Callie rolled her eyes.
“Ann’s actually nice,” Towner said, and Callie could tell she meant it. “She’s just got enlightened attitudes about sex. Free love and all that. Comes from her neohippie days. I have to say the men in this town seem to enjoy her.”
“Apparently.”
Towner laughed. “She’s really okay. She’s helped Rafferty with a number of criminal cases.”
“How?”
“She’s very intuitive. Psychic. She reads lace, which is why I gave her most of Eva’s pieces. She even reads for me at the tearoom sometimes.”
“What do you mean, she ‘reads lace’?”
“It’s kind of like reading a crystal ball, but she uses lace. She gazes into the patterns, and she can see visions. My grandmother Eva used to do it. Ann reads the lace, then tells Rafferty what she sees. Sometimes it helps him figure things out, sometimes not.”
“Do you read lace, too? At the tearoom?”
“No,” Towner said. “Not anymore. Though I do sometimes have visions.”
“Visions. Really?”
“Oh, don’t act like you don’t know what I’m talking about.”
Callie stared at her.
“Salem is full of people who have ‘gifts.’ Who seem to know things they shouldn’t or things that haven’t happened yet. You’re obviously one of us.”
“Us?” Callie wasn’t sure how she felt about being outed. “You sound like Rose.”
“Takes one to know one. I fought my visions for years.” Towner pushed a hairpin into place. “So much so that I almost made them disappear. Now they’re more like glimpses. Ann has taken the opposite approach, honing her skills. She’s what they call a seer.”
“And a witch.”
“That, too.”
And a drug dealer.
“Medicinal use only,” Towner said. “Until the dispensaries finally open up.”
“Wow,” Callie said. “That was impressive.”
Towner smiled. “A bit of proof for the skeptic.”
Callie thought about it. “So you read minds?” She’d seen Ann do the same thing this afternoon. It was disconcerting.
“It comes and goes. Some people are easier to read than others. Ann’s great at it. She’s also renowned as an herbalist. She’s developed treatments for mercury and lead poisoning, chelation agents that work with fewer side effects. She’s a powerful force in these parts.”
“I’d say so,” Callie said, thinking about Paul.
“Towner? You up here?” they heard Rafferty call from the next room. Towner walked over and opened the door that connected them. “Wait for us here if you like,” she said to Callie. “John only takes a few minutes to get ready, and I know you don’t want to go back down there by yourself.”
“The wine cellar was once a speakeasy,” Finn was telling a group of guests who were waiting to go down in the elevator. He was about to start his third tour of the day, leading guests behind the paneled bar and down the elevator into the cellar. Callie had gotten separated from Towner and Rafferty moments after returning to the library; now she was on her third Old-Fashioned. She should have said no to this last one, but Finn kept handing them to her, not asking if she wanted another. She’d have to stop letting him catch her eye. The way he kept staring at her, she was wondering if he was flirting. She glanced over at Paul, who was engrossed in conversation with a group of wealthy-looking older women.
The truth was, Callie was having trouble with all this ostentation. The Whiting Foundation might fund everything from schools to soup kitchens, but the way the Whitings lived didn’t seem right. Conspicuous consumption was a phrase the nuns used when they disapproved of people who hadn’t taken the same vows of poverty they had. Conspicuous consumption certainly seemed the name of the game in the Whiting mansion. Callie realized she was scowling.
“A bit much?” Rafferty asked, joining her. She noticed he wasn’t drinking. Just a club soda with lime.
She should have followed his lead. “A tad.”
“Wait until you see their artwork in the dining room. A collection of Dutch Old Masters. I’m told it’s about to make the rounds of European museums.”
“It all seems slightly obscene,” she murmured, staring directly at the woman who’d come in wearing the full-length mink.
“Would you like to see the speakeasy, Callie?” Finn asked, his fingers searching for the hidden elevator call button.
Rafferty had been observing Finn earlier, the way he kept gazing at his own reflection in the wall mirror. Classic narcissist, Rafferty thought, though he had to admit that most people found Finn Whiting charming. What wasn’t charming was the way he also seemed to be gazing at Callie in that same mirror. “I’d like to see it,” Rafferty answered, breaking the long silence that followed Finn’s invitation.
Paul swooped in, taking Callie’s arm. “Come take a walk with me,” he said, directing her toward the door. “I haven’t had a chance to show you the grounds.”
They left the library together and headed across the hall, cutting through the kitchen and into the butler’s pantry. “First rule,” Paul said, taking her half-empty drink. “Never try to keep up with my father. The man’s got an iron liver, and he’s just getting started.”
She blushed. “Thanks for the warning.”
He emptied her drink down the copper sink. Then he poured two mugs of coffee. “Cream? Sugar?”
“Black is good,” she said.
He gave her a mug and then led her outside through the pantry door, holding it open for her. It was a warm day for November, but it was still chilly outside. He took off his jacket and held it out to her. “Unless you want me to go back for the mink? We could find some red paint to splash on it in the barn.”
So he had overheard her. “I shouldn’t drink.”
“Everyone should drink,” he said. “Though probably not the way my father does. If it weren’t for alcohol, none of this would exist.” He looked around. “Which I’m sure would devastate you.”
“You make me sound like a horribly judgmental person,” she said.
“Do I?” His words feigned innocence, but his look was playful.
They walked up the gravel driveway. She could smell the woodsmoke from the chimneys. As they approached the stables, some dogs ran out to greet them. Hunting dogs that looked as if they’d just emerged from the Currier & Ives print she’d seen in the library.
“Be careful of Jasper there, he’ll steal that right out of your hand. He has quite a coffee habit.”
Callie held her cup high and laughed as the dog jumped for it.
“Leave it, Jasper,” Paul said, and the dog reluctantly stopped and fell into step behind them, with a look that was at once disappointed and ashamed.
Callie noted the dog’s expression and spoke for him in a sad and goofy drawl, propelling her voice until it seemed as if Jasper were saying, “I don’t have a problem. I can quit anytime I want.”
“Ventriloquism?” Paul looked amused.
“One of my many talents.”