"There needs no ghost come from the grave to tell us this," the ever-loyal Horatio assured Hamlet, Shakespeare's famous Danish prince. But four hundred years later and far from Ellsinore, a ghost haunts the dreams of Josie McGuire, assistant professor of history at Lancaster University, high in the Great Smoky Mountains. An evil she can't identify and too powerful to resist draws her into the past, wanting her to see, to know - what? Only her husband's voice seems to be able to break its hold. Peter Cooper, Professor of Veterinary Medicine worries about the toll these nightmares are taking on his diabetic wife. But is the phantom real? And where did it come from? Searching for an ancient Cherokee village site on the Coopers' mountain property university archeology students find human remains. Female, fairly young, and only in the ground about 50 years according to the archeologist and the police forensics team. Who would hide a body in that field? And what role does the retired German professor and his English wife play? Indian archeology and World War II events come together as Peter Cooper and Jim Dalton tackle the mystery of a murder committed half a century ago, hoping to lay a ghost and prevent the killer from striking again.