by Emma Jameson
“I like that,” Ben said. “We’re alone in the house and will be till morning. Should we take the next step?”
“What?” Juliet stared at him.
“The talking board.” He sounded surprised that she needed explication. “We were all set to try it before Gaston interrupted. The house is dark and quiet. It might be a long time before we find such perfect conditions again.”
“Oh. Yes. Yes, of course,” she babbled, embarrassed by where her mind had gone.
“You’re sure? Our attic expedition gave us a couple of scares,” he reminded her. “Blackout or no, if you scream, Mrs. Parry may burst in to see what she’s missing.”
“Scream?” Juliet scoffed. “What do you take me for, a ninny? No matter what happens, you won’t hear a peep from me. Not if a voice from beyond speaks my name. Not even if we conjure Anne Boleyn in search of her missing head.”
* * *
To Juliet’s way of thinking, it seemed vital to prepare their surroundings. As Ben focused on the blue lamp, filling its reservoir with paraffin oil and fashioning a wick out of medical gauze, she raided Mrs. Cobblepot’s cache of emergency candle stubs. There weren’t enough candlestick holders for all the stubs, so Juliet popped them into kitchen jars of various shapes and colors. The result was eclectic and surprisingly pleasing: a flickering green glow on the bookshelf, a red one beside the clock, and a line of yellow ones on the mantel.
“Here we are,” Ben said, lighting the makeshift wick. “It will burn fast, but I reckon it’ll last for a half-hour, perhaps more.”
“It’s perfect. Conducive to phantasmagorical communion,” Juliet said as the lamp’s cool blue light fell upon the talking board, highlighting HELLO, GOOD-BYE, and the long, deep scratches.
As per Revelations of a Reluctant Medium, the rest of the preparations were simple: two straight-backed chairs arranged face-to-face for “Petitioners to the Spirit Realm,” preferably male and female. “This universal dichotomy,” wrote Madame Daragon, “yields the most interesting results, particularly when the door is locked and the Petitioners are undisturbed.”
Juliet was inclined to agree. A man, a woman, candlelight, and a locked door? Interesting results indeed.
She sat down. Ben took his place opposite her, roughly four feet away, and said, “This won’t do.” He dragged his chair toward her till their knees touched. “That’s better. We’re meant to make a table with our legs and balance the board on it.”
“I feel a bit ridiculous,” Juliet said, though perhaps that wasn’t the most appropriate word.
“So do I, but the book was written in 1899. I suppose if Madame Daragon wanted to sell books, she had to throw in a thrill or two. Here we are,” Ben said, placing the planchette, a miniature table with a hole in the center, on the board. “Ready?”
She nodded.
He rested the fingertips of both hands on the planchette. Juliet did the same. On the mantel, the flame inside a pink jar flickered and danced, as if bedeviled by a curious draft.
Ben’s eyes were closed. By candlelight, he looked more beautiful than perhaps she’d ever seen him, the planes of his face perfectly delineated by shadow. She meditated on that for a time, enjoying herself, before suddenly realizing a few minutes had passed without any movement of the planchette.
“Is one of us meant to say something?” she whispered.
He opened his eyes. “Have you forgotten Madame Daragon’s advice?” he asked, chuckling. “‘Empty your brain and become a vessel for the beyond.’”
“Oh. Right.”
He closed his eyes again. Rather than gaze at his face, which was probably keeping her grounded in the tangible plane, Juliet closed hers as well. I shall think of nothing. Nothing whatsoever. My brain is empty, which is hardly the sort of thing one should strive for, but there it is.
Something creaked.
Juliet resolutely kept her eyes closed. After a moment, Ben said, “It’s only Humphrey.”
She heard a pattering of feline feet. It was very hard to achieve thoughtlessness when the slightest stimuli triggered an avalanche.
It’s not my fault I have an unusually overstocked brain. I’ve spent years expanding my intellectual arsenal.
“Do you hear it?” Ben whispered.
Juliet’s eyes popped open. “What? Did it move?” she asked, looking at the planchette.
“No. Footsteps.”
She listened. Nothing. Reflexively, she drummed her fingers lightly on the planchette, which shot toward the word HELLO.
Fenton House’s floorboards creaked. One heavy footfall, then another. As Juliet’s heart hammered wildly, a voice spoke.
“Ju…. It’s your husband, Ethan. I’ve come back to you, my love.”
Juliet screamed.
The Bounder
Ben leapt to his feet, sending the board and planchette flying. “How did you get in?”
“Why, your patient entrance, of course.” Ethan Bolivar’s booming voice was good-humored and boundlessly confident. To Ben he sounded like the star of a boys’ wireless program: a fearless adventurer who laughed in the face of death, dug up buried treasure, and rescued damsels between adverts for tinned soup.
“I braved the blackout in search of my wife,” Ethan said. “What a shock to find her alone with another man, in the throes of seduction.”
“Seduction?” Ben spluttered.
“For heaven’s sake.” Lady Juliet switched on the front room’s twin electric lights. The glare swiftly transformed Ethan from a shadow to a man.
“Seduction,” Ethan repeated gravely. At least six foot four, he was broad-shouldered and barrel-chested, with jet-black hair and a mustache like Clark Gable’s. “When I arrived in the village, I went first to the Sheared Sheep, which received me very kindly. There I was told my beloved Juliet was under the spell of a vagabond quack.”
“Quack?” Lady Juliet balled up her fists. “You’ll quack like a duck when I’m done with you. It’s been months! Not a letter. Not a phone call. Now you return like a thief in the night to accuse me of infidelity?”
“Darling—”
“I’m not your darling. Not after the way you carried on with Lenora. With Helen. And heaven knows how many more?”
“I deserve your recriminations,” Ethan said smoothly. His heroic chin was cleft by a dimple; his Savile Row suit was set off by all the right accoutrements, including a silk necktie and a bowler hat. “If only I’d known you craved a letter, I would have posted a thousand. I would have sent cables daily and phoned weekly. My neglect has driven you into the arms of a lesser man.”
Lady Juliet gave a strangled cry, lunging for him.
“Stop!” Interposing himself, Ben squared his shoulders, standing as tall as he could in the midst of such titans. “Listen, Bolivar. I’m prepared to overlook your trespassing, but the rest is out of bounds. Lady Juliet is my friend. No more, no less. We spent the afternoon in Barking. By the time we got back, it was too dark for her to drive to Belsham Manor, so I offered her my guest room.”
“A likely story,” Ethan said.
“Yes, it is,” Ben shot back. “If we were carrying on, why on earth would she park her car outside my house for the entire village to see?”
Ethan stared at Ben for several seconds, then he pointedly turned to Lady Juliet. “Who is this Bones character?”
She tried again to lunge at Ethan. Ben blocked her.
“I mean it,” Ethan said. “What sort of man entertains a married woman in a pitch black house and shamelessly calls it innocent?”
“You,” Lady Juliet barked. “And I’ll have you know it was innocent. See the spirit board? See the planchette?” Scooping it off the floor, she waved the planchette under his nose. “Fenton House is haunted. You’d know that if you hadn’t spent the last year gallivanting across the Continent.”
“Spiritualism?” Ethan frowned. “You’re cleverer than that. Spiritualism is a shell game. A way to milk cash out of dotty old bats.”
“Ju
st because you see an angle to everything under the sun doesn’t—” She broke off. “It doesn’t matter,” she said, visibly straining for composure. “You’re here. I’m even glad to see you. Tomorrow, first thing after breakfast, we’ll get those divorce papers signed, and you can start your life anew.”
“Divorce?” Ethan’s dark eyes widened. “Ju, sweetheart, I’ve just said it. I’ve returned for one reason—to win you back.”
Ben, who was still between them, decided it was time to step aside. He would have preferred to order Ethan out of his house, but Lady Juliet’s earlier explanation of Helen Archer’s behavior—that a woman couldn’t hate a man so much without also loving him—had shaken his assumptions about her feelings. Did she still love her estranged husband? If so, Ben’s duty was clear. He couldn’t stand in the way of a potential reconciliation, literally or figuratively.
With the way cleared, Ethan smiled at Lady Juliet. He opened his arms wide, which left his chest unguarded. She shoved him with both hands.
“Ju,” Ethan gasped, arms windmilling.
Ben didn’t move a muscle. He enjoyed watching Ethan sit down hard. The wall sconces rattled, a book fell off the shelf, and Humphrey galloped out of the room.
“Ethan.” Lady Juliet took a deep breath. “I lost my head. Are you injured?”
“No,” he said weakly.
She kicked him. “How about now?”
“I adore you,” he moaned, shielding his face with his hands.
Ben wanted to applaud, but it was probably inappropriate for the village physician to cheer on bodily harm.
“All right. That’s enough.” Dragging Lady Juliet to one side, Ben gave Ethan a hand up. “On your feet.”
It took most of his strength to haul the big man off the floor. As Ethan stood, panting and gazing mournfully at Lady Juliet, Ben retrieved the man’s bowler, which had been knocked off.
“You saw yourself in. Now see yourself out. Switch on the office light as you go,” he added, hoping the sight of Bobby’s corpse would administer a well-deserved shock on the way out.
“But, Doctor, I’m hurt. I need treatment,” Ethan said.
“You fell on your arse. Here’s your treatment: take that arse out of my house before something worse befalls it.” He pressed the hat into Ethan’s hands.
“I can take a hint,” Ethan said. “Juliet, you heard him. Gather your things.”
“You’re not giving orders. You’re leaving.” Ben went to the front door and put his hand on the knob. “Now.”
Ethan glared at him. Ben returned the look stonily, wondering if he’d be forced to dust off his right hook. If memory served, he hadn’t used it since age fourteen, but he hadn’t turned pacifist in the intervening years, either.
That must have shone in his eyes, because Ethan’s demeanor changed. He smiled at Ben as if he’d always intended to go quietly.
He’s a good judge of character, Ben thought. I suppose a con man must be.
“My love, I understand how very cross you are,” Ethan told Lady Juliet. “Therefore I’ll return to my room at the Sheared Sheep and ponder my crimes. Can’t I persuade you to join me for a nightcap?”
Lady Juliet trembled like a rocket prior to launch, so Ben flung the front door wide. Light spilled into his garden, prompting an ARP officer to blow his whistle from several yards away.
“Douse that light!”
“You heard the man,” Ben told Ethan. “Go, and I’ll close the door. Stay, and I’ll keep it open till the officer arrives to issue a citation. Then I’ll turn you in for trespassing.”
Ethan sighed. “Goodbye, Ju, darling. I’ll call upon you at the manor tomorrow.”
“You’ll be received with tea and cake—if you sign the papers.”
Ethan stepped onto the porch, then turned. Straightening his back, he put on his hat, which added three inches, and looked down at Ben. “You haven’t seen the last of me.”
Ben couldn’t think of a retort that wouldn’t be unimaginatively profane, so he slammed the door in Ethan’s face.
“I’ll lock it,” he told Lady Juliet. “I’ll lock the patient entrance, too. Perhaps I’ll check the windows for good measure,” he added, mostly as a joke, but she made no response. She wasn’t crying, but she had the stiff posture and blank face of someone who would soon break down. When he finished securing the ground floor, he found her where he’d left her, standing in the middle of his front room, staring into space.
“Right.” Ben spoke sharply enough to cut through her daze. “Follow me.”
“Please, Dr. Bones. Don’t force me to talk about it,” she quavered. “I couldn’t possibly—”
“No discussion.” Taking her by the hand, he steered her toward the guest room, which Mrs. Cobblepot kept in a state of perfect readiness. “Have a seat. I’ll be back momentarily.”
When he returned, Lady Juliet wasn’t sitting. She paced like a caged tiger.
“You’re very kind to offer me this room,” she said. “But I can’t allow Ethan to run rampant. I can walk to the Sheared Sheep easily enough. You needn’t worry, I know this village blindfolded. Someone has to tell him what an insufferable, boorish, egomaniacal—”
“No. Sorry. Doctor’s orders.” He pressed a glass into her hands. “Drink it. All of it, no waffling. Down in one.”
“I don’t want a drink.”
“Yes, you do. It’s medicinal.” He’d poured her the same amount of scotch he would pour himself after a terrible shock. A woman of her stature and unstinting good health would probably require every drop.
Lady Juliet sniffed the glass. Shrugging, she knocked back the whiskey like it was water.
No dainty cordials for her. And no tears either, at least while I’m in the room. That’s grit, he thought with some pleasure.
“Well done,” he said, collecting the glass. “I’m off to bed. I suggest you turn in as well. I realize Ethan’s reappearance may cause a strain, but I’m counting on you to help me tomorrow. We can’t forget about Mrs. Archer. She may be innocent, and we can’t rely on Gaston to work that out.”
Something flared in her eyes. He’d hit upon a nerve, and precisely the right one. Not daring to risk this positive result by pushing any harder, Ben exited, closing the door behind him.
* * *
He should have been asleep on his feet, given the day’s events, but relaxation eluded him. He tried to read a bit of the new du Maurier novel, Rebecca, but found himself reading the same paragraph twice without comprehension. His unread issues of The Lancet and the New England Journal of Medicine proved even less engaging. Lady Juliet’s relationship with Ethan Bolivar, whether it ended in divorce, reconciliation, or a longer separation, was none of his affair. But that didn’t stop him from thinking about it.
At least now I know why she married him. Well-dressed. Well-spoken. Physique like a circus strongman. All he needed was a cheetah skin and some mustache wax.
He went downstairs, had a dose of his own medicine—scotch—and went back up, resolved to get in bed and hope sleep followed.
He’d fallen into a ritual for undressing, now that Mrs. Cobblepot had taken charge of his laundry. His jacket went on its peg, as did his tie, since neither could be washed, only aired or spot-cleaned. Shrugging out of his braces, he stepped out of his trousers and draped them over a chair, braces still attached. They would be worn again tomorrow. He had three pairs of trousers, one for best and two for everything else. They would last another five years if he treated them well, and that meant putting them through Mrs. Cobblepot’s mangle as rarely as possible.
His shirt, vest, socks, and sock garters went in the basket; his shoes went under the bed. Mrs. Cobblepot had designated the top drawer of the highboy for his pajamas. They were starched and ironed according to her high standards, which left them stiff and scratchy. His preference was to sleep nude, but Gaston had promised air raid drills during the night, as well as the day. Ignoring them wasn’t an option; every villager was obligated to vacate
their beds and take cover in the nearest approved building or Anderson shelter. Exiting Fenton House au naturel during a drill was unlikely to be well received.
Wasn’t there a story about Ethan leaving town naked? Something about Juliet locking him out of Belsham Manor without his clothes?
Chuckling, he got into bed, switched off the lamp, and closed his eyes.
* * *
THWACK
He sat up. Why had the nurse let him nap so long?
After a few seconds, Ben realized he wasn’t in a cot at London’s St. Thomas Hospital. His sleep-addled brain had mistaken the thwack for the sound of a patient’s chart slapping against his chest. One of the senior physicians had delighted in waking exhausted junior doctors that way.
Turning on the light, he immediately saw the source of the noise: his cane, which had fallen on the floor. Had he left it against the nightstand again?
He was too sleepy to care. The bedside clock read five minutes past four, which gave him plenty of time before that infernal hammer beat the double brass bells. He was about to switch off the lamp when it hit him.
I haven’t used my cane all week.
The hairs on the back of his neck prickled. He’d tucked the cane in the back of his wardrobe, hoping he could delay its use a bit longer.
The wardrobe door was slightly ajar.
“Lucy?”
No answer. His heart thudded in his ears.
He sniffed. No French perfume. Only the faint odors of laundry soap, drawer sachets, and floor wax.
