Read Online Phantoms Can Be Murder: Charlie Parker Mystery #13 by Connie Shelton - Free Book Online

that’s been going
here for a thousand years.”
    I expressed regret but she
assured me we could catch it on Wednesday. Her purchases filled a plastic
shopping bag, which I offered to carry since she still had the yarn.
    “I’d intended to show you one
more local landmark, The Nutshell Pub, which is known as the smallest pub in
Britain, but perhaps we should take these things home first. You might be up
for a little rest, yourself?”
    The rain that managed to hold off
more than half the day hit with a vengeance as soon as we walked into the house
so our plan for the little pub got postponed. The downpour settled into a
steady drizzle while Louisa napped. Restless, I wasn’t sleepy and found myself
pacing through the parlor, once again taking stock of the books on the shelves.
    I suspected that the collection
had, for the most part, belonged to the previous owner just like the rest of
the furnishings. There were classic novels of the Bronte sisters’ era and
several volumes on gardening, a pastime Louisa had admitted to me that she did
not much indulge in. One of her neighbors loved the hobby so much that he came
over to keep her roses fed and pruned and the scrap of lawn trimmed, and she
was perfectly happy with that.
    The one section that no doubt
came to the house with my aunt was a corner shelf filled with books on
astrology, the occult, and histories of ghostly doings in and around the town
of Bury. I pulled one down and flipped through the pages. It was an excellent
reference and I could see why Louisa was now considered such an authority on
her tours—she’d really done her research.
    A small booklet slipped from
between two of the guidebooks and fell to the floor. Wrinkled from humidity and
yellowed with age, it clearly was of a different vintage from the other books
nearby. When I bent to pick it up, I saw that it was titled in a foreign
language—something that looked a bit like German but with a whole lot of
diacritical markings. Hmm . . . A crude hand drawing of a hooded figure
decorated the front cover. I flipped through the pages and a single sheet of
folded paper popped out. More of the foreign writing. The rain blasted the
windows with renewed vigor, casting the room in a wavering light.
    “Charlie?”
    I jumped about a mile and I think
a squeak escaped me. “Louisa! I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to snoop—”
    She gave me a quizzical look. “I
was about to ask if you’d like some tea. Did you get to nap at all?”
    I shook my head and closed the
booklet. “I was looking at some of your books about the haunted sites here in
Bury and I—this—well, it fell off the shelf.”
    Don’t get me wrong. I am an
incurable snooper. It’s just that I itch a little when I actually get caught at
it.
    Louisa patted my arm on her way
to the kitchen. “Charlie, it’s fine. Help yourself to anything you see. I tend
to keep an eclectic mix.”
    I heard her fill the kettle and
take mugs from the cupboard.
    “So, then can I ask—what’s this
language?” I stood in the doorway and held up the booklet.
    “Oh, that. It’s Romanian.” She
spooned loose tea into a ceramic pot. A dreamy look came over her face.
“Nicolae gave me the book. Right before I had to escape. That single sheet was
the forged document that was supposed to keep me from the firing squad. I could
have fallen in love with that man—dark curly hair, vivid blue eyes . . .” She sighed.
“I really missed him.”
    “Romanian. Wait—escape?
Seriously?”
    The kettle whistled and she
poured boiling water over the tea leaves and set the lid in place on the
teapot.
    “Of course, dear. Well, in those
days one didn’t simply ask the communists to let you go. But there was a pretty
well established underground movement, a few days dodging through the woods. It
wasn’t really cold that time of year. Except on rainy nights. And of course I
always questioned whether that document would have really saved me.”
    While she spilled out