The Secrets of Ghosts

by Sarah Painter

  ‘You’ll be a hungry maverick if you don’t join that queue.’

  ‘Oh, go on, I know you’re not nearly that mean.’ He put a hand to his stomach and Katie tried not to notice how nice his torso looked, how well he was wearing his shirt and buttoned-up waistcoat.

  ‘You have no idea,’ Katie said, narrowing her eyes.

  ‘Fine, I shall simply have to fill up on carbs. But I’m blaming you when I feel all bloated and lethargic later.’ He grabbed a bread roll from the basket and stuffed it into his pocket, then piled two more onto the side of his plate.

  By now one of the legitimately queuing people had reached Katie so she turned resolutely away from the cheeky good-looking guy and said: ‘Would you like a chicken and Parma ham parcel, madam?’ The woman at the front of the queue opened her mouth to answer but didn’t get a chance.

  ‘That sounds heavenly. You know, I’ve changed my mind and I will.’ Cheeky guy had his plate out again and was smiling at Katie, his dark eyes shining with barely suppressed humour. Katie wanted nothing more than to slap the plate out of his hands but Frank was hovering nearby, eyeballing her with an intensity that suggested guests ought to be walking away with chicken parcels, not engaging in a Mexican stand-off with the staff.

  Katie knew when she was beaten. She successfully manoeuvred the chicken parcel onto the plate and gave him a fake smile. ‘Enjoy!’ Then she turned back to the woman who was waiting.

  While Katie concentrated on her silver-service tongs, she couldn’t help watching the chicken thief. He looked quite boyish, but with a scruffy bit of stubble that contrasted rather pleasantly with his smart clothes. She wondered, for the thousandth time, why suit-wearing had gone out of fashion for men. Cary Grant, James Stewart, Henry Fonda, all bona fide hotties in their day, and all unlikely to look quite so delicious in hipster jeans and an over-sized knitted beanie.

  There was something a bit off, though. Katie almost dropped a chicken parcel down a customer’s dress as she contemplated him. He had taken his plate of food and eaten standing up. He chatted to people, looked as if he was always on his way to a table, but never actually landed anywhere. It was almost as if he didn’t have a seat to go to.

  The chicken thief had a slim build and light brown hair that was kind of curly and wild as if he’d just rolled out of a particularly enjoyable bed. He smiled easily whenever anybody looked his way, but in between he was watching the crowd with an unnerving purpose. After studying him for a while, Katie realised that he looked like a predator in a herd of gazelle. Something was telling her that he was up to no good, although God knew what she could do about it, when she was distracted by an over-excited pageboy having the sugar rush of his life. When she next looked for him, he’d disappeared. It was none of her concern, anyway. Wasn’t her wedding. Wasn’t her problem.

  Later on, after the dining tables had been moved and the disco cranked up, Katie was pushing the last bits of buffet food around on the serving plates, trying to make them look a little less sad and leftover, when Frank hustled up and barked orders: ‘It’s winding down here. Go and help with room service.’

  She fetched the tray from the kitchen and checked the room number. Mr Cole in The Yellow Room had ordered a late-night snack of cheese and biscuits and a glass of port. Katie had been upstairs in The Grange many times before but, in her depressed state of mind, the grand staircase seemed oppressive. There was too much oak panelling everywhere and the brass stair rods just made her wince in sympathy with whoever had to polish the damn things. She had a sudden, horrifying vision of that person being her. What if she never worked out what she wanted to do? What if she ended up working at The Grange for ever and ever?

  The Yellow Room was on the top floor. Katie walked down one grand hallway to a narrower staircase and up two flights to a plainer corridor. The walls were papered in cream with a thick embossed damask pattern but the ceiling was lower and the decorative mouldings less fancy. The old servants’ quarters, most likely. The corridor was very clean and very quiet. The fire door whispered shut on the stairwell and, at once, the light seemed to dim.

  Katie didn’t know why she suddenly felt so uneasy. She told herself she was tired and a bit miserable, but it didn’t help. She felt a blast of cold air on her back and turned to see who had opened the door. It was shut.

  Katie readjusted her grip on her tray and forced herself to walk down the hallway. There were muffled voices from behind one of the closed doors, the muted sounds of a television from another. Katie willed her heart to stop beating quite so fast and tried to laugh at herself. She was being ridiculous. She was Katie Harper and a little cold breeze wasn’t going to make her twitchy.

  The Yellow Room was the last door and she wedged the tray against her body so that she could hold it with one hand and knock with the other.

  No answer.

  She knocked again, and called out in a chirpy, ‘I’m here to help!’ voice: ‘Room service.’ The door wasn’t locked properly and it swung open.

  Katie edged into the room, keeping her gaze lowered in case something private was happening. ‘Hello? Is everything all right? Shall I just leave the tray—?’

  She caught sight of something in her peripheral vision. A man was lying on the polished hardwood floor. His tie askew.

  ‘Sir? Are you all right, sir? Mr Cole?’

  There was something about the way the man was lying. His absolute stillness. Katie knew without touching him that his skin would be cold. In fact, cool air seemed to be spreading outwards so that Katie could feel it even where she was standing. She put the tray down on the floor with a clatter and stepped over it to kneel down next to the man. ‘Mr Cole? Can you hear me? Are you all right?’

  She touched his arm then, remembering first-aid lessons at school, pressed two fingers to the side of his neck. He was cold. Really cold. Just-come-out-of-the-freezer cold. His eyes were wide open and his expression fixed in a way that Katie knew that she would never, ever forget.

  The coolness travelled up her fingers from where she’d pressed them against the man’s skin and she just had time to think that he shouldn’t be that cold, that it wasn’t right, when she felt an icy stillness spread up her arm and across her chest, making her breathing suddenly slow. Soon, every part of her body was chilled and her scalp was prickling. She tried to move away, but her strength had gone. One moment she was kneeling upright next to the dead man, her hand at his neck, and the next instant she was slumped sideways and unable to move. Mr Cole’s head was uncomfortably close. Through the horrible numbing cold, she felt revulsion and fear. She wanted to move away, but couldn’t. She wanted to shut her eyes, to stop seeing his face, but she couldn’t do that either. She felt as if her eyelids were frozen in place. From her angle on the floor, Mr Cole’s face was in profile, and the terror and panic just as obvious. He looked as if his worst nightmare had risen up in front of him.

  Katie felt a surge of panic. She still couldn’t move and the cold was bringing back terrible memories. Not again, she thought. Not again. There had been a time. One very bad time when she’d felt a similar draining of control. A time when she’d stumbled out in the snow, drunk and crying and something else besides. She had felt herself dissolve, her will liquid and useless, and she’d vowed never again. As the cold slowed her thoughts further, she fought against it. Imagined pinching herself, imagined the pain she’d feel, and willed it to keep her conscious and rational. She stared at the pores on Mr Cole’s face and tried to remember. She hadn’t done any magic; she was sure of that. Hadn’t tried any for months, now. The weakness was spreading. She wanted to sleep so badly, to stop thinking, and now her vision was fading. She heard a voice say, ‘Oh, Christ,’ and she thought, It’s okay, someone’s come, and the last of her strength disappeared and the world went black.

  Chapter 2

  Katie opened her eyes and light flooded in. A blurred circle of white gradually resolved into a face. Brown hair flopping forwards over unfamiliar features. After a moment, the n
ose stopped dancing, three eyes became two and the mouth pulled into a worried line. At once, she realised who was leaning over her: the good-looking wedding guest. The one she’d thought didn’t belong.

  ‘Oh, thank Christ,’ he said, sitting back on his heels. ‘You’re alive.’

  Katie moved her head and saw that she was still lying next to the dead man. She struggled to sit up and the young guy lunged forwards. ‘You shouldn’t do that. You might have hurt your back or neck or something.’

  ‘I didn’t fall,’ Katie managed. Her voice hurt her head, which was already pounding. It made it difficult to think clearly. She could move, though. She stretched out an arm, flexed her fingers.

  ‘Look…’ he was standing up, now ‘…I’ve got to go. I’ll send someone up here.’

  Katie was trying to unscramble her thoughts. She’d come in and seen the man and then she’d passed out. No, she’d knelt down and touched the man and then she’d felt very weak. She looked up, wincing as the pendant light shone too brightly into her eyes.

  The good-looking man was at the door, hesitating. ‘You’re okay, now,’ he said, as if reassuring himself.

  ‘He isn’t,’ Katie said pointing at the man. They had to call an ambulance. He was past that, of course, but still. Suddenly, she realised she was going to be sick. She got to her feet and, the room spinning wildly, made it into the en suite to throw up in the sink.

  When she came out the man had gone, but she heard footsteps in the corridor.

  *

  Later, she sat in the public lounge with a sweet cup of tea and a female police officer. Either an autopilot setting had kicked in, or she was still spaced from fainting, but she was calm and methodical as she told the officer what she’d seen. A second track of her mind was running its own commentary. Katie expected it to be shocked and sad and all the things she imagined to be normal human reactions, but instead it thought: Well, at least my birthday will be memorable for something.

  Katie closed her eyes. She was a bad, bad person.

  Jo came out of the kitchen, still in her chef’s whites, and gave her a hug. Jo nodded to the police officer, then looked into Katie’s face. ‘You okay?’

  Katie nodded. ‘Just a bit of a shock. I’m fine.’

  Jo squeezed her shoulder. ‘You should be at home.’ She glanced at the officer whose name Katie had already managed to forget. ‘Don’t keep her hanging about, will you? It’s not right.’

  The female officer had a monotone voice, as if she were reading from an autocue and wasn’t very good at it. ‘There is a procedure that we have to follow.’

  ‘I’m fine,’ Katie said, before Jo could tell the police what she thought of their procedure. She rustled up a smile for Jo, who gave the officer one last long look before walking away.

  ‘So,’ the officer said, seemingly unaffected by Jo’s display of concern. ‘Do you remember seeing anything out of the ordinary tonight?’

  ‘No, nothing,’ Katie said. ‘I mean, apart from the man. Mr Cole.’

  ‘We’re talking to all the members of the wedding party and the staff, but is there anybody else who may have had contact with Mr or Mrs Cole this evening?’

  The chicken thief. Oh, bugger. If her hunch was correct and he’d crashed the wedding, he wouldn’t be listed as a guest. Did that matter, though? She hadn’t seen him talking to Mr Cole, although he had been upstairs in the hotel, where he’d had no business to be. On the other hand, bringing him into the conversation would delay the interview and she really wanted to go home.

  While she dithered, the police officer continued her list of questions. ‘Any loud disagreements, anybody acting strangely?’

  ‘It was a wedding,’ Katie said, wondering if her face had betrayed her. ‘Define “strange”.’

  Patrick Allen strode into the room and straight up to the senior policeman who was conducting an interview at a nearby sofa. ‘I came as soon as I could. I own The Grange.’

  The detective stood up and they shook hands. Katie had inherited a less-than-positive opinion of Patrick Allen from her aunt Gwen, but at that moment she felt sorry for the man. His hair was sticking up at the back as if he’d got out of bed to come to the hotel and he looked grey with concern. Maybe he wasn’t the heartless suit Gwen had always described him as.

  ‘We’re not a chain,’ Patrick was saying. ‘We can’t take this kind of publicity, and in this financial climate...’ He seemed under the impression that the detective was a journalist. ‘I don’t want a circus.’

  ‘There is no reason for alarm, sir,’ the detective said. He started to say something about it looking ‘very routine’ but they moved away as they were speaking and Katie didn’t catch it properly.

  ‘Miss Harper.’ The police lady opposite was leaning forward, her notebook balanced on one knee. ‘Can I ask you again to think if you saw the deceased argue with anybody this evening?’

  Katie snapped back to the conversation. ‘Wasn’t it a heart attack or something? Why are you asking that?’

  ‘We don’t know the cause of death at this time and we need to get as complete a picture as possible of Mr Cole’s last few hours.’

  Those words — ‘last few hours’ — flipped a switch inside Katie and, at once, she felt incredibly sad. That man, Oliver Cole, ate his salmon starter and drank the over-priced fizzy wine and chatted to people with no idea that he was enjoying the very last few hours of his existence. She reached into her shirt and touched her necklace as another thought hit her: with the Harper family intuition, would she be as clueless? Iris certainly seemed very prepared for her passing: she’d sorted out her journals, left notes for Gwen... But was that better? Preferable? How did it feel when you knew exactly how many more seconds there were to go on the clock? Suddenly, Katie really wanted to get out of the overly warm living room. She wanted to go back to her flat and sleep for a day. Maybe two. She focused on the policewoman, who was looking a bit irritated. ‘That’s everything I can tell you. It’s time to wrap this up.’

  The woman’s eyes slid over Katie’s face as if searching for purchase. Then she said: ‘It’s probably about time to wrap this up. If you think of anything else, anything at all—’ She held out a business card.

  ‘I’ll call you,’ Katie said, getting up. She walked swiftly out of the room before the policewoman regained her senses and went to the staff room to collect her denim jacket and bag. Katie felt shaky. For a horrible moment she’d thought the policewoman had been going to ignore her suggestion. Light distraction or suggestion was one of the basic skills of the Harper women, as natural and easy as telling a white lie or reading cards to help a friend make a decision. It was one of the first hints that she was a Harper, turning up when she was just fourteen, and as much a part of her as the colour of her hair. What if each skill were stripped away until there was nothing left? What if, rather than coming into her true power, she was experiencing the disintegration of the abilities she already had?

  The staff entrance was behind the kitchen so she said goodbye to Jo on her way through.

  ‘You sure you’re all right?’ Jo frowned at her, her pixie-cropped hair sticking up at odd angles where she’d had her hat pinned all evening. ‘Here.’ Jo disappeared inside her walk-in fridge and returned with half a cheesecake on a cling-filmed plate.

  ‘Thank you.’ Katie was touched by Jo’s kindness and it made her want to cry. She got out of the kitchen before Jo could see her eyes filling up, but it was a close-run thing.

  The hot weather was holding and the night air was freakishly warm, even though it was past eleven o’clock. The curtains in the hotel were drawn and blocks of red-tinged light hit the gravel that circled the house, but the driveway was a pitch-black tunnel. She’d told Patrick last year that he needed to put more of the solar ground lights along it but he clearly hadn’t been listening. As soon as she stepped away from the lights of the main building the shape of the low garden walls and clipped hedges took on a grey and menacing appearance, becoming strange and
other-worldly in the half-light.

  As a result she didn’t notice the figure sitting on the steps that led from the upper lawn until the very last moment and she nearly kicked him in the back.

  She recovered her balance without falling over him. ‘Jesus! You scared me.’

  ‘Sorry.’ The chicken thief stood up. He was too close for comfort. Especially in the dark, deserted garden. Katie took a step back.

  He stepped away, too, as if aware of her discomfort, giving her more space. ‘I’m sorry I startled you.’

  ‘Why are you loitering out here?’ She didn’t mean to sound so abrupt, but it hadn’t been the best evening.

  He held up an unlit cigarette. ‘I’m wrestling with my demon.’

  ‘Ah,’ Katie said. ‘I’ve heard it’s harder to give up nicotine than heroin. Or is it cocaine?’

  He shrugged.

  ‘Why aren’t you in there?’ Katie gestured to the hotel. ‘The police want to speak to you.’

  ‘To everyone, surely. Not me specifically.’ He tilted his head back. ‘You look better. Are you feeling better?’

  ‘You did find the deceased,’ Katie said. ‘I think that makes you a key witness or something.’

  ‘You found him first.’

  ‘And I’ve spoken to them,’ Katie pointed out.

  ‘Good for you. Very public spirited.’

  ‘Seriously. A man is dead. You ought to—’

  ‘I prefer to keep a low profile.’

  Katie’s mouth twisted. ‘I hardly think they’ll care about you crashing the wedding.’

  ‘You noticed that, huh?’ He pulled out a packet and stuck the unlit cigarette inside. ‘And I thought I was so stealthy.’

  ‘It wasn’t that obvious. I was watching you, though—’ Katie broke off. That was an embarrassing thing to say. He looked amused, which didn’t help.

  ‘That’s good to know.’

  ‘Because you seemed dodgy,’ Katie said. ‘Not for any other reason.’