The Prophet

Chapter Twelve

Needless to say, I slept very little that night. Long after the frost on the windows melted, I’d remained in my office reeling from this new development. Never had I felt threatened by a ghost in my home. Never had the boundaries of my sanctuary been breached by any entity, and yet, somehow Shani had traced a heart on my bathroom mirror.

Why on the mirror and not on the window? Did she want me to know that she had found a way into my haven? Was she making sure that I couldn’t ignore her?

And what of that other presence?

I really, really wanted to believe the face I’d glimpsed outside my window had been nothing more than a manifestation of my fear or a wine-induced hallucination. I hadn’t been sleeping or eating properly, and by Fremont’s own admission, he’d been haunting me. Plus, after my trip to see Devlin, I’d hardly been in the most stable frame of mind, so it wasn’t hard to conclude that in such a state, my imagination could have played tricks.

But on Angus, too?

I kept a tense vigil in my office until well after midnight. Exhaustion finally drove me to bed where I tossed and turned for hours.

Despite a restless night, I arose the next morning at my usual time even though I had no particular place to be. I didn’t have a restoration scheduled until the following month and, other than a few headstone repairs, nothing much else on the books. But between my savings and the ad revenue generated from Digging Graves, I was certain I could manage for a while.

Actually, I could do more than manage. An unexpected legacy had provided me with a generous nest egg, but that money was safely tucked away until I could decide how and when I wanted to use it. Considering the circumstances of my birth, I’d wanted no part of any inheritance from my blood family, the Ashers, but then I reminded myself that my mother’s illness had likely depleted her and Papa’s savings. If I could help them out financially, perhaps everything I’d been through in Asher Falls would be worth it.

Dressing for my morning walk, I donned a track jacket over a UNC T-shirt and then let Angus out into the backyard. The horizon glowed as I headed down Rutledge toward the harbor. I performed a few warm-ups and then picked up the pace. The morning was crisp and clear, and the jacket felt good all the way to Broad Street before I finally had to shed it.

Tying it around my waist, I turned left on Meeting Street, striding past the parade of historic churches and grand old homes with barely a glance. Another left and I found myself on Tradd, the most scenic of all avenues in a city known for its beautiful boulevards and thoroughfares. It was the only street in Charleston where one could glimpse the Ashley and Cooper Rivers at the same time, but this morning, I looked neither right nor left as I made my way to East Bay Street, where the colorful row homes and stately mansions were still bathed in misty gray.

I passed only a few early birds on the Battery. Migrating to my favorite spot, I stood facing the harbor as the sun broke the horizon and the sea burst into flames. It was a sight I never tired of.

Against the background of tiny Fort Sumter, a formation of pelicans glided low across the water, searching for the telltale shimmer of silver beneath the surface. It was very quiet where I stood. I could hear the gulls out in the harbor and the murmur of voices from the tourists that had risen early to watch the sunrise, but the sounds were muted and easy enough to tune out.

Someone appeared beside me at the railing. My gaze was still glued to the light show over the water, but I knew who he was. I slanted a glance at Fremont’s ghost. Right here on the Battery was where I’d first seen him months ago. Only then, I’d still thought he was a flesh-and-blood man. Perhaps even a murderer.

“You don’t look so good,” he commented.

“I just walked all the way from my house. I’m a bit winded.”

“No, that’s not it. You look ill. What’s wrong with you?”

I cut him a glance. “Oh, I don’t know. Could it be that you’re haunting me?” I asked with more than a shade of sarcasm.

I couldn’t see his eyes behind the dark lenses, but I felt the frost from his gaze. The sensation was eerie and unsettling. “I’m not doing that to you.”

“Really? Because as I recall, you admitted to draining my energy so that you could sustain your presence in the living world. That’s what you said, isn’t it?”

“That was then. I needed a way to get your attention. I had to make sure you would agree to help me. But now that we’ve come to an arrangement, I’ve backed off.”

I merely lifted a brow.

“I’ve purposely kept my distance so that you could build your strength back up.” He paused, and I felt that icy stare yet again. “You’ll need every ounce of it.”

“Is that a prediction?”

“You can take it as such.”

Ignoring his ominous tone, I leaned against the railing. “If you’re not draining me, then who is? Or should I say what?”

“Another ghost would be my guess.”

Another ghost. I didn’t know why, but it struck me as significant that, despite his humanlike appearance, he thought of himself as a ghost. He was under no delusions of remaining in the living world. Far from it. He just wanted to solve his murder and move on.

I tucked a strand of hair behind one ear. “You don’t look like any of the other ghosts I see. You have no aura, no transparency. How do you manifest after dawn and before twilight? Don’t you have to wait for the veil to thin? How are you here now, when the sun is coming up?”

“It takes a lot of energy and concentration.”

“If you’re not draining me, where do you get your energy?”

“Why does it matter?” he asked tersely. “It has nothing to do with you.”

“Everything about our arrangement concerns me. You came to me, remember? And for all I know, you brought something with you that is draining me.” I thought of that lurking shadow outside my window and shivered. “I know you’re probably tired of answering all my questions, but this is important. My house is built on hallowed ground and yet you were sitting on my front porch. You were able to breach my sanctuary and now something else has, too.”

“I told you it wasn’t me.”

“I know that’s what you said, but assuming you wanted to, could you manifest inside my house?”

“No, not inside.”

I paused in relief. Then glanced at him doubtfully. “Is that the truth or are you just telling me what I want to hear?”

“The real truth? I’ve never tried.”

“Why not?”

“Because, believe it or not, I’m not looking to inconvenience you any more than I have to.”

Inconvenience me? That was certainly an interesting way of putting it.

“I appreciate your consideration,” I said. “But unfortunately, my sanctuary has been violated. A heart was traced in the frost on my bathroom mirror. I don’t see how it could have been done unless a ghost entered my home.”

“Psychokinesis,” he said.

“You can do that?”

“On occasion. If you’re worried about a visitation, try burning some sage in the house. You can use the ashes to smudge the mirrors and windows.”

“That actually works? Sage will repel you?”

I saw a thin smile. “Me? No. But it might discourage a lesser manifestation.”

“Like a ghost child?”

He shrugged.

“If you’re not draining me, then it must be Shani,” I mused.

His voice sharpened. “Shani?”

“John Devlin’s daughter. She seems to have latched onto me.”

“She drowned,” he said.

I whirled in surprise. “Have you seen her?” A woman walking by on the Battery slanted me a curious glance, and I turned back to the harbor, lowering my voice. “You’ve seen Shani Devlin?”

“I told you I keep my distance from the other ghosts.”

“Then how do you know about the drowning?”

“Someone must have told me.”

I was silent for a moment. “You say you have no recollection of the shooting or of the time preceding it. You don’t even know why you were in the cemetery or the identity of the woman you met sometime earlier, the one whose perfume you still wear. Yet you know about a death that occurred just hours before yours. The accident happened at around twilight. The car Shani was riding in went through a guardrail into a river, and she and her mother were trapped inside. You were shot sometime between two and four in the morning. In the hours in between, you somehow learned about Shani’s death. This could be important because it would help establish a timeline. Did someone call to tell you about the accident?”

“I remember nothing,” he said.

“Not true. You remembered she drowned. That must mean something.”

“I was a cop, remember? It wasn’t unusual to hear about accidents, especially one involving another detective’s kid.”

A man sidled up to the railing to admire the bloodred sunrise. “Beautiful, isn’t it?”

“Yes, lovely,” I murmured.

“I’ve watched sunrises all over the world,” he said. “Nothing beats the one over Charleston Harbor.”

I smiled noncommittally as I watched one of the pelicans break formation and dive, emerging from the sea a moment later with a flash of quicksilver in its beak.

“Have a nice day,” the stranger murmured and sauntered away.

I glanced over to make certain Fremont was still beside me. He was.

“Something about that girl’s death,” he muttered.

“What?” I asked anxiously.

“I don’t know. Tell me more about her ghost. You say she’s latched onto you?”

“Like you, she can’t move on. She wants my help, but I’m not sure what it is I’m supposed to do.”

He said, very softly, “You still don’t know who you are, do you? You still don’t understand why we come to you.”

His ghostly voice swept over me. “You come because I can see you.” And because I broke Papa’s rules.

He nodded vaguely as he turned back to the harbor. “Why can’t the child move on?”

I took a deep breath, trying to quell a rising foreboding. “I can’t say for sure. She was only four years old when she died. She doesn’t converse with me the way you do, but she can communicate.”

“You mean the heart?”

“And sometimes I hear her in my head. I think she can’t move on because her father won’t let her go.”

“That makes sense. I saw them together a few times. They were very close.”

“Her mother was trapped in the car, too, but I doubt she’s ready to move on. She has John right where she wants him.”

“That sounds like Mariama,” he said, his gaze still on the horizon.

The sound of her name startled me, and I turned to stare at his profile. “You knew her?”

“We grew up together,” he said, in that strangely hollow voice.

“Were you friends?”

“Friends? Hardly… .”

“Lovers?”

“Every man who crossed Mariama’s path loved her.”

“Including you?”

“For a time. Then I moved to Charleston and discovered that the world didn’t revolve around Mariama Goodwine.”

“How did she take that revelation?”

“Not well.”

“Are you the reason she came to Charleston?”

“She came because she saw an opportunity and seized it. A man named Rupert Shaw offered to finance her education.”

“I know Dr. Shaw. He’s a friend of mine.” Fremont paused and I could feel a facture in the air as if something unseen had moved between us. “He used to spend a lot of time in Beaufort County.”

“Doing what?”

“Research,” he said. “He was particularly interested in Essie Goodwine, Mariama’s grandmother. She was the most prominent root doctor in the area. He wanted to learn about medicinal conjure, but knowing Essie, she only taught him a few harmless incantations and spells. She wouldn’t cotton to anyone’s use of the root for evil.”

“Evil? I hardly think that criteria would apply to Dr. Shaw,” I said, remembering my own visit with Essie Goodwine. She’d given me a packet of Life Everlastin’ and an amulet to ward off evil spirits.

She’d also told me there would come a time when I would need to tell Devlin about Shani’s ghost because he would have to choose between the living and the dead. I couldn’t imagine revealing such a thing to him back then, but last night I had come very close.

He knows, Essie had said, touching her heart. In heh, he knows.

He probably did know on some level. The draft, the cold spots…the inexplicable sounds in the middle of the night. The spiny hair at his nape, the icy shiver along his spine…

I forced my attention back to the ghost at hand.

Robert Fremont gazed down at me so intently, I wondered for a moment if he could read my thoughts. He had the power to pass himself off as human. What else could he do?

“Do you know anything about rootwork?” he asked.

“I only know what I’ve read here and there. You don’t grow up in South Carolina without some knowledge, no matter how rudimentary. It originated in West Africa, didn’t it?” Which naturally made me think of Darius Goodwine.

“Devotees believe that all things have spiritual essence, a soul even. A knowledgeable root doctor can tap into that universal power through the spirit world and use it for good or ill. Mariama was raised to respect the root. She was meant to follow in Essie’s footsteps. I think that’s why Shaw really brought her to Charleston.”

“So that he could use her to tap into the spirit world? I suppose that makes sense. He’s always had a keen interest in the afterlife, but not for personal gain or power. His wife was ill for a long time before she died. He tried to make contact through séances, but according to Devlin, Mariama wanted no part of it. She was afraid of what Dr. Shaw was trying to do.”

“She had a healthy fear of the dead as anyone with her knowledge would.”

“Because a person’s power isn’t diminished by death?”

“Because she knew you can’t always control what you bring back,” he muttered.

A chill wind feathered up my spine. “Did you see a lot of Mariama after she moved here?”

“Some, but she wasn’t in town long before she met someone new.”

“John?”

“He was taboo and that made him all the more irresistible to her.”

“Why was he taboo?”

“Old resentments run deep in these parts. Distrust of the white man is still alive and well, and a union with John Devlin was considered a betrayal by some. He wasn’t just white, he was rich. Old-money, Charleston rich.”

“So, Mariama’s family didn’t approve of the relationship?”

“It was deeper than disapproval. And much more complicated.”

I was very curious about Devlin and Mariama’s relationship, but reluctantly I moved on to a new subject. “She lived with Dr. Shaw when she first came to Charleston, didn’t she? Did you know Ethan Shaw?”

“Well enough to realize that he was in love with Mariama, too.”

My brows shot up in shock. “Ethan?”

“It’s like I said—”

“Every man who crossed paths with Mariama loved her.” But Ethan? “Did Devlin know?”

“He may have, but most men had blinders on when it came to Mariama.”

“Do you think anything went on between them?”

His gaze was scornful. “She wouldn’t have given someone like Shaw the time of day. But she wasn’t above using him if the need arose.”

“Using him how?”

He took a moment to answer. “Mariama had an unnatural power over the living. Whatever she wanted…whatever she needed…she could always find someone willing to do her bidding.”

That didn’t exactly answer my questions, but I suddenly remembered something Devlin had said to Ethan the night before. You told the police you were with me the whole night. You didn’t just give me an alibi. You gave yourself one, too.

He couldn’t have been doing Mariama’s bidding that night, though, because she was already dead.

“What’s wrong?” Fremont asked.

“I’m just wondering why so many smart men fell in love with her. I understand she was beautiful and charismatic, but from everything I’ve heard, she was also selfish and cruel.”

“She wasn’t always like that. She was wild and impulsive and more than a little dangerous. But not cruel. Not until Darius changed her.”

I marveled that, even dead, he was still quick to defend her. “Darius Goodwine? What was their relationship?”

“First cousins, but they were raised as siblings.”

“How did he change her?”

“He knew how to use her Achilles’ heel against her.”

“What do you mean?”

“John Devlin was her weakness. There was a part of him that Mariama couldn’t touch, couldn’t own. His resistance drove her mad. She would have done anything to weaken him. So Darius exploited her vulnerability.”

“How?”

“He persuaded her to run off to Africa with the child. It took Devlin weeks to find them. He brought Shani back home, but Mariama stayed on with Darius. By the time she finally returned, Darius had made the transformation.”

“What kind of transformation?”

“From shaman to tagati.”

“What’s a tagati?”

“The closest translation would be sorcerer. Or witch. Someone who uses medicinal conjure for evil purposes.”

Medicinal conjure as in gray dust? I wondered.

“The most powerful thakathi are female and Darius convinced Mariama that with his knowledge and her power, they could be an invincible force. He followed her back to Charleston and his influence had a profoundly negative effect on her.”

“Because she started to believe him?”

“Because she knew it was true. It’s not easy for an outsider to grasp, but in our community, the concept of magic is as accepted as the concept of God. There is an old saying that we practice one religion openly on Sundays and another in secret every other day of the week.” He’d been gazing out over the water, but now he turned to stare at me. “A lot of people don’t believe in ghosts, but that makes me no less real to you.”

I could hardly argue with that logic. “You say Darius followed her back to Charleston. Is that when he brought in gray dust?”

Fremont said in a hushed voice, “What do you know about gray dust?”

“It’s a hallucinogenic powder that stops the heart.”

He glanced around as if afraid someone might eavesdrop. Which, when I thought about it, was pretty strange. The only one who could be overheard was me, and people would likely take me for a nutcase and keep their distance.

“Who have you been talking to?” he demanded.

“No one. I’ve just been doing some research. That is what you expected of me, isn’t it? That I should be more resourceful?” I didn’t give him a chance to reply. “If you were investigating Darius at the time of your death, then he’s our most likely suspect.”

“I wasn’t just investigating him,” Fremont said. “I was trying to stop him.”

“From drug smuggling?”

He paused. “Yes.”

Something in his voice drew another shiver. “Were you working with Devlin?”

He murmured something so low I couldn’t make it out. I had the troubling notion it was a chant or incantation.

“What are you doing?”

He didn’t answer.

“Why is everyone afraid of Darius Goodwine?” I demanded. “He can’t possibly be a threat to you now.”

The ghost didn’t reply. He was already starting to fade and in another moment, he was gone. I stood at the railing alone and trembling as a cold gust cut through me. My foreboding grew with the wind. The harbor sparkled with sunlight but somewhere in the distance, darkness gathered.