BELLEWETHER, by Susanna Kearsley

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Ghost Story/Romance -- 4 1/2 stars\
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It is the last year of the Seven Year War between the French and the British.  Two captured French Canadian officers are billeted with a family on Long Island to await a prisoner exchange.  The household consists of two brothers, their sister Lydia, their father and a young slave.  Lydia is trying to fulfill the hole left by the recent passing of their mother.  The arrival of the two officers--one surly, one silent--only adds to the daily tension in their home.  Told in alternating then-and-now sections, in modern day, their home still stands and is being prepared to open as a museum.  The young curator is fascinated by the story of a light that sometimes appears in the woods behind the house.  Legend says that it is one of the French Canadian officers who was killed by Lydia's brother when he and Lydia attempted to escape together. The young curator is determined to find if there is truth to the legend, but the museum board stands in the way.  When things in the museum start to go bump in the night, is it a warning or an offer of help?  I'm not much of a romance reader, but I have always enjoyed Susanna Kearsley's books.  Her stories are steeped in well-researched history entwined with both historical and imaginary observers of their time and their world.   Her romances are gentle and fulfilling, not a heaving bosum or ripped bodice in sight.  Somehow managing to be both predictable and surprising, the ending of this one is like the cherry on a sundae.