I made my way out into the shop, turned the sign to ‘Open’ and brought the box of books I’d gotten from Barry to the counter so I could enter them in my computer program before I put them in their new temporary home on one of the bookshelves in the store.

Pandora slunk over and got busy sniffing and rubbing the side of her face on the box, stopping to stare up at me with round eyes every few seconds.

My mind wandered as I worked on the tedious data-entry.

“I wonder if Barry’s strange fainting spell has anything to do with Lavinia’s murder?” I asked out loud, squinting out into the store, hoping to see the swirly mist of Lavinia’s ghost. I had questions for her.

“Meow.” Pandora rubbed her cheek vigorously on the now empty box.

“You’re right, that’s too farfetched. There’s no way they could possibly be related.”

Pandora let out a low “mew” swatting in the air at something only visible to her.

“Right, I thought so. But what about Bing? Why was he driving down the road so fast?”

Pandora made a sneezing noise and shook her head.

I pictured Bing in his truck, so intent on driving that he didn’t even notice me coming the other way.

“He was driving away from Barry’s … or was he driving to some place?” I’d seen him driving on the road that went past the turnoff to Barry’s, but that didn’t mean he’d been at Barry’s. He could have been coming from further up the mountain. And where had he been driving to?

I finished cataloguing the books and hit the button to print the price tags for each book. The printer hummed to life, startling Pandora and causing her to jump sideways and hiss at it. I couldn’t help but laugh … that printer got her every time.

I grabbed the stickers and shoved them in my back pocket, then lifted a stack of half the books and headed out toward the row of bookcases where I kept the children’s books, Pandora trotting obediently at my heels.

“There’s still that strange secret at the church that Lavinia and Ophelia both seemed to share. Even though Ophelia has an alibi, I think that’s worth checking into.”

I hoped Lavinia would show up and clue me in herself, but ghosts hardly ever appeared when you wanted them to. They liked to show up when they were least expected and scare the bejesus out of you, instead.

I slapped the price tags on the children’s books and slid them into their slots, then headed to the section where I kept the classics.

“So, the only real clues I have are the black car Ophelia saw and the bronzes,” I said, still talking to Pandora, who I’d like to think was hanging onto my every word.