“Good job you’ve got your pistol.”
“It’s not real. See?”
She pulls the trigger and there is a snapping sound and a little puff of smoke escapes the barrel. I’m instantly thrown into the memory of a Christmas morning, Eddie and I in our pajamas, hands trembling with excitement. He pulled a cap gun just like Stevie’s from his stocking and when he fired it had smelled just like this: spent matches and a smidge of sulfur.
“All right, Annie Oakley, put it away,” I hear a man’s voice say. I turn to see a dark figure leaning over the churchyard wall, silhouetted against the sun. Stevie grins and pokes out her tongue, hightailing it around the corner and out of sight, trailing her laughter like ribbons. An older man with a bolt of gray hair extends a hand toward me. His eyes are a rich, marine blue which crease as he smiles.
“There are two types of people in this world.” His voice is a rich baritone. “Those who are Cornish and those who wish they were. Which are you?”
“Well, I was born in Devon, so the second one I suppose.”
“Well, then, you have my condolences. Next best thing to being Cornish is being here, so you’re a step in the right direction.”
He shakes my hand, his grip firm and steady.
“Bert Roscow. I’m guessing you’re part of this circus on Beacon Terrace, aren’t you? It’ll be television cameras next.”
I stare at him blankly.Circus? Beacon Terrace?I’ve no idea what he’s talking about, so it is with some relief that I realize Sam has parked the car a little farther up the road and is walking toward us. Bert sees him and grunts, planting his big hands on the wall and leaning a little farther forward.
“I was just saying it’ll be television cameras next!” Bert calls to him. His voice is loud but he doesn’t seem angry, although it’s hard to tell. I can’t seem to place his age—his hair is white and his face netted with wrinkles—but he’s sprightly and hale, well-dressed. Sam smiles at him, shaking his head as he speaks.
“I shouldn’t think so, Bert. They’re all too busy filming this weather, aren’t they? Half an hour of it on the news last night. I almost lost the will to live.”
“So you’ve come back for another go, have you?” the man asks. “You must think there’s something in this story.”
“I do, as it happens.” Sam nods. “Public interest. Last yearThe Heraldran a story about a gray monk haunting the site of an old friary—pure fiction of course, with a few blurry snapshots—but our readership increased threefold and we got more post that week than we could manage. People came down from all over to visit the supposed Friars Walk behind the big Tesco.”
“I meant about the girl. Alice. You think there’s some truth to what they’re saying?”
Sam laughs uneasily. I can’t help feeling that he has been caught out somehow. Like a child pointing out to a magician that he can see the mechanism of the trick up his sleeve.
“You’re asking if I think the house is haunted?”
“I’m wondering what could possibly have brought you here if you didn’t. I’d hate to think you were pursuing a story without a thought for Alice’s welfare.”
“Ah,” Sam says. “On that note, let me introduce you to Mina Ellis. She’s a child psychologist and she’ll be assessing Alice to see if there isn’t some more, uh, fundamental problems at hand. Mina, this is Bert. He lives next door to the Webbers.”
“Number Twelve,” Bert tells me, eyes twinkling. “Me and my wife, Mary, the light of my dreary old life. We both watched Alice grow up and she never gave us a jot of bother. Seems like one minute she was playing with her dolls under the kitchen table and now I’m being told she’s a high priestess who can communicate with the dead. I told her, I said, ‘Alice if you’re in touch with the spirit realm, speak to my brother and ask him where he put the keys to his bloody garden shed.’” He laughs, looking from me to Sam and back again. “I’m sure I’m showing my age here but who was it who said ghosts were a product of digestion? ‘A blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese—there’s more of gravy than the grave about you,’ something like that?”
“Dickens,” Sam says, lighting his roll-up. “It’s fromA Christmas Carol.”
“That’s right! Good man. Good man.”
A little way behind him I see the young girl again, holding her gun against her hip. Stevie is watching us cautiously and when I smile at her she dashes behind a gravestone in the shape ofa Celtic cross. Before I know it Bert is shaking my hand warmly and saying, “Well, whatever’s going on in there, I hope you both get to the bottom of it. Give us a knock if you need anything and you can meet Mary, if she’s having a good day.”
As Sam and I walk back to the car he calls after us, “You know I used to be in the newspaper business myself, Sam—might be able to give you some tips!”
“What was all that about a circus?” I ask Sam who frowns and shrugs.
“Not a clue,” he tells me.
FIVE
Outside 13 Beacon Terrace a knot of people are standing, sweltering in the heat. Their shadows spill over the pavement and pool in the road like melted tar. Sam pulls my suitcase from the car, faking his shoulder giving way with the weight of it. We both laugh politely.
“Who are they?” I ask, nodding toward the group ahead.
“Huh. Don’t know. They weren’t there last week.”