“She was agoraphobic?” Alix asked.
Dilys leaned forward as though in conspiracy. “My grandmother used to say that Addy had a ghost lover.”
“Anyone want more slaw?” Jared asked. “There’s plenty left.”
Both women ignored him.
“It had to have been Captain Caleb,” Alix said. “My memory is that Aunt Addy—as she told me to call her—and I used to lie in her bed and look at his portrait and she’d tell me mermaid stories. I thought it was all madly romantic.”
“You remember that?” Dilys asked. “But you were only four.”
“She knows where everything in the house is,” Jared said.
Dilys smiled. “That’s because she used to search through the drawers and cabinets to find things to use for her buildings. If you hadn’t given her those Legos she m
ight have started pulling the bricks out of the walls.”
Alix looked at Jared in question, then memory lit her face. “You’re the tall boy who smelled like the sea.”
Dilys laughed. “That’s Jared. He always smelled like fish and sawdust. I don’t think he took a bath until he was sixteen and started liking girls.”
Alix was still staring at him. “You showed me how to use the blocks, and we sat on the floor and built … What was it?”
“It was a crude replica of this house. My mother kept saying it needed work and I was thinking about how a room could be added.” Later, he’d sketched his ideas; Ken had seen them, and had used Jared’s drawings for the remodel. That Jared couldn’t now tell Alix that she, as a four-year-old builder, had inspired him in the beginning of his career greatly annoyed him.
Alix was trying to take all of it in. She had been given Lego building lessons by a boy who would grow up to be one of the world’s greatest architects. Her face must have told what she was thinking because Jared looked away. She could see that he was frowning. He certainly didn’t want to be seen as a celebrity!
Alix didn’t want to say anything that would deepen that frown. She looked back at Dilys. “So Captain Caleb was Aunt Addy’s ghost lover?”
Dilys nodded. “That’s what my grandmother said. My mother told her she was being ridiculous, but truth or not, I loved the stories. And so did Lexie.”
“Lexie? I’ve heard of her but not met her.”
“Lexie and her mother moved in with me after Lex’s father died. When Jared left for college, he very kindly let us move into this house.” For a moment she looked at Jared with such love and gratitude that it was almost embarrassing.
Hiding his face so they couldn’t see his expression, Jared stood up and started collecting dirty dishes. Alix moved to help, but Dilys’s look said that Jared would do it.
“How do you have an affair with a ghost?” Alix asked. “I mean, wouldn’t there be some physical limitations?”
“I’ve always wondered about that too,” Dilys said. “In fact …” After a glance at Jared, who had his back to them, she leaned toward Alix. “I asked my grandmother that very thing.”
“And what did she say?”
“That one time Addy said she loved the man so much that she kept him a prisoner.”
Alix leaned back in her chair. “What an odd thing to say. I wonder how she could have done that.”
“Actually, I asked her that once and she said that she didn’t do any searching for the key that would unlock his cell door.”
“That sounds cryptic. What do you think she meant by—” Alix began but Jared cut her off.
“Do you two think you could stop gossiping for a while?” he asked. “I have an appointment at three.”
“The Kingsley men do not believe in ghosts,” Dilys said. “They pride themselves on being sane and sensible, and ghosts don’t fit into that image. So, dear,” Dilys said, “if you see a ghost in Kingsley House you will have to be the one to tell me all about it.”
“Dilys,” Alix said slowly, “if I see Captain Caleb, ghost or not, I’m keeping him for myself.”
The two women laughed so hard that Jared went back into the kitchen.