Читать книгу A Place Called Paradise - Honey Perkel - Страница 13

It was after noon when Lulu made it back to the cove and the charming eatery Molly had suggested. Annie Rose’s was packed with lunchtime customers. Lulu eyed the dessert cart as she stepped inside and decided to order the chocolate mousse and the berry cobbler. Still a bit shaken from her experience in town, she needed to calm her uneasiness.

The attractive young hostess informed her there would be a fifteen minute wait until she could be seated. The smells that were coming from the kitchen were intoxicating, so Lulu was only too happy to wait in the elegant little restaurant.

Her eyes wandered, her mood soothed by the soft piped-in music that filled the room. She looked past the cloth-covered tables with bud vases of roses. Past the windows and stone fireplace. And … was that Bernard painted in shades of blue above the mantel? Why would his portrait be here?

People were lingering over their coffees, enjoying their meals with family and friends. Lulu’s eyes stopped on a familiar figure sitting below the painting. Bernard! He was sitting at a table, motioning for her to join him. Lulu stared. Was this really him? She looked from the portrait to the man at the table, trying to convince herself that he was, in fact, sitting here.

Lulu nervously crossed the room and sat down.

“I know this is happening, but I’m finding it hard to believe.” It was unsettling enough to be sitting with such a handsome man, but to know that man was a ghost was unbelievable. My God, she could reach across and touch him! Lulu forced down a hiccup.

Always before, she’d seen him wearing a navy blue sports jacket, ecru shirt, and burgundy tie. It was how he’d been reported to be dressed at other sightings as well. Today he wore crisp khaki slacks and a white short-sleeved polo shirt.

Lulu leaned over and whispered. “You’re not in your usual clothes.” She looked around to see if anyone was watching. “And I can see you. Can others?” She was actually talking to an apparition!

“Would I wear all new clothes and remain invisible?” Bernard smiled in return.

Lulu giggled nervously. “Uh, ... I’m kinda wondering who I’m having lunch with, you know. Animal or mineral? Visible or ghost?”

“Visible.”

“Good, because it would hurt my reputation if I’m seen in public talking to myself.” Lulu giggled again. “So, how do you do it?”

“Do what?”

“You know, change to a solid so that we can see you.”

“It’s a matter of physics. To change from one state of matter to another is called phase transition. Matter and energy are interchangeable. Variations of the same. Photons are quantum units of light that are …”

“Wait, wait, wait,” Lulu said scratching her head. “English, please.”

“That was English,” Bernard responded. “To simplify things, it’s an issue of mind over matter.”

“You will yourself to appear and you do?”

“Well, yes, more or less, with a little science thrown in. Let’s put it this way. You see me today. Tomorrow, I’ll be lying in the dark staring up at the ceiling, regaining my energy.”

Holy whoop! Lulu picked up her menu. Deciding what she wanted for lunch was so much less complicated.

“Say,” she added, “since you haven’t had a job for more than a half a century, which of us is picking up the check today?”

“Well, you are, of course. But I don’t eat much.” He chuckled.

“That’s good news.” Lulu set down her menu. She looked at him.

Bernard was glowing with some inner light, looking ethereal, radiant, in an aura that surrounded him. Could others in the dining room see that this man’s appearance was different?

An attractive woman came to their table. Bernard introduced her as his cousin Caroline, the owner of Annie Rose’s. She greeted Lulu warmly, took their orders, and left.

Lulu was beginning to relax. “Do you have a large family here in Seaside?”

Bernard grinned. “I do have several cousins here.” He gestured to a table near the window. “Today is Tuesday. Cousins Tilly, Iris, Molly, and Molly’s mother, Janet, meet here at Annie Rose’s for lunch each Tuesday.”

Lulu gazed at the table that Bernard was referring to. Four women. Talking. Laughing. Enjoying one another’s company. She recognized Molly Spencer and an older woman who was the spitting image of her. Both had Bernard’s piercing blue eyes. Another woman at the table was tall and lanky, and still another had jet-black hair. It was quite obvious they all resembled Bernard in some way.

Looking at Bernard’s hands, Lulu asked, “Who has your extraordinarily long fingers?”

“That was Elizabeth,” Bernard spoke quietly, reverently.

Caroline brought Bernard’s cup of red pepper bisque and Lulu’s plate of ratatouille with grated parmesan cheese. Lulu gazed across the table at Bernard’s soup. Where did that soup go after it passed through his lips? She quickly dismissed the thought. Maybe she didn’t want to know.

As it was, Bernard only took one spoonful of the bisque, then turned his full attention to Lulu.

“I’m glad you came.”

“I still don’t know why you called me here.”

With steady fingers, Bernard stroked the handle of his spoon. “Something is going to happen. There is bad energy beginning to invade the town. People feel it, and they are talking. Awful things are occurring.”

“Sewers backing up, roofs falling in, weather changes,” Lulu interjected. “And last night there was a black shapeless figure moving across my mirror.”

“Yes.”

“Walking through town this morning I saw a vision of Seaside in ruins.

“I fear it’s a warning of something bigger.”

“What do you think is going on?”

“We face threats every day on the coast. Global warming. Tsunamis. Attacks from terrorists in our harbors. But this is very different.”

“What do you suggest we do?” Lulu took a sip from her glass of red wine.

“Wait.”

“And?”

“And do what we do best; keep the white light around us and pray.”

“Why did you ask me to come and help you, Bernard?”

Bernard leaned over the table. Lulu’s heart began to pound as the ghost’s image came closer. Then he took her hand, sending strange charges of electricity through her body.

“I’ve asked you because you need to face your demon, Lucille.”

* * *

“So who’s going to fix the hole in your roof?” Iris Grayson asked her cousin, Tilly, as the women ate their lunches. They’d been shocked to learn that Tilly’s roof had suddenly collapsed. And here the work had just been completed a year ago. Luckily, no one had been hurt in the accident.

“I’m not sure,” Tilly Jacobs responded. She pierced a chunk of chicken with her fork. “I’m looking for a handyman.”

Three sets of eyes turned quickly towards Tilly. The women’s jaws dropped open.

“No, no, no. It’s not what you’re thinking. I just want to get my roof fixed. That’s it. Nothing else.” Tilly remarked eagerly to the others.

It was no secret that Tilly Jacobs had an affair with her previous handyman, Brad Bailey. But all that had changed now. She and her husband Richard were doing just fine.

“Does anyone know what’s happening in this town?” Molly Spencer inquired.

“I only know that something strange is going on,” said Iris. “One of my Chinese dianthuses died last week. I don’t remember the last time I lost a plant in my garden.”

Tilly nodded. “There’s a restlessness. I hear about it everyday at the realtor’s office. People are worried.”

Molly took a sip from her glass of wine. “Bernard has called in the troops, you know.”

“What do you mean?”

“The motel. It’s packed with ghost trackers from all over to try to help him catch some evil force. He’s having lunch with one of them across the way,” Molly appeared worried as she gestured at the other side of the restaurant.

The four women peered at the table where Bernard and a heavy-set woman sat.

Janet, Molly’s mother, asked with apprehension, “And how will he do that?”

“Damned if I know,” Tilly said, “but if cousin Bernard is in charge you can expect anything to happen.”