matching turtleneck. Definitely a good-looking guy, who definitely gave her a bit of the appreciative once-over and probably caught her doing the same.
She apologized for Cree's absence – unnecessarily, because he was obviously glad she wasn't there – and then told him, 'We really appreciate your making time for this. Your knowledge about the history of the house will really help us out.'
'How else was I gonna keep an eye on what you all're doing?' he grumped. 'Let's just see the damn plans.' She got the sense that his surliness was mostly an act, just doing what was expected of him.
He led her into a huge room to the right, the front parlor, where she got her first real sense of the house. The place was big as a barn, about half furnished, all of it old stuff that was no doubt valuable but struck her as a little ragtag, especially the carpets – apparently the ambience of faded splendor was the thing in New Orleans. And the closed-in, musty smell and the dim light from the chandelier didn't exactly help matters.
They made space on a table and unrolled the plans, holding the corners down with an antique inkpot and paperweights.
'There's nothing different. I didn't change a thing,' Ron told her, tracing the kitchen floor plan with a well- manicured finger. 'Had the walls painted and new tile put on the floor, but I wasn't gonna change the layout of the whole damn kitchen.'
Joyce explained that they were not particularly interested in the kitchen, and that so far they had no reason to think Lila's ghosts had any connection to the Chase murder. She thought he looked surprised and maybe a little pleased at first, then a little disappointed. Cree would read his responses better, she knew, and wondered again what she was doing tonight.
They started with the library. Ronald switched on the light, and Joyce set up her tools and spread the plans on a table near the door. It was a big room furnished in antiques and lined with bookshelves, its dark woods and prehistoric carpets and book spines soaking up the insufficient light from the ceiling chandelier. Joyce tried to sense whatever it was that Cree felt here, and couldn't. It was just a mildew-scented, deluxe-type old-fashioned library room that looked like it could use a makeover.
Still, she felt obligated to flatter the place. 'Such a nice room. Very… um, masculine decor.' Somehow, being alone in the big house with a man she didn't know at all, that sounded more flirtatious than she'd intended, one of those door openers you had to be careful with. Especially since there did seem to be a little buzz going.
'Yeah. Mainly it was my daddy's room. Used the desk there as his home office. Also where he and his gentlemen friends would repair after dinner for brandy and cigars. To discuss politics, business, and women in the time-honored fashion.' He looked around as if remembering, and then his face made that sourpuss grin again.
'Looks like you've got a few memories here,' she prodded. 'What was that one?' She had the sonic measure, but under the circumstances her instincts told her it would be good to keep Ron's hands occupied. So she gave him one end of the hundred-foot tape and with a gesture commanded him to take it to the far wall.
The long steel band sang as Ron started across the room with it. 'Something I don't usually tell with ladies present.'
'Relax. It'd be a bit of a stretch to consider me a lady,' Joyce reassured him. And then realized how that sounded.
Ronald turned to face her appreciatively. 'My daddy and Uncle Brad and me. They took me in here, shut the door, and told me about the birds and bees. Kind of tag-teamed me. Daddy soberly gave me the biological facts and lectured me about the sacred responsibilities of marriage while Uncle Brad enthusiastically filled in the more explicitly, shall I say, 'romantic' side of it. Needless to say, the latter was vastly more appealing. They also gave me my first drink of whiskey to acknowledge my initiation into the secret knowledge of manhood. I was eleven. They must have done a good job all the way around, because I've had an enduring appreciation for both subjects ever since.'
He looked at Joyce to check her reaction and continued to the back corner with the tape. 'How the heck is measuring this old place going to help you?' he called over his shoulder.
Joyce jotted down the length and then explained some of the nuances of spatiotemporal divergence as they lifted the tape and carried it to the opposite wall. 'Has to do with figuring out which world the ghost thinks it's in. For example, a ghost seen emerging from a wall suggests the wall didn't exist when the ghost was alive. And the converse is true – if a ghost's movements reflect the current configuration of the site, and we discover that there have been alterations, we can reasonably conclude that the ghost lived since those alterations were made. And the more Cree knows about when the ghost was alive, the easier it is for her to determine who the ghost is. And once she knows who it is, she can better figure out why it's here. In this case, we're particularly wondering about any changes since 1882, when John Frederick Beauforte killed the servant in this room.'
'You know about that? We're going that far back for this?' Returning with the end of the tape, Ronald looked around, eyebrows high and lower lip thrust out, as if seeing the room in a new light. Again, she got the sense he was pleased or relieved.
They measured the four walls of the room, then began taking distances between its significant features: the fireplace, the windows, the door. Ron was cute, Joyce decided as he crouched to hold the end against the edge of the fireplace coping. His slacks pulled taut against nice buns, and though he had a just bit of a gut it was more than compensated for by the good shoulders and hunky back.
'Ro-Ro,' Joyce said. 'How did you get afflicted with that one?'
He gave her that grin, just a little sharklike, sarcastic but cute. 'My uncle Brad. Seems I had a bit of a stutter when I was two years old. 'What's your name?' he'd ask. 'Ro-Ro-Ronnie,' I'd answer. He started teasing me with it, and it stuck – Ro-Ro.'
When they were done with the horizontals, Joyce took a moment to jot some notes. Ron came to the table where she stood and leaned across her to reach over and switch on the table lamp. It was only partly a courteous gesture, more of a flirtation, Joyce decided. The extra light was nice, but afterward he half sat against the table edge, too close, looking at her. She was acutely aware of how near he was, how big he was, how alone they were in the cavernous, dark house. And from this close, she didn't really like everything she saw in his eyes. Something calculating, and selfish, and indulgent. Something else, too… a little afraid, maybe, as if somewhere in him was a scared boy putting on an act. The combination frightened her, and she decided maybe it was time to cool the boy- girl games.
'So you really believe all this stuff?' he asked. 'This psychotherapy for ghosts?' His expression made it clear it was intended as a good-natured, skeptical jibe.
'Of course.'
He shook his head, amazed. 'And your boss, she really sees ghosts?'
'She sees them and communicates with them, yes.'
'Can I ask you something?' Ron leaned in confidingly. 'What's her problem, anyway? She's got this… shall we say, chilly side to her. Has she got… relationship problems? A problem with men?'
Joyce took a small step sideways. 'You know, Ron, I don't think '
He held up his hands. 'I know, I know. Sorry. I know she's your boss, you're loyal. No insult intended, honest to God – I think the world of that woman. I do. I was just going to point out that you, by contrast, most definitely do not seem to possess that, uh, particular problem.' He paused to observe her response, grinning at whatever he thought he saw in her face. Before she could reply, he pushed himself away from the table and dusted his hands together. 'Well. What's next, milady? I am at your service – what dimensions or proportions would you like to measure next?'
They took the vertical dimensions, plumbs, and levels. By the time they were finished, it was clear that the library had not changed in the one hundred and fifty years since it had been built. And given that the built-in shelves, the fireplace, and the windows and door largely determined the placement of furniture, the patterns of human activity would probably be unchanged as well.
Joyce felt a flash of disappointment: The physical room could tell them nothing about the ghost Cree had seen there.
They moved upstairs. Ronald switched on the lights in the central room and cleared a space on a table for the second-floor schematics. Joyce took a moment to study them and get her bearings, trying to ignore how close he stood as he looked over her shoulder. She didn't look at him, but she could feel his eyes on her body, as if his gaze traced an uncomfortable heat. She wondered what had possessed her to wear this dress tonight. From this close, his scent surrounded her, and she was dismayed at how attractive she found it.
