Ghostly Echoes (Jackaby #3)(5)

Across from him stood a man with white-blond hair. He wore a scowl and a three-piece suit, tailored impeccably to his slim figure. “They’re not going to be happy about this,” said the slender man.

“They’ll be a lot less happy if the whole thing blows up in their faces,” countered Howard Carson. The thin man grimaced as Carson rattled on about conductivity and tensile strength.

In a chair behind them sat a third man, heavyset with a chubby face and a mustache waxed into thick curls. He said nothing as he fidgeted an unlit cigar from one hand to the other, watching the men work. Beside him stood a prim woman with ink-black hair holding a clipboard and a pen. “Are you getting all of this down?” the big man asked quietly.

“Yes, Mr. Poplin, every word.” She remained expressionless, her pen scratching away.

“Good girl.”

“Don’t forget, boys,” came a soft voice from behind me. Before I could turn to see her face, a woman with brunette locks stepped through me toward the desk. I shuddered, or I would have if I had a body to shudder; I would never get used to the sensation of not physically existing. “The copper fittings in the prototype lost conductivity as they tarnished. Silver will cost more, but it will also increase the output over time.”

The thin man grimaced. “What do you know about it?” he said.

“She knows quite a lot, actually,” interjected Carson. “I told you already that my fiancée has been assisting me with my work. She’s as sharp as they come.”

Jenny Cavanaugh stepped behind the desk and turned to face the room. Had I been in possession of my own jaw at the time, it would have dropped. The Jenny I knew was a beautiful ghost—but the woman before me, with real weight to her steps and a flush in her cheeks, looked like another person entirely, so vibrant and alive. Her hair framed her face rather than hovering in weightless silver waves. She wore a honey yellow dress, practical and pretty, and around her neck hung a little pewter locket.

“She’s quite keen, you know,” Carson was saying. “And she’s right about the fittings.”

“Thank you, Howard.” Jenny Cavanaugh and Howard Carson looked at each other for only a moment, but their affection was obvious.

“We discussed this already,” said the blond man flatly. “We will move forward with copper.” I did not like him. It was more than his sanctimonious sneer. Something within Jenny disliked the man, so I disliked the man.

“If you insist,” Howard said, taking a deep breath. “Copper will do.”

Jenny was not satisfied. “It would save us all a great deal of time and effort if we knew the exact purpose of our efforts.”

The man glared at Jenny. “Our benefactors have provided us with very clear objectives.”

“Objectives are not an ultimate purpose. What exactly are your benefactors building?”

“Jenny—” Howard said.

“The future!” declared a new voice, and all eyes turned to the door. “We’re building the future, young lady. One shiny cog at a time.” The man who stood in the doorway was stout and unshaven. He had coal-black hair and wore a shabby black coat over a black waistcoat. His skin was deathly pale, save for a bluish shadow across his chin and under his eyes.

I knew that face. That was the face we had fruitlessly hunted across the countryside and back into the shadows of New Fiddleham. That was the last face our client poor Mrs. Beaumont had ever seen before she died. I watched as that face spread its pallid lips into a crooked grin. “Doesn’t that sound exciting?”





Chapter Three


“You knew him?” I gasped as the dark drawing room faded away and Jackaby’s office reappeared, the midday sun streaming in through the windows. I stood up abruptly from the leather armchair and immediately regretted my decision. My vision reeled and I sat back down.

Jenny—my Jenny—hung pale and translucent in the air ahead of me. She had been beaming, but the smile was rapidly melting away. “Knew whom?”

I breathed, holding on to the armrests to keep from falling out of the chair. Slowly the world stopped spinning and the feeling returned to my skin. “How did I get—Jenny, did you possess me all the way into the armchair?”

She nodded, but the pride had left her face. “I knew whom, Abigail?”

“That man. The one in the photograph.”

Rising more gradually this time, I stepped over to Jenny’s open file. My temples were throbbing and the room felt as though it were slowly spinning to a stop. Jenny stood beside me as I tried to pull my mind together. When the world was finally stable again, I looked up to find that she had already fixated on a picture. Her translucent hand brushed the image of her body, sprawled across her bedroom floor.

“Jenny . . .”

“Howard gave me that locket,” she said. “It’s not in the house any longer. I’ve looked and looked. It had a note inside. ‘From Howard with love.’ It’s just a little pewter thing, but it’s the little things you miss.”

“Jenny, stay with me,” I said cautiously. “Please? This is important.”

She pulled her eyes away from the picture. “I’m with you, Abigail.”

I plucked the photograph of the pale man off the top of the pile and held it up for her to see. It was grainy with a sepia tint, but the face was unmistakable. I had seen him watching my window from the street corner, and then again, lurking outside the train station. Now I had seen him up close through Jenny’s memories, and not a hair on his head had changed in those ten years.