no..."
"I know they're home," Annie insisted. The front of the mansion was immaculate, as always, which made the heavy scent of charred wood all the more disturbing.
Max knocked again. Rang the bell, kept his finger on the button.
They could hear the peal.
And see the lights blazing on both floors.
"Unfortunately," Max said grimly, "we aren't cops. We don't have a search warrant. Nobody has to talk to us."
Annie jerked to look to her left. Had the drapes moved at that second window on the ground floor?
But what if they had?
Charlotte and Whitney Tarrant were under no compulsion to permit Annie and Max Darling to enter Tarrant House.
But lights were also shining next door, at Miss Evangeline Copley's house.
Annie nodded her head decisively. "Let's see what Miss Copley has to say. She's the one who heard Ross and the Judge quarrel that afternoon."
Max resisted at first. "We know all about that, Annie. And isn't she the ghost-lady Laurel talked to? Listen, Annie, I'm sure ghosts are fine, but they're no help to us. No ghost spirited Courtney away or set fire to the Tarrant Museum."
"Maybe Miss Copley saw something last night." Annie pushed away the memory of that flash of white, deep in the Tarrant garden. That was long before a hand splashed gasoline on the museum. "She's an old lady. Maybe she doesn't sleep much."
Annie led the way.
Max had just raised the knocker when the door popped open and milky blue eyes peered out at them.
"Miss Copley, we're here because Miss Dora Brevard—"
"I know all about you young people, and yes, I want to help. Come right in." White curls quivered as Evangeline Copley nodded energetically and held open the screen door. "To think that dear young man has lain a-mouldering in his grave all these long years, blamed for a heinous crime! Why, it sets my heart afire with anger." The soft voice rose indignantly. She was as tiny as Miss Dora but as different as a Dresden shepherdess from a witch's peaked hat. A fleecy white angora shawl draped her shoulders. Her blue linen dress matched her eyes. She clapped together plump pink hands. "Now, I know things that aren't generally known." She trotted ahead of them into a parlor that would have been a perfect setting for Jenny Lind. Two Regency sofas faced each other oneither side of the fireplace. A magnificent French gilt mirror hung above the Adam mantel. The ceiling medallion that supported the glorious chandelier was also gilt. Golden brocade hangings decorated elaborate recessed windows.
Max gave Annie an I-told-you-so look and, when they took their seats in matching curved-back chairs, he was poised for a quick escape. So he was brisk. "We know all about the quarrel Ross had with his father the day they died. But we wanted to ask if you knew anything about the fire last night, the one that destroyed the Tarrant Museum."
"Evil in this world, sadness in the other." She looked at them brightly, a link from one world to the next.
Max didn't roll his eyes, but he stiffened.
Miss Copley had no trouble divining his thoughts. With a sweet smile, she said matter-of-factly, "I'm almost there, you know. Ninety-nine my last birthday. The angel wings can't be long in coming. Perhaps that's why I was the one to see Amanda."
Max folded his arms across his chest and didn't say a word.
Annie would have pinched him if she could have managed it unseen. She and Max were going to have to have a chat about body language. But, for now, she knew it was up to her. "Uh . . . Amanda," she ventured. "You've seen her?"
Miss Copley eyed Max thoughtfully. "Now, now, young man, there are more things in heaven and earth than you know." But her tone was gentle. "Why, I've seen angels, too. Once when I was a young girl walking by the river on a summer afternoon, a group of angels went right by me, lovely girls in long white gowns with golden iridescent wings, talking, talking and there was such a sense of peace and happiness. . . . But that's not why you're here. Now, I do want you to understand''—she leaned forward, her china-doll face puckered earnestly—"ghosts are not angels."
Max looked helplessly at Annie.
Annie said heartily, "Of course not."
Miss Copley folded her plump hands and smiled approvingly at Annie. "Why not?"
"Uh." Annie took a deep breath. "Well, angels, of course, are"—she took a plunge—"happy?"
Miss Copley considered this seriously. "Well, my dear, of course they can't always be happy. But you see the difference. Angels are messengers of God, they come to do His bidding. Whereas, ghosts"—a faint sigh—"are tied to this plane. They can't be freed as long as they continue to suffer. But I hadn't seen Amanda in many years—not until this week. So I am quite concerned. Why is she walking again? What has happened to recall her to the scenes of her misery? Walking there at the back of the garden, just by the obelisk. I saw her again last night when I came home from dinner at my nephew's. Of course, I went out to see if she might be there, since I'd seen her the night before. And then for that awful fire to start. It brought me right up out of bed. But, of course, you know that Amanda had nothing to do with the fire."
The cloudy blue eyes clung to his face until Max gave an affirmative nod.
"A car drove up perhaps five minutes before the fire broke out. Someone set it, of course." Miss Copley nodded to herself. "But I know Amanda was nearby. For I've seen her twice now." Her sweet voice fell into a mournful singsong. "Each time, she was all in white. Just as Augustus liked for her to dress. Walking, walking. The swirl of white, the glint of moonlight, the sound of faraway footsteps."
It was one thing to deal with Laurel, who recounted ghostly tales somewhat in the same manner as a social climber toting up celebrity sightings. It was quite another, Annie realized, to discuss a ghost with an old woman as attuned to the next world as to this one.