the machine, she convinced herself. He may have seen her mouth moving, but he couldn't have heard anything. She pretended nonchalance and elbowed the cold water on and rinsed the sticky tomato pulp off her hands. "I was just mumbling to myself about ruining a perfectly good tomato by using a dull knife." To add credence to her lie, she reached for another, sharper knife.
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