Giving Up the Ghost (9 page)

“It's not the food I'm interested in,” I said.

“Am I to accompany them as well?” Grunvand asked Strong.

But I replied for him.

“No,” I said. “You are to stay with the general manager. If there was an attempt on my life, then he may be in danger as well.”

“Yes, certainly,” Grunvand said. “That's what I was thinking.”

I paused.

“I am sorry for the loss of your friend,” I said.

“As am I,” Grunvand said. “And I find it impossible to explain his actions.”

“Explaining away attempted murder is never easy,” I said. “Do you think the family would like his body returned to Chicago?”

“Thank you, but you have it wrong,” Grunvand said. “Frank had never been to Chicago. He was from Missouri, and worked out of the St. Joseph office. The chief hired him on the basis of a recommendation from one of our longtime operatives, after he proved useful in the James-Younger affair.”

“But he had a Chicago accent.”

“Oh, no,” Grunvand said. “His speech was rustic.”

Calder stood.

“I think you'd better walk over to the furniture store and take a look at the body,” Calder said. “I have a feeling the gentleman on ice over there isn't your friend at all.”

Within the hour, Grunvand confirmed that the corpse at Mitford's was not Frank Blackmar; McCarty was summoned and agreed to accompany us to Florence; and I packed a few clothes and provisioned my well-worn leather ammunition satchel (which itself had once belonged to a murderer and was a prize from a previous case) with those things that I knew from experience would prove handy.

I spent a few minutes sitting on the stairs and talking with Eddie, who had relocated to the newel post. I told him that I was called away on a case, and that I didn't know how long I would be away, but that I would, sooner or later, return. In the meantime, I said, Mitford the Undertaker had agreed to look in on him, and make sure he had food and water. But, I said, he would not be caged inside the agency; the secret raven-sized door above the agency's main door would remain unlatched, should he wish to venture outside. The door, which opened beneath the overhanging porch, but so high up as to be out of reach of anyone not on a ladder, was difficult to spot, even if one knew where to look. After a fire had destroyed two of the businesses along Front Street the previous summer, I began to worry that Eddie would not be able to escape should the agency catch fire, and convinced Calder to spend an afternoon fashioning and fitting the door. Calder had pasted a playing card—the Ace of Spades—on the inside of the door, as a marker so Eddie could better find his exit in case of emergency.

“Any advice for me on this one?” I asked.

Eddie ruffled his wings, a sure sign that he was anxious.

“Of course I'll be careful,” I said.

By the time I gathered my things and walked to the depot, the
Ginnery Twitchell
was huffing on the main line beside the station. There was only one car behind the locomotive and tender, the railway express car. The others had been left at the old siding outside Dodge.

Young Delaney awaited me on the platform.

“Miss Wylde,” he said, reaching for my bag. “May I—”

I pulled the bag out of his reach.

“Please,” I said. “Allow me the dignity of carrying my own things.”

“I was only trying to be a gentleman,” he said.

“Most of the gentlemen I have known were not, in fact, gentle, and they hid their rapacious ways behind a cloak of civility,” I said. “Merely attempt to be a human being, please.”

“Of course,” he said, but appeared a bit bewildered. “Miss Wylde—”

“Let's dispense with the honorifics, shall we? It will be much simpler for both of us. You may call me Ophelia, and I will call you Delmar.”

“I would prefer Delaney.”

“Easily granted, young Delaney.”

“This is yours,” he said, handing me an envelope.

I put down the bag and opened the flap. Inside were two pieces of paper.

The first was a letter, signed by Strong, that indicated I had been retained by the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe, in the capacity of consulting detective, and that employees should meet any reasonable request I might have in the course of my investigation.

The other was a slip of yellow paper, about three by five inches, with the name of the railway in a flourishy script, and LIFETIME PASS in large letters. Then there was a place for my name, which was written in ink by a steady hand, and another place for the number of the pass, 03-78-07. It was signed by the general manager.

“That's it?” I asked. “I thought it might be more elaborate. Why, it is no more impressive than the advertising slips for Prickly Pear Bitters the Shinn Brothers print by the hundreds down the street at the
Dodge City Times
.”

“It is worth a fortune,” Delaney said. “Please exercise some care because, if lost, it will not be replaced.”

“Don't worry,” I said, tucking the pass and its envelope into my satchel. “I lost a ticket once, and that was a nightmare.”

“Shall we? Your friends are already aboard.”

“Could I ride up front with Skeen?”

“Even your pass does not allow passengers in the cab.”

The freight door in the side of the express car was open, and we stepped from the platform into the interior of the car. Calder and McCarty were sitting on a bench near the post office section of the car, and I took a chair near them. Delaney leaned out of the car and waved. Once the train began to move, he pulled the door shut and engaged the latch.

McCarty was sitting with his medical bag on his lap, his arms folded over it.

Calder had his feet stretched out in front of him, his boots crossed.

“It was strange,” McCarty said, “having no news this morning, and hearing no train traffic rattle by.”

“I enjoyed the peace,” Calder said.

“The country could be at war,” McCarty said, “and we would not know it.”

“That's what was enjoyable about it.”

McCarty shook his head.

“I couldn't stand this way of life for very long,” he said. “It has only been a decade or thereabouts since the continent was bridged by both rail and wire, but that world seems quaint and very long ago.”

“Are we any happier?” Calder asked.

“Wiser, perhaps,” McCarty said.

“Neither wiser nor happier,” I said. “We have more information and our affairs have become more efficient, but neither adds to the volume of the human heart. Shakespeare remains eternal, whether he is on a dusty shelf in some library, or shot like lightning from New York to San Francisco.”

“Is he still eternal if all the copies of his plays rot to dust?”

It was an uncharacteristically deep question for Calder.

“Why, Jack,” I said. “What an excellent question. The answer, I think, is yes—as long as someone, somewhere, is reciting a line from memory or simply recalling the story with pleasure.”

McCarty told me I had put it just right, but Calder rubbed the back of his right ear and I wasn't so sure. Perhaps I was just saying what I wanted to be true.

“What about all of these undelivered messages clotting up the wires?” he said. “I don't understand where they're coming from. Are they being sent from a single source, or from everywhere?”

“Nowhere is more like it,” I said.

“What do you mean?” McCarty asked.

“My guess is that it's coming from the stuff between the worlds.”

“The luminiferous aether,” McCarty said. “The substance that makes the propagation of light waves possible. Something has created an aetherial tear or rift that has caused the magnificent auroras—and allowed this supernatural manifestation?”

“I think so,” I said. “But it's a particular kind of rip that allows only these certain messages through, the incomplete, the lost, the undelivered. It's as if there is a sort of purgatory for messages, and somebody has thrown open the door.”

“How do we close the door?” McCarty asked.

“We close the door by figuring out why somebody would want to open that door in the first place,” I said. “This isn't a natural phenomenon, because it doesn't match what happened in 1859.”

“And then there's the death of Hopkins,” Calder said.

“The
murder
of Hopkins,” McCarty said, “if Ophelia's telegraphic goblins are telling the truth.”

“They're not my goblins,” I said. “But yes, the death of Hopkins is the place to start. Doc, that's why I wanted you to come with us. An expert medical opinion, one that we can trust, may prove essential. Treat it as a private coroner's inquest.”

“Is that legal?” McCarty asked.

“In cases where there is the consent of the family,” Calder said. “But if there is no next of kin, we'll have to obtain the permission of the local prosecutor. If Hopkins has already been buried, then we'll need an exhumation order from a judge—and to get that, we'd have to show cause. Even then, judges are reluctant to disturb hallowed ground.”

“We'll have to cross that bridge when we come to it,” I said.

The train was going at full speed now, perhaps forty miles an hour across the prairie. The express car jostled with the motion of the rails, and the big lamp hanging over the post office desk swayed gently in time.

Delaney, who had been busy at the far end of the car, brought a tray of coffee and tea and ham sandwiches. The ham sandwiches were on thick bread, and each had a generous slice of cheese.

“I took the liberty of storing this up during our stop at Dodge,” he said. “Even though Marion County is but a few hours away, we are still traveling during lunchtime. I find that I think best when my stomach's not growling, don't you, Miss Wylde?”

I gave him a stern look.

“I'm sorry,” he said. “Ophelia.”

“If I feed my stomach,” I said, “it starves my brain.”

I took only a cup of tea, while the men helped themselves to coffee and sandwiches.

“This is a fine sandwich,” McCarty said, after two bites. “I especially like the spicy mustard sauce. What is it that I'm tasting? Star anise, perhaps. What do you think, Jack?”

“Don't ask me,” he said, his mouth full. “My idea of a good meal is anything that doesn't bite you back.”

“What about you, Delaney?” McCarty asked. “No sandwich?”

“No, sir,” he said. “The chief prefers that I bring my own meals aboard, and eat away from management and guests.”

“Have a sandwich,” Calder said. “We won't tell.”

“No, thank you, sir,” Delaney said. “Rules must be obeyed.”

“Suit yourself,” Calder said. “Tell me, how long have you known the Pinkerton man?”

“Grunvand? I can't say that I know him at all,” Delaney said. “I met him only a few days ago. And I never was introduced to his partner, poor Frank Blackmar.”

We rolled on through the October afternoon, generally following the old Santa Fe trail just north of the Arkansas River. The clusters of trees on the riverbank were already beginning to turn, patches of red and yellow signaling the arrival of fall. The sky was clear and the temperature was brisk, but not cold. About three hours into our journey, the river turned south toward Wichita, and we continued northeast toward the city of Newton.

We slowed as we passed through the city of Newton, but did not pause at the station, even though the platform was crowded with stranded passengers who attempted to flag us down by waving their arms and shouting. Some among the crowd jumped down and stormed the tracks, and I was afraid they might fall beneath the great wheels of the
Ginery Twitchell
and be sliced to bits. Engineer Skeen gave long warning blasts on the whistle, some city marshals and railway workers dragged some of the desperate people back, and somehow we managed not to kill anyone.

When it was apparent we weren't going to stop, the train was pelted with bricks, stones, and garbage. The window I was looking through was cracked by a whiskey bottle that was hurled by a young woman with wild eyes.

“It's a mob,” Calder said, pulling me away from the window.

“What are they afraid of?” Delaney asked.

“They are afraid of the unknown and angry at being powerless,” McCarty said. “You can't much blame them, considering they've been stranded in a strange town far from home, by circumstances they neither can control nor understand.”

“No excuse for acting like animals,” Delaney said.

“Crowds act with one mind,” McCarty said. “And that mind is driven by animal instincts, not intellect.”

I looked at Calder, and he looked away.

“We were lucky at Dodge,” McCarty said, “because there's not enough passenger traffic that far west to strand many passengers. But the farther east we get, the greater the numbers will become.”

A minor revelation struck me.

“That's why Strong decided to stay behind,” I said. “He was afraid to come back east for fear of the mobs.”

“He did think it prudent to avoid the stations,” Delaney said. “But he was not planning to remain in Dodge. If the wires do not clear by tomorrow morning, he will board an eastbound stage and make his way back to railway headquarters in Topeka.”

Delaney paused.

“Perhaps I shouldn't have told you that.”

“Don't worry, young Delaney. We can be trusted.”

“This is a bad sign,” McCarty said. “If crowds are rioting at Newton, Kansas, a railway hub on the prairie, you know things are worse in the cities. And this is just the first day. Can you imagine what things could be like in two or three days, if transportation isn't restored?”

“Allan Pinkerton's worst nightmare,” I said. “An instant tramp army.”

“The towns will quickly run out of food,” Calder said. “I don't think the stage and freight lines could possibly haul enough to meet the demand. If you live on a farm you'll do all right, but these travelers must depend on retail operations, and with many dozens or even hundreds of passengers stranded at each point along the way, the shelves will be emptied pretty quick.”

“That's a horrific thought,” I said.

Soon after leaving Newton, we entered a land of rolling hills, rich fields, and many trees. It was all as peaceful as Newton was riotous. Forty minutes later, we drew near the town of Florence. I said something to Delaney, who pulled a cord overhead, signaling Engineer Skeen. We slowed, and came to a stop on a lonely section of track.

“I think it best if we walk the rest of the way in,” I said. “Let's blend into town instead of announcing ourselves by stepping off the only train running today.”

“Good thinking, Ophie,” McCarty said.