Medium Dead

by Chris Dolley

  “Of course I do.”

  “Then why you say these things?”

  “Because they’re true! Brenda needs help, not a ... gigolo.”

  Brian went for the hurt puppy dog look. It might not work on Susan, but he was enjoying remaining in character. And by remaining in character he was going to win her round. Eventually.

  “Would a gigolo know Brenda’s birthday? Or her favorite song? Come, you test me. Ask me any question about Brenda and I prove to you I know her as good as you.”

  He wasn’t sure if she was going to bite at first. But Susan had a competitive streak and loved to be proved right. She bit, and with her thoughts holding the answers as soon as her voice framed the question, Brian passed every test she could throw at him.

  Even then Susan wasn’t convinced. “Are you wired?” She spoke into his lapel. “Are you giving him the answers, Brenda?”

  Fabio shrugged. “I am no wired. You want me take off my clothes to prove it?”

  She gave him a withering look – a close relative to Brenda’s Medusa. Then peered into the house. “If I find Brenda’s lurking in the bathroom, I might take you up on that.”

  She hurried back into the house where she found Brenda surrounded by witnesses. And not a microphone in sight.

  o0o

  It was approaching midnight.

  “I think we should be going,” Brenda told her mother. “It’s late.”

  “Nonsense,” said her mother. “I see you so little. Why don’t you stay the night? Two nights. I can make up the spare room ... for both of you.”

  “No!” Brenda didn’t mean to sound so shrill – or so panicked – but her mother had just winked at her.

  Brian appeared at her side and draped a long possessive arm around her shoulders. “It is all my fault,” he said to Brenda’s mother. “I have already booked room. And, of course, I have horse to return.”

  “Horse?”

  “Yes, I tie him outside. You no mind?”

  Angelica ran to the window and pulled back the curtains. “It’s true! There is a horse outside! I can see him!”

  Brenda gave Brian a look. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Arranging our exit.’

  Bob, Susan and her mother joined Angelica at the window.

  “I can’t see your car, Brenda,” said her mother. “You didn’t ... you didn’t ride here?”

  “I thought it romantic,” said Fabio. “I promise my Brenda a moonlight ride along the lake shore.”

  “You don’t even like horses, Brenda,” said Susan.

  “I do. It’s just that I’ve never ... had the time before.”

  “Can I feed the horsey?” asked Angelica, bouncing towards Fabio. “Please! Please! Can I?”

  “If your mother say so. He like the short sweet grass and keep your hand flat.”

  Angelica had the door open as soon as her mother reluctantly agreed.

  “Come, darling,” said Fabio. “Our steed awaits.”

  Brenda followed, peering not at the horse, but past the Hummer at the empty space by the road. ‘Where’s my car? You didn’t turn it into a horse, did you?’

  ‘I moved it around the block when I went to the bathroom. The horse took a while to find, but ... it’s worth it, don’t you think?’

  The horse was magnificent. A huge white Lipizzaner loosely tied to a tree. Angelica was feeding it with a handful of grass she’d ripped from the lawn.

  “That’s some horse,” said Bob.

  “Only the best for my Brenda,” said Brian looking directly at Susan.

  Then he was walking towards the horse, untying him from the tree, making sure Angelica stood back. Brenda watched. Was he really going to jump on its back? There was no saddle, no stirrups.

  He placed one hand on the horse’s withers and swung himself aboard. Was riding bareback one of his superpowers? Or was Brian winging it?

  And was she going to have to do the same? She hadn’t ridden a horse in years. She wasn’t dressed for it. Her dress was too tight and there was no saddle.

  Fabio circled with the prancing horse. Both looked magnificent, both had flowing manes. She could have been staring at a book cover.

  Then he brought the horse alongside her and held out his hand.

  “Come, darling, the night, she awaits.”

  The way he said it. The way the moonlight picked out the white of the horse. The clear, cool night. The collective ‘aahh’ from her mother and Angelica.

  She had to take his hand. But first she had to make a slight alteration to her dress. She bent down and ripped a seam.

  ‘I always wanted to do that.’

  ‘I know.’

  She took his hand, and he swung her up behind him as though she were no weight at all. She clung to his waist with both hands. And looked over to her mother who ... had her hand in her mouth. She was so happy she was crying.

  Then the horse reared. Brenda clung on tighter as the Lipizzaner punched the night with his front hooves and whinnied. She hoped it was Brian being theatrical, but she had a nasty feeling her magic exit was about to end in a Horse vs. Hummer visit to the ER.

  “Wow!” shrieked Angelica.

  ‘Wave, Brenda. And don’t forget to smile. You’re about to make the fantasy exit of all exits. Your family will talk about this for years.’

  She smiled – nervous, but fulsome – and gripped extra hard with her knees and right hand while attempting a flamboyant wave with her left.

  And then the horse powered forward to the cheers from the doorstep. Brenda clung to Brian as they narrowly missed the Hummer. Even more cheers as they cleared the hedge and galloped across next door’s lawn. Another hedge, another lawn, a fence and ... was that a water jump, or a garden pond?

  Off they charged, galloping into the night

  And Brian was right. That was an exit.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  “We’re not riding all the way back to Ohio are we?” said Brenda as they cleared the tenth garden fence. They had to be out of sight by now.

  “No, I’ve got to return the horse. I’ll drop you off at your car.”

  Five minutes later he materialized in the front seat of her Ford Contour – as Brian.

  “You’ve changed back,” she said.

  “You’re disappointed?”

  “No,” she lied, then realized he could read her mind and changed her answer to, ‘Okay, a little. He’s easy on the eyes,’ before flooding her mind with neutral thoughts and plenty of la, la, la’s.

  They shared the driving back. Apparently, teleporting a Ford Contour – even a rusty one – was beyond Brian’s powers. By the time Brenda arrived home she was shattered.

  “Do you want me to stay here tonight?” Brian asked as Brenda was just about to slip her front door key into the lock.

  The key developed a mind of its own and slid across the scratch plate. “What do you mean ‘stay here tonight?’“

  “So we can get an early start in the morning. There’s a lot to do. There’s the Abbiati papers to sort out, the Sacrifice case, and I have this strange memory of you stealing a car.”

  “Borrowing a car. I paid for it. Sort of.”

  Okay the money may have been slightly stolen, but she was going to give the car back! She just hadn’t had the time. She’d do it tomorrow. After she’d had some sleep and could think clearly.

  Brenda spent a fitful night. Dreaming about Count Fabio was bad enough, but he kept morphing into Brian, which was even more unsettling than when he morphed into the horse. Consequently it was a tired and dreamswept Brenda who dragged herself downstairs the next morning. Brian was already up, sitting at the dining table, busily sorting through papers.

  “We seem to be missing something,” he said.

  “What?”

  “About a million dollars. You haven’t been shopping, have you?”

  It was too early for jokes. “I hid it under my bed for safekeeping. And it wasn’t a million. It was eight hundred thousand, fifty thousand
of which I had to put down as a deposit on a car to bring your charred, lifeless ass back home. We’ll get the money back when I return it.”

  “Do you want to return it?”

  The inner Brenda gave birth to kittens – little black satanic ones with devilish smiles and forked tails. Watch yourself, Brenda. He’s a demon and he’s tempting you. That’s what they do – lure unsuspecting humans with shiny new Jaguars and drawers full of money. The next thing you know, you’ve mortgaged your soul and you’re taking bribes from criminals instead of putting them away.

  “I’ve never been bribed in my life,” said Brian, hand on heart and looking hurt. “But, seeing as you’ve brought it up, is there anything wrong with deducting expenses?”

  Maybe it was too early in the morning, or maybe he’d caught Brenda at a weak moment, but was there anything wrong with deducting expenses?

  The inner Brenda produced another litter. Once you start taking money, you won’t be able to stop. You can’t trust Brian. For all you know, he’s testing you again. Seeing how far he can drag you down his slippery slope to hell!

  “Really, Brenda, everyone knows the path to hell is paved and far from slippery. Besides, Satan has it gritted.”

  Brenda snorted. It would be so easy to take the money. It would be so easy to justify it, but ... wouldn’t it be corrupting?

  “Was Robin Hood corrupt? You think the poor got all the money he took from the rich? What did he use to feed himself and his merry men? You think he had a day job? You think he lived off Maid Marion? Anyway, if I was only doing this for money I’d be teleporting in and out of bank vaults all day. But I don’t. I take what I need. Crime fighting’s expensive. We need equipment. And don’t forget – the police get paid. Private detectives get paid. But our clients are dead and can’t pay. Does that mean they have no rights? Isn’t it fitting that we tax criminals to pay for our services?”

  He had a point. Several of them.

  “How much are we talking about?” said Brenda, shoving her conscience aside.

  He shrugged. “Whatever you think’s fair. We do need fast reliable transport. If you think you need a new car....”

  The inner Brenda was in danger of being buried under small felines. You don’t need THAT car. She had a point, too. There were plenty of new cars a lot cheaper, and the Jag would stand out.

  But it was gold and it had a gearshift that came out of the floor like a spaceship...

  “Isn’t that breaking the first rule of magic?” she asked. “Using magic for personal gain?”

  “What first rule? There are no rules in magic. Anyway, you don’t have to decide right now, but sometime this week we’ve got to hand out that money, and whatever good cause we donate it to, you can be sure that some of it’s going to disappear in admin fees.”

  Brenda ate breakfast while Brian boxed Abbiati’s papers – wrapping the gun in a plastic bag before placing it on top of the bank statements with an explanatory note. If nothing else, there should be enough to get him on tax evasion. And keep the local FBI field office in New Haven busy for a month or two.

  “I’ve been thinking about the Sacrifice case,” said Brian, sealing the box. “I think the only way to make any real progress is to call up as many Sacrifices as we can and ask them their real names. Then we can track down their cases and see where he’s abducting them from and when.”

  “None of the Sacrifices I’ve talked to want to give their real names.”

  “That doesn’t mean they all won’t. And maybe we can tease it out of the reluctant ones. Be a little more persuasive.”

  Brenda didn’t like the idea of ‘persuading’ any of the Sacrifices. It was all right for Brian to say ‘we,’ but it was Brenda who’d have to do the persuading. She was the one who’d have to face the tears and the sobs and feel like an unconscionable bully.

  “No,” she said. “I’ve got a better idea. Let’s start with the two girls who were murdered before Mary Alice. If they can identify Daddy’s picture, then at least we’ve linked the cases. Maybe they knew him.”

  Brian agreed and, as soon as they’d cleared away breakfast, they moved through to the area by the sofa that had become Brenda’s summoning zone. She sat cross-legged on the carpet, closed her eyes and took a deep breath. What next? She still had no idea how she summoned the dead – whether a simple call was enough, or whether there were mechanisms to boost that call or make it easier for a spirit to slip through from the other side.

  “I wouldn’t overanalyze it,” said Brian. “Every medium I’ve known has used a different ritual. It’s whatever works for you.”

  Brenda took the case file for the first victim, Ashley Peterson, and concentrated on her picture – the smiling one taken while she was still alive, not the later ones when her bedroom was a crime scene. Brenda closed her eyes and held the image of the smiling girl in her mind.

  “Ashley, Ashley Peterson, can you hear me?”

  She called out with her voice and with her mind, echoing the words and willing them into the ether and beyond.

  She waited. The room silent except for the slow ticking of the wall clock. And the low thrum of her own blood pulsing around her body.

  She opened one eye and peered around the room. No Ashley. No ghostly shape shimmering by the bookcase or over by the curtains. She tried again, imagining a rip in the fabric between the worlds, reaching through with her mind and calling through.

  ‘Ashley, Ashley Peterson. I summon you. Follow my voice.’

  The clock continued to tick and her blood continued to pulse. But no Ashley. No answering call, no shimmering presence.

  She tried again, imagining the rip wider, peeling back the edges with her mind, amplifying her voice with ten thousand watts of imaginary psychic speakers stacked inside the tear, all volume controls set to max.

  ‘Ashley Peterson! Wherever you are, come to me now!’

  Another long wait. Another furtive check of the room. Was she doing something wrong?

  “Perhaps if you held her picture,” suggested Brian.

  She’d try anything. It wasn’t quite the same as holding something that had once belonged to Ashley, but ... who was to say that that worked either? Perhaps the important thing was for Brenda to believe.

  She took the piece of paper in her hands and placed both thumbs over Ashley’s picture, pressing them lightly against her index fingers on the reverse side. Then she concentrated on Ashley’s face. Not closing her eyes this time, but calling to the girl with her mind, imagining the picture to be a gateway, the paper a thin membrane separating the physical and spiritual worlds.

  ‘Ashley! You hear my voice and you must come. I summon thee!’

  Brenda concentrated harder, her brow furrowing with the effort, a slight pain behind the eyes. ‘Ashley. Speak to me. Now!’

  Nothing. Brenda let go of her breath, not realizing she’d been holding it for so long. Why wasn’t it working? What was she doing wrong?

  “Try the other girl,” said Brian.

  She did, going through the same ritual, holding the girl’s picture between finger and thumb, burning the image into her mind, imagining rips and tears and all kinds of tunnels between this world and the next and shouting the girl’s name through.

  ‘Lauren! Lauren Stone!’

  “Yes?”

  A girl materialized by the television set. An eleven year-old Lauren Stone, the girl in the picture. She was wearing different clothes and her hair was longer, but it was her.

  “What do you want?” she asked. She didn’t seem frightened, or fazed in any way. She stood by the television taking in her surroundings as though beaming into a stranger’s lounge was the most natural thing in the world.

  “I want to help you,” said Brenda. “Are you a brave girl?”

  Lauren looked surprised, and a little suspicious. “Ye-es.”

  Brenda hesitated. This was the tricky bit.

  “Good,” she said, masking her uncertainty with a smile. “I’m going to show you a pic
ture and I want you to look at it closely and tell me if you recognize the man. Can you do that?”

  “Of course. Who is it?”

  “Remember, this is only a picture. You’re safe here. The man can’t hurt you. Do you understand?”

  “I’m not a baby.”

  Lauren sounded so normal, so alive. She barely shimmered and her skin wasn’t the slightest bit translucent. She could almost have passed for alive – if you didn’t look too hard.

  Brenda reached down, picked up the composite Brian had made of Daddy, then showed Lauren the picture.

  The girl’s face changed in an instant. Her eyes widened and she jumped back – a silent, otherworldly jump, her features shifting and reforming like a girl made of steam caught in a sudden draft.

  “He can’t hurt you any more,” said Brenda. “This is only a picture. You’re safe here.”

  The girl was fading, her face translucent and the edges of her clothes losing coherence.

  “Wait!” shouted Brenda. “You are safe. See that man over there?” She pointed at Brian, willing the girl to stay for just a second longer and look. “He’s a powerful magician. If anyone tries to hurt you, he’ll turn them into a frog.”

  “An ugly frog,” said Brian. “With big hairy warts.”

  The girl’s form shimmered and billowed, but was no longer fading. She looked at Brian, then Brenda.

  “Is he really a magician?” Her voice was faint and distorted.

  Brenda turned to Brian. “She wants you to show her some magic.”

  In an instant Brian transformed himself into Count Fabio, again looking fashionably windswept, his eyes extra sultry and that smile...

  “Wow!” said the girl, both her voice and her shape returning.

  Wow indeed, thought Brenda, making a slight adjustment to the collar of her blouse. The room had suddenly become considerably warmer.

  “Lauren,” said Brenda, “do you know the name of the man in the picture.”

  Lauren was still staring at Count Fabio.

  “Lauren!” repeated Brenda. “Do you know this man’s name?”

  “No.”

  “Is he the man who attacked you?”

  The girl looked down at her feet, and nodded.