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me.
    Stepping out of my car, I slowly locked the doors, taking my time. In the gilding afternoon sun I could see the towering Douglas firs had dropped a carpet of needles atop the house’s slate roof. It looked as if the gutters hadn’t been cleaned in this millennium. Two L-shaped wings jutted from each side. I tried to estimate the rambling mansion’s square footage and failed. Big. Really big. But in a state of long-term neglect that had left its once awesome grace moldering into disrepair.
    I swear there was a faint odor of something dying or dead.
    Shadows formed where the lowering sun could not reach. I shivered though it wasn’t cold.
    After a few minutes I followed the path to the front of the house where sweeping grounds rolled toward the edge of the cliff. In the name of safety a wrought-iron fence had been erected along the perimeter, but spokes and curlicues were broken out in places and briers had climbed inside, tendrils reaching through like thorny fingers.
    The lawn was freshly mowed, however, and the path I followed was swept clean. Dead ahead was the front door beneath another, smaller portico. The slate path swooped up into several stairs which were missing pieces of rock. I climbed the steps and stood for a moment looking at twin wrought-iron rings hanging on massive wooden doors. Not exactly in keeping with the architecture. Definitely monastic. I lifted one and let it fall. Its boom sounded like a wrecking ball.
    Out of my peripheral view I noticed a side building. I turned to look at it and saw that it was a playhouse. Child’s size. Its front door was bright red and freshly painted. The rest of it looked scary and decrepit. Worse than the house, even.
    The door in front of me swung slowly inward revealing a gloomy interior. I had a mad desire to sing cheerily, “Avon calling!” but managed to hold myself back.
    A figure moved into view. A slight, middle-aged man, his skin wrinkled in that used-up kind of way, blinked at me in the quickly fading light. “Yes?”
    “Hi, I’m Jane Kelly. Jasper—Jazz—invited me to meet him here?” I couldn’t help making it sound like a question. I was hoping somehow this skinny guy would help me out.
    His expression grew faintly anxious. “Here?”
    I wasn’t sure whether to go into the whole thing about Orchid and her mental condition. I thought about trotting out a lie but sensed that might get in my way in the long run. I opted for a nod and a bright smile.
    “Jazz doesn’t live here.” He glanced behind him, as if he were afraid of imparting a huge family secret.
    “He said his grandmother lived here. Should I wait outside?”
    This really threw him off. He clearly didn’t know what to do with me. After a hesitation that lasted long enough to embarrass us both, he finally stepped from the gloom onto the porch. “I’m not sure if I should have you come in. The family’s here.” He tossed another glance to the still open door.
    I got my first good look at him. He definitely carried the Purcell gene for attractiveness, even with his dried-up appearance and mannerisms. His eyes were gray-blue and his hair was thick and lustrous, only shot sparsely with gray. If he’d given any thought to physical fitness, which by his stooped posture and generally soft appearance didn’t seem possible, he would be one good-looking man. I pegged him somewhere in his late fifties but it was hard to tell. He could have been much younger. He just seemed old.
    His worry about “the family” was starting to amuse me. Or, maybe it was just relief that I didn’t have to go inside without Jazz. I leaned forward and whispered, “Should I wait in my car, then?”
    “Yes…yes…maybe…”
    “James!” a female voice called from the gloomy bowels.
    James started as if he’d been goosed. “That’s Dahlia,” he murmured.
    So, I was looking at James Purcell the fourth and waiting for his sister Dahlia to appear. I did a quick recap in my head. James was a bachelor.