“Creepy.”

“Exactly. It wouldn’t be surprising if late at night, on the edge of sleep, you thought you saw something.”

“I didn’t just see her, I had conversations with her.”

Dennis shook his head. “Did she talk about something that had been bothering you?”

North. “Yes.”

“The subconscious finds ways to work out its problems. A dream state is as good a way as any.”

It was so plausible, it was demoralizing. “I feel like a fool,” Andie said. “I was really starting to think there were ghosts.”

“I’m worse,” Dennis said morosely over his glass. “I was hoping there were. Just once, I’d like to see one. It’s like studying the dodo. No matter how much you know, you can never get primary evidence.” He sighed. “If they were real, I could write a groundbreaking paper on them. It could revolutionize the field. I could be…” He met her eyes, his face flushed now. “Because, unlike Boston Ulrich, I am respected in my field.”

“Of course you are,” Andie said, startled. Then he took another sip of his drink and she realized the brandy was doing its good work. But even tipsy, Dennis made sense. There were no ghosts, of course there were no ghosts. “Listen, I am very grateful. And I will make you a huge breakfast in the morning before you go back as a thank-you. If you give me your sweater, I’ll even get the pizza sauce out for you.”

He smiled at her, his face relaxed now. “That’s very kind of you.” He handed her his glass, and then took off his ugly green sweater and handed it to her. Then he patted her arm as he took back his drink, his basset-hound eyes sympathetic. “You get some sleep now.”

“All right, thank you,” Andie said, and watched him toddle down the big stone staircase, weaving a little. The guy could not hold his after-dinner drinks. But still he’d been patient. And he knew about ghosts. Good guy, she thought, and took his sweater into the bathroom and washed the tomato sauce out of it and hung it to dry, patting it a little in sympathy with its owner who’d been kind without making her feel like she was crazy. All that angst over nothing.

I really did believe in ghosts there for a while, she thought and went back to Alice’s room to make sure she wasn’t upset about the whole ghost conversation, cracking the door just an inch to make sure she was asleep.

The woman in the tiered dress was standing at the end of Alice’s bed, pale and dreadful, watching Alice. Andie clutched the doorknob, and opened the door farther, and the chill in the room hit her as the woman looked up. Andie saw two black, blank eyes staring at her, empty and implacable, as the cold went into her bones.

Not a woman. Not telepathy. A ghost.

“Oh, my God,” Andie whispered, staring at the thing, and Alice sighed in her bed, fast asleep, unaware that the temperature in the room had dropped by thirty degrees.

Alice. I have to get Alice out of here.

She stepped into the room and the ghost wafted toward her, sepia toned and translucent, like old tea. “I have to take Alice,” she whispered to the thing, trying to keep from screaming. “It’s too cold in here for her. She’ll get sick.”

The thing grew darker, the form stronger, and then Andie heard a whisper from behind her.

I wouldn’t do that.

She turned around and saw Aunt May in the little hallway, swishing her long skirt that became translucent as it moved.

She’ll kill you as soon as look at you, May said. She killed me.

Eight

Andie could see the stone floor flickering through May’s skirt as she swished it, and the old vertigo came back with a new surge of terror that this was real, that she wasn’t hallucinating, that there were ghosts and one of them was talking to her right now and the other was at the foot of Alice’s bed, that Alice was there, she had to get Alice out of there-

If I were you, May said, I’d call North. He ought to be here. He ought to help.

“May,” Andie said, making one last grab for sanity. “You’re a dream.”

No, May said, flipping her skirt again, like a teenager trying to be cool. That was really me, talking to you. I wanted to see if you were a keeper.

“A keeper,” Andie said, her heart pounding as she looked back at the thing at the foot of the bed, terrible in its immobility, more terrible when it moved. Gotta get Alice out of here, gotta find out if I’m losing my mind, gotta talk to Dennis, gotta get Alice out of here-

The other nannies were boring, May said. You’re different. And you’re married to North Archer.

Andie kept her eye on the thing. “Listen, if it’s all right with you, I’ll just move Alice into my bedroom-”

My bedroom. That’s my bedroom. You’re just sleeping there.

“The nursery,” Andie said. The thing at the foot of Alice’s bed drifted a little as she watched it, like a sheer drapery caught by a draft, but mostly it just stood and stared at Alice. “We’ll both sleep in the nursery and you can have your bedroom back-”

She won’t let you take Alice. May left the doorway and came closer, and Andie backed up a step as more cold hit her. That wack job’ll kill you dead if you try to move Alice. I tried to get the kids out of here, I knew they’d have a better life in Columbus if we went to live with North Archer, and that bitch put me over the gallery railing. Alice saw her do it. You’d think she’d have thought of Alice, wouldn’t you? What kind of thing is that for a kid to see, her aunt murdered? But no, she put me over right in front of her. May swished her skirt again. Of course, she has no brain, so thinking was probably not part of the picture.

“Jesus,” Andie said, looking at the thing at the foot of Alice’s bed with even more horror than before. “Does Alice know she’s there? Can Alice see her?”

Of course. She’s always been there for Alice.

Andie thought of the little girl, living with that horror her entire life. “Oh, God.”

That’s nothing. You know why Carter’s sleeping in that room at the front of the house? Crumb thinks he killed me and he might do her next, so she keeps him as far away from her as possible, locks her door at night, and drinks herself unconscious. She dragged my body out to the moat so he wouldn’t be suspected because she doesn’t want anybody shutting this house down, but she won’t talk to him because she thinks he did me in. And he thinks Alice did it because I’d kind of yelled at her right before that. You know Alice, she has a temper.

Andie tore her eyes from the thing to face May. “You didn’t tell Mrs. Crumb the truth? You didn’t tell Carter?”

She doesn’t trust me, May said, her beautiful lips curving in a beautiful dead smile. She doesn’t like me.

Andie swallowed, trying to process it all. She was having another conversation with a ghost. With May, who was practically a pal at this point, especially in comparison with the horror at the foot of Alice’s bed. “The… thing at the foot of the bed. The one who watches Alice. What… who is that?”

An old governess, May said, drifting up to stand beside Andie, bringing icy cold with her. Alice calls her “Miss J.” There’s not much left of her. It’s been over two hundred years. The humanity kind of evaporates after a while and all that’s left is the need, the thing they didn’t get while they were alive. For her, it’s Alice. All she wants it Alice. Try to take Alice from her, hurt Alice, and she’ll get rid of you, but she won’t talk. She doesn’t have anything to say. She’s just… a need. A thing. A thing that holds on to Alice.

“She won’t hurt Alice,” Andie said, zeroing in on the important part.

Her whole existence is Alice. She’s still here because Alice is here. She loves her, as much as a thing like that can love.