“I was mistaken for the ghost of a nun once,” I said.

“I can't imagine why.” Helga stared pointedly at my jaunty red, white, and blue outfit with the nautical theme that had looked really cute in a Provincetown secondhand store window two summers ago.

“So you're telling me that the college does a Halloween ghost tour to raise money, and…”

Helga gasped. “Not Halloween! Lickin Creek does not, I repeat, does not celebrate that Satanic ritual.

And, of course, we at the college respect that. We call it the Harvest Time Legend Tour.”

Impatiently, I asked again, “What kind of difficulties?”

“Lizzie Borden quit last Friday.”

“You mean you now have no PR department?”

“Not until Janet returns from maternity leave. And she says she's not coming back one day early! President Godlove suggested you might take over Lizzie's duties during the tour.”

“Isn't it a little late to be organizing something that's taking place this week?”

“Everything is ready to go. But we need someone in the administration building to supervise the students, make sure the ticket taker is on the job, keep things moving smoothly.”

“So get a faculty member to do it,” I said, turning back to my desk.

“We're spread as thin as butter on hot toast right now. There are no faculty members available.” She paused. “That does give me an idea. We like to have someone well known play a ghost every year. I suppose we could switch the head of the music department over to supervisor, and you could take her part. She wasn't keen on being in costume, anyway.”

“Now you're talking. I was once the lead in Blithe Spirit in high school.”

Helga stood up and brushed more imaginary dust from her skirt. “Then that's settled. I'll see you there Tuesday evening at six.”

She'd outwitted me, I realized, and had gotten exactly what she'd come for. Flattery gets me every time, and I liked the idea of being “well known.”

“I'll send a student over to your house with your costume. You'll probably have to shorten it.” She strode to the door, then paused and said, By the way, have you turned up anything new about Mack's death?”

“No. President Godlove told me the investigation was over and I should stop looking into it.”

“He doesn't really believe it was an accident, does he?”

“I don't know what he really believes. All I know is what he told me, and that was he was satisfied with the coroner's report and Woody Woodruff's arrest.”

“He's an idiot.”

Cassie started to laugh, then covered her mouth.

“He certainly is. I should have been named president. I'm far better at fund-raising than he will ever be. Besides, I'm a woman, and it's a women's college. The position should have been mine. Everybody knows that. I was next in line, and I was better qualified to run the college than the outsider they brought in.”

“What happened?”

“The trustees didn't show good judgment. That's what happened. I'll see you on Tuesday.”

A few minutes after she left, I turned to Cassie and asked, “What's the real story?”

“According to the Grapevine, Helga and Mack had a longtime relationship that ended abruptly when he went off to learn sign language and came back married to his teacher, Charlotte. In anger, Helga said some nasty things about his new wife, and they got back to him.”

“Like what?”

“She called Charlotte a gold digger. Said the only reason a young, attractive woman would marry an ‘old fart like him,’ her words, was to get her hands on his money.”

“If Helga thought Mack was an old fart, why did she want him?”

Cassie grinned. “Who knows? Besides, time has definitely proved her wrong. Charlotte has always been a devoted wife to Mack, even after he lost most of his money in that shopping center deal gone wrong last year. To me, that proves she married for love.

“Anyway, when Helga's name came up as the perfect candidate for college president, Mack persuaded the board of trustees to look elsewhere. He said a lot of things about her that later proved not to be true, but it was too late. Godlove was already on the job.”

“Do you think Helga was angry enough to want him dead?” I mused.

“It happened a while back. I doubt she'd hold a grudge that long.”

“From the way she talked, it sounded like more than a grudge, Cassie. I wonder what Helga knows about firearms.”

“Really, Tori. You're beginning to sound obsessed. The college has moved on, Mack's family has moved on. Don't you think you should too?”

I pushed my way through a jungle of helium-filled balloons and potted plants to find Ken Nakamura, pale and drawn, propped up in his hospital bed. Moonbeam was spoon-feeding him a creamy yellow substance.

“You look wonderful,” I lied as I cleared some magazines off the only vacant chair. Why do I always feel it's necessary to say that to someone in the hospital? Usually they look like they're on their last legs. Ken wasn't quite that bad, but he didn't exactly look “wonderful,” either.

His right arm was in a sling, his chest was wrapped up like a mummy.

“I wish I could give you a hug,” he said, “but that'll have to wait. Moonbeam told me you saved my life.”

“I didn't do anything,” I said truthfully.

“No need to be modest, young lady. If you hadn't thrown me to the ground, the next shot could have been fatal.”

Although I had no recollection of doing that, I decided to relax and enjoy the glory. There would be time later to tell him what really happened, that I'd bent over to pick something up, didn't recognize the sounds I heard as shots until I saw him drop to the ground covered with blood, and that someone else had called 911.

A nurse bustled in, took his vital signs, told him he was “looking good,” but should not allow his visitors to wear him out. “You're the heroine who saved him, aren't you?” she said to me.

I started to shake my head, but stopped when she continued, “The EMTs told us he'd have bled to death if you hadn't kept pressure on that chest wound. That was quick thinking on your part.”

How about that? Maybe I did deserve some of that praise, after all.

After Moonbeam had finished feeding him his tapioca, she turned the crank to lower the head of the bed, then said to Ken, “Dad, at your house I saw your family scrapbooks and a notebook with Japanese writing in it. Tori said you might have been interned during the Second World War. Is that true?”

Ken sighed. “Yes, dear, it's true.”

“Why didn't you ever tell me?”

He closed his eyes, and I saw how frail he was. “For a long time I tried to forget. Now, I realize I am old, and Tamsin needs to know. That's why I got the books down from the attic-I plan to translate Masao's journal after I retire.”

“Who is Masao?” Moonbeam asked.

“My brother.”

“I didn't know you had a-”

Ken interrupted her. “Masao died in 1943. Time has blurred the details, but his journal brought back my memories of the most shameful chapter in our country's history.”

He leaned back, eyes closed, and for a moment I thought he'd fallen asleep. Moonbeam looked question-ingly at me. I put my finger to my lips. “Wait,” I mouthed.

With his eyes still closed, Ken began to speak. “My father came to America more than one hundred years ago after the Meiji government took his family's land. I'll tell you his story someday. After a series of adventures, he ended up in Long Beach, California, where there was an established nikkei community.”

Moonbeam looked at me for translation. “People of Japanese ancestry,” I explained.

“We had a good life there. My father owned several fishing boats. We were very comfortable. My mother never had to work in the canneries. There was even enough money to send Masao to Japan for his education. A child of ten when he left us, he returned a man of twenty, shortly before the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. He was an American, but thought as a Japanese; he told me he felt like a stranger in his own land.”