“Everything,” Adam repeated.
“I just thought that maybe, with the three of you here together, you might think of something else,” Jeremy suggested, looking curiously around the shop. Porcelain fairies dangled from delicate wires, and velvet cloaks were displayed on mannequins that were more realistic than many of the wax characters Jeremy had seen in the museums earlier. One rack displayed small bottles of potions, while another featured colored stones, whose labels promised they would bring power and wealth and all kinds of other things, waiting to be packed into small velvet bags. There were wind chimes, kitchen witches, books and more. Celtic music played softly in the background. Several of the displays featured carefully arranged autumn leaves, the real thing, and the candles that burned throughout the store scented the air with the unmistakable fragrance of pumpkin pie. In a nod to the upcoming holiday, Pilgrims adorned the shelves, along with other timely objets d’art.
“Well, let’s see,” Eve said, and looked at Brad. “The two of you—you and your wife—came in, and you were looking at the lithographs over there, right?” She nodded in the direction of several framed pictures.
“Yes,” Brad said. “Mary especially liked the one of the woman sitting in the moonlight, playing the harp, because she said she has the grace of a dancer.”
“Yes, we talked about it, I remember,” Eve said.
“Then we started chatting about Sammhein—what you call Halloween,” Adam said, unwrapping a stick of gum and sticking it in his mouth.
Eve frowned slightly, as if she were remembering the day more clearly. “We talked about how commercial things have become, and what a rip-off some of the new horror houses are. What some of those places charge for a two-minute walk-through, a couple of cheap 3-D effects and a few people in bad masks is just outrageous.”
“And people line up to pay it,” Adam said, shaking his head in amazement.
“We talked about how we’d been through some of them already,” Brad said. “And then we talked about the museums we’d liked.”
“Then we talked about the House of the Seven Gables,” Eve said, “and you said you were going to do that another day, when you’d have more time. And then I read Mary’s palm and saw that she was going to be a success as a dancer. The second I touched her hand, I could feel how talented she was, how full of life—”
Eve broke off abruptly, looking stricken at her choice of words. Life. She had said life.
And for all they knew, Mary was dead.
“I think we suggested that they eat at Red’s,” Adam said awkwardly into the silence.
“Did you also suggest that they go anywhere else for a reading?” Jeremy asked.
Adam’s forehead furrowed in thought. “I think we talked about how there were plenty of readers at the psychic fair set up over on the mall.”
“And we said we were already going over there,” Brad said.
“Did either of you know the guy the police can’t find? Name of Damien? Didn’t have a permit…”
“I saw him outside his tent one time,” Eve said, then hesitated, looking troubled, before she went on. “He had a…smirk on his face. I didn’t like the look of him.”
“Can you describe him?” Jeremy asked.
“Tall,” Eve said. “Thin. And kind of exotic-looking, not just because he was wearing a turban, of all things. And I think he was wearing eye makeup, and maybe some kind of bronzer, too.”
“What I wish I understood was how he created the effects in that crystal ball of his,” Brad said. “He really freaked Mary out. We saw different things, which was weird. I saw the first Thanksgiving, and it seemed so real that I swear I could smell the turkey. And…then it got ugly, with people pulling out knives, like they were ready to kill someone. To tell you the truth, I thought it was scary, and I don’t scare easily. Jeremy, you know that.”
“Yes, I know,” Jeremy assured him.
“There was something really creepy about this guy, I’m telling you,” Brad insisted.
“Maybe that’s why he’s so hard to locate, because he’s avoiding the police,” Jeremy said, and looked back at the Llewellyns. “What time did you two leave the store? Do you stay open late on Halloween, till midnight or anything?”
“Of course not,” Eve said.
“Why not?” Jeremy asked. “I mean, wouldn’t you get tons of business?”
“We’re not entirely about money,” Eve said, indignant.
“I wasn’t suggesting that you were,” Jeremy said. “Everyone has to make a living.”
“We closed a little early that day, actually, because we were joining the rest of the wiccan community for the march to Gallows Hill. It’s a Sammhein tradition. I think we closed at about four, right, Adam?” she asked, turning toward her husband.
Jeremy thought there was some message in the way she was looking at Adam. Wouldn’t she have known when they closed without asking him?