Midnight Bayou

them still. “Tell me more, Effie.”
    “All right.” She suppressed the urge to fuss over him and went back to the facts. “The original owners had lost most of their money during the war. They hung on, selling off parcels of land, or renting it out to sharecroppers. Their politics and the Manets’ were in opposition. There was a fire, burned the house down to the ground. Wiped them out. The Manets bought the land, and had this place built. They had two sons, twins. Lucian and Julian. Both went to Tulane, where Lucian did very well and Julian majored, you could say, in drinking and gambling. Lucian was the heir, and was meant to run the family busi-nesses. Most of the Manet money had dwindled, but Josephine had a considerable inheritance. Both sons died before their twenty-third birthday.”
    Declan handed her a glass. “How?”
    “Here we have rumors and speculation.” She sipped. “The strongest speculation is they killed each other. No one seems to know why, family argument gone violent. It’s said Lucian went into New Orleans, on his mother’s orders, to fetch his brother back out of one of the brothels he frequented. Julian didn’t want to be fetched, they argued, and one of them—odds are on Julian here—pulled a knife. They fought, struggled for the knife, were both wounded. Julian died on the spot. Lucian lingered about another week, then somehow got out of bed, wandered outside, and fell into the pond, where he drowned.”
    The pond, he thought, choked with lily pads, steamingwith mists at dawn. “That had to be rough on the parents.”
    “The father’s heart gave out a few years later. Josephine lived several years more, but had a reversal of financial fortune. She had the house, some land, but had all but run out of money. Again, speculation is Julian had gambled a large part of it away, and it was never fully recouped.”
    “Remy said there was a granddaughter. Lucian’s or Julian’s?”
    “There’s speculation there, too. Though the records show that Lucian married an Abigail Rouse in 1898, and that a daughter was born the next year, there’s no record of Abigail’s death. After Lucian was killed, the Manets declaimed the child, legally. Had her written out of the will. She was, apparently, raised by the Rouses. I can’t find anything on Abigail Rouse beyond the legal records of her birth and her marriage.”
    “Maybe they kicked her out when Lucian died.”
    “Maybe. I talked to Remy about it.” She wandered toward the windows, stared out at the messy gardens. “He’s a little vague, but seems to recall hearing stories about how she ran off with another man.”
    She turned back. “Stories from the Rouse side differ sharply. They lean toward foul play. You’d get a fuller picture of her, and what might’ve happened, if you talk to someone from the Rouse or Simone families.”
    “A clear picture about a girl who ran off or died a hundred years ago.”
    “Honey, this is the South. A hundred years ago was yesterday. She was seventeen when she married Lucian. She was from the bayou. His family could not have approved of such a match. I doubt her life in this house was rosy. Running off might’ve been just what she did. On the other hand . . . I saw something, someone, in that room upstairs. I don’t believe in that sort of thing. Didn’t.”Effie fought back a shiver. “I don’t know what I think about it now, but I sure would like to find out.”
    “I’ll ask Miss Odette. And Lena. I’ve got a date with her Monday.”
    “Is that so?” The idea brightened her mood. “Looks like we’ll have more rumor and speculation.” She handed him back the glass. “I have to get on. I’m sending Remy out here tomorrow to give you a hand and keep him out of my hair. I’ve got a fitting for my wedding gown and other bridal things to take care of.”
    “I’ll keep him busy.”
    “Why don’t you come back into town with him?” she said as she headed out. She wanted to lock her arm around his and tug him through the door and away. “We’ll have some dinner, go out to the movies.”
    “Stop worrying about me.”
    “I can’t help it. I think about you way out here, alone in this house, with that room up there.” She glanced uneasily up the staircase. “It gives me the shivers.”
    “Ghosts never hurt anybody.” He kissed her forehead. “They’re dead.”
    B ut in the night, with the sound of the wind and rain, and the bang of spirit bottles, they didn’t