Chapter 24

“Do you know him?” asked Eric.

He rose to his feet and joined me on the other side. Kneeling on the leaves, he peered at the man’s face. “He’s not familiar to me.”

“I’m trying to remember where I saw him. There’s something about him, his mouth maybe.” The most distinguishing feature of his face was the angled bracket on each side of his mouth. I had drawn them recently in my sketchbook. And then it came to me. “You know the weird house with the gargoyles?”

“Sure.”

“I saw him across the street in the dark, leaning against the side of a house like he was watching it.”

“This guy? Are you certain?”

“I wouldn’t want to swear to it in court, but I’m pretty sure he’s the one I saw right before Cyril was attacked.”

Eric slowly turned his head to look at me. His voice was soft and level. “Was there enough time for him to break into Cyril’s house and attack him?”

I considered his question with a certain degree of horror. Had I seen Cyril’s attacker only moments before he tried to kill Cyril? Was that possible? “Maybe. I was ambling back to the bookstore, looking at the Halloween decorations. I guess it’s possible if he was fast and knew his way into the house.” I shivered.

Eric remained calm. “Well, he’s definitely dead, and since it’s likely a crime scene, then we’ve already contaminated the site by being here. Maybe we shouldn’t turn him over. Let’s just leave him as is.” He was on his phone in an instant. “Hi, Dolly. Eric Jonquille. I’ve got a body on the edge of Rock Creek Park where it backs up to the cemetery.”

So many thoughts ran through my head.

Maybe it was the creepy light that the moon cast on the world. Maybe it was because we were in a cemetery. Maybe it was the shock of finding a second corpse. But the thought that kept coming back to me was that Hilda had been correct. I had no idea how long the body had been there, but Hilda’s prognostications seemed to be coming true. The only thing she got wrong was that the rug had been in a doorway.

Was I reading too much into it? This corpse might not be the second murder that she predicted. And maybe Manny’s murder wasn’t the one she told us about, either.

Just because there happened to be two murders didn’t mean either one of them had any relation to what Hilda had predicted.

Eric ended the call.

We stood alone in the dark next to a dead person.

He flicked on the flashlight in his phone again and aimed it at the feet. The corpse was wearing high-quality black leather shoes. “Hilda said there would be a second body.”

“Do you think she was right?” I asked.

Eric ran the light all the way along the body from one end to the other. Without moving, he aimed the light at the ground on both sides.

“It’s peculiar, that’s for sure,” said Eric.

“You don’t believe her?” I was surprised. “You’re the one who tries to keep an open mind.”

“I don’t like to jump to conclusions.”

That made sense. Eric was right.

I was the one thinking that Hilda might have killed two people. She could have done it just to promote her abilities. Or she could have made up that story as a cover for murders that she had planned. But in that case, wouldn’t it have been smarter not to say anything? And would she have been stupid enough to lead us here to the second body?

I heard voices, and a painfully bright beam focused on us.

As they neared, the shadowy forms of three people took shape in the dark. One called out, “Jonquille?”

“Right here.”

They joined us and I recognized a couple of the cops.

“Florrie and I saw something reflect in the light of our lanterns. She took a step off the path to see what it was and we both fell over this guy.”

They trained their flashlights on the body. He wore pressed trousers that looked to be a heathered gray, and a black bomber-style jacket. He had a full head of graying hair. I couldn’t see his face at all, but the pressed pants and the good cut of his hair suggested that he was a professional of some kind.

I overheard one of the cops call for homicide detectives.

“We’d better catch up to the others before they think we’re lost,” said Eric.

“If you want to stay here, I can use the light on my phone to find them.”

“Not a chance. What kind of gentleman would let his best girl wander through a dark graveyard at night by herself?”

One of his buddies chuckled, but said, “You better go with her.”

We didn’t say much as we left the crime scene. Eric took my free hand into his. “I’m sorry you had to see that, Florrie.”

“Don’t worry about me. Are you going back there tonight?”

“Maybe. I’d like to follow up on this case.”

“Because of Hilda?”

“Partly. Mostly because I was looking for a body rolled up in a rug with a foot sticking out. And then it appeared.”

“You think this corpse might be related to Manny’s death?” I asked.

“Hard to tell at this point, but it could be.”

“Hilda is up to her eyeballs in this whole thing.”

He squeezed my hand. “Let’s keep this under wraps for now. Okay?”

“You don’t want me to say we found a body?”

“I think we have to tell them that much. They’re going to wonder what happened to us. But let’s not mention the part about a connection to Hilda just yet. It will be in the news soon enough anyway.”

I could see lanterns ahead. It wasn’t long before Veronica was shouting my name.

“It’s us! We’re okay!” I responded.

The group gathered around us.

“We thought a ghost nabbed you!” joked Bob.

“You might say that,” said Eric. “Florrie stumbled over a body.”

I looked up at Eric. Unless I missed my guess, he was studying Hilda’s reaction. As far as I could tell, it wasn’t significantly different than anyone else’s. Most of the faces displayed horror and shock, but a few seemed doubtful.

“We had to wait for the police to come,” I explained.

Veronica hugged me. “You poor thing!” She held me at arm’s length. “Why do you keep finding bodies?”

“She really did fall over this one,” said Eric. “It’s probably a good thing that kids playing in Rock Creek Park didn’t happen upon him.”

In the glow of the lanterns, we all looked creepy, but Hilda, with her flaring cape and wild hair, would have frightened small children. She walked toward me and clasped my hand.

I wanted to blurt out that we had found the second body of which she had spoken. But maybe we hadn’t. Maybe it was a different murder.

“You have a power within you,” Hilda stated. “I can feel it. Florrie, the spirits say you have to let it grow and develop. You’re trying to suppress your natural abilities.”

I . . . was . . . appalled. I shivered all over and snatched my hand away from Hilda.

“Are you sure you’re okay, Florrie?” asked Eric.

I pulled my shoulders back and took a deep breath. “Sure. Go on back and do your thing. I’ll stay with the group.”

“Thanks for understanding, Florrie.” Eric kissed me on the cheek.

I grabbed his hand as he turned to leave. “Find out what caught the light of our lanterns.”

“Will do.” He handed me his lantern and walked away, using the flashlight in his phone to light the path.

I watched him until he became one with the darkness.

“Maybe I should take you home,” said Veronica. “You’ve had a shock three times in the last few days.”

What I wanted was to be a fly on Eric’s collar to find out what was going on. “I’m fine,” I said. But when I heard my voice quaver, I didn’t even convince myself.

Our group moved off quickly. I spied the cemetery entrance not too far away. I whispered to Veronica that I was going to head home and insisted that she continue.

They walked on. I was watching them when I saw a slender man walking alone without a lantern. Had he come here at night to visit a grave in secret? For one long moment, I feared he might be President Lincoln, but he wasn’t wearing a top hat. That was when I realized that he didn’t have a head at all.

I was fairly sure that I stopped breathing.

And then, right before my eyes, he walked smack into the wall of a mausoleum and disappeared. I blinked several times. How was that possible?

My hands trembled. Surely, I hadn’t seen a ghost. Part of me wanted to run over and examine the mausoleum wall. But the greater part of me wanted to get out of there as fast as possible.

Breathing somewhat erratically, I rushed toward the entrance and handed the two lanterns to the gentleman who had given them to us.

He smiled knowingly. “Did you see the headless ghost?”

I was taken aback. “You know about him?”

“Oh, sure. He’s a regular here. We don’t know who he is, but we think he’s looking for someone. We joke about the fact that he can’t find who he’s looking for because he doesn’t have a head.”

A quiver ran through my entire body. “I hope he’s not looking for me, because I’m out of here.”

The man laughed. “Your first ghost sighting?”

My heart pounded in my chest. “Yes. May I ask you a question?”

“Sure.”

“Does the headless ghost walk through walls?” I felt incredibly stupid.

“On a regular basis,” he assured me.

I thanked him and gladly returned to the more earthly surroundings of Georgetown. It was late and the streets had grown less busy. I wasn’t far from the bookstore. I walked the few blocks, trying to shake the image of the headless ghost. But then I couldn’t help thinking about the man in the leaves. What a horrible ending for someone. He had surely been murdered. There was no other way or reason for a dead person to be in an offbeat location like that. Eric may not have wanted to concede that the new body and Manny were the same ones Hilda had seen or imagined, but I couldn’t help wondering if they were exactly the same. Could there be a connection between the two deaths? And I was seriously spooked by Hilda’s suggestion that I was finding dead bodies for a reason. That it was some sort of mystical power. I shook all over. What nonsense!

Lights were still on in the Maxwell mansion when I returned home. To be honest, I was in no mood for company. All I wanted was to curl up with a cup of hot tea.

Peaches and Frodo met me at the door of the carriage house. I interpreted Peaches’s demand for attention to mean that she had missed me. Frodo was happy I had returned but all he really wanted was a cookie.

I took care to lock my front door. While I didn’t think I had anything to fear, someone or two someones were murdering people in my part of town. There was no reason to keep the front door unlocked anyway. I paused in the kitchen to put on the kettle for tea and headed up the stairs.

Peaches and Frodo followed me to the bedroom, where I changed into a Christmas-red plaid nightshirt. It was probably silly of me, but red plaid always made me feel warm and cozy.

The teakettle whistled and the three of us returned to the kitchen. I stroked both Peaches and Frodo, glad I wasn’t alone. I plunked an English breakfast teabag into a mug, poured the boiling water over it, and added plenty of milk. I didn’t let it steep long, though. I didn’t want to be up all night and would have a hard enough time sleeping as it was.

I fed Peaches a cat treat that reeked of fish. Frodo received a special dog chew for his teeth. I preferred a gingersnap cookie. I carried my tea to the sofa and curled up with my sketchpad.

So much had happened that I hardly knew where to start. I doodled idly while I thought about the fact that my entire perspective on ghosts had just changed. I had lived quite happily believing them to be myths and scary tales. But there was simply no denying what I had seen. No wonder other people who had seen ghosts were afraid to admit it for fear of ridicule.

As my doodle developed, the tall headless ghost I had seen took shape. His collar had been crisply folded. I hadn’t seen a neck at all. Just a body. But it was finely detailed. It wasn’t like a big blob or an amorphous figure. I had read about people who claimed to have seen lights moving or a fog. I hadn’t seen him long enough to make decisions about his attire, but something about him screamed 1800s to me. It had to have been his clothing.

I wanted to tell myself that I hadn’t seen him. That it had been the power of suggestion. That I imagined him because of Hilda and Jacquie’s incessant talk of ghosts. But the truth was that I knew what I had seen. He had been completely clear to me. And, even worse, the man at the gate had confirmed it. He hadn’t said something that was so universal that it would have applied to every gust of dust and fireplace smoke tendril. The man at the gate knew. He knew the ghost didn’t have a head. Chill bumps rose on my arms again.

I flipped the page to start fresh. I had drawn a foot in a carpet recently. This time the corpse hadn’t been covered by anything except leaves. I drew the man’s body as I remembered it, lying on the ground with dried leaves on top of it.

I went to the next page quickly and sketched the skull again. If there were such things as ghosts, could there also be such things as screaming skulls? I would have to ask Bob and Veronica which one of them had placed the skull in the window. In a way, it had been a brilliant, if frightening, idea. I drew the eye sockets with streams of white shooting out of them. Taking my time, I blurred the area along the beams, and used a variety of shade values on the skull.

I was studying my results when someone pounded on my door.