Ghostfinders 02 - Ghost of a Smile Read Online Free PDF Page B

police.”
    “Heaven forfend,” said JC. “Let’s just say we’re professionals. We have a lot of experience in this field, enough to know that what’s happening here isn’t an ordinary haunting. Albert Winter didn’t just happen to die in this place. Something lured him in here, then took its own sweet time killing him. And whatever did that is still here.”
    Susan shuddered suddenly, despite herself. She could hear the truth in JC’s calm voice. She looked over at her grandfather. “Gramps took up ghost-hunting as a hobby when he retired. Something to keep him occupied . . . But after Grandma Lily died last year, he’s been taking it all a lot more seriously.”
    “Am I to take it that you’re not a believer?” said JC.
    Susan snorted loudly, looking him over scornfully. “Of course not! I’m here to keep him company and see he doesn’t get into any trouble. I’ve watched his back on a dozen cleansings and never seen or heard a thing. It’s all empty rooms, shadows in the corners, and plumbing rattling in the walls. You know a lot about the killing; you sure you’re not some kind of police?”
    “How can I be sure, let me count the ways,” murmured JC. “Trust me, Susan, there isn’t a branch of the police that would accept any of us on a bet. Except perhaps as Bad Examples. But there was a murder here, and we are looking into it. We are concerned as to how it may have happened.”
    They all looked round as Graham Tiley came striding back, his footsteps echoing in the quiet. He stopped right before JC and looked at him sternly.
    “I’ve had a look at your machines. Machines won’t help you with the spirit world. Nor will official attitudes. It’s all about prayer and belief and compassion. Spirits who are having trouble passing on respond best to the personal touch. Human contact, kindness, sympathy, positive attitudes. I’m here to talk and to listen, and to help if I can.”
    “An entirely worthy intention,” said JC, getting in quickly before Melody could stop sputtering long enough to say something unhelpful. “Unfortunately . . . not all ghosts want peace. Some have to be pacified.”
    Suddenly, without any warning, the whole building was shaking with the deafening sounds of machines working filling the air. Huge machines slamming and grinding, overpowering. The floor vibrated heavily, shaking everyone with the brutal power and motion of unseen machinery. They all put their hands to their ears, but it wasn’t the kind of sound they could keep out. The roar of the machines filled the whole factory floor, filled their heads, and rattled their bones. Susan grabbed onto her grandfather’s arm with both hands, to hold him steady. They all looked around them, Tiley waving his lantern with a shaking hand; but there was nothing to see anywhere.
    “I know this noise!” said Tiley, leaning in close and shouting to be heard over the din. “Though I haven’t heard it in years. This is what it sounded like on the factory floor, when all the machines were working at once. It made me deaf for a week when I first started! No ear protectors in my day . . . But they pulled all the machines out of here when they shut the place down!”
    The sound stopped abruptly, and Tiley shouted his last few words into an echoing silence. The air was still, the building was steady, and the floor was calm and certain again, as though nothing had happened. But there was still something . . . in the dark, out beyond the light.
    “Can you feel that?” said Happy, stepping forward reluctantly. “There’s a definite presence here . . .”
    “Of course there is!” snapped Tiley. “And you and your young friends have upset it, with your modern scientific attitudes! You people need to get out of here. You’re making things worse. Leave me to get on with my work.”
    “We can’t do that,” said JC.
    “Why not?” said Susan. “Who are you, really? And don’t give me that professionals bullshit. Who wears