Living Spectres: a Chesterton Holte, Gentleman Haunt Mystery

by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro

  Moncrief changed the direction of his motion and said, “Oh. It’s you.”

  “What’s happened?” Holte asked, meaning the sudden influx of ghosts. “What brought them here?”

  “Something happened in French Indo-China, or maybe Batavia. Something natural, I gather. Probably a flood, by the look of them. Perhaps a tidal wave or a typhoon. Anyway, something drastic.” Moncrief sounded very disinterested. “There are thousands of them.”

  Holte did not bother to question Moncrief’s voiceless tone, but asked, “Where’re Poindexter and Knott?”

  “Elsewhere,” Moncrief replied. “Knott is looking for Overstreet; he thinks that Miles knows where Derrington has gone, and you know how determined he is to confront Derrington. He’s as determined now as he was just after he arrived here.” He faded a bit. “I think you were right, and Poindexter has gone on. He hasn’t been around for quite a while.”

  “Knott’s still looking for Overstreet? I assumed he’d found Miles, but you say not?” Holte was astonished. “Isn’t Overstreet in Canada, near Montreal? Hasn’t he been arrested?”

  “Not any more, according to Knott.” Moncrief said, turning slowly at the edge of a vortex of ghosts.

  “But…” Holte faltered, recalling what Loring had told Poppy. “I understand he’s scheduled for extradition. It’s being arranged.”

  Moncrief had started to drift away, but changed his mind. “I hope he is going to be sent back into the US. Then Knott can find him, and we’ll have that settled. All this slipping in and out of the world of the living is beginning to annoy me.” He considered what he said, and added “I don’t mean you, Holte. It’s Knott who’s doing it.” There was the hint of a sigh in this. “He’s bent on revenge.”

  “So you’ve said, and who can blame him,” Holte muttered, then reminded himself of the purpose of his visit. “Do you happen to remember a young man named Gameal Augustus Darius Pearse?”

  Moncrief was perplexed by the question. “GAD? Yes, I knew GAD, not well, of course, but his family was part of our set. We attended a lot of the same functions, though GAD was just entering the adult world when I was killed. Kind of a strange one, GAD, seemed to me—a bit of a loner, more interested in plants and animals than politics. You know the type, don’t you? Too bad that HOB died when he did.”

  “Have you happened to run into HOB here?” It was unlikely, Holte knew.

  The other ghosts circling around them in the crowded emptiness made a non-sound that was somewhere between a wail and a whimper, a reminder that everyone here was trying to come to terms with the lives they had led; to be asked to recall more than what each was wrestling with was a burden that most were eager to avoid.

  “Once or twice,” said Moncrief, astonishing Holte. “Why?”

  “Did he say anything about GAD?”

  Moncrief mulled this over. “I don’t think so. What’s going on with GAD?”

  Holte decided to be blunt. “He’s missing.”

  Now it was Moncrief’s turn to be surprised. “Missing? How?”

  “That’s what I’m trying to find out. You’re sure he isn’t here?” Holte felt Moncrief shrink back, and realized that he would have to soften his approach. “His family wants to find him, if he’s still alive, and bury him, if he’s dead.”

  “I didn’t know you have books to balance with the Pearses,” said Moncrief, intrigued; he moved nearer to Holte.

  “I don’t, not with them,” Holte told him.

  Moncrief fluctuated at the edge of a minor swirl. “Has this something to do with that Thornton woman? The one who’s a reporter? Oliver’s girl?”

  “Indirectly, yes, it does.” Holte prepared to explain himself, but for once, Moncrief took Holte’s answer at face value. “I want to settle the matter.”

  “And you want to do it by finding GAD?”

  “If I can. If he’s still alive, that could make it harder to do.” He tried not to sound too cynical, but was worried that he might have done so.

  “Well, all I can say is that I haven’t seen GAD here—but I might not; I haven’t been looking for him. I told you we weren’t all that close.” Moncrief drifted sideways. “Where did he disappear?”

  “Somewhere in Europe, they think, but he could be in Russia or Algeria, for all I know.” Holte gave Moncrief a short while to absorb all this.

  “Then you’ve got a lot of places to look. That’ll keep you busy.” He faltered. “Would you like me to look around for him, just in case?”

  Holte did the equivalent of nodding. “If you would. That’s kind of you.”

  “I’ll try to remember. If I do, I’ll tell you next time you’re here.” When a little more time had passed, Moncrief asked, “How are things at Hadley and Grimes? Do you know if the government is investigating them yet? Or have the police been scared away from the case? Poindexter was sure that the investigation had been sabotaged.”

  “The federal government and the Philadelphia District Attorney are on it,” said Holte, trying to determine where this might be leading.

  “Good.” And again, “Good.” Another, more silent, silence fell between Moncrief and Holte. Finally Moncrief wondered, “Is there any news of Louise?”

  “I’m sorry, Moncrief. Nothing so far.”

  Moncrief began to drift again. “That’s too bad. If you find out anything about her, will you let me know?”

  Holte was more baffled than he had been by the question about Hadley and Grimes, but he managed to summon up a response. “Yes. Of course. I’ll let you know.”

  “Thanks. I’ll let you know if I find out anything about GAD—you can remind me.” By now, Moncrief was caught up in the swirl of ghosts, fading into their general confluence.

  Frustrated by Moncrief’s departure, Holte allowed himself to drift through the dimension of ghosts, hoping to recognize even one of them. When that did not happen, he recollected his pledge to Poppy, and aligned himself to slip back into the world of the living, the beginnings of an idea forming in his mind. He began to materialize outside of Poppy’s bedroom window. It was very late at night, he realized, and debated with himself as to whether or not he should enter her room and wake her. He was fairly certain it was still Wednesday night, so he moved through the window, and did his best to make her bedside lamp blink, to no avail. He slid toward the end of the bed, and found Maestro glaring at him, a low, musical growl just beginning to get louder.

  At this sound, Poppy came half-awake. “Maestro? What’s wrong?” she mumbled.

  “I bother him,” said Holte, apologetically. “I said I’d be back soon.”

  Poppy blinked and shoved herself up on her elbow. “What time is it?”

  “I don’t know,” said Holte, and flitted across the room to her alarm clock. “Three seventeen.”

  “Ye gods,” Poppy groaned. “Why did you wake me up at this hour? Is the house on fire?”

  Holte ignored her sarcasm. “I’ve come back from the dimension—”

  “—of ghosts. Yes. All right,” she finished for him, now almost fully awake. “What did you find out?”

  Holte drifted down to the floor and appeared to be sitting cross-legged about four inches above the carpet. “I talked to Moncrief. He doesn’t believe that GAD is dead, but he’ll look around for him.” If he remembers, Holte added to himself. “By the way, he doesn’t seem to think that Overstreet is still in Canada, but he’s not certain.”

  “Why not?” Poppy asked, her curiosity fully engaged; was it possible that Loring had left to escort Overstreet back to Philadelphia without telling her? She frowned in dismay, and immediately chided herself inwardly for such a reaction.

  “Because Knott seems to be unable to find him there. He thinks Overstreet knows where Derrington has gone, and since he’s almost certain that Derrington murdered him, Knott wants to have a word or two with him. But to do that, he has to find him.” Holte rose a little way into the air, turning more filmy as he went.

  “And Knott hasn’t been able t
o find him?” Poppy reached for a pillow to lean on. “I thought ghosts could find anyone.”

  Holte sighed. “If we know how to define the person we’re looking for, we can, but there are a lot of people on earth, and sorting through them takes time and patience, if you don’t know where to start. Knott has lost his place to start.”

  “Not completely,” said Poppy, giving voice to her thoughts. “He knows where Overstreet was, and surely that’s a place to start.” She reached over and turned on her bedside lamp; she blinked in the brightness. “It’s that following-a-scent kind of thing, isn’t it?”

  “Yes.” Holte studied her for a few seconds, and then recalled a lapse. “I’m sorry. I forgot to ask about Stacy.”

  Although she gave a short, irritated sigh, Poppy said, “It doesn’t matter.”

  “Yes, it does. I said I would do it, and I didn’t, so I owe you an apology. The next time I go to the dimension of ghosts, I’ll see if I can find out anything about him—anything useful.” Then he changed his tone, proceeding more cautiously, uncertain how to present his idea. “Something occurred to me as I was coming back here, something from my life. It might be helpful in the search for GAD.”

  “What is that?” She tried to cover a yawn, but did not succeed. “Sorry. I’m interested, but I’m also still sleepy.”

  “Do you want to go back to sleep?” Holte asked.

  “Not now. My mind’s racing its engines—that is the phrase, isn’t it? Racing its engines?”

  “Among the fast set with autos, yes, it is,” Holte answered, amused.

  Poppy blinked and stretched. “There. Now I’m ready. Carry on.”

  Holte steadied himself in the air, and began as if submitting a report. “There’s a man in London. He’s out of the Service now, but when I knew him, he was my—I suppose you’d call him my co-ordinator—when I was working on the Continent. Since he retired, he’s been running a kind of search bureau: he specializes in locating displaced persons, finding them for families and such. He’s in his late fifties now, but still capable and committed to his work.” He paused, trying to decide how to go on. “He was known as N.Cubed when we were working together. His last name is Blessing.”

  Poppy gave a snort of disbelief. “A co-ordinator of spies, called Blessing?”

  Holte was able not to laugh. “It’s worse than that: N.Cubed stands for Noel Nicholas Naman. I should warn you that he has almost no sense of humor about his name, or any part of it.”

  “Was he born at Christmas? That might account for it—his parents wanting to commemorate their son emphatically,” said Poppy, half seriously. “I suppose if he could survive school with that name, he can survive anything.”

  “I have no idea when his birthday is. I never dared to ask.” He took a short moment to get focused again. “He knows how to locate people, and has had a good number of successes. The government still enlists his help from time to time. I understand his prices are reasonable, and he gives good value for money.” He went silent again. “If you like, I can go to London and get his address, if you think it might be of use.”

  “For Inspector Loring?” she suggested.

  “And perhaps the Pearses. It could be a place to start.”

  Poppy reached out to open the drawer in her night-stand and took out a pencil and a pad of paper. “Tell me if I have this right: Noel Nicholas Naman Blessing, in London?” She was scribbling as she spoke.

  “You do. I think he’s somewhere near the Courts, but I don’t know for certain.” He rose a few inches higher. “Do you want me to look?”

  “Not yet. The Clarion should have a London telephone directory in the reference library. If he isn’t listed, then perhaps I may take advantage of your kind offer.” She closed her notebook and put it back in the night-stand drawer, along with her pencil. “Does he work alone, or does he have a staff?”

  Holte waited while she readied herself to take notes, then launched into his account of Blessing. “He has a staff of sorts, most of them in Europe, but he often handles his searches himself. He speaks five languages, including Czech and Hungarian, so you can see how this would help him locate missing persons.”

  Poppy thought about this, then asked, “How do you know so much about him now? Unless you have books to balance with him?”

  Holte had a spurt of panic, which carried him to the far side of the room; he realized he had not given her credit for her skill at making deductions. “Yes. I did want to balance the books with him. He was the first person I contacted, when I remembered enough to work it out.” He drifted back in her direction. “You were the second, in case you’re curious. The Bastins are third.”

  Poppy mulled this over as she attempted to ward off sleep. “What had you done that needed balancing with Mister Blessing?” She steeled herself for his answer.

  “It’s the nature of the business, owing people,” said Holte, sounding exhausted, as if the memories were a demanding weight upon him, noncorporeal though he was. “Blessing had given me orders, very strict orders, and I…neglected to follow them.”

  “You disobeyed orders?” She was troubled by the implications of his admission. “That doesn’t sound like you.”

  “I improvised.” He became marginally more visible so that he and Poppy could have the illusion of looking one another in the eyes. “My contact did not reach me at the time and place that had been arranged, but there was a need to get some papers to the…it doesn’t matter now which company wanted what I carried.” Now that he was telling her, it seemed impossible to stop. “Suffice it to say, they were English and at the Front. In the trenches. I could not find a way to reach them, and in my attempt to do so, I exposed a whole network of spies, which ruined our chances to assist the soldiers in their fighting, and they suffered heavy losses. But that wasn’t the sum of it: I hadn’t realized that N.Cubed had a back-up plan—although I should have inferred it—and had I remained where I was, where the failed contact was to take place, another of N.Cubed’s network would have found me, and completed the delivery, so the network would have remained in place, and the men in the trenches wouldn’t have been so badly depleted. N.Cubed took full responsibility for the loss, and four months later, I was dead, so I could not make it up to him—until I remembered.”

  Poppy’s expression had grown somber as she listened to Holte. “How… dreadful. For all of you.”

  It took Holte a little time to come up with a response. “In the weeks immediately after the network was exposed, I tried to think of it as fortunes of war, something that could not have been avoided, and that was not my fault, but all along, I was certain that I had been too precipitous, that I should have remained in position, waiting for orders. But with the fighting getting worse, I was afraid that my contact might have been taken prisoner, and that could have meant that I was no longer safe. I panicked, though I didn’t believe I had, at the time. I made for the coast and was taken aboard a Dutch fishing boat, and carried across the Channel to Plymouth. Blessing was distressed, but he blamed my unknown back-up more than he blamed me, which only made it worse. I was kept in England for a fortnight, where I was safe.”

  “Strange, to think of being a spy and being safe,” Poppy remarked, trying to offer him a bit of sympathy.

  “It is, isn’t it,” Holte observed. He moved a little higher in the air. “I’ve kept you awake long enough. Turn out your light and go back to sleep. I’ll see you in the morning, on your drive in to the paper.”

  He had almost disappeared when Poppy called out, “Wait!”

  Holte hung against the ceiling. “What is it?”

  Now that he had halted for her, Poppy had to order her thoughts. “It’s none of my business, I know, but how many other books of yours need balancing?”

  “More than I’d like to admit,” he said, and vanished through the ceiling, leaving Poppy to cogitate on all he had told her.

  THIRTEEN

  THERE WAS A MESSAGE SLIP WAITING ON POPPY’S DESK BY THE TIME SHE REACHED the C
larion on Thursday morning. She recognized the number as Loring’s, and so sat down and called the phone bank of the paper and asked to be connected to Loring’s number at the police department. Little as she wanted to admit it, she was worried that Loring might be turning down her invitation to her party.

  The operator came on the line. “You’re connected to Inspector Loring, Miss Thornton.”

  “Thank you,” Poppy said as the operator completed the contact.

  “Thanks for calling back,” said Loring. “I was about to go out but I wanted to be sure I reached you early today.”

  Poppy began to think about what Holte had told her, and she did her best not to hold her breath. “Has anything come up?”

  “Indirectly, yes.” He coughed and lowered his voice. “We had a call yesterday evening from the Mounties, saying that Miles Overstreet escaped while being brought to the British Army Detention Center at Montreal. There is a manhunt on for him now.”

  “A manhunt? Surely they don’t think he’s dangerous, do they?” She spoke almost by rote, and made herself add, “How did it happen?”

  “The escort was held up at a drawbridge, and apparently a yacht that was passing below the bridge shot up at the Mounties and while they ducked and hid, Overstreet flung himself out of the rear of the touring car, and jumped into the river, where someone from the yacht picked him up and hauled him aboard before turning around and going downstream, raising their sails as they went. At least that’s what Captain Joiner told me this morning.”

  “Was it planned, or serendipity?” Poppy asked, reaching for a notepad and a pencil.

  “I don’t know—not yet. It seems to be a coincidence; I don’t believe in them. Captain Joiner has promised to keep me abreast of their investigation. He’ll make another report to me tomorrow. In the meantime, the Canadians have alerted the American Coast Guard with a description of the boat in question. Or should I call it a ship?” He sighed. “I wish it weren’t such a big ocean.”