by Maia Chance
“That does sound logical. Although … you are unwilling to entertain the possibility that you have seen and heard … an authentic ghost?”
“Don’t be dippy!” Was I unwilling? Was Berta? Her face was serene and pinkly scrubbed. Her round blue eyes glinted with intelligence. Pulp consumption or no, surely she didn’t go in for spooks. “If it’s truly the case that the ghost and the murderer are one and the same, Berta, then we’re down to only two suspects. Theo Wainwright. Miss Murden. Neither has an alibi and they both have an excellent motive, so what we must do is push the murderer into making a mistake, or else we must dig up some kind of foolproof evidence of the murderer’s guilt.”
“If only we could quiz persons at Montgomery Hall without fear of arrest,” Berta said.
“If only we could search their closets for bloody shovels and white gowns.”
“We could enter the estate in disguise.”
I suppressed a snort. “Spies must blend into the scenery. Blending isn’t really our strong point.”
Berta unclasped her handbag, which sat on the chair beside her, pulled something out, and placed it on the oilcloth. It was the latest issue of Spectral Stories, the one with the ghost looming over the séance. She said, “I have an idea.”
I looked blankly at the magazine. “I can’t even begin to guess.”
Berta leaned forward. “If we cannot go to Montgomery Hall to question our two suspects, then we will bring them to us.” She nudged Spectral Stories an inch closer to me. “We will conduct a séance.”
Coffee went down the wrong pipe. I coughed. “You’re joshing.”
“Indeed I am not. I have read so many stories about séances, I could play a medium in my sleep. What is more, I recently read a story that explained the proper technique for producing raps beneath a séance table. One need only affix a bit of metal to one’s bootheel and strike it on the chair leg. I have already asked the clerk at the Old Whaler’s Inn if we might use the parlor for such an event, and he said yes, provided we pay a small fee—”
“Stop.” I held up a hand. “Do you truly believe Theo Wainwright and Miss Murden will accept our invitation to a séance?”
“Yes. If, that is, the invitation is sufficiently threatening.”
“What sort of threat?” I thought of the Colt .25 I knew to be nested in Berta’s handbag.
“The murderer has surely grown anxious. They have killed twice, and if the invitations suggest that we know who the guilty party is, they will attend the séance if only to learn where they stand with us and our investigation.”
“Sounds … dangerous.”
“Nothing ventured, nothing gained.”
I sipped coffee, considering. It was a loopy ruse. Imprudent. Preposterous. “Okay,” I said. “I’m game.”
24
After breakfast, I took Cedric to pay his respects to a gatepost, while Berta visited the powder room in the Old Whaler’s Inn. Then we motored to Mystic to develop and mail our photographs. No Ralph in sight. Was he so hurt by seeing me lollygagging with Eustace that he’d quit the case? Or was he simply blending seamlessly into the backdrop?
And why did the entire topic make my stomach clench?
I parked on Main Street in front of Grady and Sons Camera. Cameras, boxes of film, a display case of camera accessories, bottles, and sheets of film crammed the little shop from floor to ceiling. The air smelled tartly of developing chemicals. The man behind the counter told us it would be an hour to develop the film, so we said we’d return.
“It’ll be seventy-five cents,” he added.
“In New York it costs only fifty cents to develop a roll,” Berta said with a huff.
The man merely shrugged.
Next, we found a stationer’s shop, where we purchased a box of blank cards and envelopes. We spent an hour in a coffee shop, writing out the invitations to our séance. We used up several before we got the wording just right. In my best finishing school penmanship they read,
The Great Madame Bergen, renowned spiritualist, requests your attendance at a private séance during which she will summon the spirit of the Lady in White and enjoin her to reveal ALL SHE KNOWS.
This afternoon, 13 November, 1923, 4:00 p.m.
The Old Whaler’s Inn
Carvington, Connecticut
This sounded, Berta and I agreed, sufficiently threatening.
“I can’t help thinking Miss Murden and Theo will simply laugh and toss these into the wastebin.” I licked an envelope seal. Writing the invitations reminded me of how I had neglected to hire the caterer and mail the invitations for my sister’s wedding. Guilt zinged through me.
We collected and paid for our photographs at the camera store. The snaps Berta had taken inside the Carvington Fish Co. warehouse were bright and clear. The others were grainy and dark, although one photograph of the boat going up the coastline was more or less decipherable.
“Wait,” I said, squinting, “it was a powerboat?”
“I told you it was a powerboat, Mrs. Woodby. I wish you would li—”
“Was there a powerboat inside the warehouse last night?”
“Why, no.”
“Don’t you remember how Abe Murden covered up that powerboat with a tarp when we spoke to him in the warehouse a few days ago?”
Berta tipped her head. “No. Wait—yes. Yes, I do recall that. He seemed a bit edgy about the entire business, almost as though he wished to hide the boat. Why would he wish to hide a powerboat?”
“I’m not sure, but considering he’s Miss Murden’s brother, and considering it was likely he sailing that powerboat in the cove last night, I think we ought to find out.”
We went to the post office and mailed the photographs express to Felix the Cat at Caffè Agostini on Macdougal Street.
The postal clerk looked at us a little funny, but the photographs were on their way. They would reach New York by midday tomorrow. I clung to a slender hope that Lem Fitzpatrick would hold up his end of the bargain and return the diamonds.
The only trouble was, even if he did, Theo wanted his diamonds back tonight.
* * *
We motored back to Carvington and, belatedly realizing that all potential courier boys were in school at that hour, hired Nat at the grocer’s to deliver the invitations to Theo and Miss Murden. We told him to try Montgomery Hall first and, if he did not find Theo there, go to Fisk Hall on campus. We had to pay Nat triple what a child would have charged, much to Berta’s chagrin. On the flip side, Nat had his own motorcar, so the invitations would be dispatched at the speed of diesel.
Then, we waited.
After lunch at the Red Rooster, we returned to Flintock’s Groceries. Nat told us that he had successfully hand-delivered the invitations to both Miss Murden and Theo at Montgomery Hall. After that, Berta said she needed to rest if she was to put on a convincing show as Madame Bergen. As soon as she said nap, I went all drowsy myself.
I plugged in my electric fire in my room and was just about to unbuckle my T-straps when there was a rap at my door. Cedric ignored it and curled up in the armchair.
I opened the door. It was Knobby Wrists.
“Telephone call for you in the parlor, madam,” he said.
“Lola?” Eustace said when I picked up the receiver. “What’s this about a séance at the inn? I assume those outlandish invitations are your doing?”
“Yes.” I explained how Berta and I hoped to draw out the murderer.
“Far-fetched, I must say,” Eustace said.
“Perhaps. But it just might work.”
“May I come?”
“Of course.”
A pause. “And … may I expect an answer from you this evening?”
I couldn’t keep him waiting around forever, could I? “Yes. Yes, you may.” I rang off.
In the lobby, I paused at the front desk. “Pardon me,” I said to Knobby Wrists, “but do you know much about the oyster trade?”
He looked up from his accounting book. “Oh yes. My u
ncle was an oysterman, and my grandfather before him. That was when there were still oysters to be had along this coast. They’re scarce now. No one managed the harvesting and seeding properly. As a child, however, I recall dredging oysters with Uncle Harold. How I hated it. I always grew seasick. Even now I feel sick whenever Mother fries oysters. In fact—” He sniffed the air. “—I believe she’s frying some now.”
I did smell salty oil on the air, and clattering sounds came from the kitchen. “Is there any reason, if a person happened to be harvesting oysters, why they might wish to keep their powerboat concealed?”
“A powerboat, you say?”
“Yes.”
“It is illegal to use a powerboat in the harvesting of wild oysters, at least here in Connecticut. And dredges may weigh no more than thirty pounds.”
“Illegal?”
“Yes. Oystermen may use them in their own cultivated beds, but there are none of those hereabouts. No public wild beds either.” Knobby Wrists peered at me. “Who has been dredging oysters with a powerboat?”
“Oh, no one,” I said. “Thank you.”
I went upstairs, itching to tell Berta what I’d just learned, but trying to wake her from a nap was as worthwhile as trying to wake a hibernating groundhog. I lay down in my own room, but rest was out of the question with all these churning thoughts. Miss Murden’s costly new shoes and motorcar. Her brother Abe’s powerboat sneaking along the dark coast. Lem Fitzpatrick’s suggestion that Carvington Fish Co. was selling oysters at below-market prices …
Miss Murden already had a solid reason to have bopped off Rudy: to keep from losing her lifelong housekeeping post—and her home—at Montgomery Hall. But it was also beginning to look as though the Murdens were operating some sort of shady oyster scheme. What if Rudy had been involved somehow, and as a result, the Murdens rubbed him out of the picture?
The question was, would someone really murder for … mollusks?
* * *
At four o’clock that afternoon, all the preparations for our séance were complete. Berta and I had dragged three sofas to the edges of the parlor to make way for a round table covered with a fringed velvet cloth. Upon the table sat a tarnished candelabra with unlit candles, a box of matches, a bowl of corn chowder, and a slice of Boston cream pie. Berta had explained to me and Mrs. Lawrence that spirits required sustenance, so any medium worth her salt presented food to boodle the spirits into communicating.
“You know we aren’t really going to communicate with a spirit,” I whispered to Berta when Mrs. Lawrence was out of earshot. We hadn’t had a second to converse privately, so I’d have to wait to tell her about how powerboats were illegal for oyster dredging. We hadn’t had a moment to eat anything, either, and as it was pressing on toward evening, I admit that I fleetingly considered stealing the ghost’s slice of Boston cream pie. “We’re only trying to spook the murderer into a misstep.”
“You never know,” Berta whispered back, rearranging the bowl of soup. “In any case, we must create an occult setting if we wish to unnerve the killer.”
Motion outside the parlor windows caught my eye, and I hurried over to see a gleaming black motorcar roll to a stop on Church Street. Mwinyi, tall and nimble in a blue wool overcoat and chauffeur’s cap, got out and opened the back door.
Not Theo, but Coral emerged, in a cream-colored coat with a white fur collar, a cream wool cloche, and displeasure written all over her elfin face.
Why was she here?
Then Theo emerged from the motorcar. He was bundled in a houndstooth wool coat that was too large for him—could it have been Rudy’s?—and he glanced up and down Church Street. Then he and Coral went side by side toward the inn’s front door.
I was about to turn away from the window when another luxe black motorcar drew up. Eustace’s Duesenberg.
Voices in the lobby made me turn away from the window. I went out to find Berta greeting Theo and Coral.
“I knew it would be you pair,” Theo said with a smirk. “Madame Bergen! What nonsense. And I can’t say I much appreciate the threatening tone of the invitation. You two are really audacious, do you know that?”
“Yes, we do,” I said. “Please take a seat at the table in the parlor, just through here.”
Coral was removing her hat. “I adore the head scarf, Mrs. Lundgren. Very gypsy. When Theo and Eustace mentioned there was to be a séance, I simply couldn’t stay away. What fun! I wonder if we could badger Rudy’s spirit into communicating with us. He could tell us what happened, and we’d be done with this. Where should I put my coat?”
“You may place it on one of the sofas in the parlor,” Berta said.
“Peachy.”
Coral and Theo went into the parlor.
“I saw Lord Sudley outside,” I whispered to Berta, “but what about Miss Murden? Should we wait for her?”
Coral swung around. “Oh, Miss Murden is coming. She told me so at lunch. I don’t think she’d miss this for the world.”
Eustace was the next to step through the front door.
“Lola,” he said, wearing a guarded expression. “You look lovely. Hello, Mrs. Lundgren. Lola, might I have a word?” He glanced around the lobby. “In private?”
Here we went. He wished to know whether it was thumbs-up or thumbs-down re me becoming Lady Sudley. And I hadn’t yet decided on my answer. “All right,” I said with forced cheeriness. “We’re still waiting on Miss Murden, so I suppose we have a few moments.”
Berta looked disapproving. “I shall make the final preparations for the séance.”
“Why don’t we go back to the kitchen?” I said to Eustace. “We may speak privately there. The innkeeper said she was going out for the afternoon. She wants no part in occult activities.”
Eustace chuckled. “I can’t fault her for that.” He followed me back to the kitchen and shut the door behind us. He looked down at me, twisting his hat in his hands. “Well, then. Here we are.”
“Yes.” My eyes strayed to the Boston cream pie on the kitchen table. Good golly, a slice would be nice.
“I’ve got some news,” Eustace said.
“Oh?”
“I’m booked on the Queen Mary to Liverpool in a few days’ time. I’ve purchased two first-class stateroom fares.”
“You’re returning to England? What about the murder investigation?”
“What of it, my dear girl? You and your Swedish sidekick have been blundering about for a week now, with absolutely nothing to show for it—”
“Not nothing.”
“—and I have my estate to run. I received word that Sudley House’s roof has sprung a leak, and you’ve no idea what a headache it is to manage the construction of a new roof on one of these old places. Requires a military mind and a bottomless bank account. At any rate, I must return home. I don’t think we’ll ever get to the bottom of Rudy’s death—or Glenn’s, either, although I suspect his death was really something to do with the radio station and all the petty jealousies among those actor types. I’d put my money on whoever has gotten the job as The Filmore Vacuette Hour’s new host.”
“But—”
“I shall pay you and Mrs. Lundgren for your time. She’ll need the money, of course, and you will probably enjoy having a little something of your own to spend until we’re wed, won’t you, my proud little pigeon? After that, everything that is mine will be yours. It will be pleasant to see you dressed as a lady at last—we must do something about that before we board the ship, actually, because I always run into people I know shipboard and we can’t have you looking like a sad little shopgirl, now, can we?”
My fingernails nipped into my palms. “Eustace, we never did discuss where we would live if we were to be wed. In order for me to keep up my detective agency, I really must live in New York City—unless, of course, I could convince Berta to move to England and set up shop there, but she has the lowest opinion of stewed tomatoes for breakfast—”
“Keep up your detective agency? While you’re marr
ied to me? Lady Sudley, private eye? You must be joking, my dear.”
“I’m not.”
“But that would not do at all. Why, it’s—it’s patently absurd! What can you be thinking? You’ll have charities to run, village fetes at which to appear, not to mention keeping up with all my social circle.”
“You wish me to be a hostess and nothing else?”
“How can that possibly come as a surprise?”
I had no idea. Perhaps I was mad. Or merely a numskull. Either way, I finally had my answer. “Eustace, I think you’re an absolute peach and a prince among men and all that, but I’m afraid there is no way I can become your wife.”
“You’d rather be an impoverished gumshoe, flirting with danger and subsisting on tinned beans?”
“Berta would never allow a tin of beans to pass her threshold—but, yes. Yes, I suppose I would.”
“But, my dear, you require someone to look after you.”
“Actually, I think I manage quite well looking after myself.”
Eustace hung there for a moment, speechless. Then he moved to the table, dragged out a chair, and sank into it.
I got out some plates and forks from the hutch, sat down across from him, and cut us each a slice of pie. “Here,” I said. “Eating will make you feel better.”
Eustace grimaced down at the pie. “I don’t enjoy pastry.”
Chewing pie, I poked around the kitchen and found a covered dish of fried oysters. “What about these?”
“Oh, very well.” Eustace took three oysters and set them on his plate. I turned and replaced the dish beside the stove. Hopefully Mrs. Lawrence wouldn’t mind me helping myself. I sat down again.
“These oysters are delicious,” Eustace said. He pushed his plate toward me. “Try one.”
I didn’t really want a fried oyster. I wanted more pie. But I dutifully ate one. “Scrumptious.”
“You’re lying.” Eustace’s lips stretched into a nasty line. “You do realize that I hired you to look into Rudy’s death only because I thought you were beautiful, don’t you?”