Mawmaw’s grin falls. “I see you’ve got ahold of this idea like a six-toed cat with a field mouse.” She eyes me for a moment, then says, “It depends. Ghosts can be attached to anything. They haunt by attachment. So if they’re attached to a place, they haunt only that place. And if they’re attached to a thing—like an old piece of furniture, say, or a tarot deck—then they’ll haunt anywhere that thing goes. And if…” She suddenly gets a cold look and drops her eyes into her lap.

“If what?” I press her.

“Well, if they’re attached to a person, then they’ll haunt anywhere that person goes,” she says carefully.

I take a breath. The one thing all these strange apparitions have in common besides the deck, dream-bound or otherwise, is me.

Mawmaw aims her knife at me. “Anyone else see these strangers?”

“I don’t think so. I mean, sometimes they’re just in my dreams. But the ones on the street, everyone just kind of passes them by. Except Daniel did see the man at the café.”

She looks at Daniel. “How’d he seem to you?”

Daniel shrugs. “I don’t know. Pretty normal, I guess. I mean, he was dressed kinda weird.”

“Might be characters from your deck; might be masquerading as characters from your deck. Might be ghosts. Might be something else entirely.” Mawmaw Barb is pensive.

“Like what?” I ask her.

She gives a little shrug and sets her knife down. “There’s a lot more to the spirit world than just ghosts, honey. There’s haints. They’re the ghosts of those gone too soon who desire to cause harm to the living. And there’s the feu follet, a nature spirit that haunts the swamp and leads folks to a watery grave. And there’s more besides. Those things we have yet to name. But a spirit will usually let you know it’s a spirit, even if it appears as a full-body apparition.”

I stare over the beans at Mawmaw. “How?”

Her lips twitch on one side. “They may look human, but there will always be something out of place. Something that doesn’t make sense in our world.”

“Like how ghosts are usually all white or see-through? Or how they’re always wearing clothes from another time? Like that?” Daniel asks.

“Not always that obvious. You have to be a good observer. Sometimes it’s just a little detail. Maybe their eyes are a tad too big to be real. Or their fingers a touch too long. They might be missing something, like ears or—”

“Or their voice?” Or a couple of fingers?

Mawmaw looks at me hard. “Could be.”