Murder on the Astral Plane (A Kate Jasper Mystery)

by Girdner, Jaqueline

  The wicker basket was passed around and we each took a mask. I put mine on and saw black. And suddenly, I could hear better. Much better. I heard the cats fussing, the rustle of chairs, and whispers and groans, not to mention the passing traffic from the open windows. It was a relief to still have my hearing.

  Justine asked Linda to start the music from the other room, and then my sense of sound was blanketed as well, by oboes and cellos and violins and other instruments I couldn’t identify. I wondered if this was how sensory deprivation worked.

  “Okay, everyone,” Justine’s soothing voice came as if in overlay. “Just open yourself to any impressions. Breathe and relax.”

  I breathed, but I didn’t relax. It was too spooky, all alone in the dark. I couldn’t see anything but the black of my mask, or hear anything but the ubiquitous classical music. I concentrated on the feel of the hard chair beneath me for a while. The discomfort was oddly now a comfort to me. Something to hold on to. Along with the feel of the breeze from the open window. And the smell of incense, cats, patchouli, and people. I began to orient myself back to reality.

  Justine said, “Barbara.” I jumped in my chair like a piece of popcorn meeting a blast of hot air. Damn. Well, at least no one could see me, since we were all masked.

  I tried to direct my thoughts to Barbara. But I liked the feel of the hard chair better. And the effect seemed to be the same no matter whose name was called. Except for Silk’s. I saw her laughing face as I heard the hisses and yowls of a cat fight erupting. Somehow, that made sense.

  “Is someone in pain here?” Justine asked. No one answered but the cats. From the yowling, I guessed the answer was yes.

  And that’s how it went. For an eternity.

  And then Justine clapped her hands and called the session to an end. The sound of the classical music died abruptly, and I yanked off my mask, too fast, temporarily blinded by the light. As my eyes adjusted, I listened to the sound of chairs being pushed noisily back. Then I heard excited whispers. It was good to hear again. And to see. Sight, what a gift. I turned my head and noticed a knot of people gathered around Silk’s chair…upset people.

  And I saw the stillness of Silk’s body and the length of cat-toy wire twisted around her neck. Not that I really needed my newfound sight. Because Silk was in the center of a group of people…and she wasn’t talking. She was just slumped in her chair.

  And anyway, I was there, in a group.

  Silk Sokoloff had to be dead.

  - Three -

  “She’s dead, Silk’s dead!” someone screamed. The voice seemed to come from a long distance. Was that Tory Quesada screaming?

  I willed myself to raise my head to see if it was Tory, but I was frozen to my chair, my face averted from Silk’s slumped form. The form that was still imprinted on my mind.

  It was true then. I was in a group of people, and someone was dead. Not just dead. I tasted bile. Murdered. A cat toy twisted around her throat, while her pink boa lay limp on the floor. Silk!

  Silk had been too alive to be dead. Tears for a woman I barely knew stung my eyes. And then I remembered my dream. And the flash of Silk’s laughing face as we had practiced our exercise in intuition. My skin prickled on my frozen body.

  “I told you,” someone else added, low but distinct. “The spirits demanded a sacrifice.” Artemisia was that someone, I was sure. “Nobody believed me. Maybe you believe me now—”

  “Okay, breathe, people.” Justine’s soothing words broke in. “Breathe and—”

  “What happened?” a new voice demanded. I took the breath that Justine advised and turned in my seat to look at Denise, her cheeks pink as she came through the door to an adjoining room. “I heard a scream…”

  Her voice faltered as her eyes traveled to Silk’s body. I kept my own eyes from making the same trip, concentrating on the wisteria-covered bower visible through the open windows.

  “Silk, Silk is—” Justine began.

  “Dead?” Denise finished for her.

  “Yes, dead,” Justine confirmed. Her voice dropped to a whisper. Then she straightened her shoulders and cranked up the volume. “Denise, you were observing. Who did this to her?”

  “I…I was in the bathroom,” Denise admitted, her face growing pinker. “I had a problem.”

  In the bathroom? In the bathroom! Our observer had been in the bathroom. Did that mean no one had seen who murdered Silk? Someone must have seen something, anything.

  Zarathustra and Linda came into the living room from another door. Maybe they’d heard something—

  “What happened?” they asked simultaneously.

  A babble of hysterical voices greeted their question.

  “But who did it?” Zarathustra demanded, his voice high and loud above the rest.

  “We were wearing masks,” I said, the sound of my own voice surprising me.

  There was a short silence while Linda and Zarathustra considered my answer. And the others. I watched comprehension dawn on face after face. Apparently ten people had been masked, including Silk Sokoloff. And the other three hadn’t been in the room. Apparently. Because there were no witnesses. Except for the one who had been unmasked and moving. The one who—

  “Garroted?” Gil Nesbit inquired, his usually loud voice quiet now. “Isn’t that what it’s called? Garroted?”

  “Did anyone try to revive her?” Linda Underwood cut in reasonably. “Are you sure she’s dead?”

  “Yes,” Justine answered simply.

  Linda bowed her head and closed her eyes, her hands clasped in front of her chest. Was she praying?

  “Okay, people,” Justine began again. “Let me ask you this question once. Did anyone see who did this?”

  No one answered her question. It was as quiet as it had been when we’d begun our exercise. I could even hear the traffic outside the silence of the room.

  “Does anyone have a clue as to who did this?” Justine followed up. I had a feeling she was consciously holding back the desperation that wanted to creep into her tone. But she kept her words soothing.

  “The spirits,” Artemisia offered.

  Linda opened her eyes in Artemisia’s direction, then quickly stepped toward the pinched-faced woman to wrap an arm around her shoulder, whispering something inaudible, but humming with comfort into Artemisia’s ear. I wished Linda would come and put her arm around me.

  “She’s really dead?” another voice asked. It was the weasel-faced man…what was his name? Rich McGowan. His face was even whiter than before. “This isn’t a trick?”

  “Dead as Elvis,” Elsa Oberg answered, her thin voice quavering. She raised her brows above her bifocals, adding, “Probably deader.”

  Isabelle Viseu made the sign of the cross and wrapped her arms around herself, her round, golden eyes even rounder now. Frightened. I didn’t blame her.

  “The police,” I suggested. It felt like an extraordinary effort to get the words out, but I made it. “We have to call the police.”

  “Wait!” Barbara cried out.

  Barbara. In the crisis I’d almost forgotten Barbara. My friend Barbara, the psychic. Did she know who the murderer was? I took a deep breath in. And hoped.

  “We’re psychics here,” she declared, stretching her small frame until she looked like a short, Asian, female General MacArthur. It was quite a stretch. “We can figure this out ourselves.”

  I let my breath out. She didn’t have a clue. And I didn’t have to be psychic to guess that.

  But Justine took Barbara’s proposal seriously.

  “Thank you, Barbara,” she said quietly. She surveyed our group. “Shall we all sit in the circle of chairs—?”

  “No!” I objected. “I mean, that might not be a good idea,” I amended. I rose from my own seat and left the circle, touching only my own chair as I did. “Excuse me, Justine. But this is a crime scene now.”

  “Oh,” she replied, her deep, dark eyes unsure for a moment. Justine’s eyes were the kind that looked as if they’d seen eve
rything, but I was pretty sure that those looks were deceptive when it came to real crime scenes.

  “Maybe if we all sat in a circle on the floor,” Linda suggested. “Like cats. Cats are good. And there’re a couple of chairs left for Isabelle and Elsa, if the floor’s too hard.”

  “Thanks, hon,” Elsa rasped, and in a few minutes we were all sitting, most of us on the floor which was thick with layers of carpet, averting our eyes from Silk’s body, and waiting for psychic enlightenment.

  “I’ll begin,” Justine announced. “During the exercise, I called out Silk’s name and then I felt…” She paused.

  “I felt a sudden pain around my neck at the fifth chakra, and then it was gone. I thought it was a psychic pain—an emotional pain might be a better word—

  “I felt it too!” Rich yelped. He stood up from his place on the carpet, pacing, his close-set eyes wild. “It was horrible, choking me at the neck. It hurt! But I thought it was my imagination, and then we took off the masks, and—”

  Rich’s speech ended abruptly as his face turned whiter than ever and he ran from the room, hand over his mouth. “Bathroom?” he managed.

  Denise and Justine pointed and he disappeared behind a closed door.

  “Poor man,” Linda commented. “Unbelievers freak so easily. If we were nonjudgmental like cats—”

  “Linda,” Barbara interrupted. “How about the cats? They were witnesses. Can you ask them?”

  “Oooh, that’s an idea,” Linda agreed, her weathered face brightening. “Kitties?” she called out and two furry heads appeared.

  “Wait, wait,” I whispered. The sounds coming from the bathroom convinced me Rich wouldn’t be with us for a little while. “What did Silk mean when she called Rich a ‘narc’?”

  “An investigator,” Linda explained, looking into my eyes. She must have seen frustration there. “An informer,” she expanded.

  “I know ‘narc’ means informer,” I told her. “But what did she mean specifically when she—”

  The bathroom door opened. Damn. Back to feline informants.

  “Kitties?” Linda called again.

  And sure enough, the tabby and the marmalade who’d been playing with Linda earlier came sidling in closer, looking suspiciously at the group, with Rich McGowan following, looking just as suspicious but less sick than he had a few minutes ago. A chill reminded me why we were sitting on the carpet, playing this game. Someone had been murdered. I looked at the faces surrounding me. Barbara, Justine, Linda, Zarathustra, Tory, Gil, Denise, Artemisia, and Elsa and Isabelle seated in the coveted chairs, while Rich lowered himself to the floor again. Was one of these faces connected to the mind of a murderer?

  “Tibia? Femur?” Linda addressed the animals. “Silk was killed. Do you know that?”

  The two cats tilted their furry heads in the feline equivalent of “Are you nuts?”

  “Oooh, that’s right,” Linda pressed on. “You don’t know what ‘killed’ means, do you, sweetie pies?” She frowned for a moment. “How about your dancing toy?”

  Both cats looked in Silk’s direction. Then the tabby reached out a paw and cuffed the marmalade.

  “Now, Tibia,” Linda began.

  The marmalade pounced on the tabby. The cat fights were on. And I wasn’t betting on a winner.

  Tibia yowled in indignation as Linda spoke. I caught “cats” and “different time and space continuums” over Tibia’s yowling. Then Femur started in.

  “…so it’s hard for a cat to understand the concept of death,” Linda finished, finally raising her voice.

  Justine stood up, her hands on her hips and looked down at the two cats.

  “Stop that, both of you!” she commanded.

  Tibia and Femur looked up at the power above them and scrambled into the kitchen. And began to yowl again.

  I snuck a look at Barbara, wondering if she was disappointed in the experiment. But she had her peaceful Buddha smile in place on her lovely face. I wanted to cuff her like Tibia had cuffed Femur. How could she be serene now?

  Justine seated her tall, broad body gracefully on the carpet once again, legs folded neatly beneath her. I was sure Tibia and Femur considered her a goddess. Then we all sat in silence, waiting for whatever it was we were waiting for. Inspiration from the goddess?

  I looked at Isabelle Viseu’s face with interest. She was searching the group now with her eyes, too, but her search looked more focused than mine had. After a short survey, she frowned and lowered her eyes.

  “Isabelle?” asked Justine. “Do you have something to share with the group?” Justine’s voice was calm on the surface, but even I could feel the excitement that bubbled underneath. Isabelle was the one who saw auras, I remembered. Did she see the murderer’s aura now? I shook my head. How could she spot a murderer’s aura even if she did see it? Did anyone know what a murderer’s aura looked like?

  “Certain colors are…” She stopped. “I must think about this,” she ended abruptly.

  Justine was not so easily dissuaded.

  “Isabelle,” she said softly, ever so softly. “Please, if you see something, you must let us know.”

  “I suppose you may be right,” Isabelle agreed, then lowered her eyes again.

  We waited for her to continue, but apparently that one sentence was her entire statement.

  “Rogerio?” Tory called out dramatically.

  Tory got our attention. We turned as she tilted her head like a satellite dish. But it was no use. She had our attention, but not Rogerio’s. “He isn’t communicating,” she whispered. “All this negative energy has stopped his transmission completely. He’s very sensitive.”

  Lucky Rogerio. I wished it could be as easy for me to cease communications as I watched Artemisia pull out a crystal suspended on a long chain.

  “Pendulum!” she demanded. She furrowed her plucked brows ferociously, pinching her long face. “Do you know who killed Silk?”

  The pendulum began to circle counterclockwise, slowly, rhythmically.

  “Stop that!” she shouted. “You must know.”

  The pendulum continued to circle counterclockwise, in wider and wider circles.

  “You can’t do this to me!” she screamed, and I saw the tears of frustration running down her face, melting her mascara.

  I looked closer at her long, pinched face. Was this the face of a murderer? Long ago, I’d worked in a mental hospital. I’d known lots of people who believed they were beset by evil spirits. And maybe they had been. But never had one of those persons claimed a spirit as the party responsible for a death in front of my own masked eyes. What if—

  “Counterclockwise means no for Artemisia,” a voice whispered in my ear. I spun clockwise on the carpet to face Barbara. You’d think a psychic would know better than to sneak up on a person like that. If I’d been standing, I’d have probably shot straight through the roof, propelled by her unexpected whisper.

  “Pendulum!” Artemisia screamed again, pulling me back around. “You’re mine! Do what I tell you!”

  Linda scooted up next to the screaming woman and put her arm around her. “The pendulum only knows what you do, sweetie pie,” she told Artemisia. Artemisia laid her head on Linda’s shoulder and began to weep in earnest.

  “Anyone else got any ideas?” I asked, averting my face from Artemisia as well as Silk now.

  “Let’s just close our eyes and concentrate,” Justine suggested.

  All right, I confess. I kept one eye open. And I wasn’t the only one. After about ten minutes of tense concentration, no one had any more to say than before.

  “We’ve failed,” Justine finally admitted. And suddenly, I felt guilty for keeping an eye open.

  “No, honeybunch,” Linda told her. “We just haven’t finished yet.”

  Justine smiled and stroked her sweetie’s shaggy hair for a moment before standing. Then she strode to the phone and called the Paloma Police Department.

  The first two officers arrived with a siren. Officers Yuki and O�
��Dwyer. Yuki was trim and female, O’Dwyer round and male. But they moved in perfect synchronization toward Silk’s body, inspecting it and then turning simultaneously as if to guard Silk from further attack. If only they could have guarded her. But it was too late. My eyes welled up again for the woman I hadn’t even known. And then I heard new voices approaching.

  The next two members of the Paloma Police Department didn’t need any siren. They were already arguing as they came through the open door. Loudly and clearly.

  - Four -

  “Whaddaya mean, psychic soiree?” boomed a small, gaunt man with an intelligent face. His voice was bigger than he was as he walked into Justine’s living room. And rougher.

  “Psychics, Chief Wenger, sir,” the taller, younger man answered, his voice quivering with excitement as he tailed the older man through the doorway. “As in telepathy,” he expanded. “That’s what the woman said on the phone, that it happened at a psychic soiree, some kind of experiment. Sir, the very possibilities—”

  “Is this more Marin, New Age hoo-hah?” the man who had to be Chief Wenger demanded. “Kettering, you know I hate that crap.”

  “It’s not crap, sir,” Kettering replied eagerly. “Actually, studies show that many Americans believe—”

  “I don’t give a rat’s behind what many Americans believe,” Wenger cut in, surveying the room. “Fer Pete’s sake, someone was killed. Right, Yuki, O’Dwyer?”

  The two uniformed officers nodded almost imperceptibly. Kettering’s reply, however, was not imperceptible.

  “Right, sir,” he continued, still smiling, his eyes glinting under his dark eyebrows. He was well over six feet tall with an eager-beaver face and a jutting chin that Kirk Douglas would have coveted. Kettering was so excited, I had a feeling he would have rubbed his hands together, except that he couldn’t because he was carrying a huge stack of books, The Enneagram Made Easy by Wagele & Baron on the top. “Can’t you see the opportunity? I’ll be able to facilitate all of my studies now. This is cosmic, sir. A real murder, and a group of people attuned to the very—