Free Ghost Ship: A Port Chatham Mystery by P. J. Alderman

with whom she’d become acquainted.
    “Rooooooo,” he agreed now.
    “And there’s no way I’m investigating Seavey’s murder.”
    “Raaaooow.”
    “After all, he’s a sociopath. It’s not like he deserves to know who killed him. And who knows what he’d do if he found out? He could go after someone’s descendant, out of pure spite. I could end up responsible for some poor innocent person’s death.”
    Malachi made the supreme effort to lean over and lick her cheek in agreement, then sank back down.
    “Precisely.”
    Jordan scrunched around in the tub, trying to get her neck positioned more comfortably against the rim. A folded towel hovered in her peripheral vision. With a scowl, she grabbed it and wedged it behind her neck.
    “We need to establish some house rules,” she complained. “I deserve privacy in my own bathroom.”
    Hattie floated toward the opposite end of the bathtub.
    Malachi whined.
    Jordan felt like doing the same. “I’m not interested in hearing anything you have to say at the moment,” she told Hattie. “I’ve had a long, stressful day, and all I want is a relaxing soak, then bed.”
    Hattie wrung her hands.
    “Quit that.”
    “It’s just …” Hattie hesitated. “I thought Seavey had murdered me, you see. I’ve maligned his good name all these decades—”
    “He doesn’t have a good name.”
    “Michael isn’t a bad man. He simply did what he had to, to survive. Just as I did after my husband died.”
    Jordan sighed. “I’ll grant you that Seavey probably isn’t truly evil in the tradition of Jack the Ripper, but he isn’t exactly a model citizen, either. And it’s not the same. You intended to run your husband’s shipping business ethically, siding with Frank’s union to provide better treatment of sailors. You were murdered because you only wanted the best for Charlotte. Seavey, on the other hand, murdered for financial gain. And let’s not forget he was blackmailing you into his bed, for Christ’s sake, as a condition for helping you get Charlotte back. Those are not the actions of an honorable man.”
    “But he avenged my murder,” Hattie pointed out.
    Jordan gave up and stood, wrapping a bath towel around herself and blowing out the candles. “That doesn’t cancel out his other criminal activities.” She shooed Hattie out the door.
    The ghost trailed her down the hall and into the bedroom. “I’m merely asking you to look into the circumstances surrounding his death. Maybe he’s right—maybe Eleanor did publish lies to support her editorial position. But I owe him the courtesy of finding the truth.”
    “Michael Seavey was the bane of your existence until you died—how can you possibly believe that you owe him anything?”
    “Couldn’t you just look into the shipwreck and see if there were any survivors?” Hattie pleaded. “You were so good at understanding the motivations of the people I knew back then, and of understanding who might have been capable of murdering me. Wouldn’t this be similar?”
    “What is this? Good ghost, bad ghost?” Jordan grumbled. At Hattie’s confused look, she said, “Never mind.”
    Drying the ends of her hair with the towel, she explained impatiently, “First of all, I’m not interested in functioning as an amateur detective for all the ghosts in this town.” She paused, shuddering at the implications of what she’d just said. “And second, in this case, everyone probably wanted Seavey dead—he had so many enemies I wouldn’t even know where to start.”
    She rummaged through a drawer, looking for the cotton T-shirt Jase had given her as a belated house-warming present and she’d converted into a nightshirt. The one that stated across the front, in large block letters, REALITY IS JUST A STATE OF MIND .
    Hattie wrinkled her nose. “I don’t understand this modern practice of painting comments on your night-wear,” she said. “ Or of wearing something to bed that should be worn during the day. Last