The Ghost and The Haunted Mansion: A Haunted Bookshop Mystery

again.”
    I returned to the party and crossed to the bar. As if he’d read my mind, Hardy handed me a third ice-cold glass of tea before I even asked for it. Grateful, I took a long gulp, not caring anymore whether or not it contained alcohol.
    Got enough liquid courage now, baby?
    “For what?”
    I want you to brace someone else, someone who does know the identity of Miss Todd’s estranged sister, someone who you’ve been avoiding like the plague.
    “Who?”
    Ghoul Girl.
    “Aw, crap.” I took another sip of spiked tea.
    Let’s go, Penelope. You and me together. Let’s find out, once and for all, whether or not this broad really can see yours truly.

CHAPTER 16
     
    Now You See Him
     
    I’ve got to keep in some sort of touch with all the loose ends of this dizzy affair if I’m ever going to make heads or tails of it.
    —The Maltese Falcon , Dashiell Hammett, 1930
     
     
     
     
    “DID YOU KNOW there’s a magic circle under this rug?”
    Ophelia turned to face me. Her heavily lined eyes flashed darkly, but she said nothing.
    “It’s a pentagram,” I said, “like the one on the gate outside, only it has a—”
    “Fleur-de-lis in the center,” she said flatly. “Yes. I know.”
    “You can see the circle then? You can see it through this rug?”
    She rolled her eyes. “I’ve seen the gate outside . I don’t have X-ray vision.”
    “Oh.”
    Ophelia swirled her drink. The ice tinkled softly against the tumbler. Tink-tink, tink-tink . . . It was mildly hypnotic, but then, I had consumed some pretty powerful fire juice.
    “You know about magic circles, Mrs. McClure?”
    “Not much. What do you know?”
    “In rituals of ceremonial magic, the practitioner stands inside the circle, which forms a barrier against the demons and evil spirits the sorcerer hopes to summon and control. Bend to his will, so to speak.”
    I felt a chill, not the ghostly kind, more like the old-fashioned kind, right up my spine. “What can these demons and spirits do?”
    Ophelia shrugged. “Whatever the sorcerer wants them to do. Turn lead into gold. Bring you the mate you desire. Grant power and influence, bestow eternal youth—”
    “Could the spirits be employed to destroy another person?”
    “That, too, I suspect.” Ophelia sipped her green tea, met my eyes. “If you believe in such things.”
    I looked away, pointed to the carpet. “That’s where I found Miss Todd’s corpse. Right there, on the rug, in the center of the circle.”
    “ You’re thinking there are spirits in this house, and that the magic circle failed to protect Miss Todd, right?”
    I took a gulp of my own tea and nodded.
    Ophelia forced a laugh. “Which proves your fears are baseless. If this house really was haunted, and if those spirits suddenly menaced Miss Todd, shouldn’t she have been safe from harm inside the magic circle?”
    “Well, I guess . . .”
    But she died, anyway, which proves that witchcraft stuff is a bunch of hooey.
    Ophelia sighed like a patient teacher with a particularly slow student. “For starters, sir,” she whispered to the air just above my head. “Ritual magic is not the same thing as witchcraft. Ritual magic is a conceptual system that asserts human ability to control the natural and supernatural world.”
    An exceedingly uncomfortable moment of silence stretched between us.
    “Do you see him?” I whispered.
    Ophelia nodded. “Don’t you?”
    “I just hear him. Unless I’m dreaming. He sometimes comes into my dreams, influences them. But then he disappears. He did that after our last dream.”
    “It takes energy to manifest. They draw it from the molecules around them. That’s why the air’s cold whenever they’re present. A dream like the one you’re describing probably took a lot of energy from him.”
    I glanced uneasily around us, making sure no one could overhear our discussion.
    “You mean he has to rest after expending a lot of energy?”
    “Just like we do.” Ophelia studied me closely for a moment. “You suspect me of something, don’t you, Mrs. McClure?”
    “You’re a psychic, right? Not just a medium or whatever you call yourself?”
    “I call myself Ophelia.” She sniffed. “Listen, I can see spirits, which is obvious, right? And I can read emotions of maybe six out of ten people. You’re easy to read. You’re an open book.”
    Jack laughed.
    “Okay, Ophelia, if I’m such an open book, then you must know what I suspect you of.”
    She shrugged. “Not really. I