A Barricade in Hell (10 page)

“I suspect you're right, but I'll reserve final judgment for now. The question I want answered is not only why this spirit appears to be focused on Gabe, but why now.” Dora tossed the shredded remnants of sage and pine into Gabe's old room and pulled a clean white rag from the bag at her feet. She wiped her hands, pensive and thoughtful. “Causing trouble for Mrs. Allen is sure to lure Gabe into the thick of things one way or another. He dotes on Katie Allen, nearly as much as he adores his mother, and he'd never leave her to cope alone. He'd find help.”

“Even if that help involves an apprentice and her teacher performing cleansing rituals on a Tuesday morning.” I hugged the basket of candles and herbs to my chest. We'd done this a hundred times, but I was jittery and nervous. “I assume cleansing the house of spirits is what you have planned. Now would be the preferred time to tell me otherwise.”

“Containment first and then hopefully some answers. Now, scoot inside before I seal the threshold.”

We lugged the baskets and bag of pine branches through the door. I set mine down on the worn black and tan carpet next to the four-poster bed, grateful to be shed of the weight. The furniture was the same as I remembered: a tall, scarred oak chest; an easy chair and floor lamp under the window; a small washstand in the corner. But the personal effects on the washstand and atop the chest, the book left lying on the chair, place neatly marked with a green ribbon, all belonged to a stranger.

Nothing marked the time I'd spent here with Gabe, how comfortable and at home I'd been living in this room. I was an intruder now. That was an odd thing to contemplate.

Mr. Baskin's room was cold, but it was a natural cold, a consequence of the season. Windows had been flung open, letting in a strong breeze from outside that whipped the curtains up and down. Dora hurried to tug the sash down and shut out the wind.

“There, now the candles will stay lit. Give me a moment before we light them.” She pulled off her gloves, walking the edges of the room with a hand outstretched, pausing to touch a picture frame on the wall, run a finger along the top of the chest, or brush her palm over the back of the easy chair. I stood near the door, waiting for instructions on where to place the candles.

Dora walked the circuit three times, her frown growing darker. She stopped in the center of the room and folded her arms over her chest. “Dee … close your eyes. Tell me what you sense and if you hear anything unusual.”

I set the basket of candles at my feet. “What's wrong?”

“Maybe nothing.” She sat on the edge of Mr. Baskin's bed, eyes narrowed and searching the corners of the room. “Humor me. I want to be sure before we continue.”

I trusted Dora implicitly, but turning toward the windows bathed my face in sunlight and made shutting my eyes easier. The sounds of other tenants drifted up from the lower floors, a woman's laughter and the heavy tread of a man climbing the creaky stairs. Traffic noises carried from outside, a child's shout and a mother calling her son back to the yard. The smell of baking cookies chased the scent of Mr. Baskin's cologne from the room, making my stomach rumble.

“Nothing.” Try as I might, I couldn't find anything out of the ordinary. I turned, Dora's sour expression confirming my instincts. “There's nothing here, not a trace of a spirit in this room. I'd swear no ghosts had ever entered Mrs. Allen's house, let alone caused the destruction she described. How can that be?”

“I wish I knew, Dee. The house is completely empty of spirits, too empty for a building of this age. Almost all old houses have at least one faded haunt hanging about. At the very least, I'd expect to sense residue of a spirit's presence before it passed from this world. I'd dearly love to know what happened to the resident ghosts.” Dora stood, smoothing her skirt before pulling her gloves on again. She turned in a slow circle, peering at everything in such a way, I was certain she saw more than a shaving brush on the washstand, or a book left unfinished on the chair. “Katie Allen's not one to make things up or cry wolf just to draw attention. She's too solid and rooted in the here and now. I'm sure everything happened just as she said.”

I looked around Mr. Baskin's quiet room, feeling the emptiness settle around me and endeavoring to remember if the boardinghouse had always felt so hollow. Perhaps I hadn't noticed. That I'd grown so used to the presence of spirits that a house without them felt unnatural was telling. “Dora, if it's not a poltergeist breaking Mrs. Allen's dishes and threatening her boarders … what is?”

“I wish all the answers that leap to mind didn't make my skin crawl. Ghosts aren't the only denizens of the spirit world. They're merely the most common and benign.” Dora yanked open the windows, letting the windborne smell of salt and the sea fill the room again, and replace the dusty scent of sage and pine. “Do you remember the discussion we had on imps and fiends? Certain types of demons are said to devour older, weaker ghosts and assume the spirit's place. Demons must be invited inside deliberately, they don't wander into the realm of the living by accident. But that would explain the lack of haunts and house spirits here.”

I stared. “Ghost-eating demons? You can't be serious.”

Dora waved a hand in exasperation. “Of course I'm serious. But just because I used that as an example doesn't mean I'm convinced we're dealing with anything quite that dramatic. Chances are that Katie was closer to the mark in thinking something similar to brownies or sprites are at the root of her troubles. Trickster spirits are found everywhere.”

The tightness in my throat eased, allowing me to breathe. I'd questioned my sanity for years before circumstances forced me to acknowledge that the ghosts I saw were real. That spirits sought me out was bad enough, but I'd learned to cope. I wasn't eager to repeat the experience. Suddenly, facing a poltergeist didn't seem all that bad. “All right. What do we do now?”

“We go down to the kitchen and have tea.” Dora gathered up half the supplies we'd lugged in from the car and started for the stairs. I took the rest. “Afterwards, I'll burn some sage and sprinkle some rue and thyme on the windowsills, but that's mostly for show. Katie needs to see something tangible to believe in what we're doing. You used to live in this house, so I'll leave building wards to you. We should be able to keep out most harmful spirits.”

My failure to keep one small ghost out of my home and away from Gabe still weighed on me. “I've not done well on that front of late. Are you sure?”

“Quite sure. There are methods of layering protections and weaving barriers I haven't taught you yet. I foolishly thought neither of us would ever need protections that strong. Not in San Francisco.” Dora paused on the second-floor landing, shoulders tense, and looked back toward Mr. Baskin's room. “Obviously, I was mistaken. Evil has no regard for borders. The Great War is changing the world, and balances are shifting. I'd do well to remember.”

A gust of icy air swirled down the stairwell from the top floor, chilling me through my winter coat and rising gooseflesh on my arms. Daniel was still trapped in Europe, subject to all the unsettling changes and dangers Dora spoke of. I refused to think of the tiny shivers rippling across my shoulders as an omen.

Open windows on a January day and a drafty old house. That's all it was, nothing more.

 

CHAPTER 7

Gabe

Gabe stared out the car window, struggling mightily to keep his impatience from getting the best of him. Traffic crawled along the downtown streets. Fewer horse rigs worked in the city every year, but the remaining horse-drawn cabs and delivery wagons clogged the roadways, slowing everyone down. Henderson navigated the car down side streets and shortcuts in an attempt to bypass the worst jams, but there was only so much that could be done.

That Jack hadn't said more than a dozen words since they left the station didn't lighten Gabe's mood. He wanted this trip to Chinatown over with and done.

He and Jack had met in his office early and gone to Baldwin's cell first thing. Both of them had hoped a night in a warm bed and a good meal might have helped Archie regain his senses. If anything, Baldwin was worse, cowering in the corner of his cell and whimpering each time Jack tried to speak to him.

They'd quickly given up trying to question Baldwin. Persisting was cruel, as much for the pain Jack felt as for the distress their questions caused Archie. He wasn't sure he could stomach that a second time.

Sadie had taken the news of Amanda's disappearance and Archie's incarceration hard, just as Jack feared. Any hope Sadie might have an idea of where Amanda was died pretty quickly. The two women hadn't spoken since Amanda's visit to deliver a gift for the baby. Weeks had passed since.

Henderson, Dodd, and Baker hadn't turned up much of anything on Effie Fontaine either, another disappointment. A few of the men drinking in the most popular dockside taverns had heard the name, but not much more. The same was true for the prostitutes working near the wharves. Gabe suspected Miss Fontaine didn't frequent the same social circles as Baker's and Henderson's contacts.

He and Jack had discussed other ways to track down information on Miss Fontaine and her followers before confronting her, but the Bradley Wells murder case and the trip to Chinatown came first. They'd agreed, reluctantly, to put off delving into Effie Fontaine's life until after they met with Dora that afternoon.

Secretly, he hoped Dora would put them on the road to catching Wells's killer quickly. He'd almost welcome her pointing out some obvious clue they'd missed and solving the case. Life, and police work, never resolved itself that cleanly, but he saw no harm in daydreaming.

Gabe knew which case was foremost in Jack's mind and the reasons behind his silence. He felt the same way. A strange sense of urgency—part experience, part instinct he couldn't quite explain—pushed him toward finding out more about Effie Fontaine.

Instinct and unexplained feelings were a poor basis for prioritizing investigations. They still didn't have any real evidence that Amanda Poe had come to harm or hadn't left of her own accord. Pressure from Commissioner Lindsey aside, finding the person, or persons, responsible for three murders should come first.

The stylized buildings on the edge of Chinatown, their sweeping, curved rooflines and bright colors designed to appeal to tourists, came into sight. Chinatown had burnt to the ground after the 1906 quake, leaving the residents homeless and impoverished, and on the verge of losing their place in the city. Some of the illustrious citizens of San Francisco had denied the Chinese survivors access to fresh water or food, content to let them die. Desperate times often brought out the worst in people, but he'd never understood that level of cruelty.

Gabe had heard the stories of tong elders begging to keep their homes, and finally convincing San Francisco's leaders that a rebuilt Chinatown would attract visitors from all over the world, enriching the city's coffers. Greed turned the tide in favor of San Francisco's Chinese residents, not compassion.

As they approached Sutter and Grant, his tolerance for delays and snarled traffic evaporated. He slid open the window separating the front and back seats. “Pull over and park, Marshall. We'll walk from here.”

“Yes, Captain.” Henderson pointed. “There's a space right over there.”

He climbed out and slammed the car door, waiting for Jack to come around and join him on the sidewalk. The Sung family tea shop was dead in the center of Grant Street, at the heart of Chinatown. In 1905, still rookies and new on the force, he and Jack spent four months walking a beat in Chinatown. They'd endlessly circled up Stockton and Grant and Pine, avoiding the small alleyways and side streets that were too dangerous for a pair of rookie cops. Staying away from places they didn't belong kept them alive, and in the end, earned them a measure of respect.

Tourists were scarce this early on January mornings, visits from the police even rarer. They were the only white faces on the crowded street and garnered just as many suspicious stares as they had while walking a beat. But the whole point of walking was to be seen, to let the tong and Mr. Sung's family know they were coming. Surprising the family and their tong leader was a bad idea.

Tension knotted between his shoulders as he looked up and down the street. They were being watched, openly, with no attempt to conceal the watchers. Permission from the Sung family tong aside, someone didn't want them here. Gabe slipped his hands into his trouser pockets and worked at looking relaxed. “Stay with the car, Marshall. Keep your eyes and ears open. You have company.”

“Yes, sir. I see them.” Marshall Henderson pulled a battered nickel weekly out of his back pocket and leaned against the front fender. He spent so much time waiting with the car that he'd taken to carrying old copies of
Pluck and Luck
or
Secret Service
with him at all times. Other senior officers weren't so lenient, but Gabe let him read.

They set off walking and hadn't gone more than a few yards when Jack broke his silence. “Tsk, tsk, Captain. What would the commissioner say? Boredom is supposed to be a part of a patrolman's job.”

“My dad always said boredom makes you lose your edge. I'll take his opinion over Lindsey any day. And we both know that Marshall never misses a thing.” He nodded to the gray-haired old woman and the little boy with wide, curious eyes watching them from a doorway. She scowled and hurried the child inside. “Maybe you should try reading, Lieutenant Fitzgerald. Henderson tells me detectives in the weeklies always solve the crime. You might learn something.”

“I read.” Jack sidestepped two men carrying a heavy crate into a curio store. Straw sifted through the rough pine slats, leaving a trail on the sidewalk. “But my taste runs more to
Collier's
or Ring Lardner in
The Saturday Evening Post
. I get my fill of detectives and crime on the job.”