Papa thinks you’re just a humbug, and I’m beginning to think he’s right,” said Susy, now sounding distinctly cross.
“You do not know whereof you ask,” said the voice, distinctly angry. “You mortals cannot see what is before your faces. How should you presume to quiz those who can see more clearly? Why should I deign to answer you?”
An ominous volley of raps came from every corner of the room, growing to a thunderous crescendo, and the slow tolling of a distant church bell began again.
“Stop trying to scare the girl,” said Mr. Clemens, sharply. “She asked you a polite question, and you dodged it. She asked you again, and you still haven’t said anything worth listening to. If you can’t give us good answers, why don’t you just say so, without all the damned noises and mumbo jumbo?”
As if to spite him, the knocking continued just as loud, now joined by rattling chains. I braced myself for an outburst from my employer—or perhaps from the “spirits,” who seemed to be building up to some sort of culmination. I cannot say exactly what I expected to happen—but surely it was not the sudden groan that came from across the table, followed by a piteous cry.
“Oliver! Oh, dear Lord, what has happened? Oliver, give me your hand again!” It was a woman’s voice, obviously in utter terror, and there was no question of its being from any otherworldly source. This was flesh and blood, in deep distress. I opened my eyes, which had been tightly closed in concentration during the séance, and realized that I could dimly make out shapes and movement across the table.
A confused babble of exclamations followed. “What the devil?” “Cornelia, what is wrong?” “Oh, Oliver!” I heard chairs scraping back from the table, then the rapping and ghostly noises stopped abruptly, as if someone had thrown an electrical switch. “Somebody strike a light,” said another voice, urgently. Someone was sobbing.
It was Mr. Clemens who was the first to find a match and strike it. In the wavering light I could see Martha McPhee sitting next to me, looking about her as if just awakened from a dream. Across from me several people were on their feet, frightened expressions on their faces. “Someone light the gas,” said Sir Denis, leaning forward intently, his own match illuminating the tabletop.
Mr. Clemens reached me his matchbox, and I turned to find the light. But I did not need any more light than I already had to see the dark form slumped back in a chair on the far side of the table. There was more than enough light to recognize it as a limp human body. “It’s Dr. Parkhurst,” said Sir Denis. “Good Lord, the man’s bleeding. It looks as if he’s been shot!”
There was a chorus of gasps and shrieks at Sir Denis DeCoursey’s announcement that Dr. Parkhurst was bleeding—and then, even as we watched, the doctor fell slowly sideways out of his chair onto the floor. Several of us were already on our feet, Mrs. Parkhurst was still in her seat, leaning sideways and imploring her husband to say something. Her sister, Miss Donning, recoiled as if in honor at the limp form on the carpet. I turned up the gas and lit it, then hurried back to the table to see what else I could do.
“Shot?” said Cedric Villiers, for once not looking bored. “How the devil could he be shot? I didn’t hear any gun go off.”
“With all that knocking and bell ringing, who could have heard it?” said Mr. Clemens, who had sat back down and put his arms around his wife and his staring daughter. He turned to look at Sir Denis DeCoursey, who was kneeling over the limp form. “Is he dead?”
“Youth!” said Mrs. Clemens, plainly shocked—at what, I wasn’t quite certain, but her use of her habitual pet name for her husband struck an incongruous note to my ears. Then, after a moment, she said quietly, “Oh. I suppose it is an appropriate question, in the circumstances.”
“He’s just barely breathing. We must try to find a doctor, though there’s not much hope with a head wound like that,” said Sir Denis, and even from across the room I was inclined to agree with his grim prognosis. With the lights up, I could see quite clearly. Too clearly; I wanted to turn my eyes away from the grisly spectacle.
“Someone help me move him to the sofa,” said Sir Denis. Cedric Villiers was closest, but he made a face, and so I stepped around the table to help. I took the legs while Sir Denis grasped the wounded man under the armpits, and between the two of us, we managed to get the limp bundle over to the nearby sofa. He was surprisingly heavy—Dr. Parkhurst had not looked that large when he had been standing on his feet. Sir Denis knelt down next to him, then looked up and said, “Someone fetch some water, and some cloths we can use as bandages. We must do whatever we can to give the poor devil a chance to live.”
Lady Alice, who had stood up almost as soon as the lights came on, nodded and went off with a purposeful look on her face, Most of the others, I noticed, were doing their best to look away. Mrs. Parkhurst had now fallen on her sister Ophelia’s shoulder and was sobbing loudly. She reached out toward her husband and cried, “Oh, help him! Someone please help him! Dear Oliver, don’t die! Don’t leave me alone!”
After a moment, Lady Alice returned with a basin of water and some towels, which Sir Denis used to swab off Dr. Parkhurst’s forehead, then to try to stanch the bleeding. After getting a closer look at the wound, he frowned and put his ear against the doctor’s chest, listening intently for a moment. His expression was grim as he straightened up and said, “I’m afraid there’s no heartbeat. May the Lord have mercy on him.”
At that, Mrs. Parkhurst began to shriek, “No, no!” Her sister wrapped her arms tighter around her, and now Hannah Boulton began to sob loudly. Mrs. Clemens and her daughter Susy both had shocked expressions, but neither seemed quite as stunned as the other ladies—of course, they had not known the victim.
Lady Alice’s face was grim, but she went and touched Martha on the shoulder. “Mrs. McPhee, is there another room where we can take Mrs. Parkhurst and the other ladies? This is a rather terrible scene, I’m afraid.”
Martha was still in her seat, blinking like a person just awakened from sound sleep. At Lady Alice’s words, she started and rose to her feet. “Yes, of course, what am I thinking of? Please, ladies, come with me. Mrs. Parkhurst, may I take your arm?”
Still sobbing loudly, Mrs. Parkhurst let herself be led through a door, apparently into a bedroom, supported by Martha on one side and by her sister, Miss Donning, on the other. The other women followed them—although Susy Clemens seemed reluctant to leave. I almost would have traded places with her, had I any good excuse to remove myself from the grisly scene. When the door closed quietly behind them, Sir Denis said, “Now we must call in a doctor—though I fear there’s little the fellow can do. And we need to inform the police.”
“Good thinking,” said Mr. Clemens. “Is there a telephone in the building?”
“I certainly wouldn’t know,” said Cedric Villiers, with a surprisingly indifferent shrug. “Ask that fellow out in the foyer—he’s the one renting the flat.”
Mr. Clemens was closest to the door; he stepped over and opened it. “Ed, you better come inside. We’re in trouble.”
“What, is the show over already?” said McPhee, getting up quickly from the red velvet-covered couch where he’d been sitting. I could see a deck of playing cards spread out on a small table in front of him—some sort of game. Apparently he had not given up cardplaying quite as completely as Martha had suggested. He took out his watch and glanced at the time. “Martha usually
