Howard Saxon called the following evening upon Holly Moment, who appeared pleased at his coming. The evening before he had merely telephoned, having found it necessary to attend the wedding of a pugilist. At the pugilist’s wedding there had been a barrel of liquor and a dozen attractive young women, but Saxon had been bored and unhappy from the beginning. His anxiety for the professor’s daughter was still high, and the attack on Rainfall had been anything but reassuring.
It was his hope that he might be allowed to look in on Miss Moment whenever he happened to be in the neighborhood. After all, the household must be pretty lonesome! Thinking upon the little strolls taken, in sunlight, by Ghost and Holly, his blood turned cold. What madness! What reckless madness! His imagination ran riot at the thought. He conjured swift and terrible pictures in which always he saw himself standing between Holly Moment and some fantastic peril. Somehow, when he was himself upon the spot, the danger that appeared to threaten seemed less immediate.
He had arranged, in point of fact, a sort of tentative schedule of appearances for himself. On one evening, with or without invitation, he would visit Ghost—who as a friend would doubtless be glad to see him—and on another evening he would frankly call upon Miss Moment herself. Between whiles there was always the telephone, that remarkable instrument.
Miss Moment was happy to see him.
“How was the wedding?” she asked brightly.
Saxon shook his head. “Blond and dismal.”
“Oh, come,” she laughed, “something of interest must have occurred. I suppose it came off? Why didn’t you ask me to go with you?”
“Great Scott!” cried Saxon, amazed. “You don’t mean to say—Why, if it had crossed my mind, I’d have asked you in a minute. No, I wouldn’t, either! But wait until you can go places, and—say, I’ll take you places that will make your hair curl! Well, maybe I will.”
“You are curiously uncertain, aren’t you?” asked Miss Moment. “Was the bride pretty?”
“Not a particle!” said Saxon. “Oh, I suppose Bat thought she was pretty. Blond and—ah—puzzled. You know? Why are blondes always puzzled, Miss Moment?”
“Are they? It hadn’t occurred to me. And what of brunettes?”
“Decisive,” answered Saxon. “Decisive and— overwhelming!”
“Dear me,” smiled the professor’s daughter, “I am learning things about my sex this evening.”
What an ass he was, he told himself grimly. As a rule he was sane enough. Now he could think only of nonsense. God knew there were plenty of things he wanted to say to her. Her own ease was superb, he noted.
Nevertheless, she was slightly embarrassed.
“Speaking of brunettes,” she contrived cleverly, “what do you think I discovered Heliotrope doing to-day?”
“What?” Saxon was relieved.
“Playing with a Ouija board!”
“Not really?” He had a swift vision of the mountainous negress bending over the little varnished board. “Something about our case?”
“I don’t know. She blushed when I caught her at it, so I suppose it was a love affair. I think she blushed. It’s hard to say when Heliotrope is blushing and when she isn’t.”
“So I should imagine.”
“I thought it might be amusing to borrow the board and—”
“Try it ourselves? Why not!”
“Not that I have any faith in such things. Have you?”
“Then I’ll get the board and we’ll see what Little Chief Skookum has to say for himself.”
“Is Little Chief Skookum her lover?”
“Her control, I think. Does one have controls when one uses a Ouija?”
“I must have forgotten,” grinned Saxon. “I think Ouija herself is the control.”
“I’ll get the board, anyway,” said Miss Moment. “Mr. Ghost will be down soon, I think, and then we’ll have a— But we mustn’t make puns about Mr. Ghost. He’s too nice.”
She departed for the kitchen in search of the negress.
“Now,” she continued, reappearing after a time, “shall we hold it on our knees or put up a table?”
“Let’s hold it on our knees,” suggested Saxon. It was an idea that appealed to him.
A slow step sounded on the staircase, and in a moment Walter Ghost entered the room. He greeted Saxon warmly.
“Am I de trop?” he asked. “Hello, what are you youngsters doing with that thing? I didn’t know you went in for supernaturalism, Holly.”
“I don’t,” she said. “It’s Heliotrope’s. Of course you’re not de trop. Is he, Mr. Saxon?”
“Certainly not,” said Saxon. “You look tired, Mr. Ghost.”
“I am a bit tired,” confessed Ghost. “I’ve been thinking too much about this absurd murder business, I suppose. It is absurd, you know. Were you about to ask the spirits for assistance or advice?”
“What were we going to ask?” Miss Moment laughed. “I guess we hadn’t got that far, Mr. Ghost.” She looked at him with sudden doubt. “Surely you don’t believe in such things!”
“Don’t I?” Ghost was quizzical. “How do you know I don’t? I believe in everything.”
“You’re joking, of course. Well, you may ask the first question.” She seated herself and took the board upon her knees, which met Saxon’s under the improvised table.
Her fingers rested delicately upon the smaller instrument that spelled the mystic words, and Saxon’s moved to join them. Ghost whipped out a pencil and a notebook.
“I’ll record the revelations as they come through, shall I?”
The dark head of Holly Moment was bent seriously above the board. “Concentrate!” she said; and suddenly she was a little timid in the face of this new experience. Almost a little afraid.
What if, after all, there were something in it?
Ghost’s eyes were sparkling with interest. On his own tongue a dozen questions were waiting to find utterance.
Miss Moment’s voice was slightly strained, but her diction was precise and accurate: “With whom am I about to speak?” After all, she thought, it was perhaps as well to know.
There were some instants of breathless indecision. The little instrument moved faintly under their fingers, then stopped. After a time it began again. It moved slowly toward a letter—wavered—backed away—returned to the attack….
The motion was circular and crablike, and to Holly Moment it was curiously disturbing. She was not pushing the pointer a particle; of that she was certain. Was Saxon?
The guide moved forward—paused—hesitated above a letter—stopped still. There was no further movement.
“H,” said Walter Ghost crisply.
“By Jove!” exclaimed Saxon. “It does work, doesn’t it?”
“It’s beginning again,” cried Holly Moment. “Concentrate!”
The weaving, circular motion was reëstablished. The little guide moved more rapidly now, as if it had gained confidence in its powers. The pointer settled upon another letter.
“O,” said Ghost.
“Absolutely spooky!” observed Saxon, with profound interest.
“Concentrate!” warned Holly Moment.
Under their fingers the three-legged guide was moving again. It was moving swiftly, like a skater with keen skates upon polished ice. It cut a wide swath across the board, running crazily toward the end of the alphabet.
A curious thrill passed through the skeptic soul of Holly Moment.
“W,” said Ghost. He laughed suddenly. “This won’t do at all. It’s spelling out your name, Howard. Let me ask it a question.” Addressing the painted board, he asked: “Do you mean Howard?”
The pointer moved affirmatively toward a corner of the board upon which was painted the word “Yes.”
“Silly!” exclaimed Miss Moment chidingly.
The board made no reply.
“Well,” said Ghost, “I suppose there are several Howards in the world and out of it. We’ve got somebody, anyway. You’ve established a connection. Go ahead.”
“You ask a question,” suggested Saxon.
“Very well! Suppose we try a shot in the dark.” Ghost bent above the board. In a low voice he asked: “Who killed Amos Bluefield?”
The silence that followed was eerie. Slowly the little stool began to move….
“L … E … A … R.”
Miss Moment took her fingers abruptly from the board. “It’s ghastly,” she observed. “Also, it’s complete foolishness! We ought to be ashamed of ourselves.”
“Perhaps I ought not to have let you do it,” admitted Ghost. “It isn’t necessarily foolishness—I mean the board’s answer isn’t—but it does seem an unlikely reply. Lear was playing in Milwaukee until the end of the week in which Bluefield was killed. Still,” he laughed, “it would have been even more unlikely if I had asked, ‘Who killed Lear?’ and the board had answered, ‘Bluefield!’”
In their interest they had forgotten everything else. With a sense of shock they heard a key turn in the outer lock.
An instant later Professor Chandler W. Moment had entered the room. He stared, speechless, from one member of the group to another.
“What under the canopy—” he began.
“A little experiment, Professor,” laughed Ghost. “We were upon the point of solving the mystery of Bluefield, Lear, et al. Won’t you take a hand? Holly and Howard are about fed up with it.”
“Not I,” said Saxon. “I love it!”
“Really? Then you and I will try our hands at it. Let me have your chair, Holly, and you take the notebook.”
“Quite lunatic, all of you,” observed the professor from the doorway. Nevertheless, he hung up his hat and stick in haste and moved to join the investigators. “Ask it what happened to my second pair of spectacles,” he said. “Where did you get that thing, Walter?”
“Hush!” said Ghost. “It’s Heliotrope’s. We’ve got a ha’nt named Howard on the celestial line, giving us information.”
“And a Ghost named Ha’nt supplying the information,” muttered the professor, drawing up a chair. “All right, I won’t say another word.”
In breathless silence the séance was resumed. The board was now supported by the knees of Ghost and Howard Saxon.
There was a moment of immobility, then a surprising thing happened. Without a question asked, the little guide began to move beneath their fingers. It moved rapidly, accurately, and without pause, from letter to letter until it had spelled out a sentence.
The professor’s eyes were bulging.
“A … canary … used … to … hang … where … you … are … now … sitting.”
“Good God!” exploded Chandler W. Moment. “My aunt Eliza!” He turned reproachful eyes on Ghost. “Walter, you rascal, you’re pushing that thing around.”
“Am I pushing it, Howard?”
“No more than I am, I guess,” answered the amazed Saxon. “And I certainly never heard of your aunt Eliza or her canary, Professor. Did she have one?”
“She did,” said the professor stiffly. “It hung there, from the chandelier, immediately above your head. Upon my word, I never heard of anything like it.”
“It’s odd,” agreed Ghost. “Suppose you question her, Professor.”
“I should feel like a fool,” said Chandler W. Moment. “What under the sun would I ask her?”
Nevertheless, he moved forward, and bending wrathfully above the board he barked his question: “Are you the old woman they used to call ‘Catty’ Calthrop?”
At this insult there was a slight movement, as of protest, on the part of the board. But the reply was sweetly complacent.
“It … made … no … difference … to … me … what … I … was … called.”
“Exactly what she would have answered!” gasped the professor. “Walter, what is the meaning of this?”
“I can’t imagine what your aunt knows about these murders,” replied Ghost coolly, “but if there is anything she wants to tell us, I think we should give her the opportunity.”
The professor nodded wildly. “Go ahead,” he gulped.
Ghost bent again above the varnished board. His voice was low and melodious. “There is something I want to know,” he said. “Answer me, if you can. Somewhere there is a solution to our problem. It is a solution that dates back many years. Perhaps it is in an old street in an old city, and perhaps an old woman can give it to us. I do not ask for names—for names of people. What is the town I must seek to find my answer?”
For an instant the world appeared to stop turning. Totality seemed closing in upon them.
Then for the last time the pointer started upon its wayward course. Once more out of a child’s alphabet there emerged slowly three meaningless syllables:
“Wal … sing … ham.”
“Wal … sing … ham,” repeated Ghost. “Walsingham!” He looked up. “Is that a city, Professor?”
Professor Moment was excited. “A college town, Walter! A little college town in Connecticut!”
“H’m,” said Ghost.
He turned again to the board.
“Do you mean Walsingham in Connecticut?”
They grew old waiting.
“Yes,” said the board.