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“Old Maude, she liked pretty things.”
Something in the tone had Jude stopping her circle, to look back at Brenna’s face. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know her. You were fond of her.”
“Sure, everyone loved Old Maude. She was a grand lady. She’ll be pleased you’re here, looking after the place. She wouldn’t want it standing alone and empty. Should I show you about, then? So you have your bearings.”
“I’d appreciate it, but first I’m desperate for the bathroom.”
Brenna let out a quick laugh. “A long ride from Dublin. There’s a little powder room right off the kitchen. My dad and I put it in for her out of a closet only three years back. Straight that way it is.”
Jude didn’t waste any time exploring. “Little” was exactly the word for the half bath. She could have rapped her elbows on the side walls by crooking her arms and lifting them. But the walls were done in a pale, pretty rose, the white porcelain gleamed from fresh scrubbing, and there were sweetly embroidered fingertip towels hung neatly on the rack.
One glance in the oval mirror over the sink told Jude that yes, she looked every bit as bad as she’d feared. And though she was of average height and build, beside the fairylike Brenna she felt like a galumphing Amazon.
Annoyed with herself for the comparison, she blew her frizzed bangs off her brow and went back out.
“Oh, I would have gotten those.”
Already the efficient Brenna had unloaded her luggage and hauled it into the foyer. “You’ve got to be ready to drop after your travels. I’ll get your things upstairs. I imagine you’ll want Old Maude’s room, it’s pleasant, then we’ll put the kettle on so you can have some tea and I’ll start your fire. It’s a damp day.”
As she spoke she carried Jude’s two enormous suitcases up the stairs as if they were empty. Wishing she’d spent more time in the gym, Jude followed with her tote, her laptop, and her portable printer.
Brenna showed her two bedrooms, and she was right—Old Maude’s, with its view of the front gardens, was the more pleasant. But Jude got only a hazy impression, for one look at the bed and she succumbed to the jet lag that dropped into her body like a lead weight.
She only half listened to the cheerful, lilting voice explain about linens, heat, the vagaries of the tiny fireplace in the bedroom as Brenna set the peat to light. Then she followed as if walking through water as Brenna clattered downstairs to put on tea and show her how the kitchen operated.
She heard something about the pantry being freshly stocked and how she should do her marketing at Duffy’s in the village when she needed supplies. There was more—stacks of peat outside the back door, as Old Maude had preferred it, but wood as well in case she herself preferred that, and how the telephone had been hooked back up again and how to light the fire in the kitchen stove.
“Ah, there, now, you’re asleep on your feet.” Sympathetic, Brenna pressed a thick blue mug into Jude’s hands. “Take that on up with you and have a lie-down. I’ll start the fire down here for you.”
“I’m sorry. I can’t seem to focus.”
“You’ll do better after some sleep. My number’s here by the phone if you’re needing anything. My family’s barely a kilometer from here, my mother and dad and four sisters, so if there’s anything you need, you’ve only to call or come by the O’Tooles’.”
“Yes, I—four sisters!”
Brenna laughed again as she led Jude back down the hall. “Well, my dad kept hoping for a boy, but that’s the way of it. Surrounded by females, he is, even the dog. Up you go, now.”
“Thank you so much. Really, I’m not usually so. . . vague.”
“Well, it’s not every day you fly over the ocean now, is it? Do you want anything before I go?”
“No, I . . .” She leaned on the banister, blinked. “Oh, I forgot. There was a woman in the house. Where did she go?”
“A woman, you say? Where?”
“In the window.” She swayed, nearly spilled the tea, then shook her head clear. “There was a woman in the window upstairs, looking out when I got here.”
“Was there now?”
“Yes. A blond woman, young, very lovely.”
“Ah, that would be Lady Gwen.” Brenna turned, slipped into the living room, and lit the stack of peat. “She doesn’t show herself to just everyone.”
“Where did she go?”
“Oh, she’s still here, I imagine.” Satisfied that the peat had caught, Brenna rose, brushed off the knees of her trousers. “She’s been here three hundred years, give or take. She’s your ghost, Miss Murray.”
“My what?”
“Your ghost. But don’t trouble yourself about her. She won’t be after harming you any. Hers is a sad tale, and a story for another time, when you’re not so tired.”
It was hard to concentrate. Jude’s mind wanted to shut down, her body to shut off, but it seemed important to clear up this one point. “You’re trying to say the house is haunted?”
“Sure and it’s haunted. Didn’t your granny tell you?”
“I don’t believe she mentioned it. You’re telling me you believe in ghosts.”
Brenna lifted her brow again. “Well, did you see her or didn’t you? There you are,” she said when Jude merely frowned. “Have yourself a nap, and if you’re up and about later, come on down to Gallagher’s Pub and I’ll buy you your first pint.”
Too baffled to concentrate, Jude merely shook her head. “I don’t drink beer.”
“Oh, well now, that’s a bloody shame,” Brenna said, sounding both shocked and sincere. “Well, good day to you, Miss Murray.”
“Jude.” She murmured it and could do nothing but stare.
“Jude, then.” Brenna flashed her gorgeous smile and slipped out the door into the rain.
Haunted, Jude thought, as she started up the stairs with her head circling lazily several inches over her shoulders. Fanciful Irish nonsense. God knew, her grandmother was full of fairy stories, but that’s all they were. Stories.
But she’d seen someone . . . hadn’t she?
No, the rain, the curtains, the shadows. She set down the tea that she’d yet to taste and managed to pull off her shoes. There weren’t any ghosts. There was just a pretty house on a charming little hill. And the rain.
She fell facedown on the bed, thought about dragging the spread over her, and tumbled into sleep before she could manage it.
• • •
And when she dreamed, she dreamed of a battle fought on a green hill where the sunlight flashed on swords like jewels, of faeries dancing in the forest where the moonlight lay as tears on the leaves, and of a deep blue sea that beat like a heart against the waiting shore.
And through all the dreams, the one constant thing was the sound of a woman’s quiet weeping.
TWO
WHEN JUDE WOKE it was full dark, and the little peat fire had burned down to tiny ruby lights. She stared at them, her eyes bleary with sleep, her heart leaping like a wild stag in her throat as she mistook the embers for watching eyes.
Then her memory snapped into place, her mind cleared. She was in Ireland, in the cottage where her grandmother had lived as a girl. And she was freezing.
She sat up, rubbing her chilled arms, then fumbled for the bedside lamp. A glance at her watch made her blink, then wince. It was nearly midnight. Her recovery nap had lasted close to twelve hours.
And, she discovered, she was not only cold. She was starving as well.
She puzzled over the fire a moment. Since it seemed basically out and she didn’t have a clue how to get it going again, she left it alone and went down to the kitchen to hunt up food.
The house creaked and groaned around her—a homey sound, she told herself, though it made her want to jump and look over her shoulder. It wasn’t that she was thinking about, even considering the ghost Brenna had spoken of. She just wasn’t particularly used to homey sounds. The floors of her condo didn’t creak, and the only red glow she might come across was the security
light on her alarm system.
But she would get used to her new surroundings.
Brenna was as good as her word, Jude discovered. The kitchen was well stocked with food in the doll-size fridge, in the narrow little pantry. She might be cold, she mused, but she wouldn’t starve.
Her first thought was to open a can of soup and buzz it up in the microwave. So with can in hand, she turned around the kitchen and made a shocking discovery.
There was no microwave.
Well, Jude thought, that’s a problem. Nothing to do but rough it with saucepan and stove, she supposed, then hit the next dilemma when she realized there was no automatic can opener.
Old Maude had lived not only in another country, Jude decided as she pushed through drawers, but another century.
She managed to use the manual can opener that she found, and put the soup in a pan on the stove. After choosing an apple from the bowl on the kitchen table, she walked to the back door and opened it to a swirling mist, soft as silk and wet as rain.
