The Ghost and The Haunted Mansion: A Haunted Bookshop Mystery

started Cooper’s. Now she and Milner ran it as a married couple.
    “What gives, Pen?” Linda demanded, the bangles on her wrist jangling as she ran a hand through her short, spiked, Annie Lennox-style platinum hair. “My mechanic at Warwick Motors mentioned you’re already calling yourself ‘Mrs. Tarnish.’ How could you not tell me what was up with you two!”
    “Whoa!” I told Milner and Linda. “The only Mrs. Tarnish I know lives in Florida, and I doubt there’ll be another one anytime soon.”
    “Just going to live together?” Linda asked.
    “No!”
    “Methinks she doth protest too much,” Brainert Parker quipped from behind me.
    Milner laughed and shook his head, his wiry black-and-gray ponytail shaking in the process.
    I scanned the expectant faces around me, shocked to realize they all believed this crazy rumor. “Just because I spent the night at Seymour’s house—I mean, as his guest . Okay, I slept in his bed, but Seymour stayed in another room—” I threw up my hands. “You’re all mistaken. You’re putting me into some kind of an imaginary relationship.”
    I bit my cheek, thinking of Jack. What would their reaction be if they knew the real truth? Oh, God.
    “Come, Joyce!” Mr. Koh called.
    The Kohs left and Sadie locked the door behind them. Then she joined me. I glanced around. Everyone was gone except our closest circle of friends—Milner and Linda, Brainert, and Fiona Finch, who must have arrived while all the others were leaving. She stepped up to me with arms folded and lips pursed.
    “I tried to straighten them out, Pen,” Fiona insisted. “But apparently I’m no longer a reliable source of gossip.”
    “What does Pen expect after that crazy ghost story we heard she was telling?” Linda asked.
    “But it’s true,” I said. “I know Todd Mansion is haunted because I’ve seen the ghost with my own eyes.”
    Stunned silence and wide eyes greeted my statement. Great.
    “Okay. You’ve got our attention,” Brainert said.
    It took twenty minutes, but with Fiona’s help I brought Brainert, Milner, and Linda up to speed. I told them about Miss Todd’s will, the mysterious Ophelia Tuttle, the sabotaged brakes, Seymour’s wake for Timothea, the magic circle under the rug, and the aggressive moves by the Charlene Lindsey-Fabian on behalf of her Lindsey-Tilton group.
    I described the supernatural events of the other night, told them about the weird tapes Miss Todd recorded, and the hidden history of Todd Mansion that Fiona uncovered. Fiona stepped in at that point and told them about the house’s connection to spiritualist Gideon Wexler, the séance she hosted at Chez Finch, and the assault on medium Rachel Delve right before she was about to name Arthur Fromsette’s killer.
    When Fiona was finished, I saw only dubious expressions on everyone’s face.
    “If Seymour were here, he’d back me up,” I insisted.
    “Where is Seymour?” Sadie asked.
    My aunt had been quiet up to now, but I knew she was worried. That threatening note addressed to me had really gotten her back up. She’d wanted to help catch whoever had written it (no doubt the same person who’d put our lives in danger on the road out of Millstone), so I handed her the audiotapes that Miss Todd had made. I still hadn’t listened to them all, and I asked her to play them and make notes of anything, well, noteworthy .
    “After he made bail, Seymour came to my inn around two o’clock today to pick up his things,” Fiona informed us all. “He told me he was driving to Providence to pick up equipment. Special equipment, he called it. Seymour mentioned something about not waiting six months for help, and that he’d solve his ghost problem himself.”
    “Pen, what do you think is happening?” Brainert asked.
    I took a deep breath. “As crazy as it sounds, I believe someone is manipulating the ghosts in that house. I saw the specter of spiritualist Gideon Wexler floating across the living room. I didn’t imagine it. And I’m convinced something frightened Miss Todd to death.”
    Brainert frowned. “Who would be manipulating these spirits and for what purpose?”
    “I believe Ophelia Tuttle is doing it—or someone else in her Rhode Island Paranormal Society. Mr. Stoddard may even be involved. I also believe Miss Todd’s living sister is behind this, too. Her name is Mrs. Beatrice Ingram. She lives in Newport and had a meeting just yesterday with Charlene Lindsey-Fabian and Jim Wolfe about