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With a steaming cup of tea cupped in my hands I looked around the den. What had I missed. I opened the desk and stared into space as I sipped my tea. I had organized all the papers and hadn’t found anything unusual.
I picked up the photo album, with a faded velvet cover, and leafed through pages of photos. Then I stopped holding my tea cup in mid- air. That was the couple I had talked to. Impossible. The names underneath were Paul and Francesca Fitzgerald.
I pulled drawers out and stared, in disbelief, at the hidden door. Someone was clever when they built this desk. It resisted my attempts at first but it finally opened with a loud pop revealing small drawers. Inside one drawer there was a leather bound diary that I set on top of the photo album as I continued to clean. When I was done the room sparkled in the late afternoon sunshine but felt chilly. I lit a fire making the room cosy again.
After I prepared a meal for Muffin and me I curled up on the leather lounge, in front of the crackling fire, to read Francesca’s diary. She talked about settling into the area and the cottage that Paul’s parents had built. I woke with the diary on my lap and gazed at the dying embers of the fire with Muffin curled up beside me. When I went to the kitchen the sun was peaking over the mountain leaving a rosy glow in the sky.
Ghostly Writes Anthology 2016 Page 54
