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"I did not do that!" Bartholomehispered

She shook her head impatiently and stepped in

The once beautiful hardwood floors did need work, she noticed Workh the years, and their boots had done soate area still boasted an old-fashioned cash register, but the any desk, where an attendant sold tickets, was beautiful It had been bought from an auctioneer and had once been the captain’s desk in an old sailing ship The swivel chair behind it was equally old, handso; she had walked through with Liaht that she had seen froht of the foyer’s chandelier, and it cast a gentle glow over the place

Katie opened her mouth, about to call out, but she didn’t She chose not to twist the turnstile-the noise here would be like an explosion She sat atop the old s around, then stepped to the other side

Looking up was eerie Figures of Papa He down the stairway They had always been a big hit at the h the place having their pictures taken with the pair

"Don’t you dare go up those stairs," Bartholo at hihost can’t be scared My God, Bartholomew You were a pirate"

"Privateer My boat was authorized by the government," Bartholomew corrected irritably "And don’t be ridiculous, I’htened for you, foolish girl What is the ht you better Innocent young ladies do not wander into dark alleys"

"This isn’t a dark alley"

"No, it’s worse You can get trapped in here"

"I’ upstairs," she assured hi in the wrong historical order She wasn’t going up the stairs; she just wanted to see as going on

"Katie," Bartholo her

She turned and stared at hihosts?"

"Ghosts will seldo people, bad people, criminals, rapists, murderers and thieves-they will hurt you," Bartholomew said sternly

"Just one more minute… We’ll check out the downstairs, and I’ll call the cops Or Liaht? I just don’t want to cry wolf"

"What?"

"I don’t want to create an alarm when there’s no need Maybe Liaht on"

"And the door open?" Bartholoed

She walked to the left, where the tour began once visitors reached the first floor The first room offered one of Key West’s most draene Otto had been given a very creepy doll, supposedly cursed by an angry faene Otto beca it Robert, after himself Robert the Doll moved about the house and played pranks In later years he drove the real Robert’s wife quite crazy

From the sorimly real with a memorial to the sailors who had died aboard the battleship Maine when it had exploded in Havana Harbor in 1898 Theon the ship Froued into an area where dancers moved about at the Silver Slipper World War I ca alcohol made its way in an easy flow froh the pantry in back led around to the other side of the house It was dark, with little light froway made another appearance as 1931 rolled in and Pauline’s uncle bought the present

Katie knehat she was co up to-the exhibit on Count von Cosel and Elena de Hoyos Just a sh an archway It had always been a popular exhibit Until, of course, the re-created figure of poor Elena had been replaced by the strangled body of a young Conch wo of the end

People liked the bizarre, the roedy of history, but with this event fear had suddenly co to be eccentric in the Keys

Real violence was not welcoht, so ot sohis entire bar across the street in the ry over a hike in his rent Tennessee Willia the words of his play A Streetcar Named Desire Another war, soldiers and sailors, the roadblocks that caused Key West to secede and become, if only for hours, the Conch Republic

The rest of history paled beside the story of von Cosel and Elena So it had always been

Morbid curiosity Had he really slept with the corpse? Ooh, Lord, disgusting! How?

Katie knew the story, of course She’d heard it all her life She’d retold it at college a dozen ti the truth of it until they looked it up on the Internet It was tragic, it was sad, it was sick, but it always drew people