Spirits Onstage (A Daisy Gumm Majesty Mystery, Book 8)

by Alice Duncan

  Spirits Onstage

  A Daisy Gumm Majesty Mystery

  Book Eight

  by

  Alice Duncan

  Award-Winning Author

  Published by ePublishing Works!

  www.epublishingworks.com

  ISBN: 978-1-61417-722-7

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  Please Note

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

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  Copyright © 2015 by Alice Duncan. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions.

  Cover and eBook design by eBook Prep www.ebookprep.com

  Dedication

  My wonderful beta readers did overtime work on this book, and I can't thank them enough: Lynne Welch, Kathleen Birmingham, and Sue Krekeler. I honestly don't know what I'd do without you.

  By the way, Webster's Pharmacy in Altadena, which used to have a soda fountain, actually opened in 1926, but they said I could use their name a few years early. The real seller of the best roast-beef-on-pumpernickel sandwiches on the face of the earth was Kern's Delicatessen, which sat right next to Webster's and which is, alas, no more.

  Chapter 1

  The night of Mrs. Pinkerton's dinner party, the one she'd begged Sam Rotondo and me to attend, Sam picked me up on the dot at seven-thirty p.m. My state of astonishment that he'd accepted Mrs. P's invitation still hadn't lessened. Sam isn't the most socially jovial person I've ever met. That's putting it mildly.

  But perhaps I should introduce myself. I'm Daisy Gumm Majesty, widow of the late love of my life, Billy Majesty, who was shot and gassed during the Great War. After he came home from that catastrophe, he was miserable. He was confined to a wheelchair and could barely breathe. He finally managed to kill himself with the morphine syrup he had to take in order to relieve the pain in his body. However, Dr. Benjamin, our wonderful family physician, knew what was what and reported Billy's death as accidental, resulting from the injuries he had suffered in the war. Doc Benjamin was right, except about the accident part. I still blame the Kaiser.

  Even though I knew in my heart that Billy wasn't long for this world when he came home from Europe, I was devastated by his death. Which just goes to show that one can know almost exactly what the future will bring and still be crushed when it happens. To this day, my insides ache for Billy. And for me, too, actually. I was only seventeen when we married, and only twenty-three when Sam drove me to Mrs. Pinkerton's house the evening of the party I was surprised Sam was attending.

  Mrs. P's dinner party took place about a year and a half or so after Billy's demise. She pleaded with both Sam—who had been Billy's best friend and at one time my worst nightmare—and me to attend her function. This was mainly because Sam and I had solved a problem for her the week prior. Actually, I'd done most of the solving, but never mind about that. Mrs. Pinkerton appreciated the both of us, and that's the important part.

  Um... maybe I'd better explain that last comment, too. You see, ever since my Billy had come home from war a ruin of his former happy-go-lucky, vibrant, healthy self, I'd been the primary breadwinner in our family. The family includes my mother and father, Peggy and Joe Gumm; and my aunt, Viola Gumm, widow of my late uncle, Ernie Gumm, who was Pa's older brother. Vi lost her only son, Paul, during the Great War, too, so every once in a while things got a trifle glum in our house. But I didn't mean to digress. I do my breadwinning as a spiritualist-medium to wealthy matrons in Pasadena, California. In other words, I conjure up and chat with dead people for a living.

  Do I believe what I do is for real?

  Good Lord, no! I mean, I'm not an idiot. However, most of the people for whom I work, while probably not technically idiots, have far more money than sense. And thank God for it, I say, or my family would have to struggle a whole lot more than it does. I make a really good living as a phony spiritualist, I'm excellent at what I do, and my clients appreciate me for it.

  A slight amendment is called for here: one time, and one time only, a real, honest-to-God ghost appeared through me during a séance. The phenomenon has never happened since, and if it ever recurs, I do believe I'll be compelled to take up another line of work, even though that would mean a hefty dent in the family's income. More like a gaping gash, perhaps.

  But anyway, Sam picked me up smack on time, and we drove from my family's lowly bungalow on South Marengo Avenue to Mr. and Mrs. Pinkerton's grand mansion on Orange Grove Boulevard in Sam's big, black Hudson automobile. Not only that, but Sam was dressed appropriately for the occasion!

  Sam usually looks at least slightly rumpled. Not that night. That night, he wore a pristine black dinner jacket along with creased evening trousers and a stiff white shirt with a stiff white collar. His shirt even had gold cufflinks. The fact that he'd agreed to Mrs. P's invitation had amazed me. The fact that he actually had the appropriate duds to wear to such a shindig left me in a state of utter flabbergastation. If that's a word.

  Sam doesn't care much about the social graces, but they're my bread and butter. I strive to maintain a sober and elegant façade to my clients. That evening, which was the first Tuesday in October, 1923, I wore a perfectly gorgeous blue velvet evening gown that came to my ankles and was tubular in shape, even when I wore it—I'd lost a lot of weight after Billy died. I used to have more curves than were strictly fashionable. The dress had a short train, and both the dress and the train edges had been embroidered by my own skillful fingers. Well, heck, the entire ensemble had been made by me, using the White side-pedal sewing machine I'd given to my mother one Christmas, but which I used pretty much exclusively. I'm a whiz at sewing. I'm also a whiz at spiritualist-mediuming.

  My dinner companion worked as a detective for the Pasadena Police Department. Sam was a New Yorker of Italian extraction, tall, large although not fat, somber, and about as light on his feet as a slab of granite. Sam was solid. My Billy had been long, lean and limber. Sam was long, wide and marble-like. Although Sam and I used to be at each other's throats all the time, for the past year or so we'd been getting along quite well. Sort of. On one memorable occasion when we'd been hollering at each other, he'd brought the argument to an abrupt halt by saying he loved me. Neither one of us has explored that admission much since, but we did get along better now than we had earlier in our acquaintanceship.

  My parents and Aunt Vi were rooting for a romance to spring up between Sam and me. I wasn't so sure I wanted one, although I did notice that I missed the big lug when he wasn't around for a day or so.

  "I'm surprised you agreed to come to this dinner party, Sam," said I as we tootled along Pasadena's streets.

  "So am I," he said grumpily.

  "I figured you'd bac
k out."

  "So did I."

  "Why didn't you?" I peered at him, but it was too dark to see much except his profile, which was rather good-looking. I wasn't used to thinking of Sam in terms of his physical appeal, but I have to confess, if only in this journal, that he had some. Physical appeal, I mean.

  His shoulders lifted in a slight shrug. "I keep my word."

  He would have to say that, wouldn't he? I vividly remember the day shortly before Billy succeeded in killing himself when he'd asked Sam to take care of me after he (Billy) was gone, and Sam had agreed. I hadn't meant to overhear their conversation, and I'm often sorry I did. But oh, well. Too late not to hear it now.

  "I appreciate you joining me, Sam. I have a feeling Mrs. Pinkerton didn't invite us merely as a thank-you gesture."

  His big head turned, and his dark eyes gleamed in the deeper darkness of the interior of the automobile. "Yeah? How come?"

  "I don't know. But she's been really excited for the past week, and I'm afraid that might bode ill for one of us. I suspect me."

  "I thought you said she just wanted to thank us for getting the Ku Klux Klan off her back."

  "That's what she said, but I'm not sure that's her only reason."

  Very well, I suppose I'd better explain that Klan reference, too. For weeks Mrs. Pinkerton's gatekeeper, Joseph Jackson, a Negro fellow and all-around good man, had been harassed by members of the KKK who had come all the way from Tulsa, Oklahoma, to do mischief to his brother, Henry. They'd even shot Joseph Jackson and blown up Mrs. Pinkerton's mailbox. But they'd been foiled, mainly by me. I say that in all modesty, but it's the truth.

  Jackson was now out of the hospital, but he still wasn't yet able to resume his gate-keeping duties at Mrs. Pinkerton's mansion. Sam and I both noticed the face of a newly acquired gatekeeper when we stopped to tell the fellow our names. He only nodded and, I presume, pressed a button so that the huge, black iron gates swung open. They'd been repaired admirably after having been partially blown to bits. Sam drove his Hudson up the deodar-lined drive to Mrs. P's gigantic circular drive, where several more automobiles were parked.

  We arrived precisely thirty minutes before dinner was to commence. We were both factually and socially on time.

  I brightened when I saw Harold Kincaid's bright red Stutz Bearcat. Harold is Mrs. Pinkerton's son and a particular friend of mine. Mind you, our relationship is strictly platonic, and it probably would have been even if Harold hadn't been... Oh, dear. I see I've hit another slight snag.

  Harold and his... well, his lover, dang it, Delray Farrington, lived together in a gorgeous home in San Marino, a wealthy community a very few miles south of Pasadena. Many people believe Harold and Del's relationship to be sinful, if not downright criminal. Recall, if you will, the late Mr. Oscar Wilde. As far as I've been able to determine, neither Harold nor Del—nor, I presume, Mr. Wilde—ever had a choice in the matter of that particular branch of their personalities. So phooey on those who consider them less than human. They were my friends. Well, Oscar Wilde wasn't, but... Oh, nuts. You know what I mean.

  "Harold's here," grumbled Sam at my side. He was nowhere near as ecstatic to see Harold's machine as was I.

  "Yes," I replied with much more animation than he'd showed. "I'm so glad. I never know who I'm going to meet when I go to a do at Mrs. P's house, and Harold always relaxes me."

  "Who's going to relax me?"

  "Pooh, Sam. You're never ruffled, no matter whose company you're in."

  "Huh."

  Typical Sam comment.

  "I wonder if Del will be here, too. They helped capture that awful man, you know. If Del hadn't gone through the banking records, he might have escaped."

  "Not after you bashed his head in with a baseball bat, he wouldn't."

  He would have to bring that up, wouldn't he?

  "Nonsense. Del helped pin the crime on the correct man."

  "I guess so."

  The "correct man" of whom I spoke had been the exalted cyclops of Pasadena's chapter of the Ku Klux Klan. I'm not making that up, either. That's what the KKK called their leaders. Talk about idiots.

  Quincy Applewood appeared before us. Quincy and his wife, Edie, were old school chums of mine, and they both now worked for the Pinkertons. Edie was Mrs. Pinkerton's lady's maid, and Quincy took care of Mr. Pinkerton's sons' horses. He also doubled as a car-parker during dinner parties, which was why he strode up to Sam's Hudson now, wearing a broad smile.

  "Hey, Daisy. Hey, Detective Rotondo. Glad to see you. There's sure a lot of folks dining at the Pinkertons' this evening. Your poor aunt had to hire two other girls to help her with the spread."

  "Yes, she told me," I said, as Quincy opened my door and guided me out politely. Sam opened his own door and stomped around to my side of the car. There he more or less wrenched my arm from Quincy's.

  "Vi's cooking the feast?" Sam asked, sounding almost happy for the first time since he'd showed up at my door.

  "She sure is," I said. "I can't remember what all she said we're going to be dining on, but it's sure to be delicious."

  "I'm sure it will be."

  Sam knew all about Vi's excellent cooking skills, since he dined at our home almost every other day.

  Have I mentioned Vi's particular talent? I shall do so now. My aunt, Viola Gumm, is the best cook in the entire City of Pasadena, if not the entire United States of America. I've never known her to fix a flop. I, on the other hand, can sour milk just by looking at it, and my mother's not much better at cooking than I am. A shame, that, but Ma and I have our own talents. I've already mentioned mine. Ma is the chief bookkeeper at the Hotel Marengo, which is a darned impressive job for a woman. Well, it would be for anyone, but a woman having a job like that in 1923 was special. Pa used to work as a chauffeur for rich folks in town until he had a heart attack and the doctor told him to knock off the driving.

  The family would have been in the soup if it hadn't been for its enterprising females, by golly.

  But that's incidental to this story. At that moment Sam took my arm, Quincy took Sam's key and drove the Hudson somewhere to park it, and Sam and I walked up the marble steps, past the two lounging marble lions, and across the marble porch to the enormous double front door of the Pinkertons' gigantic home. Sam picked up the knocker dangling from an iron lion's mouth and whacked it against the brass knocking plate.

  Featherstone, the Pinkertons' fabulously correct butler—he even had an English accent, for crumb's sake—opened the door to us, and we walked in and down the hall to join the melee in the drawing room. The drawing room is what we plebeians in the middle-class world would call a living room, by the way.

  Chapter 2

  "Daisy!"

  I jumped a little, but smiled when I saw Harold Kincaid hurrying over to greet Sam and me.

  Perhaps another explanation is needed here. Mrs. Pinkerton's last name used to be Kincaid when she was married to her first husband, a scoundrel named Eustace Kincaid. For good and sufficient reason, Mr. Kincaid now resides in San Quentin Prison. After divorcing him, and after waiting a suitable length of time, Mrs. Kincaid married Mr. Algernon Pinkerton, known by his friends and family as Algie. He's a very nice man, but I don't know that I'd like to be called Algie, which reminds me of moss and slime and other types of pond scum. But that's neither here nor there. I was overjoyed to see Harold.

  "Harold!" I cried with equal vigor.

  Sam said, "Kincaid." He would.

  "Glad to see you, too, Detective Rotondo," Harold said with a wicked twinkle in his eyes.

  "Boy, there sure are a lot of people here. Are they all staying for dinner?" Poor Vi. As I peered out over the crowd, I figured there must be thirty or thirty-five (or thirty-six, in order to keep the numbers even) people there, including Sam and me.

  "Yes, indeedy. Nothing's too difficult for my mother," said Harold with a wink. "That's because Mother doesn't have to do any of the work. I feel sorry for your aunt." See? Told you he was a nice man.

&
nbsp; "I don't think Vi's worried," I told him. "She's been excited all week, telling us about the menu for tonight's dinner. And according to Quincy, she has hired a couple of people to help her."

  "It sure smells good in the kitchen," Harold said wistfully. He's a little plump, is Harold. "I know, because I peeked in and Vi kicked me out."

  I laughed. "Harold! I don't blame her. She must wish she had eight arms right about now."

  "I offered to stir something for her, but she only yelled at me." He faked a sniffle. "Didn't even give me a stalk of celery."

  "She's serving celery?" Sam squinted at Harold.

  "Not your average, every-day stalks of celery, Detective. Daisy's Aunt Vi fancied them up a good deal." He tipped me another wink. "I peeked."

  "I'm glad of that," said I. Not that I don't care for celery, but it's not my favorite vegetable, which is probably the lowly carrot. Or maybe the even lowlier rutabaga.

  Sam, who couldn't seem to help himself, glared around at the guests. "I'm not used to eating this late. I'm hungry."

  "Featherstone will announce the meal soon, Detective," Harold assured him. "In the meantime, would you like me to introduce you to the folks you don't know?"

  "No," said Sam.

  "Sure!" said I.

  With another laugh, Harold said, "You can lounge in a corner, Detective. I'll escort Daisy around the room."

  "I'll come with you," growled Sam.

  "Happy to have you," said Harold. He probably meant it, too, but only because Sam amuses Harold. As for Sam, he doesn't care for Harold because of what he is. I've told him a thousand times that people like Harold don't choose their preferences, but my nagging hasn't done any good.

  "You already know Mrs. Bissel," Harold said, stopping beside a large woman wearing an eggplant-colored evening dress that didn't much become her. Well, her dressmaker probably said the color was aubergine, but that's just a French word for eggplant.

  "Oh, Daisy!" Mrs. Bissel cried, delighted to see me. Mrs. Bissel had given us our dog, Spike, a black-and-tan dachshund. Spike had made Billy's last couple of years on this earth almost bearable. "I'm so glad you're here!"