Phantoms Can Be Murder: Charlie Parker Mystery #13

by Connie Shelton

  “I’m not a bit surprised,” he said. “Things seem to happen wherever you go, my little detective.”

  We ended the call with a plan to touch base again before he left Albuquerque and a promise that he would keep me posted on his trip.

  The front doorknob rattled and Louisa came in, carrying a plastic handled bag.

  “Dinner in tonight?” she said, holding it up. “Home cooked, almost.”

  She carried the bag into the kitchen and pulled out a jar of marinara sauce and the ingredients for salad. From a cupboard came a packet of long spaghetti. She started to apologize but I just laughed.

  “You have no idea how close this is to my way of doing things at home,” I said. “I would have no clue how to make this from scratch. Drake is a far better cook and actually makes an excellent sauce.”

  “I had a man like that once. Luigi.” She made the name sound almost musical. “He owned a vineyard in Tuscany and his linguine was as luscious as his—” She stopped and cleared her throat. “Too bad I let him go.”

  I grinned at her but she didn’t seem inclined to give more details.

  “I can open a bottle of wine,” I told her. “If you’ll point me toward the corkscrew.”

  I poured two glasses while she filled a pot with water and turned on a flame under it.

  “Dolly had another scare at the shop today” I said, once we’d settled into our comfy corners on the old sofa in the parlor. I filled her in on the details.

  “What on earth could be causing all this?” she mused. “And right after we were there last night.”

  I let a moment go by. “Have you known Dolly very long?”

  She sipped from her glass. “A few years, mainly through the knitting group. Outside of there, I’ve only run into her a few times around town. It’s a small place, but we don’t actually see everyone every single day.”

  “I just wondered whether she has a lot of friends.” I told her a little about the reports I’d seen at the police station.

  “My, you have been thorough,” she said, heading toward the kitchen when the timer on the pasta went off. “She’s always been friendly enough with me but I’ve heard a few things . . . people who don’t seem to care much for her, a couple of women who refuse to patronize her store. I’d no idea some had actually made official complaints.”

  I trailed her into the kitchen where she was in the process of mixing the greens and shaking a vinaigrette dressing onto them. She carried the salad bowl to the table.

  “I wonder if her behavior accounts for business at the shop being so slow. Once I thought about it I realized I’ve rarely seen another customer in there.”

  “The size of the knitting group certainly dwindled over the summer.” Louisa handed me a plate. We dished up the pasta and sauce and took our seats.

  “I wonder whether she’s made someone mad enough to go to these lengths to scare her. Maybe the idea that someone is trying to frighten her out of her shop isn’t so far off. It could just be for other reasons than we’d ever guessed.”

  We ran the subject around in circles and finally decided we were merely blathering, exhaustion from our sleepless night having taken over our brains. When I noticed Louisa’s eyelids drooping I suggested that we call it a night. It was seven o’clock.

  I brushed my teeth and thought I would peruse the book of haunted places once more, but even that didn’t last very long. I switched out the light within fifteen minutes and fell into a deep sleep.

  My next conscious thought came when I began to smell coffee. Slipping on a pair of jeans with my sleep-shirt I padded down the stairs barefoot to find Louisa in the kitchen.

  “Sorry. I tried to be quiet,” she said. “Lucky thing I’d set my alarm or I would still be off in dreamland somewhere.”

  When she asked about my plan for the day I had to admit I didn’t really have one. It seemed pointless to keep searching out ghosts on behalf of Dolly, even though she’d begged me to keep working on it. I really didn’t have any fresh ideas whatsoever.

  “I’ll be giving my Haunted Bury tour tomorrow night,” she reminded me. “If you want to come along I’ll put your name on the list. It takes a couple of hours but the total distance to walk is less than a mile.”

  Why not, I decided. Some fact that she’d forgotten to tell me might come out in the talk.

  “Use your time today to rest up,” she warned as she was walking out the door. “The tour lasts until midnight.” With a spooky little eh-eh-eh she left.

  Spending the day lounging around and resting sounded really good but I found myself too keyed up to sit still. Of course the early bedtime and two cups of coffee might explain it. I read the first couple of chapters in one of the books I’d bought at the thrift shop, a mystery in which the psycho killer is the good guy and everyone else in the story is even more messed up.

  As the sun warmed the house and it began to creak I decided I’d be better off taking a long walk, and that’s when I found myself on Lilac Lane, and that’s when I realized an ambulance with brightly flashing lights was sitting right in front of The Knit and Purl.

  Chapter 14

  I froze in place for a full minute. The whole scene felt surreal. From the front door of the knit shop, technicians wheeled a stretcher covered in a white drape. The uneven shape of a body meant this wasn’t good news. My feet took off running.

  The ambulance’s strobes went still and the vehicle pulled away from the curb. A man in a dark suit picked up a black valise from the sidewalk and headed toward a car that I hadn’t noticed before. On the side of it, a sign said Coroner.

  Archie Jones stood in the shop’s doorway, his face white and slack with disbelief. His eyes were dead orbs.

  “What happened?” I said, rushing up to him.

  His mouth opened, closed, opened again but no sound came out. I stood right in front of him, trying to get his attention.

  “Archie! Look at me!”

  Gradually, his gaze homed in on my face.

  I made my voice slow and gentle. “Archie, what happened?”

  “Dolly. They’ve taken her.” His dead-looking eyes began to leak slow trails of tears.

  “Let’s go inside,” I said, stepping forward to steer him into the shop.

  Inside, things seemed to be in order. The bins of expensive yarns sat in organized rainbow arrays. The oils and herbs in their tiny bottles rested on the glass shelves, none out of place. The scent of candle wax hung heavy in the air. I led Archie to Dolly’s chair behind the sales counter and asked if I could bring him some water. He shook his head.

  “Can you tell me what happened?” I asked, kneeling to be at eye level with him.

  “That man,” he said. “He said there would be an inquest.”

  “Was there an accident? Did she become ill during the night?”

  He shook his head again. “I woke up this morning. She was lying beside me. Cold.”

  How awful. No wonder the man was in shock. I paced to the front of the shop, unable to stay still. At this point it wasn’t really my business, but I couldn’t simply walk out and leave the poor man there alone. The couple had no children, I remembered Louisa telling me.

  “Is there someone I can call for you?” Surely he had friends, former colleagues.

  He continued to stare at a spot in the middle of space.

  Okay, now what? I automatically touched the side pocket of my purse where I normally kept my cell phone but of course it wasn’t there. My reflex in times of trouble is usually to call either Drake or Ron, but that option wouldn’t accomplish anything here and now. What was the official name of Louisa’s workplace? I should phone her.

  “She was so upset last night,” Archie said in a flat voice. “The candles.”

  What on earth was he talking about? I glanced around and my gaze fell on the shelves of candles on display. Something didn’t look right. I stepped closer and saw that they’d been lit. Every one of them.

  “Archie? These candles?” I pointed. �
��Who lit all these candles?” I pictured Dolly trying some sort of massive exorcism to rid the shop of her ghostly fears.

  He shrugged. “We didn’t know. We were watching the telly, same as always. Dolly smells the candles. Comments on it a couple of times. I didn’t think it was anything. She insists on it—something’s wrong, Arch, she said to me.”

  He’d stood up and walked over to stand near me. “So she comes down from the apartment. They’re all lit.” He pointed to the candles. “She screams and I come down, and she’s got a little tamper thing and she’s putting them out. She’s screamin’ out some choice words, I’ll tell you, mad as a hornet that her stock’s all ruined.”

  At least she’d gotten all the flames out before anything else in the store was damaged. I could imagine how upset she’d be, having to order all new stock and then practically give these away since they weren’t pristine and new anymore. Maybe the loss would be too much for the small shop that wasn’t exactly thriving anyway.

  The chimes at the door sounded and Gabrielle popped in, looking perky in a pink sweater that set off her flawless complexion. Her smile faded when she caught sight of Archie’s face.

  “I’m afraid I’ve some bad news,” he said.

  I gave him a light pat on the shoulder and left so he could explain the situation privately. I wondered how Gabrielle would take the news of her sudden unemployment. I’d gotten the impression that working in the yarn shop was more a pastime than a passion for her anyway. She would probably find another job fairly soon.

  Meanwhile, speaking of being unemployed, I supposed I was officially off ghost-buster duty for good. I couldn’t say I was all that unhappy about it, but the image of the ambulance taking Dolly away from her shop continued to haunt me.

  My steps carried me toward the tourism office where Louisa would be on duty this morning. I needed to tell her about Dolly’s death before she heard it elsewhere. Undoubtedly eyes all up and down the block had seen the sheeted body and the fact that the coroner’s car had been there. I couldn’t imagine that the small-town gossip mill wouldn’t operate all that differently from what it would in America.

  I held back while Louisa finished ringing up a gift shop purchase—three postcards and a mug imprinted with the image of the Abbey. When the patron left I tilted my head toward a closed door.

  “Are we alone?” I asked.

  Her eyebrows went into a puzzled curve. “Yes, why? What’s happened?”

  “It’s Dolly.” I told her what I’d seen and about the subsequent conversation with Archie. “He’s absolutely in shock.”

  Her face paled and her gaze drifted to a spot far away. “Those burning candles. Another unexplained event. Do you think it sent her over the edge?”

  “There’s no way of knowing. Can a person literally die of fright?” But even as I asked the question I reconsidered. Archie had said Dolly was angry over the candles, not scared. Maybe she’d gotten so worked up that she’d burst a vessel or something. “I guess only the inquest will tell.”

  * * *

  I itched to be doing something all day Friday and Saturday. Louisa called another tourism office volunteer to take her shifts and the two of us basically wasted time shopping and sitting around the house. Drake checked in with me Friday night from a hotel in Anchorage. He would be out at a line camp starting Monday morning. I told him I should at least stay with Louisa until after Dolly’s funeral.

  The service was set for Monday afternoon, and I could do nothing more than wait around to ask about the results of the inquest.

  “Come along on my tour,” Louisa insisted on Saturday night. “It’s been on the schedule a long time so I have to do it. And it will help take our minds off this other subject.”

  So, we bundled up in sweaters and scarves. Louisa picked up a roomy shoulder bag and we headed out to meet the tourists at the Abbey Gate at ten p.m. In the glow of lamplight, two teen boys waited. They called out, greeting Louisa by name.

  “Groupies,” she whispered. “They fancy themselves ghost hunters, but since the Abbey Gardens are closed at night except to us, this is the only way they can hope to come across some of the better-known ethereal residents. Plus, Tim’s mother is a friend of mine. She knows she can trust me to keep an eye on the boys so they don’t go wandering off or sneaking into someone’s home because they think it’s okay to wait around for the spirits to show up.”

  “Mr. Partridge isn’t here yet,” the taller of the two boys said.

  “That’s all right. We have six others joining us yet. We’ll wait awhile.” She introduced the boys to me as Sean and Tim, and the basic difference I could see in them was that Tim was the tall one. Otherwise, they were clones in nearly identical black jeans and T-shirts, with dark knit caps over brown collar-length hair. Their trendy coats looked like Abercrombie to me.

  A uniformed man showed up on the other side of the gate and he also greeted Louisa familiarly. This must be Mr. Partridge, the guardian of the gate at night. Sean and Tim both said hello to him.

  About that time two couples came walking from the front of the Angel Hotel, just across the road. Obviously American in dress and voice, I learned that they came from Indiana and it was their first trip to England. One of the women seemed to be a fan of television shows about haunted sites and she’d heard of this tour and dragged her husband and friends along.

  Louisa consulted a sheet of paper she’d pulled from her pocket and checked off the four names. She glanced up and down the sidewalk, then pulled her sleeve back to check her watch. She seemed satisfied with whatever it told her.

  No more than two minutes passed before another couple came hurrying up, a tense conversation in brusque tones taking place between them. They were well bundled in woolens and sturdy shoes and the woman’s blond hair was done in a long braid down her back. Louisa looked at her list again. The man looked apologetic. “Wir sind spät. Traurig.”

  “Guten Abend,” she said. “Verstehen Sie Englisch?”

  I stared at my aunt. Where had she learned this?

  “Ja, pretty well,” the man answered.

  “No problem. If you have any questions you may ask me,” Louisa said. “Now, group, I think we are all here. Shall we enter the gates?”

  I noticed that her voice changed timbre at that phrase ‘enter the gates’ setting the mood and preparing us for the idea that we were about to get very spooked. Partridge took hold of a chain that ran over a pulley system and pulled. The heavy iron gate began to rise. He paused it about six feet off the ground, a fraction of its total height, and we walked under. Once everyone had cleared the entry, he let it lower with a clang. Wide eyes all around told me that everyone had that same point-of-no-return feeling.

  Chapter 15

  The ten of us stood in nearly complete darkness under the massive arch of the Abbey Gate, that entry which had felt benignly historic in daylight. Louisa turned to the group and issued a few basic rules.

  “We are allowed to enter the Abbey grounds after sunset only with special permission,” she began. “Therefore, everyone must stay with me at all times. No exploration on one’s own, please, and no walking off the prescribed pathways.”

  She gave the teens a pointed look, which made me believe this had been an issue in the past.

  “I’m handing out small torches—flashlights—to each of you. The paths can be uneven in a few places and parts of the grounds are not well lit.”

  Again, a stern look at the boys. I pictured them making scary faces with the lights under their chins or other goofy antics, but since Louisa had the power to kick them off the tour and to tell their mothers, I doubted there would be any problems.

  She went into her tour-guide voice. “You probably know some basic history of Bury St. Edmunds and the township. Contrary to popular opinion the name Bury was not meant to convey the fact that St Edmund was buried here, although he was for a time. The place was originally called Beodericsworth More likely, the etymology of this use of the word ‘bury’ st
ems from similar words like borough, burg, or borg, which simply mean ‘city.’ Around the year 906, the king’s remains were sent here for burial, later removed to London during the Danish invasion, and later returned once more. Because of the Danish treatment of the monks here at the Abbey, several of them are known to haunt the grounds. It is said that King Edmund’s ghost exacted revenge on the Dane, Sweyn Forkbeard, by striking him dead of a heart attack. There are also legends of a missing treasure—a precious gold statue of the archangel Michael—which has never been found.”

  Tim’s and Sean’s eyes sparkled at this, although since they’d often been on Louisa’s tours, it could have hardly been news to them.

  Louisa continued, “Naturally, there have been frequent sightings of the famous Brown Monk right here under this very gate.” She paused for effect. “Additionally, during the turbulent 1600s, Bury St. Edmunds was the site of the infamous witch trials and you can imagine how many restless souls remain among us. But tonight we are not here to speak specifically of dead kings and ancient history, except as it might relate to those inhabitants who have never quite left this earth.”

  Again, her tone dropped and she paused between the words to convey the mysterious. I had to give my aunt credit for her delivery skills. She led us from the oppressive overhang of the stone gate onto the central garden pathway where occasional lamp posts cast minimal lighting, throwing the whole scene into a montage of black, gray and dim green. The teens dropped to the back of the group, but I noticed that the four Americans kept close pace with Louisa.

  She purposely took the narrowest pathways, leading us between the black hulking shapes of the ancient stone ruins, up a short flight of uneven steps, across lawns that were rapidly becoming thick with dew. I had walked most of this ground during daylight hours but had to admit that the nighttime visit was far more eerie. Every dozen yards or so she would pause to talk about the monks who lived here in ancient times and to let the group catch up with her.