Fine Spirits [Spirits 02] (2 page)

      
Then I recalled the puppies. My resolution not to become involved in this affair started to totter a bit. Billy is always telling me that what I do for a living is wicked and evil and bad for my overall moral constitution. I guess my vacillating in this instance might be considered proof of his contention, although I'm usually an upstanding Christian woman who tries her best to be good. I even sing alto in our church choir, for crumb's sake.

      
I took a deep breath and thought fast. “Well . . . The thing is, Mrs. Bissel, that I can't guarantee results. As I've already told you, I've never done anything like this before. I may have to experiment.” That was putting it mildly. “I'm almost sure it would take more than one visit.”

      
“Of course. That would be fine, dear. Come as often as you like. I only want you to try. I'm sure you can do it.”

      
It was nice to have a cheering section, although I couldn't help but wish mine was closer to home. In actual fact, it would have been nice if Billy, who was at the time sitting in his wheelchair in the living room and probably fuming because I'd run off in the middle of a fight, appreciated me. Ah, well.

      
“I'm not so sure,” I told her bluntly because it was the truth, and also because I didn't want her to hate me once I'd failed to do the job. “I can but try my best. The spirits are often stubborn. They come from a plane far removed from our own, and have their own ways--ways that transcend our mortal ken--you know.” I'd become so accustomed to speaking such folderol that this ludicrous speech danced off my tongue like a prima ballerina.

      
“I know it, dear. That's why I want
you
.”

      
Still I hesitated, and not merely because I knew I could no more rid a house of a ghost than I could speak Mandarin Chinese. My hesitation this time centered around my automobile, a 1909 Model T Ford that didn't take kindly to climbing hills. Mrs. Bissel lived on the corner of Foothill Boulevard and Maiden Lane in Altadena. That was
way
uphill from our house on South Marengo Avenue in Pasadena.

      
Of course I could always take a red car. The electric railroad (we just called them the red cars) went uphill and down on a regular schedule, and there was a stop right at the corner of Lake and Foothill. From the red-car stop, I would only have to walk one short block to get to Mrs. Bissel's house.

      
The other reason for my hesitation sat in the living room, just waiting to hear about this call so he could rip my character and morals apart some more.

      
Poor Billy. I really did love him desperately. It's only that he'd come back to me from that awful war in such terrible shape, and neither of us knew how to cope with his new self. He was in almost constant pain and had to take morphine more and more often to keep his suffering under control. His lungs had been ruined by the Kaiser's mustard gas. He was, in short, a wreck of himself. He hated being crippled.

      
When we married in 1917, we'd known each other all our lives. I'd expected to stay married to the happy-go-lucky, cheerful, true-blue Billy Majesty who had looked so handsome in his soldier's uniform on the day of our wedding. I hadn't anticipated living the rest of my life with the wreck the Germans had made of him: the ravaged, heartsick, shell-shocked, debilitated Billy.

      
It broke my heart every day that I saw him in his present state. It broke his, too, but his unhappiness took the form of rage and helplessness, both of which he unleashed on me, and I really don't think I deserved it. He didn't deserve it, either.

      
To make a long story short, there was no easy answer to the problem of Billy or of our marriage. My insides ached almost all the time because of it.

      
“Um, I'm not sure, Mrs. Bissel . . .” I let my voice trail off, not for effect but because I was honestly struggling with my conscience about accepting a job I knew darned well I couldn't do.

      
“Oh, but Daisy, you
must
! You're the only one I trust.”

      
Yeah, yeah, she'd said that before. Her trust didn't alter the fact that I wasn't fit to do the job. I was no kind of exorcist. Nor was I, if her problem was rats or mice or cats or opossums, an exterminator.

      
I made up my mind. “Very well, I'll do my best, although I can't guarantee results.”

      
A long sigh on the other end of the wire almost blew my eardrums out. “Oh,
thank
you, Daisy. I'm sure you will prevail against this spirit. Or ghost.”

      
“Thank you.” I wished I was as sure as she was.

      
“And if you think it would be better, you may stay here for the duration of the job. That would spare you traveling back and forth if it takes more than one session to get rid of the spirit. Or ghost.”

      
Oh, boy, wouldn't Billy love that? “Thank you for your kindness, Mrs. Bissel, but I think I hadn't better stay at your house. My husband, you know . . .” Again, I allowed my voice to trail off, this time on purpose. Everyone knew about poor Billy. I felt like a traitor to him when I had a sudden, piercing urge to take Mrs. Bissel up on her offer to live at her place for a while. I could have used a good rest.

      
Mrs. Bissel sounded guilty when next she spoke. Her guilt made mine rear its ugly face and stick its tongue out at me. Billy was right about one thing: I did use my well-honed spiritualist act to manipulate people. If that was wicked and evil, I guess I was.

      
“Of course, Daisy dear. I shouldn't have asked. You have such burdens to bear for such a young thing.”

      
Darned right, I did. Heck, I'd only turned twenty the day before, yet I was supporting a whole family. Well, with the help of my mother and my aunt, but gosh, you'd think Billy would respect my situation at least as much as silly Mrs. Bissel.

      
I knew better than to expect it. After I'd made an appointment for a first visit that afternoon and hung up the telephone receiver (leaving Mrs. Barrow free to talk all afternoon with whomever she chose), I returned to our living room. Sure enough, Billy sat in his wheelchair, glowering, looking as if he was spoiling for a fight. I tilted my head a little and gazed at him, wondering if I looked as hopeless and helpless as I felt.

      
“Who was that?” he demanded.

      
“Mrs. Bissel. She's the one with the frankfurter dogs.”

      
“What did she want? A séance?” He sneered.

      
I was used to it. “Not this time. She wants me to rid her basement of a spirit. Unless it's a ghost.”

      
“She
what
?
”

      
Every now and then, when my life and job got truly bizarre, Billy's anger evaporated into surprise. That's what happened this time. I hoped it would last.

      
I sighed and sat on our comfy old sofa and put my elbows on my knees and my chin in my hands. I was wearing one of my most comfortable wrappers, a pink-and-white checked one that probably clashed with my dark red hair, but I didn't care. I dressed up for my work; at home I relaxed--except when clients came over for a palm-reading or to consult the Ouija board or to participate in a session of table-turning. “She claims a spirit or ghost has taken up residence in her basement, and she wants me to get rid of it for her.”

      
“You've suddenly turned into a--what do they call it? A minister who gets rid of ghosts?”

      
“An exorcist. Yeah, I guess so. Mrs. Bissel claims she doesn't want a priest. She wants me.”

      
“Good God, Daisy, your business is crazy. And you're crazy to take a job like that. It's bad enough that you pretend to raise dead people's ghosts and gab at them for money. This is going too damned far.”

      
I gazed at my husband and felt like crying. We Gumms are made of sturdy stuff, though, and I didn't. “
You
tell her that, then. I told her, and she chose not to believe me. I told her I wasn't qualified to do the job and almost certainly wouldn't succeed. She wants me to try it anyway.”

      
Billy shook his head in amazement. I knew exactly how he felt, because I'd been feeling the same way ever since Mrs. Bissel ignored everything I'd tried to tell her and begged me to take a job for which I was totally and admittedly unqualified.

      
“Rich people are strange, Billy.”

      
“You're telling me.”

      
“Do you want to fight with me some more, or can I change clothes and go up to Mrs. Bissel's house and study her basement?”

      
His lips straightened into a flat line, and he glared at me for several seconds before he gave it up. “Aw, Daisy, you know I don't want to fight with you.” He'd have sighed, but his lungs wouldn't let him.

      
Sometimes I hurt for my poor husband so much it was all I could do to keep from screaming at God for letting something like this happen to so good a man as my Billy. I still felt like crying--and still didn't. “I don't want to fight with you, either, Billy. I love you.”

      
His smile went lopsided. “Do you?”

      
I moved from the couch to his chair and threw my arms around him. “I love you more than anything, Billy Majesty, and you know it.”

      
His arms went around my waist and I sank down onto his lap, wishing we could have a real marriage. I knew Billy would have made a wonderful father, had the Germans allowed him to come home to me a whole man. Too late for that now. As much as I tried not to, and as much as I knew the feeling to be irrational, I hated the Germans.

      
“I just wish you didn't have to do what you do, Daisy. That's all.”

      
Darn it, he was
so
unfair about my job! I didn't want to spoil the mood, so I murmured, “I know it, Billy. I'm sorry.”

      
And, after a short round of smooches, which was as much love-making as we were able to accomplish thanks to the damned Germans, I went off, drooping, to change into my spiritualist costume and catch a red car up to Altadena so I could pretend to exorcize a spirit (or ghost) from an addle-pated rich lady's basement.

      
Merciful heavens, but my life seemed strange sometimes.

 

      
 

Chapter Two
 

      
Even though my mood was as gloomy as the weather, I looked swell when I was through transforming myself from a simple, everyday, housewife into a spiritualist medium. I'd recently had my hair bobbed at the barber shop Billy and Pa frequented, and the new hair-do suited me fine. I'd resisted cutting my hair for a long time because I was afraid people wouldn't accept a spiritualist with short hair. However, since I almost always wore hats when I worked, it probably didn't matter much.

      
So far, nobody seemed to be appalled by my short hair. Only a couple of years earlier, if a woman cut her hair short, the whole world thought she was a lady of the night or a Bolshevist or something else equally awful. Not anymore. Nowadays, even prim and proper ladies were getting their hair shingled--and not at hair salons, either. Rich and snooty ladies went to barbershops, just as I'd done.

      
As an added bonus, the bob was easy to care for. All I had to do was wet my hair, comb it out, make finger waves that lay flat against my cheeks, and my hair was “done” for the day. Not only was it easy to care for, but I have thick, heavy hair, and when the barber cut most of it off, I felt at first as if I was going to float up into the sky, I was so lightheaded.

      
I kissed Billy as I walked to the front door. “I'll be back as soon as I can be.”

      
He looked up at me and gave a half-hearted smile. “You look beautiful, Daisy.”

      
“Thanks, sweetheart.” I was wearing a black wool dress that I'd sewn on Ma's White side-pedal rotary sewing machine. The dress had a long waist that tied with a sash on the side of my hip. I also wore black stockings and pretty black leather short-heeled shoes that tied over my arches, and I carried a black handbag. I topped it all off with a black cloche hat I'd remade from last year's model. When I threw on my black wool coat (which I'd also made myself), I looked as if I was going to a funeral. That suited me fine, because it worked both for the job I was headed toward, as well as my mood. “Wish me luck.”

      
As I might have expected, that was the wrong thing to say. Some days, everything I said was wrong, and if I kept my mouth shut that was wrong, too.

      
Billy frowned. “I can't do that, Daisy. You're lying to people, and I can't wish you luck doing it. Not with a clear conscience.”

      
“I didn't lie to Mrs. Bissel,” I protested, stung. “I told her I couldn't do this job. She wants me to try anyway.”

      
He shook his head in disgust. “That's ridiculous.”

      
“Maybe to you,” I said, my voice hard.

      
Before we could tangle further, I left the house. I had to stand on the front porch and take several deep breaths to make sure I wouldn't cry. The day was as gray outside as I felt inside, and I wondered if I should have taken an umbrella with me. Because I couldn't bear going back into the house and facing Billy again, I decided
to heck with an umbrella
, and began walking the few short blocks to Colorado Street where I could catch a red car.

      
It didn't take more than forty-five minutes for the red car to get to Foothill Boulevard and Lake Avenue. There was still no hint of rain--and no hint of sunshine. The orange groves that still took up a lot of Pasadena land looked as if they didn't enjoy the gray weather any more than I did, and every time the red car chugged its passengers past a weeping willow, I felt as though it was weeping for me. The air was thick and cold, and I hugged my coat around me in the car, feeling miserable and oppressed and generally lousy. Not even the appreciative glances I got from the conductor and several of my fellow passengers cheered me. I wanted my husband to value me, not a bunch of strangers.