Page 55 of Death at the Deep Dive

“You had me atbacked over.”

“The bright spot is we havea lotof forensic evidence.”

“You do?”

“Yes. It looks like a rage killing to me because whoever did this was not making any effort to conceal their tracks. And I mean that literally.”

Ellery glanced at the journal lying face up on the bed. Fifty-eight years later? That had to be a coincidence.

But as coincidences went, it was an uncanny one.

“That’s reassuring.” Ellery was pretty sure his tone didn’t convince either of them.

“After you finish checking all the doors and all the windows, text me back. I’ll probably be in a meeting, but I’ll be watching for your text.”

“Right. Okay.”

Jack said lightly, “I’m just being extra careful. You know me. I’m all about safety violations and security hardware.”

Ellery smiled because that was true, but he also knew Jack well enough to know when he was genuinely concerned.

“I’ll text you back in about ten minutes.”

“Thank you. Have a good night. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

Ellery clicked off, threw back the covers, to Watson’s confused delight, and headed into the drafty hallway.

“No, we’re not playing,” he told Watson, who snatched up his plushy lamb and followed. “This is not a game. This is not a drill.”

The plushy lamb concurred, crying out in loud, harrowingpeepsas Watson trotted after. Ellery rocked to a stop, and Watson crashed into his legs.

At the end of the long hall, lamplight shone from the sitting room, pooling on the faded carpet.

It was not moonlight or starlight. It sure as hell was not sunlight.

It was lamplight. Light from a lamp that was turned off and unplugged.

Ellery’s heart, which was already thumping briskly, broke into a full gallop.

“This isridiculous.”

He tried to tell himself he was angry, but honestly? He was—he hated to sayscared—but he was pretty damned alarmed. If not actually freaked out.

But comeon, already. Was the place now haunted? Because enough was enough.

Ellery strode down the hall toward the sitting room, and about one door down, the light in the room went out, leaving the hallway in almost pitch darkness.

He faltered, but made himself keep walking, one foot after the other. It wasn’t easy. His knees were shaking in a way he couldn’t remember since early childhood. His heart was pounding so hard, he felt like he was going to smother.

Watson had stopped at the head of the staircase and was whimpering.

Ellery reached the doorway and grabbed onto the frame for support. He was not imagining that creepy chill. The little room felt like a refrigerator. And hedidsmell roses.

He said firmly, although he could hear the embarrassing waver in his voice, “I don’t know who you are. I don’t know what you want. You’re going to have to find a better way to communicate because you’re scaring us. Unless that’s the point.”

As his eyes adjusted to the dark, he could pick out shapes within the moonlit room: the black rectangles of space on empty shelves, the glint of the brass finial of the lamp, the gleam of the rocker’s headrest. His heart froze in his chest. He could just make out the silhouette of someone—something—sitting in the chair.

“Please don’t do that.”

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