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To be sure they did, he closed the door on his way out.
There was a table clock in the front sitting room that chimed the hour, he remembered. But it chimed a soft, musical sound. That’s not what he’d heard.
The old grandfather clock, he thought, second parlor. The one Collin never wound so it wouldn’t sound the hour because he’d found it annoying. Particularly at night.
Sonya might have started winding it—but that didn’t explain why he hadn’t heard it any other time since she’d moved in.
He made his way downstairs and to the room Collin had called the Quiet Place because of its position in the house. It had only one window, facing north. The sound of the sea or the wind through the pines didn’t reach here.
He turned on the light and studied the old clock with its carved cabinet and moon-faced dial. The brass pendulum hung still, and the room quiet as always.
But the hands on that moon-faced dial stood at three.
Had they always? he wondered. He couldn’t remember, but he’d clearly heard the trio of bongs—slow-paced, almost funereal.
As he walked to it, a wave of icy air hit him.
He’d felt it before, in the Gold Room.
“So it’s you,” he murmured. “Good to know. Next thing I’d like to know. Why three a.m.?”
He heard piano music from the music room, stepped back.
“Midnight’s supposed to be the witching hour, right?”
“Yeah. I thought—” He turned, expecting to see Sonya.
And looked at her grandmother.
“Man. All right.” His heart gave two hard beats before it settled again. “It’s you. I saw you once before.”
“Sure. You were such a cute little guy. You had good hands on that guitar. You grew up.”
“Yeah.” You never got that chance. “Did you make the clock chime?”
“Not me, baby. You’re right, that’s all that bitch. Every freaking night, bong, bong, bong.”
“How come I can see you now?”
She smiled, a pretty teenager who’d never grow old. “Because you’re here, and she’s here—Sonya—and you guys did the it.” She shrugged. “Cool with me. Free love. I missed most of that. Things were just happening when I, you know, died. Bummer. But I loved Charlie. We really had it together. I’d have loved my babies.”
“I’m sure you would have.”
“We were going to live here, start a commune. Art, music, poetry.” She did a little spin. “Lots of spiritual stuff, too. But.”
She lifted her shoulders, let them fall. “I had a ring, too.”
“I’m sorry.”
She lifted her left hand, tapped her ring finger with the other. “That fucking witch took it, so you watch out for her, got it? Then that old bitch—Charlie’s mom—she took care of the rest. He shouldn’t’ve done what he did, kill himself like that. I mean, wow, I didn’t have a choice, but he did. And that’s how she got her hands on my babies, my little boys. I was pretty pissed at him for a while. But, well, shit, I love him.”
“Is… Is he here, too?”
For a ghost, he thought, she had a smile like the summer sun.
“Well, yeah, what do you think? Lots of us here. It’s the freaking curse. So, that’s it for now. You need to help Sonya—it’s so far out I’ve got a granddaughter. I mean, farout! You need to help her get those rings back.”
She smiled again, sweet as spun sugar. “You were real good to my boy. It’s weird calling him a boy because he got to be an old man. Anyway, coming out like this really fries me after a while. You should go back to bed.”
