The Ghost Wore Gray Read Online Free PDF Page B

hadn’t been able to figure out any way to warn him about her.
    This is not to say that dinner was a total disaster. To begin with, the food was spectacular—even if it was mostly things I had never heard of before. The main dish was some kind of mystery meat, covered with mushrooms. But these weren’t just ordinary mushrooms. According to Baltimore they were “domestic and imported, both wild and cultivated.” Or something like that. Anyway, I never saw so many different kinds of mushrooms on one plate.
    Then there were the cucumbers. Now I’ve been eating cucumbers all my life. You peel them and slice them, right?
    Not Dieter. After peeling them he had cut them in half the long way and scooped out all the seeds. Then he sliced them, which made all the pieces come out like little crescent moons. Then he cooked them. I mean, who ever heard of cooking cucumbers? Anyway, they were still firm, and kind of shimmery, and covered with this clear, shiny sauce.
    But it was the peach melba that caused my mouth to send a message to my brain, asking if we had died and gone to heaven. That was the other reason I was squishing it; I wanted to make it last.
    As good as the food was, when I think back on that meal I remember the sounds almost as well as the tastes. If I close my eyes I can still hear the bursts of laughter, the clink of glasses, the cries of delight as Martha and Isabella delivered each new course. The conversation seemed to whirl around the table, all very witty and grown-up sounding. The fact that people got friendly so quickly may have had something to do with the wine, which was flowing pretty freely. I think it also had something to do with ordinary-looking Porter Markson, who turned out to be a wonderful storyteller.
    Porter was also a good source of information, since he had been coming to the Quackadoodle for nearly thirty years. In a way it seemed as if the place belonged to him more than it did to Baltimore and Gloria, who had only bought it two years earlier. Porter told funny stories about the guests who used to come there, and a romantic story about two people who met and fell in love there, and then a sad story about how beautiful the inn had been before the last owners had let it get so run-down that most of the old regulars stopped coming back.
    â€œBut here’s to our new hosts, Baltimore and Gloria,” he concluded, raising his wineglass for a toast. “May they bring the Quackadoodle back to its former glory!”
    We all raised our glasses and cheered. Baltimore was beaming. It was very nice, except that I thought Porter should have also mentioned my father, who was going to have a lot to do with bringing glory back to this place.
    It was shortly after the toast that the ghost made his appearance. He drifted in through the dining room door. And I do mean through —Gloria had closed it behind her when she made her grand entrance. Taking his time, he crossed the room to where we were sitting and took his place at the table as if he had been invited.
    I heard Chris drop her spoon. I felt her grab my elbow at about the time I managed to swallow the peach melba. “Do you see it?” she hissed.
    I nodded, my eyes wide.
    We recognized him at once: he was the same man we had seen in the photo upstairs. He was wearing his uniform, and if it wasn’t for the fact that he was dead, I would say he looked even better in real life than he did in the picture.
    The adults babbled on, totally unaware of the ghost’s presence. Chris and I tried to stay calm, but I could feel my hands begin to tremble. I suppose if we hadn’t already had one experience with a ghost we probably would have screamed and jumped out of our seats. As it was, we managed to keep ourselves under control.
    As we watched, it became clear that the ghost was slowly and carefully studying the people at the table. He started with Porter Markson, who was sitting to his right, then moved on to Arnie,