“Wish I knew,” I said. “I don’t really understand anything that’s going on around here at the moment.”
“Well, I’ll see if I can find anything out,” Russ said.
After he left, I walked over to the piano and ran my hand across the deeply carved panels.
Then, as if the seed of hope in my heart had a snowball’s chance of blooming into a living thing, I knelt down and pushed it gently. The piano rolled a couple of inches. I rolled it back easily and smiled.
Chapter 7
Dec
I grabbed some polish and started cleaning the fingerprint smudges off the piano just as Laura settled into the window seat to finish her summer reading.
As I rubbed, I felt her eyes on me. “What?”
“School starts soon. Have you finished all of your assignments?”
No, because I won’t be here, I thought. “Most of them.”
“Well, I’ve heard senior year is rough, since you’ll spend all that time in the Corps after school.”
My chest ached. I had to tell her, but I didn’t know how. I made a noncommittal noise, and she said, “Oh, and don’t forget about that letter.”
Before I could ask why she was so invested in the mail, the doorbell rang again. Doorbells simply didn’t ring at Hampton House in the off-season. Harriet never had visitors. She was usually out in the evenings or holed up in some dusty corner of the house. She never shared what she was doing or where she went, and I was usually too glad she was gone to force the issue. Laura’s few friends were too wary of the house to come over, and, knowing that we rarely locked the door, Russ usually walked right in, which annoyed Harriet to no end, so of course it was a habit I encouraged at every opportunity.
But Russ was probably camping out in the restricted section of the library, trying to figure out what Sheridan and Mackenzie were up to, and even if they had launched some sort of investigation with the Guild, it wouldn’t happen this fast.
Laura and I listened as Harriet answered the door.
“Well…I don’t know,” Harriet said. “This is highly unusual. How did you get in here?”
The visitor answered. The voice was female, but I couldn’t make out her words, just the same pleading tone of desperation that filled St. Hilaire every summer.
When Harriet groaned loudly, my chest tightened. When she called for us, my head started to throb in dread and anticipation.
Laura pulled on my sleeve, and I followed her to the reading room while attempting to come up with an excuse that would work with my older sister. I’m sick. Studying in preparation for the start of school. A spirit has possessed me. Who am I again?
The room was dark, shut down for the off-season. I threw myself into a chair, closed my eyes, and leaned my head on my arms on the old wood table while Laura went around the perimeter, lighting candles and incense.
The beginning of a séance always included a request for help from any available spirits. Now I offered my own. “If you freaking spirits want to prove your worth, then get me the hell out of here.”
I waited, but of course nothing happened. Nothing aside from Harriet and the customer entering the room.
Two chairs were pulled out. Sat in. A low drumming started on the table that made my heart beat too quickly.
The chair next to me scraped as Laura sat.
“Daniel,” she said in an airy voice.
“I don’t want to do this,” I whined, knowing I sounded more like I was seven than seventeen.
“Daniel,” Laura said again, and this time I got that she was using my full name.
I looked up, and what I saw made me pretty sure I’d finally lost my mind once and for all.
Anastasia Krylova was even more striking in person than she was on my computer screen, but it was her fingers that held my attention. I could almost hear music as she laid them on the corner of the worn tablecloth and gave them free rein to play a silent sonata against the wood.
“Mozart,” I blurted out. I couldn’t help myself.
She opened her eyes wide. “How did you know?”
For all the hours I’d spent watching her videos, I’d only heard her speak on scratchy audio taken with people’s cell phones and posted online. Her voice was deeper and softer than I’d expected. It was surreal to think she was sitting in my house, talking directly to me.
“I play,” I croaked out. “Piano, I mean.”
Harriet cleared her throat. I’d never told her about the reason for my trips to the library, not like she’d care. She didn’t know who Anastasia was, or what she meant to me. She only saw a well-dressed girl who looked like she could pay for whatever information she wanted. “Look, you know we’re closed, right?” Harriet said. “The whole town is closed.”
Anastasia’s face hardened. “As I said, I just walked in through the gates.”
“That’s impossible,” Harriet said.
I bit my tongue to keep from reminding Harriet that nothing in St. Hilaire is impossible, only improbable.
“What can we do for you?” Laura asked. “Miss…”
“Krylova,” Anastasia finished. “Anastasia. Well, Annie…Krylova.”
Annie? All of her posters and videos only ever had Anastasia on them. Annie Krylova.
“I was on the train,” Annie answered. “The antique one. And it broke down. They said it was going to take time to fix and a week or maybe two, to get the parts.” She shrugged self-consciously. “I could rent a car, but I am not old enough.”
“It’s the off-season, and there aren’t enough passengers to keep the train route running more than once a week in the winter,” Laura explained, glancing at me. “Even when it works.”
The look Laura gave me was full of meaning. I knew what my sister was thinking. St. Hilaire was a town that believed in synchronicity and things happening for a reason. If that was true, then Annie was supposed to be sitting at our table. We were supposed to be helping her. It was the way things were supposed to be.
Annie Krylova was in my town. Stuck here for at least a week.
Harriet broke my reverie, of course. “We aren’t a hotel, Miss Krylova.”
The fluttering of Annie’s fingers picked up against the table. “I know. I did not mean… I passed a hotel, but the sign said they were closed for the season and… It probably sounds ridiculous. I just started walking from the station, and this is where I ended up. I will sort something else out. I do not want to be a bother.”
“I don’t know what you know about St. Hilaire…” Harriet started, but I knew I had to cut her off.