The Stubborn Schoolhouse Spirit (The Penelope Pembroke Cozy Mystery Series) (4 page)

CHAPTER FIVE

Penelope locked her door and put a chair against it. Then she undressed without bothering to turn on the light. She could still feel Sam’s lips and hands and how she hadn’t wanted to pull back. She didn’t have to imagine what would have happened if she hadn’t. She’d always regretted that she hadn’t pulled back from Travis that night
in the backseat of his new car.

“Darn you, Sam,” she whispered into the darkness. “Who are you, and why do I even care?” She ripped back the quilt and slid into bed. The sheets were cold. What would it be like to snuggle against a man’s body on a cold winter night? After they’d heated things up, of course.

Stop it, Penelope. Age is no excuse for the sin of lust.

She sat up, clutching the covers around her. Had she really heard a knock on the door?

“Sam?”

Silence.

“Sam?”

This time she heard his low, rumbling laugh moving away down the hall. Curling herself into a tight ball, she buried her face in the pillow and wept.

****

In the morning when she went downstairs, the kitchen w
as empty, but her eye caught a note propped

against
the sugar bowl in the middle of the table. She ripped it open.

Wish I could say thank you for last night, but since I
can’t, I’ll just warn you I won’t be so easily dissuaded next time. P.S. Thanks for a place to crash. I’ll get breakfast on the road.

Hearing Jake, she crumpled the paper and stuffed it into the pocket of the chenille robe made from her childhood bedspread. Then she busied herself making coffee.

“Mornin’, Nellie.”

“Morning, Daddy.”

“Sleep all right?”

“Of course. Why shouldn’t I have slept all right?”

“I was just asking. Don’t bite an old man’s head off, especially when it’s pounding.”

“How many beers did you have last night?”

“Three. I think.”

“Oh, Daddy.”

“It’s only Saturday morning, Nellie. I’ll make Mass tomorrow just fine.”

“I wasn’t thinking of that.” She poured him a cup of coffee. “Breakfast?”

He groaned.

“Me neither, and I didn’t have three beers.”
Just a near miss with disaster.

****

Shana showed up while Penelope was finishing her coffee and contemplating the next step. “I came to help clean up.”

“Thanks, sweetie. I can blessed use the help.”

“You look awful. Didn’t you sleep well?”

“I slep
t just fine.”

“Just asking.”

“I ran into Mrs. Hargrove at the Garden Market on the way over here. She’s going out to the school this morning for something or other. Do you think we should keep her company?”

“I guess I’d rather do that than clean up here,” Penelope said. “Let me put
on some clothes.”

Wearing jeans and a double-layered purple sweatshirt, Penelope crawled into the front seat of Shana’s ten-year-old compact. “Why do you think she needs company?”

“Just a feeling.”

“You’re not back on the ghost thing again, are you?”

“My granny swore by them.”

“Well, mine didn’t.” Penelope grimaced. “Of course, I didn’t really know my grandparents. Daddy’s parents were dead by the time I was born, and I only met Mummy’s parents once when we went to
England when I was about nine.”

“That must’ve been hard on her, leaving her parents like that.”

“She was crazy about Daddy.”

“Still, that’s a big step to take.”

“I don’t think she was that close to her parents. She was the oldest of five. From what she said, they used her like a nanny when the others came along. Anyway, back to your granny and her
hants.
What made her so sure they existed?”

“She told me a lot of stories. Some of them scared the
beejeebers out of me, too. And once I was spending the night with her—she lived way out from town and up on the side of a mountain—and at midnight she took me out in the meadow by her house and told me I’d see the spirits of the Indians who used to live there.”

“Did you?”

“I saw something.”

“Something. Fireflies, owls, shadows.”

“Definitely not shadows.”

Shana maneuvered the car into a
spot away from a sweet gum tree growing too close to the chipped concrete steps leading to the front door. “This is a cool old building.”

“It’s old anyway,” Penelope said as she stepped out.

“I’ll bet that door would sell for big bucks at an antique store,” Shana said, running her hand over the eight-panel wooden door with peeling varnish. “It’s a classic.”

“Like the tin ceilings in some of the buildings downtown.”

“Right.”  When Shana pushed on the door, it swung open with a creak that rivaled the best haunted house of any Hollywood horror movie. A scream resonating from deep inside the building sent the two women into each other’s arms.

“Mary Lynn?” Penelope called when she got her breath. “It’s just us.”

Mary Lynn charged from a room at the back and down the long hall, curls bobbing. “Mercy, mercy Maude!”

“Sorry we scared you,” Shana said, her lips twitching.

“I think she scared us worse with that blood-curdling howl,” Penelope said.

“What are you two doing here?”

“Shana said you were coming and thought you might need company.”

“Company maybe, but not ten years chopped off my life.” Mary Lynn tossed her head. The gold hoop earrings she’d worn the night before swung like arcs of light.

“So what
are
you doing out here this morning?” Penelope asked.

“You’ll laugh if I tell you.”

“I need a good laugh.”

Mary Lynn glanced from one woman to the other. “I had a dream last night. About the boiler. Some man in a stovepipe hat told me how to fix it.”

“You’re blessed crazy as a blessed loon.”

“I told you you’d laugh.”

“I’m not laughing, just wondering what Harry’s going to do all by himself with you up at the state hospital.”

Shana doubled over with laughter. “You two are so funny.”

“So did you get it fixed?” Penelope asked.

“Not yet. I started down to the basement and…”

“And what?”

Mary Lynn assumed her martyr’s air. “I heard the voices again.”

“What did they say?”

“I don’t know. It was like a bunch of children talking. Giggling. Closing books and scooting chairs.”

“In the basement?”

“No, all around me up here.”

Shana sucked in her cheeks and bit them to compose her face. “Okay, let’s try it again. There are three of us now.”

“The basement door is at the back in one of the original two rooms,” Mary Lynn said.

“Daddy told me about those,” Penelope said. “And he said the story was that Jeremiah Bowden haunted the basement.”

“Pen!”

“I thought you didn’t believe in ghosts,” Shana said.

“I’m just telling you what Daddy said. Every time the boiler got cranky, they said it was Jeremiah’s ghost acting up.”

“Jeremiah Bowden’s nothing but a pile of bones out at the cemetery,” Mary Lynn said.

“Better than being a pile of bones under the boiler,” Shana offered, then ducked away from Penelope’s raised hand.

Mary Lynn retrieved the flashlight she’d dropped when the creaking door startled her. “The light down there worked last week, but it’s out now. Lucky I carry a flashlight in the glove compartment.” She opened the door of what looked like a narrow broom closet and shined the flashlight down a flight of wooden steps. “I call this the

key-hole
because it reminds me of one. The basement’s not very big, and most of it is taken up by the boiler.”

“Where’s the fuel tank?”

“Outside. There’s another set of stairs and a trap door that opens to the outside.” Mary Lynn put her foot on the first step. “Here goes.”

At the bottom of the steps, the flashlight flickered and went out. “I can’t tell you,” a soft voice intoned. A child’s voice?  “I promised I wouldn’t. Besides, it can’t be undone.”

Shana made it back up the stairs first, but Penelope and Mary Lynn were so close on her heels that they stumbled over her. “I guess we’ll all be at the state hospital,” Mary Lynn said, a note of triumph in her shaky voice. “I wonder if they have rooms for three?”

“You better tell her what Sam said.” Shana edged toward the front hall.

“Sam? You said you hadn’t heard from him,” Mary Lynn said.

“So I lied.” Penelope felt suddenly chilled. “Come on back to my house, and I’ll tell all. Well, almost.”

CHAPTER SIX

They drank coffee in the safety of Penelope’s kitchen while Mary Lynn made calls on her cell phone to various businesses which might work on old heating units. Midway through the sixth call, she wiggled her eyebrows at the other two women. “That’s right. A boiler. I don’t know, maybe nineteen-twenty or so. Yes, I know it’s eighty years old, but…you will? When? That would be wonderful. I’ll meet you there. I understand you can’t make any promises. All right. See you Thursday afternoon.” She ended the call. “He’s coming from Little Rock on Thursday afternoon around two.”

“But he’s making no promises for an
eighty-year-old boiler, right?” Penelope refilled their cups.

“Right, but it’s worth a shot. I can afford to pay for some repairs but not a whole new heating system.”

“How can you even afford that much?” Penelope asked.

“The Town Council voted a budget for the restoration, and I’ve had a couple of donations.” Mary Lynn busied herself digging in her purse for something and coming up empty..

“You
have
been busy,” Shana said.

“It’s been on my mind awhile.” Mary Lynn’s eyes stayed on the table.

“You’re a blessed sneak,” Penelope said. “You didn’t even tell me.”

“I tried. You weren’t in the mood to listen.”

Penelope scowled and started to retort, then closed her mouth.

“The man’s name is Taliaferro.”

Shana choked. “That was Penelope’s fake name when we were running around Eureka Springs.”

“The less said about that the better,” Penelope said.

“Well, it’s a coincidence anyway.”

“Maybe karma,” Mary Lynn said. “It worked for you, so maybe it’ll work for the boiler.”

Penelope shrugged. “Maybe it will. Now I’ll tell you what Sam said.”

****

Penelope straightened from sliding the chicken tetrazzini in the oven as Shana walked in the back door at five on Thursday. “Did you smell supper?”

Shana pulled off her coat and gloves and sank down in a chair. “Mrs. Hargrove lost a filling this morning, so she called me to meet the boiler man at the school since it’s my half-day off.”

“And?”

Shana leaned her elbows on the table and put her chin in her hands. “In short, he’s a hunk.”

“A hunk.”

“He’s like something off the cover of one of those steamy romances I see in the romance section of bookstores.”

“That good, huh?”

“Better.”

“So tell me about him.”

“I just did.”

“Besides the fact that he’s a hunk.”

“He’s got hair and eyes the color of the antique woodwork in the parlor. Six-foot-something, a dimple in his left cheek…”

Penelope snorted.

“The cheek on the side of his face,” Shana snapped.

“Okay, okay, keep going.”

“A nose like a Roman god, little ears, perfect teeth...he’s gorgeous.”

“And unmarried, I take it.”

Shana frowned. “He is now. His wife died about a week after their little girl was born. Her name is Tabitha, but he calls her Tabby. She’s four, almost five.”

           “If he’s that perfect and needs a mother for his child, how come he’s still single?”

“I don’t know, but
Peter idolizes his daughter. His eyes really lit up while he was telling me about her.”

“Did he pull out a wallet full of pictures?”

“As a matter of fact, he did. She’s adorable.”

“She’s probably a brat after getting his whole attention all her life.”

“That’s not fair, Penelope. You’re an only child.”

“It took my parents almost ten years to get me here, but they didn’t spoil me. Not much anyway.”

“She looks like her mother. Tabby, I mean.”

“He told you that?”

“He showed me a picture of his wife. She was really pretty. Had a sweet face.”

“So he hasn’t remarried because he hasn’t moved on.”

“Maybe. But he asked me out on New Year’s Eve.”

“Now just how did you blessed wangle that, you little twit?”

Shana shook her head. “I don’t know. I mean, I stayed down in the basement with him because it was actually warmer than upstairs.”

“Body heat.”

“Whatever. I handed him tools, and we talked.”

“So he got the boiler fixed.”

“He says so. He says it was top of the line when it was new and that somebody took care of it when it was in use. It just needed cleaning out and a couple of new parts.”

“I’m surprised he could get parts for it.”

“Well, he didn’t have them with him. He’s coming back next Thursday.”

“Why then
?”

Shana’s well-shaped eyebrows went up. “Well, it’s my day off, isn’t it?”

****

Five days before the schools took their Christmas break, Penelope and Mary Lynn wrapped gifts for the children of Possum Hollow, a backwoods settlement twelve
miles out of town. The school served students from kindergarten through grade six—at least what children the small but dedicated faculty could persuade to actually get on the school bus or walk to school. Truant officers ignored the Hollow with its history of bootleg whiskey and violent feuds. Knocking on doors looking for anybody, even kids, wasn’t the thing to do unless one had a death wish.

“The boiler’s purring like a kitten,” Mary Lynn told Penelope as they sorted donated toys and clothes in the dining room of the B&B.

“So is Shana.”

“Peter Taliaferro would be a good catch.”

“She says he’s a hunk.”

“He is.”

“You’re a married woman, Mary Lynn.”

“That doesn’t make me blind.”

“They’re going out New Year’s Eve.”

“Oh?”

“Yep. Did he mention his daughter?”

“Daughter?”

“He’s a widower.”

“That’s a glitch.”

“Maybe not, we’ll see.”

“I don’t guess you’ve heard from the mysterious Sam again.”

Penelope selected a roll of wrapping paper with Santas and elves.
Not unless you count the night of the

party
when he tried to disrobe me and came closer to succeeding than I want to admit. 
“No.”

“I still don’t understand how he knew what I was doing with the school and why he’d tell you to tell me to wait.”

“I don’t know either.” 
But Sam does. He knows things.

“You don’t suppose somebody else is running drugs through Amaryllis, do you?”

“I doubt it. They got burned pretty bad before.”

“Tell me you didn’t say burned.” Mary Lynn ran her hand through her hair.

“I didn’t mean it that way. You didn’t tell anybody, did you?”

“If you mean Harry, no I didn’t. He’s got enough on his mind trying to work out all the details for taking over responsibility for the house at Pembroke Point. The state has its fingers in the pie which guarantees complications.”

“But Bradley wants the town to have it and realize the income from tours and so on.”

“Yes, but somebody from the state is saying that the town can’t keep it up, and since it already has the historical marker on it, the state should take it over.”

“Travis engineered that years ago for his mother before she died. Besides, Bradley will never agree to let the state have it.”

“Somebody thinks they can make so much trouble that he’ll give in.”

“Then they don’t know Bradley.” Penelope smiled a little.
Somebody
would find its hands full with Detective Bradley Pembroke, who was not small-town in any sense of the word. “Besides, he’s interviewing a manager for the place. Some man from Mississippi or Alabama, I forget which.”

“I hope it works out for him. Pembroke Point has operated for almost two hundred years. It would be a shame for it to close down.” Mary Lynn held up a small sweater

with snowmen appliqués. “Cute. By the way, I saw Rosabel yesterday. She’s glowing more than usual.”

“I don’t see her as much anymore. I think she feels strange hanging out with me when she’s dating Bradley.”

“I can understand that, but she’ll make a good daughter-in-law.”

“I think so.”

“She’s a Yankee, but she’ll pick up southern ways.”

“You’re such a geographical snob, Mary Lynn.”

“You know what I’m talking about. There
is
a difference.”

“This is the last package. Let’s load the station wagon and be ready to drive out to Possum Hollow tomorrow. I love seeing the children’s faces when they open their presents.” Mary Lynn’s voice broke a little. “Most kids today have everything and don’t appreciate anything. But I guess if Harry and I had kids, we’d give them everything, too.”

“Sure, you would.” Penelope gathered up an armload of packages. “Get the door for me.”