Free The Secret Staircase (A Wendover House Mystery Book 1) by Melanie Jackson

away from my backyard was dark shale with pockets of soil which had probably washed down from the garden and gotten caught in the fractured stone. Small, scruffy plants were growing in the cracks and it seemed that seabirds were also nesting there.
    At one point I thought that I heard a booming echo that can mean a sea cave, but I couldn’t see anything in the growing shadows and Harris disclaimed any knowledge of Little Goose’s topography or geology, though he admitted that caves were common to the area.
    I might have asked Harris to get closer to where I heard the sound, but the wind had picked up and the water was choppy enough to make me uncomfortable with the large rocks peeking between the shadowy waves. I was used to boating on lakes, not in the sea which rises up and down with the tides. I’d never seen stones look so savage and the changing tide made the boat harder to control. Searching for caves was an activity for a calm morning when the sun would light the cliff face and surrounding sea.
    Though my day on Great Goose had been lovely, I admit that my nervousness returned as we approached the house, and I found myself asking Harris if he would like to stay to dinner when he finished installing the bolt on the basement door. He accepted and seemed to enjoy my variation of egg fried rice, but we had to eat quickly so he could beat the dark and the storm back to Great Goose.
    I felt almost sad waving Harris goodbye, though I wasted no time shutting out the dark and wind. Like the night before, I closed and locked the doors before retiring upstairs. Deciding that I wanted just a bit more of Mrs. Crumpert’s utterly delicious pie, I helped myself to another slice and then put out kibble for Kelvin, who had appeared on the back porch the moment we had the house to ourselves. I let him in, accepting the scolding for having gone off and left him all day with nothing more than an enormous bowl of crunchies and water for company. There seemed no point in explaining that he could have come in while Harris was there. The cat just didn’t like my attorney.
    I had to clean out the fireplace before I could lay another fire. Something about the smell of the ash made me melancholy. Coal made sense on the island, but if I stayed, I would want to have wood brought in. Wood reminded me of bonfires and camping and happy wholesome things. Coal was industrial and lonely.
     
    *   *   *
     
    I woke when Kelvin jumped from the bed and landed on the naked floor. He went to the bedroom door and mewled softly, patting at the wood with an enormous paw.
    Feeling slightly more confident about getting up in the dark now that I had a lock on the basement door, I reached for my flashlight—all fully cranked and ready to brighten the night—and turned it on.
    Kelvin’s eyes glowed at me. He meowed demandingly.
    “I’ll get you a litter box tomorrow,” I told him. But that didn’t solve the problem of his wanting out right then.
    Kelvin meowed insistently and since I also needed the bathroom, I gave in. Sighing pointedly, I pulled on my robe, wishing I had something warmer to wear. The nights were chillier than I had expected.
    My door opened silently, though the house was far from quiet that night. There was wind in the eaves and rain hurled at the leaded windows. In the distance, the sea grumbled. Timbers creaked and groaned. But that was okay. These were outside noises and normal old house sounds.
    And there was a lock on the basement door. It would keep out anyone and anything. At least anything earthly in nature and that was all I was worried about. Because there were no ghosts.
    “Don’t go there,” I whispered. “Don’t even think about it.”
    Kelvin frisked down the stairs and disappeared into the dark. I did not frisk. I clung to the bannister and listened carefully as I descended. Animal eyes watched me—foxes and hounds, dead pheasants, one large black and white cow, an owl. And cats. Lots of cats that looked like