Shades of Midnight

by Linda Winstead Jones

  He tried so hard to be scientific, logical, and completely distanced from the emotional aspect of his work. She suspected that was his shield, the way he protected himself.

  But it didn’t always work. She had seen him take on the pain of a man dead more than a hundred years, seen him suffer when a tormented spirit resisted his assistance. She’d seen him sit on the steps of a haunted house and place his head in his hands, when he thought no one was watching. She’d seen him agonize.

  Eve pulled the quilt over her head. “I don’t want to sympathize with Lucien Thorpe,” she said softly. “And I certainly don’t want to love him!”

  But the way he had comforted her as Viola died all over again, she couldn’t deny that it had been very sweet. Very tender. She finally fell asleep with the memory of arms around her so real, at one point she could almost imagine he was in the bed with her.

  *

  “Mr. Thorpe!” a disgustingly cheerful Miss Gertrude called as he tried to make his escape. After three hours of restless sleep, Lucien was not feeling particularly chipper.

  “Good morning,” he said, his tone much less than gregarious.

  “Surely you’re not leaving without breakfast,” she said, undaunted by his lack of enthusiasm.

  “Breakfast.” His stomach growled.

  “I have eggs, bacon, home-fried potatoes, my very best biscuits, and peach preserves.”

  His stomach growled again. It was possible that Eve didn’t intend on feeding him this morning. She hadn’t been particularly happy with him as he’d left her house last night. She might be perfectly content to watch him starve. “Perhaps I should eat,” he conceded.

  Miss Gertrude led Lucien to the dining room, where everything was laid out in warming dishes on the sideboard. “Mr. Camden, a traveling salesman who passes through often, has already eaten and taken his leave, but Mr. Adler and Mr. Latham are still abed.” She shook her head. “Why, they miss the best part of the day, those lazybones.”

  Lucien didn’t tell Miss Gertrude that if he’d had his way he would have been in bed until past noon. His need to get back to the house had awakened him too early. No, the memory of Eve and the need to get to her had awakened him. Would she be glad to see him so early in the day? Probably not.

  His landlady saw him settled at the table with a full plate and a steaming cup of coffee, and when he was suitably settled, she sat in the chair directly across from him. “I do hope everything is to your liking.”

  “I’m sure it will be.”

  “I’ve won numerous awards for my peach preserves.”

  “I’m sure it will be delicious.”

  The older woman straightened her spine as Lucien began to eat, and quickly changed the subject. “You were awfully late getting in last night.”

  Lucien mumbled an agreement.

  “I can’t imagine what might keep a man out so late,” she continued.

  Lucien wondered if the tales had already begun to spread. Justina Markham had told Douglas Hunt that ghosts were in residence at Miss Abernathy’s house. One of them had confided in a friend. That friend had shared the information with a few others. By sunset last night, everyone in town had probably heard the exciting news. Eve would not be pleased.

  Lucien swallowed the bite of biscuit in his mouth and took a long swig of coffee before answering. “I was visiting a friend.”

  Miss Gertrude’s eyes widened. “Not a lady friend at that hour!” she chastised. “I must tell you, Mr. Thorpe, I consider my guests like family, and like family their actions are a reflection not only on themselves, but on me.”

  Lucien took another quick bite, going for the eggs this time. “She’s a bit more than a lady friend,” he said. “I’m going to marry her.” He paused with his fork in the eggs, struck by the truth of that statement. He was going to marry Eve, if he had to carry her kicking and screaming to the altar. “She just hasn’t said yes, yet,” he added in a lowered voice. “Well, she did say yes once, but there was a small problem. A big problem actually. Entirely my fault,” he added quickly. “But if she said yes once, she will say yes again, right?”

  “I have no idea,” Miss Gertrude responded. “Who is this lady friend?”

  “Eve Abernathy,” he said. Immediately he regretted sharing so much with his landlady. If Eve found out he was spreading word that they were going to be married, she’d be furious. “I would appreciate it if you’d keep this between us, for the time being. She hasn’t agreed, yet.” Of course, he hadn’t asked.

  “If she allows you to stay in her house until all hours, I would hope she’d accept your proposal!” Miss Gertrude obviously didn’t approve.

  “She had other guests,” he explained. “I didn’t leave until they did, since I rightly suspected that she did not want to be left to entertain them on her own.” Yes, the guests were long dead, but what difference did that make? “Miss Abernathy and I have never been alone in her home.” That was the truth, and perhaps it would protect Eve’s precious reputation. Proper, indeed.

  Miss Gertrude seemed at least partially mollified. “Miss Abernathy. She bought the Stamper house.”

  Lucien nodded as he continued to eat. For a moment all was quiet, and he had the hopes that breakfast conversation was over. None too soon. He was wrong.

  “That house has a sad history.” The older woman shook her head. “Very sad.”

  Lucien glanced up from his breakfast. Of course! Miss Gertrude should be about the same age as Viola Stamper. Perhaps a few years older, but they certainly must have known one another. “Sad,” he said simply. Knowing Miss Gertrude as he already did, that one word should be enough to urge her to continue.

  She leaned slightly over the table. “Alistair Stamper murdered his wife and then killed himself. Oh, it was quite a scandal at the time, and every now and then someone will mention the Stampers or the house and then the stories will start all over again.”

  “Why did he kill her?” Lucien asked calmly as he reached for more preserves.

  Miss Gertrude glanced to each side, as if to make sure no one else was about. “Viola Stamper was a… well, I do hate to speak ill of the dead but she was not a faithful wife.”

  “She was involved with another man?”

  “Men,” the older woman whispered. “Oh, I can’t say any more, it wouldn’t be appropriate.” She sniffled and continued, anyway. “Poor Alistair.”

  Poor Alistair. Interesting. “Were you friends with Mr. Stamper?”

  For a moment, he thought Miss Gertrude wasn’t going to answer. She pursed her lips and leaned back in her chair. Her lower lip trembled. She suddenly looked older than before. Wrung out and tired. “Mr. Stamper and I were engaged to be married, before he met that… that hussy.” She fanned herself with one plump hand. “Oh, excuse my language,” she said. “It’s just that whenever I think about that time I get upset.”

  “It was certainly not my intention to upset you by asking about the past,” Lucien said.

  “It isn’t your fault,” she said, calming down considerably and quickly. “I was the one who mentioned the house’s history.”

  Miss Gertrude, who spent her days feeding strange men, had apparently never married after Alistair had thrown her over for Viola. How angry had she been? How… Lucien shook off the thought. Viola had been killed by a man, of that he was certain. She had thought the attacker to be her husband, so it must have been. And what woman had the strength to stab a man of Alistair’s size in the chest? Twice?

  Still, he wondered if Eve knew about Miss Gertrude’s past history with Alistair. If not, she would be livid that he’d been the one to discover the tidbit she’d missed.

  He wanted to come up with a way to discretely ask more questions about Alistair Stamper, but they were interrupted by a blur of denim and blue cotton, by stampeding feet and a head of bouncing pale curls.

  “Chester Taylor!” Miss Gertrude said sharply. “Where are your manners?”

  The little boy, who appeared to be somewhere a
round ten years old, stopped by the sideboard and grabbed a biscuit. “Sorry, Aunt Gertrude. If I stop to have good manners, I’ll be late for school.” He split the biscuit expertly and reached past his aunt for the preserves.

  “Mr. Thorpe, this is my nephew Chester. My great nephew, actually. He’s my sister Agnes’s second oldest daughter Ruth’s third-born son.”

  The explanation gave Lucien a headache, but he got the general idea. “Nice to meet you, Chester,” he said. “Don’t eat all the preserves.”

  “Don’t worry,” the boy said as he cast Lucien a quick glance. “Aunt Gertrude always has more.” He lowered his voice. “My mom makes terrible biscuits. If I don’t stop by here on my way to school, I’m starving by lunchtime!” With that, he took his biscuit which oozed peach preserves, and ran, yelling, “Thanks for the breakfast!” as he reached the door.

  Lucien’s plate and his coffee cup were empty. Miss Gertrude offered more but he declined, anxious to be on his way. He wondered if Eve was up and about or if he’d surprise her still warm and snug in her bed.

  As he stood, so did his landlady. “I’m sorry to have burdened you with such old gossip,” she said, smiling halfheartedly. “I don’t know why I said so much. You just have that kind of face, I suppose.”

  “What sort of face is that?”

  “A kind face. The sort of face that’s easy to talk to.” Her smile faded. “I would appreciate it if you kept our breakfast conversation in this room. You keep my confidence, I keep yours.”

  “Of course, if that’s what you wish,” Lucien said. “But why? Surely anyone who was here in Plummerville when the Stampers died knows that you were once engaged to Alistair. It’s not like the betrothal was a secret.”

  Miss Gertrude went pale and she turned her back on him, mumbling something about a pot on the stove as she hurried to the kitchen.

  *

  “First of all,” Eve said, half asleep and annoyed that Lucien’s knock had awakened her, “you do not have an easy face to talk to. Miss Gertrude simply doesn’t know when to be quiet. She talks constantly, and to anyone who will listen.”

  “But…”

  “And besides, if she and Alistair had really been engaged at one time, I would have heard it by now. Someone would have told me.”

  “Not if it was a secret,” Lucien argued.

  Eve threw up her hands. “A secret engagement no one else in town has ever heard of! Really, Lucien, you are so gullible.”

  “I am not!”

  Eve shook her head. “You are. Miss Gertrude is a lonely old woman who loves to talk. You were there, you listened.” She shrugged her shoulders. “She told you a fanciful story, nothing more.”

  “You didn’t see the expression on her face.”

  Eve closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

  “She said Viola was seeing more than one other man.”

  Eve’s eyes flew open. “No! That’s not possible.”

  “Why not?” Lucien asked sensibly.

  “It’s just… not.” Eve felt herself blush. “Why can’t you simply accept that things here happened exactly as they appeared to? Viola made a mistake. Alistair pretended to forgive her, but in fact he did not. He seduced her, and then he killed her.” Her hands worked as she spoke. “Alistair could not forgive her one indiscretion, and yet Viola continues to love the man who murdered her! How could she?”

  Lucien smiled. “Perhaps she is simply a woman who has more mercy than vitriol in her heart.”

  Eve’s lips pinched together. Was he trying to say that she had no mercy? That she was filled with vitriol? Ha. She could be as merciful as any woman! “What are you grinning at?”

  Lucien’s smile didn’t waver. “You look particularly lovely in the morning.”

  Eve had glanced at her reflection in the hallway mirror as she’d hurried to answer his knock, and knew better. “Sarcasm does not become you, Lucien.”

  “I’m perfectly serious. Your hair curls around your face going this way and that, your cheeks are a lovely pink, your eyes are dreamy and, if possible, more green than I remember.” His smile faded. “And that particularly ugly and cumbersome wrapper cannot disguise the fact that you are not wearing a corset. You look so soft and…”

  “Lucien!” she interrupted, grasping the lapels of her wrapper and pulling them together and up to her chin.

  “It’s the truth, Evie.”

  She didn’t know whether to argue with him or run up the stairs. He didn’t give her a chance to do either, but collected his specter-o-meter from the corner near the window and dropped to the floor to examine once again the damaged needle. She could swear that he cradled that device every bit as tenderly as he’d cradled her.

  She moved to stand behind him, while he fiddled with his contraption. “Why are you so intent on proving that Alistair didn’t kill Viola?”

  “Perhaps the truth needs to come out before they can move on.”

  “The truth has been apparent for thirty years,” she said sensibly.

  “Then why are Alistair and Viola trapped here?”

  “Because… because Alistair betrayed Viola and she cannot forgive him.”

  “You said she still loves him, even though she believes he killed her.”

  “She does, but… but…”

  He lifted his head. “Can’t we simply accept that there is the slight possibility that Alistair did not kill his wife and himself?”

  Eve wrinkled her nose. “I suppose I could concede to a slight possibility.”

  “That’s all I ask. We must approach this with open minds. Anything at all is possible. What do you have planned for today?”

  He was looking at her that way again, as he had in the entryway a few minutes ago. He saw too much, he saw too deep. Time to run upstairs and get herself properly coiffed and armored for the day.

  “I’d like to pay a call on the preacher.”

  Lucien’s smug expression changed subtly. Preachers rarely understood or appreciated his talents. She had seen Lucien in church before, had seen him pray. But he always sat in the back pew and remained quiet, and he steered clear of personal contact with the preachers. She suspected that something had happened, before she met him. Something that made him leery of men of the cloth.

  “You don’t have to go with me,” she said, trying to appear nonchalant. “It’s not like there’s anything you can do, and besides, it would be better if we weren’t seen together in town.”

  “Why?”

  “Lucien!”

  He continued to stare at her. “It doesn’t matter. I already told Miss Gertrude that we were going to get married.”

  “You did what?” She grabbed the closest thing to her and threw it at the man sitting on the floor. Luckily for Lucien, it was a soft afghan he caught and set aside. “Half the people in town have heard that rumor by now! Miss Gertrude is the biggest gossip in Plummerville!”

  “When you insisted that I stay there rather than sleep on your couch,” he said calmly, “you didn’t share that bit of information.”

  “Oh!” She grabbed something else to throw, then glanced down at her mother’s hand-painted vase and thought better of it. She placed the vase carefully on the end table by the sofa.

  “If it makes you feel any better, I did tell her that you had not yet said yes.” He returned his attention to the specter-o-meter. “My diligent pursuit will explain away my persistent presence and the fact that I might be seen following you doggedly around town.”

  His presence did have to be explained away somehow, and a persistent suitor was better than a ghost chaser, she supposed. But there was always Justina Markham.

  Who had apparently told no one but Douglas Hunt that the spirits of Alistair and Viola lived on in this house. If the rumors of ghostly hauntings had begun, Lucien would have heard from his landlady. And Eve would have had people knocking on her door by sunset last night. Curious.

  “If we’re going to track down the reverend, perhaps you should get dressed,” Lu
cien suggested absently.

  Chapter 8

  In the past Eve had always been so objective when it came to a haunting that Lucien could not believe her stubborn insistence that in this case he was wrong. She had either lost all sense of neutrality, since the haunted house in question was hers, or she had changed considerably in the past two years.

  Then again, perhaps she simply enjoyed arguing with him. If he said the sky was blue, would she insist it was actually as green as the plain day dress she wore? If he informed her that the month was October, would she argue that it was really November?

  They hadn’t said much on their trek to Plummerville, taking a route he was getting disgustingly familiar with. It wasn’t an unbearably long walk, but Eve did live at the edge of town. Thirty years ago, it had surely been even more secluded. And there Viola had been, perhaps lonely and too far from her friends for her liking. Did she feel isolated in that cottage her husband had built for her? Trapped? Was she so achingly lonely that she was easy prey for any man? He had a hard time seeing Viola as a hussy, as Miss Gertrude had so unkindly called her, but in truth they knew very little about her. And if she had been truly lonely, anything was possible.

  Lucien knew what it was like to be lonely. As a child, even his own mother had shunned him. In fact, she had been afraid of him, and as a child he had not understood why. Not until much later, years after her death, and even then understanding had been difficult. The mind of a child could not grasp why a mother would look at her own son that way, why she would sometimes flinch when he came near.

  And now… spirits often visited their loved ones, watched over them unseen, reached out a silent, invisible hand of comfort. Lucien saw these spirits. He felt their presence and the warm light of love. He never saw his own mother. Was she afraid of him still?

  He had lived his life as an oddity, and at one point he had convinced himself he was insane. It was a logical explanation, and at the time—he’d been sixteen, orphaned and confused, and his stepfather of three years wanted nothing to do with him—he’d actually preferred the concept of insanity to admitting that the ghosts who presented themselves to him were real.