man with Carolina blue eyes …
Brendan was watching her. He leaned forward suddenly. “All right, Mickey, what is it you’re not telling me?”
Her face flushed. “I don’t know what—”
“No evading.” He stood from the rocker. It tipped violently back and forth, as if someone were still sitting in it, rocking angrily. He sat on the porch rail, directly in front of her, so there was no avoiding him. “You’re holding back on me and it’s time you came clean. What is it you’re looking for, here? What do you believe of all of this? What do you know about Folger that you haven’t been telling me? How did you know about it to begin with?”
She sat back her own rocker so hard she hit her head against the top slat with a jolt, but the tears in her eyes were not from the pain. “My uncle,” she said. “He was one of the original Rhine test subjects, a high scorer. He’s the one who mentioned the Folger House. That’s how I knew it was a house that had shut down the lab.”
Brendan stared at her with a look that was half disbelief, half growing excitement. “Was your uncle part of the Folger Experiment?”
“I don’t know,” she said again. “But I think …” She stopped.
“What, Mickey?” he said softly.
Now the tears ran down her face. She brushed at them, and looked out on the hazy lights of the streetlamps, composing herself.
“Tell me,” Brendan said, leaning forward on the rail, until his forehead was almost touching hers.
“He’s very lost,” she whispered.
“Okay. Okay.” He stood, and pulled Laurel gently up with him. “Let’s go see your uncle, Mickey.”
In an unexpected bit of luck, Aunt Margaret’s Cadillac was just pulling out of the drive as they turned the corner of the block. “Wait, stop!” Laurel whispered, and Brendan did, and they watched as the Cadillac turned the corner at the end of the street and disappeared into the night.
They parked down the street, in case Margaret abruptly returned. Laurel felt like a spy as they hurried up the walkway under the shadows of magnolia trees. Glowing white flowers dotted the dark above them. On the stoop, Brendan rang the doorbell several times, with no answer. He looked at her.
Laurel stepped back on the porch and looked up at the house. She visualized the small, dark, cozy library at the back of the house; saw Morgan sitting in the chair with his half-glasses on, reading A Princess of Mars.
Uncle Morgan, she said, but it was inside her head.
They waited. Brendan started to ask, “You think we should—” but she shook her head slightly. “Shh.”
And suddenly the door opened a crack in front of them and Morgan was peering out.
Seated in the study, Laurel and Brendan on the small leather couch across from Morgan’s deep leather chair, Laurel introduced Brendan. “Uncle Morgan, this is my—friend, Brendan. He’s a professor at Duke, too, in the psychology department.”
Morgan looked them both over solemnly, without saying a word.
“We’re—,” Laurel gestured to Brendan, “we’re going to be doing a research study together.”
“We’re covering ground broken by the Rhine parapsychology lab,” Brendan jumped in helpfully. “I understand you might know something about that, sir.”
Uncle Morgan looked off toward the door to the covered porch but Laurel had the feeling he was really looking a million miles away.
“Were you at the Folger House, sir?”
Laurel winced at Brendan’s directness, but Morgan spoke instantly. “No,” he said, and the word was startling in the quiet of the study. “No no no.” Laurel felt a flood of relief, hearing it. Brendan glanced at Laurel.
“You weren’t part of the Folger Experiment?” Brendan pressed.
“Experiment?” Morgan said, looking bewildered.
Laurel felt as if a weight had been lifted from her. I was wrong.
“But you did do some work in the parapsychology lab, didn’t you, sir?” Brendan asked. Morgan just looked at him blankly. “I understand you’re very gifted with cards,” Brendan tried. Uncle Morgan looked at Laurel reproachfully and she felt her chest tighten with guilt.
“I’m sorry, Uncle Morgan,” she said. “But Brendan’s a friend. I wish you would talk to him. I think it would help—”
“They never came back,” Morgan said.
Laurel stopped. There was a heaviness in the room; the air felt thick with meaning.
“Who didn’t?”
“All of them. They never came back from that house.”
Laurel’s heart was beating practically out of her chest. “Uncle Morgan, we need to know more about that. Are you talking about Rafe Winchester?” Morgan blinked rapidly. “Victoria Enright?”
Morgan’s eyes filled with tears. “Victoria