All Things Undying Read Online Free Page B

board outside. I am crazy for mussels!’ I stood up, too, and waved toward the remains of our tea.
    Janet raised a hand. ‘You leave the washing-up to me.’
    â€˜You sure?’ I gathered up my purchases. ‘Fingers crossed Susan will be able to come on Thursday. There are some things I’d like to ask her.’
    Janet twisted the knob and held the lounge door open until I’d passed through it into the hallway. ‘She’ll probably be expecting my call.’
    â€˜Why do you say that?’
    Janet winked. ‘What kind of psychic would she be if she didn’t?’

THREE
    â€˜In the course of a successful reading, the psychic may provide most of the words, but it is the client that provides most of the meaning and all of the significance.’
    Ian Rowland, The Full Facts Book of Cold Reading , p.60
    I was licking garlic butter off my fingers in the cozy, dark-timbered ambiance of The Royal Castle Hotel’s Galleon Bar, when Paul said, ‘Too bad you didn’t like the mussels.’
    â€˜Mmmmmussels!’ I moaned.
    With the exception of a mound of empty, wing-shaped ebony shells piled haphazardly in a bowl next to my elbow, there was no evidence that mussels had ever been served.
    Between bites, I’d retold the story of my encounter with Susan Parker. Paul had listened politely, rolling his eyes only twice, which, knowing his propensity for critical thinking, must have required superhuman self-control.
    Now I was finishing off my story as well as the last of the frites that had come with my moules . ‘So, you see why I’m kind of freaked.’
    â€˜Hannah, Hannah, Hannah,’ Paul chided, as if he were dealing with a particularly slow and difficult child. ‘She’s a talented cold reader – i.e. a fake.’
    I decided to ignore him. I dragged a French fry though the scrumptious broth remaining at the bottom of the pot the mussels had so recently occupied, popped the fry into my mouth and chewed slowly.
    â€˜Earth to Hannah.’
    â€˜Are you going to talk to me like a grown-up?’ When Paul agreed, I said, ‘OK. Leaving aside for a moment the question of is-she-for-real-or-isn’t-she, what I want to know is this: what’s in it for her? Why would she walk up to a total stranger on the street, pretend to have a conversation with that stranger’s dead mother, then simply disappear?’ I reached for my wine glass. ‘She didn’t ask me for money, Paul.’
    â€˜No, but neither did that so-called psychic who showed up on our doorstep when Timmy was kidnapped. Dakota Whatshername.’
    â€˜Montana. Montana Martin.’
    â€˜Whatever.’
    â€˜But for Montana, there was money in it. There was the reward money, of course. Worse case, she did it for the publicity.’ I polished off another fry and stared at the copper pots gleaming from the walls, admiring the way they reflected the light. I flashed back to the day Montana Martin parked her boots on my daughter’s doorstep, and in a parting shot, claimed that my late mother wanted me to have her emerald ring. ‘Lucky guess,’ Paul had insisted at the time, but I had never been totally convinced.
    â€˜Remember the ring?’ I asked.
    Paul shot an exasperated here-we-go-again glance at the ceiling. ‘The opposite of cold reading, Hannah, is hot reading. Quite simply, Montana cheated. Did her homework, I mean. The ring? It’s mentioned in your mother’s will. The will is on file with Anne Arundel County. It’s public record. Montana could have looked it up.’
    Paul had a point. I hadn’t thought of that. ‘But, but, but . . .’ I was stalling, organizing my thoughts. ‘But Susan Parker doesn’t know me from Adam! For all she knew, I was a tourist fresh off the Eurostar and she’d never see me again. What you’re suggesting is that she targets likely tourists, manages to learn their