Nothing but Ghosts Read Online Free PDF Page A

say, and he watches me go; I feel his little eyes on me. I go back over the stones, to the stream’s other side. I walk down and down, inside the shade. I don’t turn to apologize or wave, I don’t turn for a thing.
    What just happened? I ask myself.
    What is Old Olson hiding?
    I take another long look back at the house and decide that it’s wrong, it just is, that something as barren and sullen as that has been planted in a garden fat with color.

Chapter Eight
    I take the long road back on my way home and stop midpoint at the library, which isn’t as pretty a building as a library should be, but is huge and therefore full of something my dad calls capacity. Ms. McDermott glances up from the oak circulation desk, then gives me a longer-than-usual stare. “Sorry,” I say, because clearly my dirtiness concerns her. “I already washed my hands. I swear.”
    Ms. McDermott is the coolest-looking librarianever—tall and thin, with straight highlighted hair and one of those noses you usually only see on magazine covers. When she puts on her glasses, it looks like she’s doing an ad for fancy glasses. When she comes out from behind her desk, you get to see her magnificent shoes. But as stylish as she is, Ms. McDermott has never been married.
    “What have you gotten yourself into, Katie D’Amore?” she asks in her low librarian voice, and I tell her that I’m spending the summer at Miss Martine’s, working on the excavation team.
    “It’s for a gazebo,” I explain, feeling less than lovely in my own muddy work boots and my borrowed Boston U cap.
    “A gazebo,” she repeats, and her nose crinkles. “And how can I help you with that?” Ms. McDermott is perpetually helping me. Even when the school library has the goods, I prefer to come here, for her brand of advice. Most of the kids from high school do.
    “Research,” I tell her. “I’m just trying to get a sense for the history of the place.”
    “The history of Miss Martine’s?”
    I nod.
    “Well, it’s not like there’s a book on that,” she says. “Or any encyclopedia entry.”
    “I once read a little,” I tell her, “on microfilm. Local newspaper stories.”
    “Well, yes.” And now I can see that Ms. McDermott is thinking, that she’s forgotten for the moment about me being a filthy mess. Bringing Ms. McDermott a challenge is like doing public service. Nothing pleases her more. “Give me a minute,” she says, and she goes back into the office that sits right behind her desk, an office with windows for walls so that now I watch her work, bringing big books down from triple-thick shelves and checking the computer. She stands with her hands on her hips for a few minutes, then writes down a few things. Now she opens the door and comesback out to the desk, and the eyes behind her glasses sparkle. Brown eyes full of light.
    “We may be in luck,” she tells me, “though I can’t be sure.” She gestures for me to follow her as she leaves her post and begins to walk toward the basement steps. “Julia,” she says to the girl who is putting returned books on a shelf, “will you take over for a sec?” Julia nods, and Ms. McDermott keeps walking—a quick walk in high heels all the way down the carpeted steps. I feel a tingle of excitement.
    Figments, Dad had said. Maybe. Or maybe something else.
    “The story is this,” Ms. McDermott says, halfway down the steps. “A few months ago we received an anonymous gift. Big boxes marked LOCAL LORE just sitting outside under the overhang when I came to work one morning. Julia and I took a preliminary look, and it seems to be all twentieth-century stuff. Diaries mostly, and newspaper clippings, little ribbons and awards,some plaques. The records of what I’d have to call an amateur historian. I just took a look at our computer log. Looks like there are references to Miss Martine in there.”
    “You’re kidding,” I say, and now the tingle is a prickle.
    “I am not.” Ms. McDermott laughs. “But