Praise for
The Haunting of Maddy Clare
“A compelling and beautifully written debut full of mystery, emotion, and romance.”
—Madeline Hunter, New York Times bestselling
author of The Surrender of Miss Fairbourne
“The Haunting of Maddy Clare is a novel of chilling romantic suspense that evokes the lost era between the World Wars that so wounded the lives of the young men and women of England, and adds to the mix an inventively dark gothic ghost story. Read it with the lights on. Simply spellbinding.”
—Susanna Kearsley, New York Times and USA Today
bestselling author of The Winter Sea
“The Haunting of Maddy Clare is a compelling read. With a strong setting, vivid supporting characters, and sympathetic protagonists, the book is a wonderful blend of romance, mystery, and pure creepiness. Simone St. James is a talent to watch.”
—Anne Stuart, New York Times bestselling author of Shameless
“Compelling and deliciously unsettling, this is a story that begs to be read in one sitting. I couldn’t put it down!”
—Megan Chance, national bestselling author of City of Ash
“With a fresh, unique voice, Simone St. James creates an atmosphere that is deliciously creepy and a heroine you won’t soon forget. The Haunting of Maddy Clare promises spooky thrills and it delivers. Read it, enjoy it—but don’t turn out the lights!”
—Deanna Raybourn, New York Times bestselling author of the
Lady Julia Grey series and The Dark Enquiry
“This deliciously eerie, traditionally gothic ghost story grabbed me with its first sentence and didn’t let go until the very last…. Simone St. James gets everything right in this ghostly tale, and I’ll be standing in line to buy whatever she writes next.”
—Wendy Webb, Author of The Tale of Halcyon Crane
“Fast, fun, and gripping. Kept me up into the wee hours.”
—C. S. Harris, author of the Sebastian St. Cyr Mystery series
The Haunting
of Maddy Clare
SIMONE ST. JAMES
NEW AMERICAN LIBRARY
NEW AMERICAN LIBRARY
Published by New American Library,
a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,
375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA
Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto,
Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)
Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
Penguin Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2,
Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.)
Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell,
Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.)
Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 Community Centre,
Panchsheel Park, New Delhi - 110 017, India
Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, Auckland 0632,
New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.)
Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty.) Ltd., 24 Sturdee Avenue,
Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa
Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices:
80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
First published by New American Library,
a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
First Printing, March 2012
1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
Copyright © Simone Seguin, 2012
All rights reserved
REGISTERED TRADEMARK—MARCA REGISTRADA
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA:
St. James, Simone.
The haunting of Maddy Clare/Simone St. James.
p. cm.
ISBN: 978-1-101-57723-3
I. Title.
PR9199.4.S726H38 2012
813’.6–dc23 2011033391
Set in Adobe Garamond Pro
Designed by Elke Sigal
Printed in the United States of America
Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
PUBLISHER’S NOTE
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party Web sites or their content.
The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.
For Adam
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Chapter Twenty-three
Chapter Twenty-four
Chapter Twenty-five
Chapter Twenty-six
Chapter Twenty-seven
Chapter Twenty-eight
Chapter Twenty-nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-one
Chapter Thirty-two
About the Author
Simone St. James
Chapter One
London, 1922
The day I met Mr. Gellis, I had been walking in the rain.
In the morning, unable to face another day alone in my flat, I wandered through the bustle of Piccadilly, the collar of my thin coat pulled high on my neck. The air was swollen with cottony drizzle that did not quite fall to the ground, and pressed my cheeks and eyelashes. The lights of Piccadilly shone garishly under the lowering clouds; the shouts of the tourists were loud against the grim silence of the businesspeople and the murmurs of strolling couples in the square.
I stayed as long as I could, watching the bob of umbrellas. No one noticed a pale girl, with cropped hair under an inexpensive and unfashionable hat, her hands plunged in her pockets. Eventually, the mist resolved itself into rain and even I turned my reluctant steps home.
Though it was only noon, the sky was near dark when I opened the gate and hurried up the walk to my small and shabby boardinghouse. I climbed the narrow stairs to my room, shivering as the damp penetrated my stockings and numbed my legs. I was fumbling for my key with chilled fingers and thinking of a cup of hot tea when the landlady called up the stairs that there was a telephone call for me.
I turned and descended again. It would be the temporary agency on the line—they were the only ones with my exchange. I had worked for them for nearly a year, and they sent me to one place or another to answ
er phones or transcribe notes in ill-lit, low-ceilinged offices. Still, the work had dried up in recent weeks, and I was painfully short of funds. How fortunate I was, of course. I would have missed their call had I come home only five minutes later.
In the first-floor hallway, the house’s only telephone sat on a small shelf, the receiver lying unhooked where the landlady had left it. I could already hear the echo of an impatient voice on the other end.
“Sarah Piper?” came a female voice as I raised the receiver to my ear. “Sarah Piper? Are you there?”
“I’m here,” I said. “Please don’t hang up.”
It was the temporary agency, as I had suspected. The girl sounded flustered and impatient as she explained what had come up. “A writer,” she told me. “Writing a book of some sort—needs an assistant. Wants a meeting with someone today. He wants a female.”
I sighed, thinking of fat, sweaty men who liked a succession of young ladies in their employ. Normally I’d be sent to an office to begin work right away, not to a personal meeting. “Is he a regular client?”
“No, he’s new. Wants to meet someone this afternoon.”
I bit my lip as my stomach rolled uneasily. Temporary girls were easy targets for any kind of behavior from a man, and we had nearly no recourse without getting fired. “At his office?”
She huffed her impatience. “At a coffeehouse. He was specific about meeting in a public place. Will you go?”
“I don’t know,” I said.
“Look.” She had an edge in her voice now. “I have other girls I can call. Are you going or not?”
To meet a man alone in a coffee shop? Yet my rent at the boardinghouse was two weeks past due. “Please,” I said. “This isn’t a matchmaking service.”
“What’s to lose?” she replied. “If you don’t like it, I’ll give it to the next girl.”
I looked out the window, where rain now streaked down. I pictured the girl at the other end of the phone, bored and brassy and fearless. A girl like that wouldn’t think twice. It was girls like me who thought twice—about going back out in our only good set of clothes, about meeting unknown men in unknown places. About everything.
I took a breath. I could go back to my damp little flat, and sit at my window, thinking and drinking endless cups of tea. Or I could go out and meet a stranger in the rain.
“I’ll be there,” I said.
She gave me the coordinates and hung up. I stood for only a moment, listening to the water on the windows and the sound of coarse laughter in one of the first-floor rooms. Then I went back out to the street.
“I don’t suppose they told you much,” the young man across from me said as he poured his tea. “I told them as little as I could.”
He was nothing like I had pictured: young, perhaps twenty-five, the same age as I. His dark blond hair was not slicked down as was the fashion, but worn longish and windblown, as if he combed it in the morning and forgot about it. Quick intelligence gleamed in his gray eyes, the wry set of his face, and the eloquent movement of his hands. The coffeehouse he had brought me to was in Soho, and the bohemian atmosphere of it matched his style—an olive green coat of soft well-worn wool over a white shirt unbuttoned at the throat. He blended perfectly in a place like this, with its offbeat paintings and thin, sullen waitresses.
It was I who was out of place here. I never came to Soho; its reputation was too wild, too artistic for me. But as I sipped coffee that made my mouth burn with flavor and watched Mr. Gellis’ fascinating smile, I ceased to care. I wrapped my cold hands around the cup, curled my sodden toes in their cheap shoes, and managed to smile back.
“Not much,” I agreed. “They said you are a writer.”
He laughed. “I hope you didn’t get too excited. I don’t write lurid books or anything of that sort. Just dry academic books.”
“I don’t read lurid books.”
“You won’t be disappointed, then.” He dropped a lump of sugar in his cup. “A lady who doesn’t read lurid books is promising. I asked for someone intelligent.”
I blinked. The agency thought me intelligent? I doubted it; likely I had been chosen because I was currently available. Still, the compliment warmed. I took off my hat and quickly ran my fingers through my earlobe-length hair, which was curling a little in the damp. “Do you require a secretary? I can transcribe.”
He leaned back in his chair. “There may be some of that.” He tapped his fingers on the tabletop and looked out the window, as if thinking. I watched his clean, debonair profile with the beginnings of warm pleasure. His presence was so comfortable, so easy, I was suddenly glad I had come.
Mr. Gellis tapped his fingertips on the tabletop again and turned to me. He seemed always in motion, as if his thoughts could not sit still. “I confess I’m not entirely sure how to approach this. What I need done may seem rather strange.”
Some of my happiness drained away. “Strange?”
“I met you in public for a reason,” he went on. “I specifically need a female, and I did not want you to feel uneasy, presented with something that might frighten you.”
I was cold now. “I beg your pardon?”
He reddened. “I’m terribly sorry. That came out wrong. I don’t get out much socially, you know.” He sighed. “I’ll let my notes do the explaining.”
He pulled a large notebook from the leather satchel slung over the back of his chair and slid it across the table to me. The notebook was well used and full; I could see corners turned down, the edges of glued-in clippings, extra pages folded and stuffed between leaves.
I opened it to the first page, which contained a newspaper clipping about a haunted house in Newcombe. In the margin next to the clipping was a neat set of handwritten notes. I turned to the second page and found more notes, in a careful hand that was squared and bold and masculine.
I read the notes for a long moment; then I looked up. “This is—”
“Yes.”
“An eyewitness account of a ghost.”
“Yes.”
I felt his gaze on me as I flipped through more pages. It was a notebook of hauntings, one after another. “So—you research ghosts?”
“I document them.” He rubbed a hand through his hair. “Well, what do you know? I’m so used to it I don’t really think of it anymore. But it sounds strange said out loud, doesn’t it?” He dug into his bag again and handed me something else—a book. I took the slender volume and read the title.
Accounts of Haunted Properties in the North of England, by Alistair Gellis. I looked up at Mr. Gellis, who was staring modestly down and stirring his tea with a spoon. “You said you write dry academic books,” I accused.
“I certainly try to.” He shrugged. “I travel to haunted places and test the veracity of the claims. I use technology to document them, or debunk them, as the situation calls for. Then I compile all of my conclusions into books filled with citations and footnotes. As dry as I can make it, really.”
It was all too wild for me to take in. “You believe in this?” I said without thinking.
He frowned, and I wished I could swallow my words. Of course he believed in ghosts, or he would not write about them. “It isn’t a matter of believing, really,” he said. “I believe what I see.”
“But surely some of these are hoaxes?”
The corner of his mouth curled. “Yes, some of them are hoaxes. Many of them, in fact. The hoaxes go in the books, too. But some of them…” He paused, then shrugged again. “What can I say? Some of them simply are not.”
I put the book down on the table. This was surely the strangest assignment any temporary girl had ever been given. I did not know what to make of it. Mr. Gellis seemed young, intellectual, and even eccentric: the type of person who could fall prey to charlatans, I thought. It had not escaped my notice that his clothes, for all their casual elegance, were more quietly expensive than those of anyone else in the room. Likely he attracted liars like magnets.
“You think I’m mad.” When I
looked up, he was smiling, amused and a little rueful. “You can say it. You think I’m barmy. Most women do.”
“No,” I protested. “No.”
“A liar, then.”
I was shocked. “No! Of course not.”
“Very well, then. You simply don’t believe in ghosts.”
“I don’t—” I shook my head. “I don’t know. I’ve never thought of it. I don’t know what I believe.” I took a breath, traced a finger along the edge of the small book in front of me, trying to put into words what concerned me. “I don’t have an opinion about ghosts. It’s people I don’t believe in, I suppose.”
“What a very unusual girl you are,” he said.
I looked up, surprised. Mr. Gellis sipped his tea, his eyes watching me calmly over the rim of the cup. I talked through my confusion. “So—the, ah, job. I am guessing you need someone to organize your notes?”
“Yes, yes.” He put down his cup and sat forward. “I have an assistant. He takes my notes for me and keeps everything organized. That is his notebook there.”
He gestured to the fat notebook on the table between us, and I pictured a serious and bespectacled man, meticulously keeping all of Mr. Gellis’ clippings in order and writing notes with that neat, sure hand.
“His name is Matthew Ryder,” Mr. Gellis went on. “But he is away this week, visiting his sister who is having a baby. Normally I would not need a replacement, but I find that this week I do.”
I nodded. Taking notes, organizing clippings—it was easy enough. “Certainly I’ll help you,” I said.
He held up a finger. “Ah—I haven’t finished. Don’t agree just yet. You said you have no opinion on the existence of ghosts.”
“I’ve certainly never seen one,” I conceded.
His smile was like sun breaking through the clouds. “How lucky for you, then. Because you’re going to see one this week. For me.”
Chapter Two
There was sharp laughter at the next table, but I barely registered it as I stared at Mr. Gellis. “You wish for me to witness a ghost?”
“I hope so,” he replied, as if we were discussing everyday business. “If the lead I have is authentic. I’ve done this long enough to believe it is.”
The Haunting of Maddy Clare Page 1
