Des lowered herself into her chair and brooded there in silence for a moment. “Okay, let’s try going at this another way.”
“Which is…?”
“Why Les? Why did someone want to kill Les?”
“For one of two reasons, it seems to me. Either he figured out who killed Norma and Ada, and had to be silenced before he could tell you
…”
“That plays,” she said, nodding. “I’m with you so far.”
“Or he actually killed them himself, and had to be punished.”
“Are you talking about frontier justice? I don’t buy that.”
“Why not?
“Because that would mean we’ve got us two different crazies operating in the same physical space at the same exact time. It doesn’t happen that way. Not in my experience. Not unless we’re dealing with running buddies who’ve had themselves a nasty falling out.”
“Maybe that’s it. Ada did tell you they wanted this place.”
“That she did,” Des acknowledged. “What were you and Les talking about before you got knocked out? Did he give you any news we can use?”
“He may have. It turns out he was getting it on with Martha Burgess.”
Des raised her eyebrows in surprise. “From the Frederick House? Well, well…”
“She doesn’t exactly seem like the type, does she?”
“Mitch, there is no type. Wives who sleep around on their husbands are just normal everyday women like Martha. Although she is awful quiet, I’ll give you that. Her husband, Bob, is the talker of the pair. A real Mr. Outgoing.”
“Somewhat like Les in that regard, don’t you think? Not that I mean to speak ill of the dead. He told me he couldn’t admit it to you out loud in front of Norma, even if she was dead. He was ashamed, I think.”
“Well, I can buy that. Do you think Norma knew who it was?”
“If she did, she never let on. Les did say that they’d been ultra-discreet. If I had to guess, I’d say neither Norma nor Bob knew about the two of them. Actually, Les said maybe he shouldn’t have told me, under the circumstances.”
Des frowned. “What circumstances?”
“Apparently, there’s another little wrinkle he thought you should know about.”
“What little wrinkle?”
“Des, I wish I knew. But that’s when everything went black. I’m afraid we’ll never find out.”
“Oh, we’ll find out,” she vowed.
“You think so?”
“I do. It may take a while, but we’ll get there.”
“Des, there’s something I’ve been wondering about.”
“And that is…?”
“Why am I still alive? Why didn’t Les’s killer murder me, too?”
“Didn’t need to, didn’t want to.”
“Why not?”
“I honestly don’t know. But it’s a mistake to think that what’s happening here is some elaborate scheme to do away with all of us, one by one by one. That’s strictly out of that old movie you were talking about.”
“You mean the one where no one gets out alive?”
“Really wasn’t necessary to say that part out loud again.”
“Sorry, I have a head wound.”
“This is real life, Mitch. If somebody wants a whole bunch of people dead they line them all up in a row and shoot them down like dogs. End of story. Norma’s death was planned ahead of time. But I still say everything that’s happened since reeks of a busted play-Ada had to die because of what she found out, and so did Les. Now did he tell you anything else? Think hard.”
“He said that the Frederick House is having financial problems. It occurred to me that maybe he intended to buy his way in with the two hundred thou Norma left him. Take Martha for his own and shove Bob Burgess out the door.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Des concurred. “Mind you, that would point the motive finger right at Bob Burgess for killing him. Too bad Bob’s not here at the present time.”
Which jarred something in Mitch’s head. Something significant that he’d forgotten. “Des, how do we know he’s not here?”
She looked at him closely. “Baby, do you need another hit of ammonia?”
“No, wait, hear me out. I just remembered something. When I got up to feed our fire in the middle of the night, I could have sworn I heard someone walking around up on the third floor. Astrid’s Castle is a huge place with millions of nooks and crannies. What if someone else has been hiding up here with us this whole time? Someone like Bob Burgess. That would explain how Les’s killer managed to slip out right under your nose-because he wasn’t under your nose. He was hiding somewhere else in the castle, waiting for his chance to kill Les. Although why Bob would want to kill Norma and Ada, too, I can’t possibly…” Mitch suddenly realized that Des was staring at him with a really strange look on her face. “You think I’ve suffered permanent head damage, don’t you?”
“Far from it. While you were outside with Les, Carly told me that she heard footsteps up on the third floor in the night.”
“Well, that settles it then,” Mitch said, gazing slowly up at the ceiling. “We’ve got company.”
“Slow down, cowboy. It’s very likely that what you two heard was nothing more than the wind.”
“Then again, it could have been Astrid.”
“You just said what to me?”
“There’s this thing they do for the tourists every year on Halloween,” Mitch explained. “Which is that Astrid, that she, you know
…”
“Mitch, believe me when I say this-I don’t know.”
“She haunts the castle. Her ghost, I mean.”
“Okay, this is your head trauma talking now,” Des said, nodding to herself. “Random gas is emitting from your person.”
“Are you trying to tell me you don’t believe in ghosts?”
“Are you trying to tell me you do?”
“Well, I certainly don’t disbelieve in them. How can I? There are just too many things that happen in life which can’t be explained.”
“Like what, for instance?”
“Like us.”
She stiffened at once. “Oh, is that right?”
“I mean this in a good way, Des. Just think about it…”
“Oh, I’m thinking about it, boyfriend. I am sitting here, thinking.”
“We come from completely different worlds. We share no common experiences and have no earthly business being together, making each other so unbelievably happy. And yet we are happy. And that can’t be explained by any conventional wisdom, can it?”
She let this sink in for a moment before she swallowed and said, “Well, no, you’re not wrong about that. But, Mitch…?”
“Yes, Des?”
“We are not ghosts!”
“I know this, and I for one am very happy about it.”
“Besides which, we are no longer talking about what we need to be talking about.”
“Which is…?”
“One of us needs to take a look around upstairs. I can’t leave this hallway, because I’m still clinging to the quaint notion that our killer is a corporeal individual, as opposed to Casper, the unfriendly ghost. Do you feel well
