I'm back! Sorry for the wait, because I was gone for a few days I'm giving you an extra long chapter. Thank you for reading, enjoy!
A small boy answered the door, he was shorter than George, and had a look of innocence, and frailty that made him seem even younger than he probably was. His face was pale and narrow, his eyes big and gentle. The only lively thing about him was his red hair, it stood up brightly on his head, drawing all eyes like a beacon.
"Hi." He said, even his voice was soft. Lockwood stepped forward, giving a warm smile,
"Hello, I'm Lockwood, these our my associates, Lucy Carlyle, and George Cubbins." He pointed at us each in turn.
"I know who you are." The boy said, looking up at him, "I read the papers, are you here to talk to mama?"
"I believe so." Said Lockwood.
"Okay, follow me." We followed him. I shut the door behind us and looked around.
The house was clean, orderly, and seemed to be in good condition. We were standing in a long hallway, there was a flight of stairs at the end of the hall, leading up to the next story. There were two doors on either side of us, I peeked into them as we passed them. The first one on the left was a kitchen, it had a crisp white tablecloth, four chairs. The one on the right was the one with the broken window. There was a blue tarp taped over the hole, but I could still feel the cold air blowing in through the gaps. It was a living room with two small couches, and a coffee table in between. The couches were ripped and the coffee table was on it's side. Shelves lined the walls, the objects they had held were flung all about the room. The next two doors held a dining room, and a room filled with cardboard boxes.
The boy ignored all of those rooms, and climbed up the stairs. The second story looked remarkably like the first, the only difference being that there was no staircase, and all the doors were shut. The boy led us to the second door on the right, and waved us in.
It was a spacious bedroom, if a little on the cavernous side. The far wall was taken up by an enormous bed, containing a small, frail woman. There was a bookcase filled with large paperback volumes, and an armoire with a picture frame on it. I couldn't see the picture. We walked forward to the bed.
The woman in it looked like an older, female version of her son. She seemed to be maybe in her fifties, with red hair that was graying at the roots. She was remarkably thin, almost skeletal. She was wearing a loose fitting white dress. A thick quilt came up to her waist, an aura of gentle happiness surrounded her, although a current of sadness ran through her. She smiled.
"Good morning, you must be Lockwood and co?" Her voice was soft, pleasant, the kind of voice that I couldn't do even if I tried. Lockwood nodded,
"Yes ma'am" Lockwood said quietly. Something about her made us want to whisper, it was like we were with a dying person in a hospital.
"I'm glad to see you. I hope you can take care of our problem." She clasped her hands, and looked down at them. "I am Elena Medacab, last night my daughter was returning from work when something was thrown through the window. It hit the ground, and cracked. My daughter said that a visitor came out," She took a breath, "I don't know much about visitors, but I could tell this one was bad because I could feel it. I came downstairs and saw my daughter on the floor, already turning blue. I'm afraid that's all the information I have. My girl could have told you more, but she died last night." The room was quiet. If the woman could sense the ghost it must have been pretty strong. The source was probably in the front room with the hole in the window.
"I'm sorry Mrs. Medacab, thank you." Lockwood said, casting his eyes downward. She smiled sadly,
"I'm sorry you had to come here so early. I believe the reasoning behind this decision was that you could have time to familiarize yourself with the house." Really? I thought it was so that Penelope/Marissa Fittes could show us who was in charge. She continued, "I will be leaving now. The house will be empty until ten o'clock tomorrow morning."
"We'll do our best to help you." Lockwood said, "we'll make good use of all the time we have here."
"Thank you, there is tea in the cupboard left of the sink, and a jar of cookies next to it. Please help yourself." We all nodded and turned to leave, I shut the door behind us with a soft click. We headed downstairs, Lockwood leading. After dumping our duffel bags by the door we set off exploring. First we went to the front room first.
It was cold inside, and it would only get colder. All the furniture was out of place. Picture frames and scented candles lay all around the floor. There were also some books, a small clock, and a pot of lavender. We gazed at the mess on the floor, how were we going to find the source inside all of this? We poked around inside there for awhile but found nothing of interest. After that we looked in the room with all the boxes. We found only one thing in there, cardboard boxes. The dining room was plain, with a large square table and four chairs. The table was covered in a light purple cloth and had a vase of lavender in the middle. There were four white placemats, each set neatly with plates, and silverware.
We were about to head upstairs when Mrs Medacab came down. She walked slowly, and wobbled occasionally. Her son was helping her, holding her wrinkled hand in his small one. She smiled at us and hobbled out the door. We climbed the stairs,
"So," Lockwood said, "We already know what one of these rooms contains, that means one door each. I choose this one!" He flung open the nearest door dramatically. He went in. I went for the one on opposite him. It was another bedroom, there was a bed in one corner, it's blankets were on the floor next to it, and the pillow was on the ground. There was a bookcase that was overflowing with books. A desk in the corner held more volumes, although these looked like textbooks, opposed to the the books in the bookcase which seemed to be mostly fantasy. There was a closet which I peeked into. It was filled with dark clothes, and Fittes uniforms. This must be the dead girl's room then. I snooped around in her bookcase, but didn't find anything unusual. I gave up my search, and went to talk to Lockwood. He was in a room that was probably the little boys, there were small pictures in crayon taped to the wall, and the bed was crowded with stuffed animals.
"Found anything?" He asked,
"Nope, what about you?" He held up a small plastic bag,
"I found a secret stash of candy, want a piece?" I grabbed one,
"I meant anything related to the case."
"Oh, in that case no." I unwrapped the candy, and popped it into my mouth. It was green apple. We went outside to find George, he was sitting on the floor eating some chocolate that had come from his pocket.
"Nothing." He said sullenly, "Just a bathroom." He finished the chocolate bar and stuffed it into his pants pocket, "I don't understand why we have to be here so early. I was looking forward to a day at the archives. We were going to see what we could find about those people in your house, Lucy." Oh yeah. I had almost forgotten about that. It just seemed so normal to be going about a house looking for signs of supernatural activity.
"Yes, that was strange." said Lockwood. He glanced at me, dark eyes glittering with some unknown emotion. "As for your question George, I believe that it's a blatant show of power from Penelope Fittes." He turned around, and headed for the stairs, "Let's go down to the kitchen, I'm rather hungry, and those cookies should hit the spot." We followed him down, and took our seats in the breakfast nook. Lockwood grabbed the cookies, and began to make tea.
"So," he said, "Penelope Fittes wants us to get rid of the ghost here, then figure out who is targeting this team."
"What about the other members, of the team I mean," George began, "You said they had been attacked too."
"Yes," Lockwood said, "But they managed to dispose of their sources, this one is quite a bit more powerful." I raised my hand, "Yes Lucy?"
"Will we get paid for this?"
"Yeah," said Lockwood, "but not as much as I would have liked. Who wants tea?" We all did, he poured three cups then sat down between me and George. After we finished lunch, we all wandered off to find a way to kill time until dark. I grabbed a sketch pad from my duffel bag, and sat in the kitchen drawing. George had found a book somewhere, and was flipping through it absent mindedly. Lockwood had vanished.
We waited until dark, then put up our various forms of entertainment, and began to take measurements. The room with the broken window was frigid now, the coldest in the house. I couldn't tell whether it was because of the cold winter air, or because of the visitor I was sure lurked there. After collecting readings everywhere in the house we agreed that the source was in the sitting room. We rigged up two iron circles. One in the room of question once we had moved some of the junk on the floor, and one in the girls room, which was above the sitting room. I was positioned with Lockwood in the downstairs one, George was upstairs. I adjusted the circle, checked my belt, and ran out of things to do. Lockwood sat with his knees up to his chest, frowning slightly. I sat down next to him and began fiddling with my rapier. What was wrong with me? I wasn't normally this anxious on a case, it must've been because of those people in my house. Yes. That was it.
"Lucy?" I looked at Lockwood, he had stretched out his long legs and was looking at me in the dark. "Are you okay?"
"Yes." I said shortly, "I'm fine, why?"
"Well, for one your house is filled with strange people. And you've seemed a little twitchy since we lost the skull." Stupid Lockwood, how could he be so perceptive. I didn't think I was being twitchy.
"Well I'm fine." I said a little to sharply. He raised an eyebrow, but wisely shut up. I sat brooding when the miasma began to build. I was about to ask Lockwood for a piece of gum when the ghost appeared.
