Free The Ghost in the Glass House by Carey Wallace Page A

don’t?” Clare asked, with a note of false wonder.
    â€œAlmost nothing,” Bridget’s mother said. “You see, they’re not like you and me.”
    â€œBut you’ve talked with them,” Clare prompted.
    â€œGhosts very rarely speak,” Bridget’s mother said. “And when they’re spoken to, they often retreat. That’s why it’s so important to work with trained mediums.”
    Clare had the same sensation she got when she heard people rattle off travelers’ rumors about a place Clare had actually been: the realization that she already knew more than the adult who was pretending to educate her. She didn’t like the feeling, but she was getting used to it. It bothered her most in moments like this, when she didn’t know the answer herself, and needed one.
    â€œThen how do you know they’re there?” Clare tried.
    â€œMost of us aren’t sensitive enough to encounter them,” Bridget’s mother said. “I do have some sensitivity myself, but I wouldn’t call it a true gift.”
    â€œWhat’s it like?” Clare asked. “To feel a ghost?”
    â€œOften there’s a chill,” Bridget’s mother said. “An unseasonable chill. You have a sense that you’re not alone.” She added this detail as if the thought came as a relief. “And then there are apparitions.”
    â€œGhosts that you see,” Clare guessed.
    Bridget’s mother nodded.
    â€œHave you seen any?” Clare asked.
    Bridget’s mother’s hand curled around a lemon.
    â€œThere was a girl who came to our room every night in Paris,” she said. “All she wore was a sleeping shift. And rubies, a thick necklace. I could see her, but Robert couldn’t. He hated for me to talk about it.”
    â€œWho was she?” Clare asked.
    â€œA nobleman’s mistress,” Bridget’s mother said. “His wife couldn’t bear a son. So when the girl delivered a boy, he took him to give to his wife as her own. The girl threw herself from our window down on the stones. He gave her the rubies in exchange for her son.”
    Clare had heard worse, both on palace tours and in gossip over lunch. The story didn’t shake her. But the mechanics didn’t add up.
    â€œHow did you know who she was?” Clare asked. “If she didn’t speak?”
    â€œI heard the story from a servant,” Bridget’s mother said. “Her mother knew the girl.”
    â€œWas she the first ghost you saw?”
    Bridget’s mother shook her head. “That was in Italy,” she said. “On my honeymoon. An old man. He sat in a chair on the balcony. The first time I saw him, I thought he was a thief. But when I screamed, he looked at me as if I’d hurt his feelings, and faded away to nothing.”
    â€œDid he come back?” Clare asked. “Like the girl?”
    Bridget’s mother pushed the pieces of another lemon across the marble to Clare. “Every day,” she said. “I started to take breakfast with him when Robert was out.”
    â€œSo you did talk with him,” Clare insisted.
    â€œHe didn’t speak to me,” Bridget’s mother said. “But he listened. Robert was convinced I had a lover. He could hear me talking, but when he came out, the old man always vanished. It made him wild.” The memory of a smile flickered over her lips.
    Clare thought back on Jack’s chatter and pranks. He didn’t seem to have much in common with these wraiths that couldn’t do anything more than appear or fade away. “So why did he come, do you think?”
    â€œThe old man?”
    Clare nodded.
    â€œI’m not sure,” Bridget’s mother said. “Usually ghosts want to tell us something about who they were.”
    Clare lifted a hollow rind from the glass and pressed a fresh lemon down. For all his dreams, Jack hardly mentioned his past life.