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Book: Give Up the Ghost: A Haunted Home Renovation Mystery by Juliet Blackwell
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Authors: Juliet Blackwell
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boxes featuring multicolored lights and hummed with the high-tech improvements Andrew Flynt had spent so much money to install.
Dog trotted along at my side, checking out corners, sniffing here and there. I imagined he was disappointed not to find anything putrid or disgusting in the underfurnished building, but as was his wont he was good-natured about it all. He did not, however, bark or mewl or crouch as he often did when in the presence of ghosts.
But as we passed from the Pilates room to the sauna, something caught my eye.
The wall seemed awfully thick. I prowled around looking for a closet door or something that would account for the missing space, but couldn’t find anything.
Every house has hidden chases, channels that hold heating vents, air returns, pipes, and electrical wires. Old buildings often had large voids between the walls that had once been filled with stovepipes or chimneys that were no longer necessary.
But a void in this location struck me as odd. There are reasons old houses were laid out a certain way, and this layout wasn’t making sense.
“Is it just me, or is this weird?” I asked Dog. He cocked his head, and I could tell he agreed with me. “Let’s go find those blueprints.”
We climbed the stairs to the main floor and I unrolled the heavy blueprints atop a shiny black granite kitchen counter.
Yep. There were areas left empty for no apparent reason. They did not contain electrical grids or vents, at least not according to the drawings. They were simply dead space. Worse, I realized as I examined the drawings closely, the blueprints did not match the actual building in some places. For instance, the blueprints called for a twenty-five-foot-long foyer, but the actual foyer wasn’t a full twenty-five feet. I would bet my steel-toed boots on it.
“The game is afoot, Dog,” I said. Dog, for his part, looked ready to figure things out. Or maybe he was hoping for a snack, it was hard to tell.
I unclipped a heavy tape measure from my belt. It was my favorite, the one I had nabbed from my dad when it became clear that his “temporary” hiatus as general director of Turner Construction had morphed into full-blown retirement, leaving me in charge. The tape was made of heavy metal and never crimped like the new ones tended to.
I took a few quick measurements, then consulted the drawings. It wasn’t my imagination: The blueprints did not match up with my measurements. Where was themissing square footage? It was one thing to cover up existing moldings, quite another to hide entire rooms or hallways.
That couldn’t be what had happened. Must be my measurements. So I went out to my Scion and rummaged around until I found my latest gadget: a tool that measured with a beam of light instead of a tape.
Same result. There were definitely hidden spaces in this house.
And then, as I was trying to figure out what was going on, I heard the faraway strains of classical music. Without thinking, I started humming along:
Ta da tan, tan, tan . . .
Another waltz.
The music sounded as if it was coming from the foyer, but when I got there I realized the strains were coming from behind the wall, in the dead space. I put my ear up to the new wallboard.
Ta da tan, tan, tan . . . ta da tan, tan, toooon . . .
Whispers.
Giggles.
And overhead, the loud squeaking of the weathervane.
Then from very far away, a man’s anguished voice, calling out:
“Ooooooor!”
Dog started barking, and raced up the broad sweep of stairs before I could stop him.
I ran after him, past the second floor, then the third-floor landing. I was gasping for breath, but kept going, all the way up to the fourth floor where I could hear the clicking of Dog’s nails on the wood floor, then down the hall past Egypt’s room.
I found Dog at the end of the corridor, simultaneously barking and mewling and crouching, his attention fixed on a large window overlooking part of the roof.
Still trying to catch my breath, I
Dog trotted along at my side, checking out corners, sniffing here and there. I imagined he was disappointed not to find anything putrid or disgusting in the underfurnished building, but as was his wont he was good-natured about it all. He did not, however, bark or mewl or crouch as he often did when in the presence of ghosts.
But as we passed from the Pilates room to the sauna, something caught my eye.
The wall seemed awfully thick. I prowled around looking for a closet door or something that would account for the missing space, but couldn’t find anything.
Every house has hidden chases, channels that hold heating vents, air returns, pipes, and electrical wires. Old buildings often had large voids between the walls that had once been filled with stovepipes or chimneys that were no longer necessary.
But a void in this location struck me as odd. There are reasons old houses were laid out a certain way, and this layout wasn’t making sense.
“Is it just me, or is this weird?” I asked Dog. He cocked his head, and I could tell he agreed with me. “Let’s go find those blueprints.”
We climbed the stairs to the main floor and I unrolled the heavy blueprints atop a shiny black granite kitchen counter.
Yep. There were areas left empty for no apparent reason. They did not contain electrical grids or vents, at least not according to the drawings. They were simply dead space. Worse, I realized as I examined the drawings closely, the blueprints did not match the actual building in some places. For instance, the blueprints called for a twenty-five-foot-long foyer, but the actual foyer wasn’t a full twenty-five feet. I would bet my steel-toed boots on it.
“The game is afoot, Dog,” I said. Dog, for his part, looked ready to figure things out. Or maybe he was hoping for a snack, it was hard to tell.
I unclipped a heavy tape measure from my belt. It was my favorite, the one I had nabbed from my dad when it became clear that his “temporary” hiatus as general director of Turner Construction had morphed into full-blown retirement, leaving me in charge. The tape was made of heavy metal and never crimped like the new ones tended to.
I took a few quick measurements, then consulted the drawings. It wasn’t my imagination: The blueprints did not match up with my measurements. Where was themissing square footage? It was one thing to cover up existing moldings, quite another to hide entire rooms or hallways.
That couldn’t be what had happened. Must be my measurements. So I went out to my Scion and rummaged around until I found my latest gadget: a tool that measured with a beam of light instead of a tape.
Same result. There were definitely hidden spaces in this house.
And then, as I was trying to figure out what was going on, I heard the faraway strains of classical music. Without thinking, I started humming along:
Ta da tan, tan, tan . . .
Another waltz.
The music sounded as if it was coming from the foyer, but when I got there I realized the strains were coming from behind the wall, in the dead space. I put my ear up to the new wallboard.
Ta da tan, tan, tan . . . ta da tan, tan, toooon . . .
Whispers.
Giggles.
And overhead, the loud squeaking of the weathervane.
Then from very far away, a man’s anguished voice, calling out:
“Ooooooor!”
Dog started barking, and raced up the broad sweep of stairs before I could stop him.
I ran after him, past the second floor, then the third-floor landing. I was gasping for breath, but kept going, all the way up to the fourth floor where I could hear the clicking of Dog’s nails on the wood floor, then down the hall past Egypt’s room.
I found Dog at the end of the corridor, simultaneously barking and mewling and crouching, his attention fixed on a large window overlooking part of the roof.
Still trying to catch my breath, I
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