“I can’t believe one little old lady lives there by herself,” Fina replies.

As we get closer, we see the house is surrounded by a foreboding iron fence. But the gates leading from the drive are open.

“Almost like she’s expecting company,” Fina says, staring at me with moon-wide eyes. “Just like you said.”

“I guess we should go knock,” I say. With every tiptoed step we take, my legs feel more unsteady. My palms are sweating inside my gloves. But I make myself keep going. I have to know why Madeline’s been writing to me. To know what she does about Gram.

Holding hands and breathing nervous puffs of frost into the night, we make our way onto the porch. Boomer’s tail starts going nuts when we step up to the door.

“Together,” Fina whispers, and each of us raises a hand and knocks gently.

My heart is beating so hard it actually hurts. I hold my breath, waiting for the door to creak open.

But it doesn’t.

“Madeline?” I call after a moment. “It’s Emma Talbot. I just want to talk about my gram.”

Nothing.

I knock again, more firmly this time. “Madeline?”

When there’s still no answer, I stand on my toes and look through the frosted windowpane in the door—the only window in the whole house that doesn’t have blinds over it.

And what I see sends a bolt of fear through me.

“Fina,” I say, “look. On the floor.”

She stands on tiptoe next to me, drawing in a sharp gasp as she takes in the trail of red leading up to the door. “Oh, my god,” she whispers. “That looks like . . . blood.”

I try the handle, but it’s locked. “Come on,” I say, taking Fina’s hand and leading her off the porch. “There’s got to be another way in.”

43

We stumble around the side of the house. But when we reach the back, we find that the yard is enclosed within a brick wall. I assume it’s brick, anyway. It’s hard to see with all the ivy growing over it.

“Look!” Fina says. “There’s a door!”

I squint through the dim light to see she’s right. You can just see a little iron ring that must be a handle. We both grab it at the same time and pull, then push. The door stays firmly shut.

Fina turns in a circle and points at an oak tree behind us. “I bet you I can climb that,” she says. “And see that branch? It goes right over the wall. I can probably get across it and jump down.”

“Are you sure?” I ask. “Maybe we should call the police.”