Ghost Ups Her Game

by Carolyn Hart

  The Rescue Express careened beside me. Cinders flew. Coal smoke obscured the horizon. I ignored the moonlight-silvered cars and swooped from Rose Bower to downtown Adelaide and a ledge of a second-story window at the police department. I landed on a particular window ledge, that of Police Chief Sam Cobb. I knew his office well. It was the work of only a moment to carefully tuck the pieces of paper on the corner of the ledge, move inside, open the window, undo the screen, grab the pieces. I closed the screen, whirled, skirted the old leather sofa that faced the windows. There was enough light from the street to reach Sam’s desk and turn on the lamp. Coal smoke pulsed around me. The mournful cry of the whistle was deafening. I covered my ears as I moved wearily back toward the window and dropped in defeat on to the sofa. Coal smoke surrounded me like Poe’s vortex. Wheels clacked.

  I spoke in a breathless, hopeful voice. ‘I can explain.’

  Wiggins’s deep voice was a mixture of despair and disbelief. ‘Precept Three. Precept Six.’

  Quick as a star pupil called to recite, I said respectfully, ‘“Work behind the scenes without making your presence known.”’ A quick breath necessitated by the pall of coal smoke and chagrin. ‘“Make every effort not to alarm earthly creatures.” Wiggins, I was doing my best. It absolutely was never my intention—’

  He cut me off. ‘In all my experience, no emissary has ever fled the Rescue Express.’ There was shocked emphasis on ever.

  ‘Only in service of the mission. Here.’ I held out my hand with the now rather limp pieces of paper curling on my hot sweaty palm. ‘The contravention of the Precepts occurred only because I was carrying out my duties.’ I knew I was babbling, which would evoke a sneer from Iris Gallagher. ‘When I opened the victim’s billfold in an effort to discover his identity, I found a folded square of paper that he kept with the bills. That suggested to me that the paper was important to him. I was holding the billfold when the hall door opened. A woman came in and when she saw him, she cried out and I dropped his billfold but I still held—’

  ‘Bailey Ruth.’

  I fell silent. I knew what awaited. A return to Heaven in disgrace. Perhaps I would never again be permitted to serve as an emissary. Like a drowning victim, faces and lives flashed before my eyes from my first effort that saved dear little redheaded Bayroo, my grandniece and namesake, to the recent rescue of a woman desperate to save her sister. I drooped. Hot tears slid down my cheeks.

  A strange sound. Not a cougar’s wail. Not the squeak of air from whirl-a-cars at the amusement park. Not the rump-a-dum-dum of the bass drum in a parade.

  Rumble. Humph. Rumble.

  I sagged in relief. Wiggins was struggling to suppress a booming guffaw.

  ‘… have to say … poor fellow … pulling on trousers while he tried to push up the sash … all bunched up …’

  I was wise enough to maintain a respectful silence.

  Two deep breaths. Another. ‘Ah. But,’ Wiggins tried to sound stern, ‘next time when in a difficult situation, remember, Silence is Golden. If you had managed to wrest the vase from him and the slips had fallen out, he might have thought he’d dropped the vase, but hopefully …’ Wiggins broke off. ‘Oh dear. A situation in Tumbulgum.’

  The lovely little Australian town at the confluence of the Rous and Tweed Rivers, pop. 349, occasionally received Wiggins’s attention. A situation could be anything from a lost sheepdog to a broken heart. I wished the sheepdog/young (or old) lover resolution but hopefully not soon.

  ‘… Oh dear – Bailey Ruth,’ his voice was fading. ‘The Precepts. Iris and Robert need—’

  The Rescue Express roared away. Coal smoke faded.

  Helping Robert was a pleasure. In my view, Iris needed a personality makeover, but she was also my charge, so I must deal with her. As an emissary, I would fulfill my duty, though taking Iris down a peg or two would give me great pleasure.

  Sam’s quiet office offered respite. And perhaps the square of paper so carefully kept with the currency might point to a solution to the murder and I would be free of Iris. In my experience, a sheet of paper secreted in a billfold or purse meant a matter of importance was involved. I was eager to deal with the scraps of paper. But first I required some energy. I pushed up from the sofa, walked around to Sam’s worn desk. I dropped the limp scraps on the desktop, pulled out the bottom left-hand drawer, and seized a bag of M&Ms. I poured a handful. Crunch. Munch. Another handful and I was in Sam’s chair, looking down at my booty.

  I never excelled at jigsaw puzzles but, aided by a third handful of crackly candies, I separated out the pieces of the note from the slicker paper of the program. I shifted these bits of paper and guessed and said a little prayer to St Anthony. He is a great help in finding something lost and I thought he could stretch a point and suggest missing words to me.

  The folded-up message obviously was short. Here’s what I had with the pieces I managed to save:

  … door … and I saw Ev … take … he … ay. I watc … the reflec … in the mirror. The … ss was full. She … ut … ray on the tab … She didn’t add anyth … to the gla … and drank all of … This occur … Marc …

  … hew … ert

  I tried a version on Sam’s yellow legal pad:

  The door opened and I saw Ev— (Eva, Evangeline, Eve, Evelyn, Evita) take the tray. I watched the reflection in the mirror. The glass was full. She put the tray on the table. She didn’t add anything to the glass and drank all of it. This occurred March …

  Matthew Lambert

  The last was a scrawl, obviously part of a signature.

  I felt prickly. You know what I mean. The sound of a door closing in an empty house. A vulture circling in the sky. The shifting of unsteady snow on a mountainside. The folded square might have been anything, but the last thing I expected was a note written by Lambert with a peculiar message.

  He saw a door open. He watched in the mirror as a woman accepted a tray. He reported that she added nothing to a glass, drank all of the contents.

  Matt Lambert recorded the event and kept that information with him. Why?

  I put the legal pad with my transcription squarely in the center of Sam’s desk. I pushed up from his chair, hurried to the old-fashioned blackboard on one wall. Sam disdained modern dry erase boards.

  I picked up the chalk, wrote:

  Matt Lambert carried a folded square of paper in his wallet. The existing remnants are on the desk along with a possible transcription. Lambert reports an apparently mundane scene he observed, but thought the information important enough to carry with him.

  I paused, searching for the right words. Sam wouldn’t be interested in a door closing in an empty house or a circling vulture or the expectation of an avalanche.

  I wrote on the blackboard: No one carries information – secretes information – unless the facts contained are critically important. Respectfully, Officer M. Loy

  I underscored the message on the blackboard.

  P.S. The note was accidentally damaged and some pieces were lost, resulting in an incomplete record.

  The signature would alert Sam to my involvement. M. Loy was my tribute to Myrna Loy, who starred as Nora Charles in The Thin Man films based on Dashiell Hammett’s characters. In the past I’d Appeared in a French blue uniform as Officer M. Loy. Perhaps tomorrow. But there was much to do tonight.

  The clock struck midnight as I arrived at the administration building on the campus of Goddard College. It was utterly silent inside the venerable building, which was erected in the early 1900s. I hovered just inside the door of Matt Lambert’s first-floor office. I had no need to flick the light switch. The flashlight in Gage Gallagher’s hand afforded good vision.

  Gage was dressed in black from the silk scarf that hid her hair to a tight-fitting turtleneck to yoga pants. Even her sneakers were black. They looked like old, worn, high-school basketball shoes. She wore black leather gloves. She was perfectly dressed to slip unseen through the night.

  I remembered her scarcely concealed
impatience as the line progressed across the ballroom floor. Was a surreptitious visit to Lambert’s office the reason she’d been so eager to be free of the room?

  I remembered Robert’s occasional worried glance at Gage despite his preoccupation with Iris and the murder he had not reported.

  I’d taken it for granted that Robert and Gage were in love or about to be in love. Robert was concerned about Gage’s mother. He might better be concerned about Gage. Slipping late at night into the office of a murder victim suggested Gage was not an innocent bystander, that there was some incriminating information in the office that would link her to the crime.

  She stood by an opulent desk with a fancy tooled red leather desk pad to protect the rosewood surface from scratches. A picture of Joyce Lambert sat on one corner, a younger, happier Joyce, brown curls cut short, soft lips curved in a sweet smile.

  Gage aimed the flashlight beam at the top right drawer. All the drawers were pulled out. Folders littered the floor. She pulled out another folder, skimmed the contents, dropped it on a growing pile. Ten more minutes and all the drawers were empty.

  Gage stepped to the desk chair, perched on the edge. She rested the flashlight on the desk and turned to the computer monitor. She apparently knew the password. Several clicks later, the cursor moved to a file midway down the screen. She lifted her index finger to click on the mouse, stopped.

  I’d learned enough about computers in previous missions to understand her frustration. If she called up a file, the last time that file was seen would be recorded.

  Her face squeezed in thought. She leaned forward, highlighted at least fifteen files, held down the delete and shift keys, clicked, and the screen was blank. She put the cursor on Close, hesitated, gently returned the mouse to the pad.

  ‘Oh, good.’ I clapped my hands in approval. I intended to do a search of his contacts, type in Ev in hopes of discovering the person who took the tray with the full glass.

  Gage rocketed from the chair, knocking the flashlight to the floor. She stood like a creature at bay, head jerking from side to side, panicked gaze searching the room.

  I realized I’d spoken aloud. I’m afraid my impulsive speech reflected a lifetime and beyond of acting first, thinking later. Bobby Mac once urged me, ‘Honey, the next time the principal makes you mad, take a deep breath, maybe five deep breaths, pretend you are in a monastery in Tibet. The gong just sounded. It means: Shut up.’

  Gage’s breaths came in quick, short gasps. She backed away from the desk, wide eyes flitting in every direction.

  ‘Don’t be frightened.’ I hesitated. I enjoy swirling colors and the effervescent experience of becoming visible, but my unexpected Appearance might utterly unnerve a young woman engaged in a highly questionable endeavor.

  Gage took several backward steps, her eyes still seeking me.

  Glass shattered. The unmistakable sound was followed by the tinkle of shards striking the floor.

  Gage and I both whirled toward the bank of windows. The only light came from the flashlight that had rolled across the room and lodged against a sofa. The low beam illuminated drapes billowing inward. Pieces of glass glittered on the floor.

  My nose wrinkled at the rank stench of gasoline.

  A gloved hand gripped a portion of drape, yanked. A grill lighter flared, igniting cloth wadded at the end of a stick. The stick with its fireball end sailed through the broken window and landed on the desk. The near drape blazed. Fire erupted on the rug, a sofa, a chair. Black smoke eddied in a current of air from the smashed window. In an instant, suffocating smoke was too thick for vision. Or breath.

  Smoke rises. I dropped to the floor. I crawled on my knees, one hand out in front, seeking, searching. Flames seemed everywhere. Smoke stung my eyes. Despite the crackle of the fire, I heard labored breathing quite near. My hand touched a sneaker. I gripped an ankle, shouted. ‘Get down. Crawl. This way.’ I tugged and she dropped to the floor.

  I released her ankle, found an elbow. I took a firm grip as I tried to recall the layout of the office. The desk faced a wall of bookcases with windows to the left, the door to the right. The door was our goal. Beyond the door was air and life.

  I struggled to breathe. Gage coughed and coughed and coughed again. I pulled her elbow and steered us away from the windows. A foot. Another. Another. My right hand kept sweeping ahead of us and then I touched the wall. ‘We’re almost there.’ I was gasping. I didn’t know if she heard. ‘Keep moving.’

  It seemed forever in the foul smoke and growing heat from the flames until I touched the surface of the door to the outer office. I struggled to my feet, pulling Gage up. My shaking hand closed on a knob. I turned the knob, pulled. The door swung in. Blessed air soothed my nose and throat. Gage shook free of my grip, hurried forward. I heard her stumbling steps ahead of me. She was on her way to the outer door that opened into the hall.

  Sirens shrilled. A whoosh. Pellets of cold water doused me as water spewed from automatic sprinklers. More cool air as Gage opened the hall door. In the light from the flames, I saw her slight figure in the open doorway. She half turned, called out in a shaky voice, ‘Whoever you are, are you all right? Where are you?’

  ‘I’m fine. Thank you.’ I admired her willingness to brave the flames if necessary, to help her rescuer.

  ‘I don’t see you.’ There were tears in her voice. Was her rescuer in that blazing room?

  I spoke firmly. ‘Leave now. No one will know you were here.’

  With that, she took a last searching look at the empty anteroom and the fiery flames in Matt’s office, then turned and plunged into the central hall.

  I reached the hall and heard running steps. Gage would escape before the fire engines arrived. Now that she was safe, I willed myself outside the building to the windows of Matt Lambert’s office. I wasn’t surprised that I saw no one. I was too late to catch the arsonist. I rose in the air, looking for headlights, saw several. But there was no guarantee the arsonist had arrived or departed by car. I tried to estimate how long Gage and I struggled to escape. At least three or four minutes. A car would be long gone. I circled back to the nearest exit to look for Gage. There was no trace of her.

  I sought refuge in a room at Rose Bower. This time I made sure there was no occupant. The nameplate on the door attracted me: Repose. The serene room was sparsely furnished. A contemplative Buddha occupied a wall niche. I took a leisurely shower, blew dry my red curls, chose a simple cotton nightie. The air conditioning was quite cool so I slipped on a scarlet silk robe embroidered with a golden dragon.

  I settled on a rather austere sofa. I was discouraged. I couldn’t pretend the day had gone smoothly. I reviewed my lack of rapport with Robert and Iris, my worry about Gage’s suspicious actions, the damage to the square of paper from Matt’s billfold, Wiggins’s shock at an emissary fleeing the Rescue Express, the escape of the arsonist. To lift my morale, I thought how nice it would be to have a glass of cream sherry. I smiled as I picked up the glass, lifted it to see the ruby shimmer. I took a sip and admired quotes from Confucius in bamboo frames. I took one to heart.

  Think of tomorrow, the past can’t be mended.

  FOUR

  Summer sunlight gilded downtown Adelaide. The early morning air was already warm enough for new chicks. Mama Mississippi kites circled above the park across from City Hall, alert for any approach to a tree with a nest. I stood in the entrance to a dress shop not yet open. I admired beach pants with a wild pattern of orange and blue swirls and a matching sky-blue T-shirt flung over a slatted white wooden chair. Bright colors. Bright day. I checked for pedestrians and Appeared. Cheered by the summery display, I chose a sky-blue cotton blouse with a lace-edged hem, a slim white skirt, white sandals. Each sandal sported a shiny blue bow. Bright me.

  Today was a new beginning. I would do my best for Iris, no matter how rude she might be. I took a deep breath of summer and hurried to Lulu’s Café. Lulu’s is an Adelaide institution, offering breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I stepped inside
and loved the mingled scents of coffee, bacon, and cinnamon.

  The tables in the center of the café were occupied, the four booths full but, how Heavenly, there was a spot at the counter. I knew it was meant for me. I slid on to the red leather stool and flashed a smile at Sam Cobb.

  ‘Claire’s out of town so I planned to eat here anyway.’ His deep voice was pleasant. ‘Figured you’d come. No uniform today.’ That was his tactful way of telling me he’d found the information about the square of paper and knew Officer Loy was back in Adelaide.

  The waitress held up a carafe. ‘Coffee?’ At our nod, she poured. ‘What’ll it be?’

  Sam ordered an egg-white omelet and side of yogurt. With a sigh.

  I gave him a commiserating glance, but my sympathy didn’t stretch to imitation. I smiled at the waitress. ‘Bacon, two sausage patties, omelet with mushrooms, onions, cheddar cheese, and pimiento, hash browns, Texas toast with cream gravy.’

  Sam looked pained, then as the waitress turned away, he was businesslike. ‘Who’re you here for?’ His brown eyes were intent.

  ‘I’m not sure.’ My smile was innocent. ‘There was some confusion on my arrival. I’ll try to find out today.’ I didn’t feel dishonest, though possibly a bit disingenuous. But Iris not only spurned help, I didn’t see she needed assistance. On the other hand, Gage might well be in trouble and Robert was hanging out to dry if anyone saw him jettison the weapon. ‘I haven’t learned much about Matt Lambert.’ I rapidly explained my unintentional grip on the folded square from Lambert’s billfold and its later adventures, resulting in the pieces on his desk. I gave Sam my most beguiling smile. ‘I’m here to learn.’ I was confident that Iris and Robert were innocent so it wouldn’t be helpful to place them at the crime scene. As for the fire at Lambert’s office, I knew nothing about the identity of the arsonist.