The knock sounded again, this time coming from the rear of the house. One. A pause. Two.

  I abandoned thoughts of Emmeline Cole and her lost fiancé and ran back the way I’d come, fumbling in my pocket for my phone. I burst into the kitchen. A single light burned above the sink. I threw the kitchen door open to be greeted by, once again, nothing. I switched my phone’s flashlight on and swept the light back and forth across the crumbling and broken concrete steps and the weed-choked grass beyond. All was dark and still. The solid trunks of trees and their sweeping branches edged too close to the house.

  Mattie stood beside me, sniffing the air.

  “I wish,” I said, not for the first time, “you could tell me what you’re sensing out there.”

  Vicky grabbed my arm and pulled me back into the house. She reached around me and slammed the door shut.

  “You’ve got a floorboard loose upstairs,” I said. “Maybe some tiles on the roof are flapping in the wind.”

  “There’s no wind tonight, Merry.”

  “Squirrels playing on them maybe. Is this the sort of thing you’ve been hearing in the night?”

  She nodded.

  In our friendship, Vicky’s the brave one, the impulsive one. I can usually be found following cautiously behind, swept up in the waves of her enthusiasm for life. Tonight, I took one look at her pale frightened face, at an expression I’d never seen before, and decided I’d have to be the one in charge.

  “Okay. We’re two strong young women. We have phones to call for assistance if we need it. We have two dogs.” I threw a look at the animals in question. Sandbanks scratched under his chin. Mattie gazed up at me, wondering if we were going to play. “Okay, neither of these creatures are attack dogs, but they are dogs, and in Mattie’s case size is all that matters. We’re going to get to the bottom of this.”

  A wooden block bristling with Mark’s set of professional kitchen knives stood on the countertop. I took three determined steps across the floor and pulled one out. I held it up. “We have defensive weapons if needed. Not that they will be. Let’s go.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “To search the house.”

  “No. I’m sure you’re right. A board’s come loose over one of the upstairs windows maybe. Let’s go back to the TV room. There’s still some wine in the bottle.”

  “You’re frightened to be in this house, and that can’t continue, Vicky, not if you want to live here and be happy here. Do you believe in ghosts?”

  “No,” she said in a low voice. “I mean no! I do not.”

  “Neither do I. Therefore a ghost can’t be haunting this house. Let’s go. Stay with me and keep the dogs close. Neither of us are too stupid to live.”

  When I look back on that night, I wonder if I’d temporarily lost my mind. Or maybe it was that the time had come for me to be brave for Vicky. I was determined to be so, and so I was. I took a firm grip on the knife in my right hand (feeling rather foolish as I did so) and carried my phone in my left. I turned lights on in every room as we entered, pleased that many of them still worked. We checked the downstairs first, pushing aside torn and dusty curtains to shake the plywood coverings on the windows, stomping hard on worn carpets and uneven and shifting floorboards to check they were secure. As we moved, I kept one eye on Mattie and Sandbanks. Something had definitely caught Mattie’s attention when we were standing at the open doors, but now we were back inside, he’d returned to his regular calm self. He accompanied me on the search simply because where I went, he did too. Sandbanks did the same with Vicky.

  They say animals are sensitive to the supernatural, don’t they? Perhaps it was that matter-of-fact way Mattie moved through the house that helped to make me brave.

  “Have you been upstairs since showing us through the house?” I said to Vicky when I was satisfied nothing was to be found on the ground floor. In that, I was disappointed. I was desperate to find something I could show Vicky as proof her nighttime fears had a rational, physical explanation.

  “No, I haven’t,” she said. “Mark and I want to get the ground floor fully livable before starting work on the upstairs. You saw what it’s like up there, Merry. A mess, to put it mildly.” I agreed. Half the spider population of New York State must live in this house.

  “We’d better go and check it out then.” I led the way up the staircase. Steps creaked under our weight, and I wondered how secure these stairs were. “Is this what you’re hearing?” I said as a board let out a low creak when my foot touched it.

  “I suppose it could be, but Merry?”

  “What?”

  “These stairs aren’t going to make any sounds unless someone.… something … stands on them.”

  Had Emmeline’s fiancé tripped on a broken step? I pushed thoughts of him aside and said, “Mice maybe?”

  “Must be mighty fat mice,” she said.

  “Do ghosts have weight? They’re usually depicted as floating through the air, feet above the ground.” I bit my tongue as another thought came to mind. If not a weightless being, then what?

  “Ask Mark to hammer this firmly into place tomorrow. Doesn’t have to be a fancy fix—a couple of good nails should do it.” I glanced at her face. “If you don’t want to tell Mark you’re concerned, I can ask Alan to come around.”

  “I can fix a loose board myself, but that’s not the real issue here. It’s time I talked to Mark.”

  “I think you should. Come on—let’s finish what we’ve started.”

  As bad as the ground floor was, the second floor of this building could have been used to film Miss Haversham’s house in Great Expectations. Minor structural repairs had been done over the years, but thick, sticky cobwebs hung from every corner, and mice droppings were scattered across the floors, along with chewed-up fabric I guessed had come from bed coverings or seat cushions to be used for nesting.

  I brushed a spiderweb off my cheek with a shudder and swung my flashlight across the upstairs landing. Vicky and I jumped at the sound of retreating feet. Mattie ran forward, head down, nose moving, heading directly for the bottom of the two-foot-high baseboards. He gave the wood a scratch and a sniff before giving up pursuit and returning to my side. Sandbanks sniffed at him and then yawned.

  “That sound I’ve heard,” Vicky said. “Mice in the walls, and likely other creatures too. You cannot tell me that sounded like the knocks we heard.”

  “No,” I admitted. “It didn’t.”

  The junk collectors had taken away almost all of the furniture that was too damaged to reclaim and the soft coverings. Vicky had told me Emmeline’s clothes, now nothing but chewed tatters, had still been hanging in the closets. The rooms were empty, but I went into each of them anyway, checking closets and window latches, stamping on floorboards. Nothing but the occasional soft creak and the sound of more mice fleeing for their lives.

  The bathtub was an old-fashioned claw-footed thing. If it could be cleaned up, it would be quite beautiful. I turned on the taps. Pipes clanged, but no water came out.

  “Water’s been switched off to the upper floor,” Vicky said.

  “Attic?” I asked.

  “Let’s not go there. The dogs can’t get up there.”

  “I’d like to check it.”

  Vicky sucked in a breath. For a while, we’d managed to stop being frightened, or even concerned. We were just two friends having fun exploring an old house. But some of the hesitation returned to her face as she threw a worried look at the ceiling over our heads.

  “No point in searching,” I said, “if we don’t search everywhere.”

  “Okay. The staircase is behind that trapdoor.” She pointed to the end of the hallway and up. A rope hung from the ceiling. It looked fairly new. No doubt it had been maintained over the years to give access to the attic if necessary. I reached up, grabbed the rope, and gave it a solid tug. A door in the ceiling slid open, making surprisingly little noise, and a ladder smoothly descended. It was also in good shape.

  I was still holding the knife in one hand and my phone in the other. I handed Vicky the knife. She slipped her phone into her pocket, took the knife, and lifted her hands, one blade in each.

  “You look like a pirate about to storm aboard a prize ship,” I said.

  “Avast,” she said with a soft grin and the slightest trace of humor.

  I took a firm hold of the ladder with my free hand and climbed up into the darkness. My head popped through the hole in the floor, and I checked out my surroundings before venturing the rest of the way. The weak beam from my phone threw shifting shadows into the corners. I took a moment to feel my feet firm on the ladder, and then I swept the light across the room. The floor was thick with dust, and I could see no trace of human footsteps. Plenty of other footsteps, but from no creatures that wouldn’t be as frightened by me as me by them. When nothing moved and no one sprang out at me, I climbed the rest of the way up and stepped into the crowded space. The attic had not yet been cleared out. It was full of years—decades—of family mementos and junk. More cobwebs and mouse droppings. The floor was made of wide-planked bare boards, heavily worn; the roof descended from a center peak to half height. A big steamer trunk stood against one wall. A cluster of suitcases, some modern enough to have wheels, many not, were stacked in the middle of the floor. Piles of rolled-up carpet were covered in damp and mold. A baby’s cradle stacked full of scraps of faded and unrecognizable cloth; a low coffee table, standing crookedly on one broken leg. The floor at the eastern end showed traces of rainwater having found a way in, and the wall was streaked with remains of moisture. This must be why Mark wanted to have the roof fixed before tending to anything else. I tapped on the floorboards near the damp patches with my foot, and they shifted under my weight. One low window was set into the west wall. It wasn’t covered with plywood, and the glass was intact, although absolutely filthy.

  I climbed down the ladder. “Nothing,” I said to Vicky. “We should check outside.”

  “Why?”

  “I’ll admit what we heard sounded like someone knocking on the door, but it might have been a tree branch hitting a window. The trees near the house need some serious cutting back.”

  We went down the stairs, the dogs running ahead of us.

  “No need.” Vicky attempted to laugh. “You’re making me realize I’m being nervous over nothing. Too many horror movies in my youth, I guess. Remember those sleepovers we used to have with Tina and Anna? Oh, my gosh, I couldn’t sleep for weeks after some of those movies we watched.”

  “You need to talk to Mark about this, Vicky,” I said. “He needs to know if you’re not comfortable here. You’re both about to make a big commitment to this house and to each other. You have to be absolutely positive it’s the right thing for you to do.”

  “Yeah.” She reached out and wrapped me in a hug. “I’m glad you’re my friend, Merry. You’re always so practical. Sometimes I need that.”

  We’d only just separated and started walking back down the hallway when a low moan echoed throughout the house. Vicky gasped. I might have gasped myself as I grabbed her arm. Mattie barked and immediately went on alert. Even Sandbanks yelped, more in reaction to our behavior than anything he’d heard.

  This was no branch scratching against a window or a floorboard settling for the night. Or even a horde of mice raiding the kitchen cupboards.

  It came again, deep and low. Full of pain. Full of … horror?

  Vicky screamed. Mattie threw back his head and howled. My skin crawled. I swiped up on my phone. “That came from outside. I’m calling the police. Something’s out there.”

  At that moment, thoroughly modern, entirely practical, part-of-this-world headlights flooded the front hall, wheels crunched on gravel, and a car engine purred before being switched off.

  Vicky ran for the door. Sandbanks, Mattie, and I followed, and we all tumbled outside to see Mark climbing the steps. “Hi,” he said.

  Vicky burst into tears and threw herself into his arms. He grabbed her and spoke to me over her shoulder. “What’s going on. What’s wrong? What on earth are you doing with those knives? Merry, are you guys okay?”

  Chapter Eight

  We gathered in the kitchen. I put the kettle on to make Vicky and me hot sweet tea. I didn’t know what I’d heard, but I’d heard something. Something I could not explain.

  When Vicky finally peeled herself out of Mark’s arms and stopped crying, she exchanged a look with me. I gave her a firm nod. It was time—long past time—she told Mark about her worries and her sleepless nights.

  I made the tea, placed a steaming cup in front of Vicky, took one for myself, and sat down. We’d laid our weapons aside while Sandbanks settled on the rug in front of the stove and immediately dropped off to sleep. Mattie sat next to me, watching. But the tension was gone from his big body, and his posture was relaxed.

  Must be nice, I thought, to be able to get rid of that feeling of danger as soon as the immediate threat has passed.

  “We thought we heard something moments before your car pulled up,” I said.

  “No,” Vicky said. “Not thought. Did. We did hear something. The dogs did too, and that’s what freaked me out most of all.”

  Mark didn’t laugh or try to reassure us. All he said was, “What sort of something?”

  “Knocking at the door at first,” Vicky said. “Twice. Two doors, front and back. We checked, but no one was there. Then we heard a sound like someone was … I don’t know. In pain, or terror maybe.”

  “Or trying to scare us,” I said. “After the knocking, we searched the house—all of it— thoroughly, but we didn’t find anything that might be making those sounds. Then, moments before you arrived, we heard the … I don’t know what to call it. A moan, a cry. This isn’t the first time that’s happened either. Vicky’s been hearing things. Noises in the night.”

  Mark turned to Vicky. “You too?”

  “You mean you have as well?” she said.

  “Yeah.” He rubbed his hands through his short hair. “I didn’t want to worry you, so I didn’t say anything.”

  “But you’re always sound asleep when I’ve heard things. I’ve been so jealous of that.”

  “I figured you weren’t sleeping well, but you denied it when I asked. I didn’t push it, because I thought maybe you were having second thoughts. About this house. About me. We’re on such different sleep and work schedules, I suppose our disturbance schedule’s been off too.” He spoke to me. “I sometimes don‘t get home until after midnight, particularly if we’ve had a big function like a wedding. Plenty of chefs are wired after a night’s work and need to stay up for a while to wind down, and they hit a bar, have a couple of drinks. Never been that way for me. I drop the moment I get in. Vicky gets up around four to get to the bakery and start the bread, so she’s usually asleep when I get to bed. These sounds you hear—have I been home when it happens?”

  She thought. “No. Now I’m thinking about a pattern, I don’t hear them when you’re here. They start not long after I go to bed, and only when you’re out. For the rest of the night, particularly after you get in, my imagination is working overtime.”

  “Same with me, in reverse,” he said. “Once or twice, I’ve heard strange sounds in the early morning. After you’ve left. I’ve gotten up and checked out the house, but I never find anything. I don’t believe in ghosts, but—”

  “But,” Vicky and I chorused.

  Mark stood up. “If there is a ghost, it’s unlikely to care much about our work schedules. A person, however, wanting to scare us so much we leave this house, would likely use the divide-and-conquer principal.”

  “You’re thinking of Jim Cole?” I asked.

  “I am.”

  “For what end? If you guys decide you don’t want to live here, you’re going to sell the house. Not hand it over to him and walk away.”

  “Anyone who’s creeping around someone else’s property at night, trying to scare people, isn’t thinking straight, Merry.”

  “I suppose that’s true. Might just be kids doing what we did when we were kids, and finding that having people living here has upped the stakes and the risk factor. You haven’t seen evidence anyone’s been inside the house, have you? The knocks could have come from the boards over the windows. The … whatever we heard tonight … did that sound close, do you think, Vicky?”

  “Close enough. No, I don’t think it was inside the house. It came from outside. Same with some of the noises I’ve heard in the night. Never anything I thought was in the room with me, or standing outside the door.”

  “Does Sandbanks ever do anything?” Mark asked.

  Vicky gave the old dog an affectionate smile. “No. For him to react the ghost would have to walk across his nose.”

  I thought of the two women in the bakery the day Vicky told me she and Mark were going to buy this house. The grounds themselves were, the women said, cursed. The two elder daughters of Charles and Ethel Cole had died outside. Were they still here?

  Nonsense.

  “I’d say it’s happening too often to be kids on a lark,” Mark said. “Kids like to hang around and see the effect of their so-called-pranks. Laughing from behind bushes and peeking in windows. That sort of thing.”

  I agreed.

  “Might be a recording,” Mark said, “played on a schedule.”

  “Might be anything,” I said. “If someone’s been in or near your house, you need to step up your security. Did you have the locks changed when you took possession?”

  “We did,” Mark said. “The original keys have been at the lawyer’s office all these years. Anyone could have taken a copy. Plenty of people probably did, as various cleaners and tradespeople had to be let in.”