The Ghost and The Haunted Mansion: A Haunted Bookshop Mystery

fill the empty space. So I bought a do-it-yourself frame from the craft store and voila! Problem solved!”
    “I see.”
    But the picture swap wasn’t the most dramatic change in the space. Neither was it the room’s single concession to modernity (besides the purple lava lamps). A massive flat screen, high-definition television was now parked in the corner. It was obviously brand-new and just out of its carton—I noticed the packing material peeking out from behind the couch, along with part of Seymour’s old lime green bean bag chair. The TV was mounted on a black steel platform, which also held a DVD player and a bank of audio speakers.
    Standing on either side of the giant screen, Harlan Gilman and Leo Rollins bickered about the best place to position the entertainment system. I realized Brainert had been right about the girth of Seymour’s former roommate. In the six months since I’d last seen him, Harlan had become so heavy he now had to lean on a cane to stand.
    As for Leo, he obviously wasn’t intimidated by the posh Larchmont address. Unlike our host, who’d dressed for the occasion, Leo wore the same flannel shirt and frayed jeans he sported at his electronics store every day, though I noticed his mountain man beard had been trimmed attractively short and was neatly combed. I couldn’t help wondering if he was once again carrying that suspicious dagger with the odd pentagram design on its hilt.
    “I’m going to put your fudge on a plate,” Seymour told me.
    “I’ll go with you,” I said.
    I followed Seymour to a vast kitchen, which appeared to be state of the art for the 1940s. Okay, the refrigerator and range were modern, but everything else dated from a time when Miss Todd was young. The cabinets were white metal with chrome handles. The Formica countertops were cherry red. The linoleum floor sported a red-and-white checkerboard pattern. The red-and-white theme continued with the café curtains and the chrome-and-red kitchen table set. Metal bread baskets and canisters sat on the counter, and an old-style wash tub and hand-cranked wringer stood in the corner.
    “Isn’t this kitchen great?” Seymour said as he piled the fudge in neat rows on a rectangular party platter. “So retro!”
    Hmmm . . . looks to me like we never left Mrs. Dellarusso’s apartment.
    I ignored Jack and asked Seymour, “What are the outbuildings like?”
    Seymour shrugged. “One’s just a big brick shed filled with tools and a push-powered lawn mower. The other building looks like ruins.”
    “Oh. Too bad.”
    “No, Pen, you don’t get it. The building’s a folly. It was meant to look like ruins on purpose. Real gothic, you know.” Finishing the platter, Seymour washed the sticky fudge off his hands. “Actually, a lot of English manor houses had fake ruins like that, back in the day.”
    A phone warbled beside the sink. “My hands are wet, Pen. Would you punch the speaker button for me?”
    “Sure.” I hit the switch.
    “Hello!” Seymour called, drying his hands. A gruff voice spoke over the line with a heavy Rhode Island accent.
    “Mr. Tah-nish?
    “Yes.”
    “This is Ben Kesey at Warwick Motors.”
    “You’re calling about my breadloaf?”
    “That’s right.”
    “What did Paddy Scotch do to my vintage VW?”
    “Gad knows Paddy’s my competitor, but you can’t fault him for what happened. Found two neat punctures in the brake fluid cylinder. That’s why you lost your brakes, see,’cause you lost your brake fluid. Be ’bout a week till I can fix it. Need a new cylinder, and parts for a VW this old are hard to come by.”
    I spoke up. “What about the punctures, Mr. Kesey? How did that happen?”
    There was a pause. “Is that Missus Tarnish? Well, there’s a funny thing ’bout those punctures, Missus Tarnish—”
    Seymour chuckled when Ben Kesey pronounced us married, but I didn’t waste time correcting him. I was too anxious to hear his reply.
    “Those holes were real neat,” the mechanic said. “Like they were made deliberate. You don’t see that kind of damage from road debris.”
    Seymour looked at me with a mixture of worry and disbelief.
    “In my opinion, those brakes were interfered with on purpose. If you or the missus has an enemy, I’d think about lettin’ the police know.”
    “Thanks, Ben,” Seymour said. “Let me know when the VW’s fixed.” Frowning, Seymour ended the call and turned to me. “I can’t believe anyone would want me dead!”
    Yeah, genius,