Things Half in Shadow

by Alan Finn

  “I think we should leave the police work to the actual police,” I said. “Inspector Barclay will solve this particular puzzle. I’m certain of it.”

  “And what if he doesn’t?” Lucy asked. “What if your inspector friend never identifies the culprit?”

  Granted, I hadn’t thought of that. But now that the idea was in my head, I couldn’t rid myself of it. There were unsolved murders all the time in Philadelphia. On occasion, I’d heard Barclay moan about how he regretted never finding the person who had shot this man or strangled that woman. It was very possible Mrs. Pastor’s death could end up like one of those—forever a mystery, a shadow of suspicion always hanging over us.

  “All right. Let’s for the moment pretend that I agree to this plan,” I said. “How do you think we could go about it?”

  “Well, you’ve reported on crimes such as murder,” Lucy answered. “Surely you’ve learned something about how to solve them.”

  Her assumption was correct, although at that moment I wished I had paid more attention to the various crime scenes I’d visited. I had also learned a thing or two from Barclay, who enjoyed regaling me with stories of past crimes on nights when both of us had had slightly too much ale. I knew, for instance, that blood patterns on walls and floors could be studied to determine from which direction a bullet had been fired. That the angle and depth of a knife wound could show you what hand a culprit favored. And I learned that in cases of murder, an inspector’s first instinct was often the correct one.

  “But what skills do you bring?” I asked Lucy.

  She gave a tiny shrug of her shoulders. “I don’t have any. But I know plenty of people who do.”

  Of that, I had no doubt. She was, after all, the woman who’d persuaded Mathew Brady himself to show up at my doorstep and take my photograph.

  “You’re considering it,” she said, watching me closely. “I can tell. You want the shadow of this crime to be gone from your life as much as I do.”

  I did, very much so, which was why I replied, “If we were to do this—and I’m not saying I will—how do you propose we start our investigation?”

  “Clearly, someone in that room killed Mrs. Pastor. According to Inspector Barclay, the means was poison. But what about motive? I think we first need to uncover why Mrs. Pastor was killed. So I suggest we return to the scene of the crime, the Pastor residence, and talk to the person who knew Mrs. Pastor the best—her husband.”

  She had clearly given the matter a good deal of thought. Yet the more I considered it, the more it seemed like the wrong course of action. Robert Pastor was, after all, a suspect, just like us.

  “I think we should speak to someone else,” I said. “Someone who knew Mrs. Pastor almost as well as her husband, if not better.”

  “Such as?”

  I thought back to an hour earlier, when I’d listened in on Lionel and Mrs. Patterson gossiping about me. They’d spoken with alarming candor, as if I were a scandalized neighbor and not the man paying their wages.

  “The servants,” I said decisively. “We need to question Mrs. Pastor’s household staff. They know everything that went on in that house. And I have a feeling they’ll be very willing to share it with us.”

  II

  Shortly thereafter, Lucy and I stood outside the home of the late Lenora Grimes Pastor. While I hadn’t officially agreed to her plan, she took my suggestion as an affirmative answer and whisked me to the scene of the crime. I was only going along with it on the chance that we might learn something important, which Barclay could then use to clear our names.

  Normally, I would have felt wrong visiting a house in mourning so soon after a death. The rules of Philadelphia society dictated that only the closest of family members and friends could immediately call. Yet there were no signs that it truly was a house of mourning. No black crepe hung over the door or windows. Someone passing on the street, unaware of Mrs. Pastor’s fate, would think it was an average day for the household.

  The door was answered by the same mighty oak of a butler who had greeted us two nights earlier. Only the gentle, smiling face we saw then had been replaced by one that was deeply saddened.

  “If you came round to pay your respects to Mister Pastor,” he said, “he ain’t home.”

  “Actually, we’re here to see you,” I said.

  “And the servant girl,” Lucy added. “And anyone else who might be in service to the Pastors.”

  The butler was rightfully suspicious. Doubt furrowed his brow as he said, “That don’t make much sense, if y’all pardon me saying so.”

  He was right in that regard. It didn’t make a lick of sense. Yet there we were on the doorstep, not knowing what to say next. A fine pair of detectives we were.

  “We’re sorry for disturbing you,” I said. “It was wrong of us to come.”

  I made a move off the front steps, but Lucy grabbed me by the elbow and squeezed. She had a wicked grip, that woman, which held me in place as she stated our case to the butler.

  “What’s your name again?” she asked.

  “Stokely, ma’am.”

  “Well, Stokely, this morning I was speaking to my own servants about Mrs. Pastor’s passing. They spoke of how saddened they would be if a similar thing happened to me. ‘Mrs. Collins,’ they told me, ‘we’d be overwhelmed with grief if you ever died on us. We’d have nowhere to go and no one to talk to.’ Hearing that, naturally, made me think of you.”

  It was the biggest lie I had ever heard. A cruder man than I would have correctly classified it as “horseshit.” But it was a convincing one, aided by Lucy’s sympathetic tone and the batting of her beautiful green eyes. I would have believed it myself if I hadn’t known any better, so it was no surprise that the butler took it to be God’s honest truth.

  “That’s right kind of you, ma’am,” he said, widening the door. “Come in, but you can’t be long. Mister Pastor will be comin’ back any minute now.”

  We entered the humble foyer, seeing no signs of mourning there, either. Stokely’s clothes, I noted, also gave no indication that someone had died. Usually, it was customary for servants to wear a black armband.

  “You can sit a spell in here, if you’d like,” Stokely said, gesturing to the very sitting room where Mrs. Pastor had died.

  “Since Mr. Pastor will be home shortly,” Lucy said, “and since we certainly don’t want to bother him in this time of mourning, perhaps our visit will be made faster if I seek out the servant girl on my own.”

  “You mean Claudia?”

  “Yes. I believe that was her name.”

  “She’s upstairs,” Stokely said. “But I’m tellin’ you now, she ain’t gonna say nothin’.”

  Lucy, undeterred, offered him a wave of thanks before climbing the staircase just beyond the front door. I followed Stokely into the sitting room, which was only slightly less of a mess than two nights before. Instruments were still scattered everywhere, including the massive harp stuck in the floorboards. The chairs and tables had been set right, but the broken lamps were now in a pile of glass shards on the floor. Next to it was a streak of blackened wood. The site of the fire.

  Stokely picked up a nearby brush and dustpan and began to sweep up the wreckage of the lamps, leading me to ask, “Is this where Mrs. Pastor will be lying in state?”

  “No, sir. She’s gonna be buried as soon as she comes home. That’s the Quaker way, see. They live plain. They don’t much care for them big funerals or all that mournin’. Missus Pastor once told me the best way to pay your respects is to live the way the one who passed lived. I’m gonna try. For her sake.”

  Stokely dumped the contents of the dustpan into the trash. When he returned for seconds, he said, “Now, you gonna tell me why you really came ’round? I know it ain’t ’cause you’re worried about the help.”

  Of course he hadn’t believed us. It was foolish of me to ever think he had.

  “We wanted to ask the two of you some questions,” I admitted. “About the night Mrs. Pastor
died.”

  Stokely set the brush and dustpan aside to move on to the instruments. He placed the smaller ones on the tables and set the bigger ones upright while saying, “Why do you want to waste your time talkin’ to us?”

  “Because we’re trying to find out who killed her.”

  “Accordin’ to the papers, either of you might have done it.”

  I must have looked surprised, because Stokely let out an annoyed huff and said, “Yes’sir, I read the papers. Missus Pastor taught me how to read. First thing she done when I got here. Taught me readin’. Taught me some math. Tried to teach me writin’, but I didn’t take to it.”

  “How long did you work for her?”

  “Eleven years.”

  “That’s a very long time,” I said, thinking about the three months Lionel had worked for me. Although a capable butler, I envisioned him leaving sooner rather than later. And after overhearing what he’d said about me, I had a feeling it would be very soon indeed.

  “I met Missus Pastor in January 1858,” Stokely said. “Knew from the minute I met her that she was different from most ladies. Right special, see? And kind. No one as kind as her.”

  “Were you always a servant?”

  “No, sir,” Stokely said, picking up Mrs. Pastor’s tambourine and dropping it on the table. “I was a slave. And they are two very different things.”

  He moved to the harp, nudging it back and forth in an attempt to pry it from the floorboards. However, his sheer size proved no match for the heavy instrument. After watching him make a few more grunting tries, I jumped in to help. It took more effort than I expected, the harp being as stubborn and heavy as a hay-fattened mule. But together we managed to dislodge it from the floor and lift it to sturdier ground.

  While the effort left me winded, it made Stokely, who had manned the heavier end of the harp, positively drenched with sweat. I offered him a handkerchief, which he used to mop his face.

  “Much obliged,” he said. “I don’t know ’bout you, but that left me thirstin’ for an iced tea. You want a glass?”

  “If you’re having one, then yes.”

  We left the sitting room and set off down the hall to a kitchen at the back of the house. It was a sunny room, warm and comforting. Hanging from the green-painted walls were a skillet, a calendar, and a rectangular slate with the words HOUSEHOLD NEEDS written on it in chalk. According to the slate, the Pastor household was in need of potatoes, flour, and a tin of Earl Grey tea. Just beyond the slate was a door leading to the cellar. Through the open doorway, I spotted a few crooked shelves, a patch of brick wall, and a single wooden step. Nearby was a stove that looked brand new; a sink with an indoor water pump; and a very large, very expensive icebox. For people who liked to live plain, the amenities in the Pastors’ kitchen had cost quite a pretty penny.

  Stokely led me to a woodblock table in the middle of the room. Already sitting out was a pitcher of iced tea.

  “If you want, you can ask me a question or two,” he said as he fetched a glass from the sink and filled it for me. “I’ll try best as I can to answer.”

  “How did you come to work for Mrs. Pastor?” I asked.

  “She didn’t hire me so much as keep me ’round.” While pouring his own glass of tea, Stokely nodded toward the cellar door. “I came up those cellar steps and never left.”

  “What were you doing in the cellar?”

  “This here was a safe house.”

  “On the Underground Railroad?”

  “That’s what you folks call it,” Stokely said. “The name don’t make much sense to me, though. Makes it sound like there was a bunch of us ridin’ the rails in high style. In truth, it was scary. Not knowin’ who to trust. Not knowin’ if the house you were walkin’ into was truly safe. But I could tell this here house was safe. There’s a tunnel down there, see. Runnin’ from the river right to yon cellar.”

  “So this route was literally underground?”

  “Yes’sir,” Stokely said. “Word is Missus Pastor’s daddy done had it built in secret for the sole purpose of helpin’ folks like me. When he took ill, Missus Pastor kept it goin’. Back then she was Miss Grimes. In Virginia, every slave that was runnin’ was told to go see Ole Maid Miss Grimes in Philadelphia. ‘She’ll help you,’ they said. ‘Go see her.’ So that’s what I done. I was in sore shape by then. I been runnin’ for goin’ on six months. All the way from Georgia. I was right sick. Fever so bad I was burnin’ up and shiverin’ cold at the same time. When I popped up from that cellar, the first person I met was Missus Pastor. She done took one look at me and sent me straight to bed. I healed quick, though. Soon I was helpin’ out ’round the house. Tryin’ to repay Missus Pastor, see. Soon, though, she started payin’ me. The first wages I was ever paid. And I’ve been here ever since.”

  Stokely’s tale was so fascinating that I momentarily forgot to ask another question. I was too busy thinking about the perseverance it took on his part to make the long and dangerous journey here. It wasn’t until he said, “Is that all you’re gonna ask?” that I remembered the true purpose of my visit.

  “No,” I said, taking a quick sip of tea to cover my distractedness. “I have plenty more. For instance, where were you and Claudia during the séance?”

  “Right here, like usual. The séances always went the same. Folks show up, I open the door and tell ’em where to go, then I go wait right here in the kitchen with Claudia till it’s done.”

  “The door was locked during the séance. Was that always the case?”

  “Always,” Stokely said.

  “Who kept the key while the séances were taking place? You or Claudia?”

  “Neither of us. It hangs right here in the kitchen, where both of us can grab it.” Stokely pointed to a nail stuck into the wall near the kitchen door. Dangling from it was a small key that glinted in the afternoon sunlight. “It was still sittin’ there when y’all called for help.”

  I remembered Stokely being the one to unlock the door after I realized Mrs. Pastor was dead. It was Robert Pastor who had pounded on our side, yelling to him for assistance.

  “So no one could have used it to sneak inside the room?” I asked.

  “No, sir. Me and Claudia would have seen them grab it.”

  “How often did Mrs. Pastor hold séances?”

  “Every night ’cept Sunday,” Stokely said. “Lately, though, Missus Pastor started havin’ séances on Saturday mornin’, too. A one-on-one sittin’, she called it. I was never s’posed to answer the door on Saturday mornin’, on account of the missus’s guests wantin’ to keep the visits a secret.”

  “How long ago did these Saturday morning sittings start?”

  “Six months, I s’pose.”

  “And did you ever get a glimpse of who came to them?”

  Although Stokely answered with a prompt, “No, sir,” I could tell he was lying. It made me wonder what else he was withholding. Still, since it was clear he didn’t want to talk about it, I didn’t press the issue.

  “Did you notice anything unusual before the séance on Saturday night?”

  “Nothin’ I can think of other than you and that pretty Missus Collins showin’ up.”

  “So everyone else present was a frequent customer of Mrs. Pastor?”

  “Yes’sir,” Stokely said. “Not Mister Barnum, though. Saturday night was only his second visit.”

  “When was his first?”

  “I reckon it was a week ago. Maybe more. He showed up, bolt out of the blue like.”

  “Do you know why?”

  “I s’pose he wanted to talk to the dead like the rest of ’em.”

  “Like Mrs. Pastor’s regular clients?”

  Stokely gave a firm nod. “Yes’sir.”

  “The others at the séance—Mrs. Mueller and Mr. and Mrs. Dutton—came quite often, did they not?”

  “Yes’sir. They came by lots. Missus Mueller was here two, three times a week. The Duttons not so much, but enough for me to know their names and them
to know mine. Mister Dutton always made sure to give me a hello when he came by.”

  “On Saturday mornings?”

  Stokely, too sly to fall for such a trick, tilted his head and gave me the same look a schoolmarm would use only on her most troublesome pupil. “I seen him once on a Saturday mornin’. Whether he came again, I don’t know. Not that seein’ him surprised me none. Like you said, they was Missus Pastor’s regular customers. Why, Missus Dutton came ’round just this past Friday mornin’.”

  “Did she often stop by during the daytime?”

  “No, sir. This was the first time. She came ’round wantin’ to see Mister Pastor. He weren’t here, so I told her I’d pass along that she came by. She said, ‘Don’t you worry ’bout that, Mister Stokely.’ And then she up and left.”

  More than anything else Stokely had said, this caught my attention. “Do you happen to know why Mrs. Dutton wanted to speak to Mr. Pastor?”

  Stokely looked more exasperated than irritated. Just when I was getting on his good side, too.

  “I can read the newspaper,” he said. “But I can’t read minds.”

  Taking that as a no, I gulped down some more tea before asking, “Other than the Duttons and Mrs. Mueller, did Mrs. Pastor have any other frequent visitors?”

  “None that I can recall,” Stokely replied. “People came and went ’round here. Some came every week for months then never came again. Others done come only once. Others came, then stayed gone a year, then came back. It didn’t matter none to Missus Pastor. She just enjoyed helpin’ folks.”

  “Do you think she truly helped them?”

  “I think so. Folks came lookin’ for comfort and that’s what Missus Pastor done give ’em.”

  “Did you ever attend one of her séances? Perhaps to find comfort yourself?”

  Stokely gave an emphatic shake of his head. “No, sir. Missus Pastor tried, though. Back when she was still Miss Grimes. She’d say, ‘Stokely, come sit and we’ll try to talk to your mama.’ But I didn’t want no part of it. I don’t mess around with the dead. Some folks that passed, you don’t want to meet again.”