Page 2 of Ghost in the Garden
“And it troubles you?”
Mrs. Lambert nodded. “Wouldn’t have come here otherwise. Saw your flyer on a lamppost and thought, that’s who I need. Someone to tell me if it’s really a ghost, and either way, what the devil it wants with my house.”
Constance set the client’s card on the table, where Solomon could see it. At least there actually seemed to be some investigation required. Surely it would be a start, though she could not imagine the outcome of such a case.
“You saw this ghost in your own home?” she asked.
“Well, in my garden.”
“What was it doing?”
“Just gliding about,” Mrs. Lambert said impatiently. She must have read something in Constance’s face, for she frowned and added defensively, “I’m not the only one who’s seen it.”
“Who else has seen this ghost?” Solomon asked.
“One of the maids and two footmen.”
A substantial home, Constance noted, judging by the number of servants.
“Tell us what you saw,” Solomon said. “What did the ghost look like?”
“Like a girl. A young woman. Veiled and sort of wispy. Like mist. I know what you’re going to say! That itwasmist, but it wasn’t. It had too much shape, and it camethroughthe mist.”
“From where?” Constance asked.
“I don’t know. It just seemed to…materialize in the middle of the garden, and moved through it, then vanished into the mist.”
“And you just saw it once?”
Mrs. Lambert nodded. “Night before last. Before that, I told the servants to stop being stupid and scaring each other, ’cause there’s no such thing as ghosts. Only when I saw it, I weren’t so sure.”
“So it might have been a real person moving about your garden without your authority,” Solomon said.
“It might have been,” she said. “It just didn’t look like anyone I ever seen before, and the servants don’t know her neither.”
“When was this ghostly figure first seen?” Constance asked.
“A couple of weeks ago. Goldie—the maid—saw her first through the kitchen window and squealed, but no one believed her until Bert and Pat saw her a week later, and then Goldie saw it again from her bedroom window.”
“And where were you when you saw it?” Solomon asked.
“In the back parlor. I’d just come in and went to close the curtains when I saw her clear as day. Well,” she amended, “not quite as clear as that. But she was like an apparition, floating through the mist.”
“Did she make any threatening gestures?” Solomon asked.
Mrs. Lambert shook her head. “No, she just seemed in a hurry.”
Constance met Solomon’s gaze briefly. It was not the serious case they had hoped for, but beggars could not be choosers, and they had to start somewhere.
“What exactly is it you want us to do?” Solomon asked.
“I don’t expect you to lay a ghost, if that’s what you’re asking. I just want to know if itisa ghost or if it’s a person. If the latter…I want to know who she is and what she’s doing on my husband’s property, because he won’t like it.”
Constance, who had for some reason imagined Mrs. Lambert was a widow, said quickly, “Is your husband aware of the ghost?”
“He’s aware what’s been said about it, but he’s never seen it and certainly doesn’t believe it’s a ghost. His footmen, Robin and Pat, are supposed to keep the place secure, and they do, to be fair, which inclines me to the supernatural explanation, though it ain’t in my nature.”
“If itisa person rather than a ghost,” Constance said, “who do you think it is?”
