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Sean slides to a rest against the buffet.
“Hey, Marion,” he says, voice very carefully nonchalant.
And he must succeed because Marion doesn’t bother looking up from his game with Jean, instead carefully considers the additional card she’s just laid down on the table between them.
“Yeah, Sean?”
“Got a question for you.”
“About what?”
“This house,” he says, eyes drifting around the room.
Considering for the first time, really, the ornate carved detailing of the shelving, the dark wooden panels that run up the length of the wall. What kind of people might have been here before them, what might have caused the place to become vacant so that it could became their Chapter House.
“Oh? What about it?”
Sean turns around and leans back, resting his weight on his elbows. “It’s real old, right? Like, it had a history before you got it.”
Marion lays a two down on a three to build fives before looking up.
“Yeah?” His smile is warm and fond. “That’s part of what I liked about it.”
“Lots of character and stuff, sure.” Sean runs his fingers along the underside of the wooden counter, feels where his nails catch in the soft gaps of the wood grain. “Now, in all that history of the place, do you know if there was anything weird about it?”
Marion blinks, then fully turns in his chair to peer up at him. “Weird how?”
Behind him, Jean picks up a pair of Jacks and patiently waits for the game to resume.
“Like…” Sean tries to phrase this question in a more roundabout way but can’t quite figure out a way to do it. He’s never been much for beating around the bush, anyway, though, so with a shrug, he decides to come right out and ask. “Like, could the Chapter House be haunted, is what I’m asking.”
From the armchair in the corner, Nathaniel startles suddenly enough that the newspaper he’s been intently reading all afternoon goes flying out of his hands. He flounders after it as it flutters noisily to the floor.
“What do you mean,” he exclaims, finally reclaiming the front page spread at his feet. “Our Chapter House is haunted?”
The paper finally restored to its natural order, rumpled, but intact, on the side table, Nathaniel turns to Marion looking betrayed. “And you never said anything?”
Marion gapes at him in disbelief.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he tells him, tells them all. “I’ve never heard anything about it being haunted.”
“You sure?” Sean asks, watching him intently.
Jean sighs heavily, sets her cards down.
“You know, I’m pretty sure we’d have noticed by now if the Chapter House was haunted. If nothing else, we’ve had bleed detectors in here. Surely, one of them would have picked up on something like that.” She turns around to face them all one by one. “Or one of us would have, with all the time we spend here. It’s your turn, by the way, Marion.”
“Oh, right.”
“And I certainly haven’t seen anything unusual. Not that kind of unusual, anyway,” she amends with a smile.
Marion hums, although Sean can’t tell whether it’s at his cards or the conversation at hand. “I haven’t seen anything… odd that we haven’t brought here ourselves as part of Candela Obscura.” Marion says, then lays down a four on a four. “Eights.”
Jean grimaces as she picks her cards up again, clearly displeased that his move has disrupted her strategy.
Sean nods slowly, but doesn’t sound entirely convinced when he eventually says, “Sure, sure.”
The game continues, Jean and Marion both playing the remaining cards in their hand without picking anything up before dealing the next trick.
As they quietly dole out the cards, Nathaniel helps himself to some whiskey from the nearby liquor cabinet. The crystal decanter clinks loudly against the glass, and again as he replaces the stopper and sets it back on the shelf.
Instead of returning to his chair, or to his newspaper, Nathaniel joins Sean on the other side of the room.
A minute or two later, he finally asks, “Sean, if I may ask… why did you wonder whether the Chapter House might be… haunted?”
The question is casual, and does not sound overly worried, but his fingers are wrapped so tightly around his glass that the knuckles have gone white.
“Yeah,” Marion lays down a King and then straightens as something suddenly occurs to him. “Have you seen something, Sean? Or heard something?”
They’re all watching him now.
“Because, if you have, you should tell us,” Jean adds, earnestly. “I’d rather like to know if there truly is something haunting our Chapter House so that we can do something about it.”
“I dunno,” Sean shrugs awkwardly in the face of their undivided attention. “Probably not.”
“Probably not,” Nathaniel repeats slowly. “That’s not particularly comforting, Finnerty.”
Sean’s face screws up and he waves a hand in the air. “Look, Doc’s right. I mean, if something was actually haunting this place, I can’t imagine we wouldn’t actually know about it. You know, we probably wouldn’t even be able to just sit here in peace right now. You ever hear of phenomena that just hang out but don’t actually do monstrous stuff?”
Nathaniel’s eyes have started darting around the room as if expecting an attack from an unseen foe at any moment, while Jean frowns, and Marion simply looks thoughtful.
“Sean-”
Sean throws his hands up in surrender. “Look, I heard some noises the other night, alright? When I was staying late to work in the archives and there was no one else here. But nothing happened and everything seemed fine so, I don’t know, maybe it was just a squirrel or something.”
Nathaniel doubles over in relief, one hand against the cabinet while he clutches the last finger of whiskey to his chest. “Oh that would explain it!”
Sean frowns, turns to him. “LT?”
“Do you have something to add to this conversation, Mr. Trapp?”
He straightens immediately, a bright smile plastered on his face. “Ah, I may have also heard some odd noises in the house and-”
Marion puts a hand out. “I’m sorry, you’ve also heard something in the house? Where?” he demands. “When?”
Nathaniel’s mouth opens and closes a few times. “Just, you know, the other day,” he offers weakly.
“And neither of you thought to say anything before now?”
“Well, we’re telling you now, I guess,” Sean says, a strange sideways glance at his old Lieutenant.
“What if it was some kind of Bleed and you were here all alone?” Marion presses.
Nathaniel coughs. “Again, it was just a little noise and nothing seemed out of place. I’m sure it’s just as Finnerty says, just some little creature that’s come in from the gardens or something.”
“It could be, I suppose,” Marion mutters. “I thought we got the House pretty well sealed off before we started using it, though.”
“Eh, these old houses always got those little nooks and crannies and critters will find all of ‘em.”
“Besides the fact that we’d rather not have any kind of uninvited guests in the house, we definitely wouldn’t want it to find its way into the archives, though,” Jean frowns. “Even if it is just an animal. I imagine Mr. Kingsley would be quite upset.”
“Forget about Mr. Kingsley.” Sean blows out a long breath. “I’m telling you I’ll be upset if a little furball undoes all my hard work putting things away all nice and neat up there.”
“Not to mention setting anything off. Aren’t there…” Nathaniel looks at them, concerned. “Aren’t there potentially dangerous devices up there?”
Sean shakes his head. “Nah, anything that’s actually dangerous is locked up.”
“Yes, but until this afternoon, we thought the house was locked up fairly securely as well.”
“Well, I don’t think a little bunny’s gonna have, like, the ability to use the key to the strong box, but point taken.” He looks up at the ceiling. “You think we should do a sweep through the place, then, see if we can’t flush this thing out?”
Marion drags both hands down his face with a groan. “I thought we agreed today was supposed to be a quiet day.”
“And it will be,” Sean grins. “We’re ensuring that there are no more strange noises where there shouldn’t be strange noises in our house. To keep it nice and quiet.”
“I’ll go with you,” Nathaniel volunteers.
“Yeah? You’d come with me, LT?”
“Yes,” he says immediately. “Absolutely. Either way, it’ll be easier with an extra set of hands and I, for one, will sleep much, much easier if I know beyond a doubt that our Chapter House isn’t fucking haunted.”
Marion huffs a laugh.
“It’ll be just like old times, huh?”
Jean pushes back from the table, leaves her cards face down. “Well, sounds like it’s settled, then. I’ll go get a broom. And a bleed detector, just to cover our bases.”