Part 29 (2/2)
For a moment, she pondered her next move. She nearly jumped sky-high when her cell phone, still in her hand, began to ring. She fumbled with the little b.u.t.tons, nearly hanging up on the caller.
”h.e.l.lo?”
”Hi. Toni?”
The voice on the other end was feminine.
”Yes?” she said carefully.
”My name is Darcy. Darcy Stone. I work with Adam Harrison.”
Toni was silent. It had been one thing to contemplate talking with Adam, a man who knew her. The gentle soul who had been there when a young child's world had fallen apart. The man who had come to see her one-woman show, but didn't press it when she said that she was just fine, not having any more nightmares, no more visions....
”Toni?”
The woman's voice was crystal clear; she might have been in the next town.
”Yes, I'm here.”
”Listen, please don't worry, Adam isn't shuffling you off to anyone. You can speak with him in a few hours-- he's on a plane right now. It's just that he has your name on a special list, and he's always said that if you called in, we were to get back to you immediately. Please, nothing you say to me will ever go any further than me. And again, no matter how insane it might sound, don't be afraid to say anything. Anything at all.”
Toni stared at the phone slightly skeptically, as if by looking at it she could somehow fathom the truth of the words being said.
”Let's start at the beginning,” Darcy Stone said, from across the miles. ”Where are you?”
”Scotland. A small village known as Tillingham. At-- at the castle there.”
”A castle. In Tillingham?”
”Yes.” Toni took a breath. ”I think I'm seeing a ghost,” she said.
”Then you probably are,” came the matter-of-fact answer.
”I am?”
”Yes.” Darcy chuckled. ”I'm sorry, I'm afraid you'll hang up on me when I say this, but...I see many ghosts.”
Toni was tempted to hang up.
”Please, don't hang up, and do talk to me,” the woman said, as if entirely aware of Toni's every thought and action.
”I rented a castle with friends in Scotland, rented with a lease option to buy,” Toni said. ”Except it turned out that we didn't really rent it, at least, not from the owner. We were told the family had died out, but there's a very current laird. I made up a story about an ancestor of his, and it turned out to have happened, right down to the name of the laird's wife.” She hesitated. ”I dreamed, or woke up, a ghost. The man in my nightmares, or ghost in reality, is the exact image of the living laird. I thought at first that maybe I was being taken, as we had been taken in by the corporation supposedly leasing the property. But then, there are the murders.”
”The murders?”
”Women have been disappearing. Three to date, I believe. And two have been found in the forest bordering the castle. I went into the forest one day, led by the.. .ghost. I found bones. Everyone a.s.sumed it was the third victim, but it looks as if it's the old laird's lady, dead now for centuries. He wasn't an old laird, he just lived in the sixteen hundreds. I'm not making any sense at all. I'm--” Again she hesitated, thinking that she really was losing her mind. This wasn't even Adam she was talking to, and she was spilling out way more than she had ever planned. ”I've quickly fallen into a certain involvement with the young laird, the contemporary laird, who certainly has been decent enough about this whole thing. We rented, or thought we rented the place to do theatrical tours--”
”I saw your production of Queen Varina,” the woman interjected. ”It was wonderful.”
Toni had never liked to think that she overreacted to either criticism or praise. But at that moment, she decided that she definitely liked the woman on the other end of the phone.
”Thanks,” she said softly. ”Um...he--the laird, that is--doesn't see ghosts. Or the ghost.” She hesitated. ”There's only one.”
Darcy was silent for a moment. ”Women have been found in the area, dead. But the ghost brought you to the remains of his longhead wife?”
”Yes.”
”Have you seen him since?”
”Yes. Now he keeps leading me to the crypts.”
There was no way she could ever describe this conversation to anyone.
”There's a simple answer,” Darcy Stone said from the other end.
”And that is?”
”He wants her by his side. Now that you've found her, he wants her buried where she should be--at his side.”
Toni was startled to feel a rise of excitement. Lord, yes! That would make so much sense. Well, if the fact that she was seeing a ghost made sense, then his leading her to the crypts after she had found the bones would definitely align, at any rate.
”Yes,” she murmured.
”Of course, it might not be that simple,” Darcy warned.
”Now that you've said that to me, it has to be!” Toni said. ”I saw him at the foot of my bed, and then going into the forest. And then...into the crypts. Oh!” She groaned.
”What?”
”They think she's an incredible historic find. His wife, the lady I found. I'm afraid they'll want to study her, put her in a museum.”
”Well, that's easy enough to handle. And I don't think this is one you're going to have to worry about at all. Her descendant just says no! But still, there might be a lot more going on there.”
”Not in this residence,” Toni said. ”There are terrible things going on--”
”The victims found in the forest weren't a.s.sociated with the castle?”
”No, definitely not. They were part-time prost.i.tutes at the very least, and kidnapped from three major cities, Edinburgh, Glasgow and Stirling.”
”You're certain there can be no a.s.sociation?”
”That would be impossible. Really. We haven't been here that long. And aside from us, there's the laird and a fellow who works for him.”
”I see.”
Toni hesitated, aware that she should mention the fact that Eban scared the wits out of her. And that, at times, she'd almost convinced herself that the current laird was dressing up as a ghost. She had never seen the both of them at the same time!
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