"You heard that too, right?" Nancy said to Celia as they stood, mystified, in the doorway.

"Yeah," Celia stammered. "Yeah, I heard that."

"Has it ever happened before?"

"Never, that I know of," Celia said nervously, sliding her locket back and forth on its chain. "Do you think there's someone in the house?"

"Maybe," Nancy said cautiously. She didn't believe in ghosts; long investigative experience had taught her that visitors from the "other world" usually had an ulterior motive. But if any house was haunted, she reflected, it would be this one.

She slipped into the hall, looking both ways, but saw nothing. There was no trace of the intruder on the stairs or in the foyer below.

"Nancy," Celia said from behind her. "it was probably only the wind howling through a crack somewhere. Let's go have some lunch."

Nancy was certain that what they had heard had not been the wind, but allowed Celia to lead her to the kitchen. The girls ate peanut butter sandwiches and Hannah's leftover egg salad, sitting silently at the massive oak dining table.

The dining room was cavernous and gloomy, with heavy red velvet curtains, choked with dust, at the large windows. A chandelier missing several of its crystal pendants hung over their heads, and a huge credenza loomed along the side wall. The only sound was the clink of forks on the girls' plates. The peanut butter seemed dryer than usual to Nancy, and it was an effort to swallow. She wondered if she should call to check on her father.

"We're cursed, you know," Celia said suddenly, setting her glass of milk on the table with a dull thud.

"Cursed?" Nancy repeated, looking up.

Celia leaned back in her chair and studied the tabletop self-consciously. "My parents died when they were still pretty young, and now Ethan's dead too. I never knew my mom's parents—they died before I was born, and she didn't have any living relatives except a sister who moved away before I was born. It must be a Selkirk curse."

"What about your father's family?" Nancy asked gently. "Did he have any relatives you might get in touch with?"

"I don't know," Celia said, a quirk of a smile touching her lips. "I remember he once said that his family probably didn't want to hear from him."

Nancy wasn't sure how to respond to this, so placed her fork gently on her empty plate and took a gulp of milk.

"I suppose I'll die young, too," Celia went on. She seemed to be talking to herself; she gazed off into middle distance and there was something trancelike about the way she spoke.

"Don't say that," Nancy protested.

"But it's true," Celia said, with a note of near-pride in her voice. "I mean, really, Nancy. I'm not any use to anyone."

"Why don't you show me the rest of the house?" Nancy asked quickly, rising and carrying her dishes back to the kitchen. Sighing, Celia followed, and to her immense relief she did not mention her impending death for the rest of the afternoon.

The girls spent the hours until dusk exploring every nook and cranny of the old house. Even Celia seemed to forget her troubles as they poked about with flashlights, jumping at every sound. They found a few items Celia had lost over the years, including a Barbie doll and a pink mitten, and discovered a nest of mice in an upstairs closet, but Nancy saw no evidence of the mysterious weeping woman or anything unusual that might give a clue to Ethan's death.

The house itself was a puzzle, its hallways twisting and turning back on themselves. Its design was haphazard; the only access to the conservatory on the east side was though the laundry room, and there was a small bathroom off the coat closet in the foyer, visible only if one swept the coats to one side and crawled past the piles of rubber boots and umbrellas on the floor.

That evening, the girls had supper in the dining room and then played cards in the formal parlor. Celia told Nancy that she and Ethan had never owned a television set, but that there was a very nice record player in the study. There was a radio in the corner of the parlor, hidden by a huge potted fern, and the girls listened to it as they played Old Maid, the only game to which they both remembered the rules.

As she climbed into bed that night, Nancy felt a stab of guilt at the thought of her father. I'll call him first thing tomorrow, she promised herself. She pulled the thin sheet over her shoulders and curled up, eyes closed.

She never knew how long she slept before she heard it. Footsteps, light and hesitant on the floor at the foot of her bed.

"Celia?" she whispered, sitting upright and brushing her hair from her eyes. "Celia, is that you?"

There was no answer, and Nancy could see no one in the room. Suddenly, she caught sight of a slender shadow crouched at the foot of the bed. With a cry, Nancy sprang from the bed and leapt at it.

Certain that Celia would hear and come running, Nancy pummeled the intruder with her fists, howling.

"Hey, get off me!" a high-pitched voice shrieked. "I ain't done nothin' to you, lady!"

Gasping for breath, Nancy scrabbled across the wooden floor and flicked on the light switch. At the foot of the bed hunched a weedy-looking young woman dressed all in black, except for a large, unbuttoned tan shirt that hung loosely from her lanky frame. Her straggly dirty-blonde hair drooped from a low ponytail. Nancy guessed that the stranger was a few years older than her and Celia.

"Hey," the woman said again. "Hey, now." Her knees were pulled up to her chin and her whole body was tensed, anticipating attack. There was something deer-like about her, skittish and long-limbed and wide-eyed.

"Who are you?" Nancy demanded, feeling less than threatening in her lacy blue nightgown. She seized the hairbrush off the vanity table and brandished it warningly.

The woman sneered and bit her lip, drumming her fingers percussively on the floor. She seemed to be in a state of constant nervous motion. "Why d'you wanna know?"

"That's not an answer," Nancy snapped, wondering where Celia was.

The woman made an impatient noise.

"I'm waiting," Nancy said, arms crossed in front of her.

The stranger sighed roughly, eyes downcast, and said, "Fine. My name's Isabel Ficklin. Happy?"

Nancy had never seen anyone who looked less like an Isabel. "What are you doing here?" she asked. "Was that you crying earlier?"

"I been here for years," Isabel said, climbing awkwardly to her feet and sitting on the blanket chest at the foot of the bed. There was a stack of yellow paper next to her, Nancy noticed for the first time.

"What's that?"

"I was bringin' you this," Isabel said sadly, holding it out to her. "I didn' want to give it up, it's all I have left of him, but I heard you talkin' to Celia downstairs and if it'll help—"

Nancy took the sheaf of paper and read the top page. It was criss-crossed with spindly, frantic handwriting; she picked out the words "curse" and "Selkirk."

"What is this?"

"It's his book," Isabel said, tugging at the front of her shirt. "The one he was always writin' on."

"This," Nancy demanded, gesturing at it, "this is Ethan Laramie's manuscript? Why do you have it? And, more importantly, who are you?"

"I told you," Isabel said patronizingly, as if she were dealing with a small child, "I'm Isabel Ficklin. And that's all I have left of him."

Nancy had lost all patience. "Celia!" she shrieked. A moment later, she heard the patter of footsteps and Celia appeared in the doorway, hair tousled, clutching her bathrobe closed.

"Who—what--,"she stammered, looking from Nancy to Isabel and back again. "I heard you scream—"

"Time you woke up," Nancy said calmly. "Celia, do you know this woman?"

Celia shook her head, eyes wide.

"Please, Isabel," Nancy said. "Tell us who you are and why you're here, and why you have Ethan's manuscript and, if you will, start at the beginning this time."

The intruder gulped, wrinkled her rather freckly nose, and began.

"M'name's Isabel Ficklin. My family use'ta live on the other side of the lake, until a year and a half ago, when my mom packed up my five little brothers and sisters and moved to Terre Haute. I didn't want to go, and I was old enough that she couldn't make me. So I stayed on here.

"I always used to look up at this house when I was little and wonder what it'd be like to live there, so I sort of got in the habit of sneaking in here when everyone was asleep. Through the broken window in the room with all the plants—"

"The conservatory," Celia said coldly.

"The conservat'ry," Isabel amended. "That was how I met him, when he was workin' late in the room with all the books—"

"The study," Celia said, apparently without thinking.

"The study."

"You knew her brother?" Nancy asked.

"I loved him," said Isabel plainly.

Celia made a strangled sound and clutched at the door frame for support. Nancy suddenly realized why the woman's shirt looked so familiar; she had seen it in Ethan Laramie's bedroom, earlier that day.

Tears were pooling in the corners of Isabel's muddy brown eyes. Celia looked murderous. "What do you mean, you loved him?" she demanded, hands on her hips.

Isabel wiped her nose on the back of her hand and choked, "He was—he was the saddest lookin' person I ever saw." She burst into tears, and Nancy handed her a Kleenex from the box on the vanity table.

"Thanks," Isabel murmured damply, blotting at her eyes.

Nancy poked awkwardly at the edges of the rag rug with her toe. This was a development she had not foreseen. Neither, apparently, had Celia, whose fists were clenched tightly.

Finally Isabel crumpled the Kleenex into a wad and said, "He looked up and saw me, that first time, in the mirror."

"The mirror in the hall downstairs?" Nancy asked quickly.

"Yeah," Isabel said. "It was always tilted a little towards the stairs, and he saw me coming down the hall from where he was workin' in the study. I didn' see him, so I went on in there. He wasn' surprised a-tall to see someone sneakin' around after midnight."

"He didn't tell you to leave?" Nancy inquired, incredulous.

"Unh-uh," Isabel said, shaking her head so that the loose strands of hair around her pinched face bobbed back and forth. "Jist smiled, sort of dreamily, and went back to writin'. I looked at the books for awhile, and ev'ry so often he'd glance up at me and shake his head. I use'ta come in every few nights or so and it'd be the same, him writin' like I wasn't there a-tall and me lookin' around."

Nancy decided this was simply too bizarre to be untrue. "Did he ever say anything to you?"

"Ev'ry once in awhile he'd say somethin', sort of to himself. I didn't always understand, but I'd smile a little and nod. He was so serious and—sort of driftin', maybe, like he didn't know what to do."

Celia made an impatient clucking noise, but Nancy silenced her with a look.

Isabel shifted nervously on the blanket chest and continued. "I know it sounds stupid to you, but I loved him and I'd—I'd like to think he felt the same about me. Sometimes though—sometimes I thought that he didn't know I was real."

"Well," said Celia icily, "I think it could hardly mean anything to him if he thought you were a figment of his imagination."

Isabel glowered at Celia, her lips twisted in an unpleasant grimace.

"So," said Nancy quickly, "Celia. Ethan never mentioned this to you?"

"Never," Celia averred. "And I never heard her sneaking around at night. But," she added sheepishly, "I sleep pretty deeply."

"But does this—what Isabel said—sound like how your brother usually was? I mean, does this seem like him?"

"Well," Celia said thoughtfully, "yes. He never seemed to belong entirely to reality, somehow. I can imagine that he'd think she was something he'd made up. Or a ghost. Or something."

"Isabel," said Nancy gently, "When was the last time you saw him?"

Isabel looked up at the young detective, tears slipping from her eyes and trickling silently down her ruddy cheeks.

"Last week," she whispered, drawing the tan shirt tightly around her. "I was with him when he died."