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I continued, "She has some talent as a medium, and had been told
that your Mrs. Locke could be trusted, that she was honest. My
friend requires guidance, a teacher, preferably another medium, and
with dear Abigail gone . . . Well, you do see the problem."

"And the name of your friend is?" Now the other eyebrow joined
the first.

"I am not at liberty to say."

"I believe you must be inquiring for yourself then, miss. You
are familiar to me, you seem to expect me to know who you are by
some previous tie of . . . friendship?" I nodded, thinking so far
so good. He was being careful not to offend me. This was all going
very much better than I'd thought it might. Patrick went on, "So I
must apologize for being unable to recall your name, and I assure
you that in the transaction of spiritual matters, anything we say
to each other is confidential. You don't need to hide behind that
old, transparent ruse of seeking advice for a friend."

As I bestowed the smile he expected for his cleverness, I
wondered if I dared omit my name once more. No, better not. "My
name is Fremont Jones, Mr. Rule, and I really am asking for a
friend, whose name I may not reveal. I will of course be willing to
pay a consultation fee, if necessary."

"That will not be necessary. I've heard that name before, it's
unusual, but I can't quite place-"

"Do you yourself have clairvoyant powers, Mr. Rule?"

He preened a little; my question had diverted him, which had
been my intent. "I'm a sensitive, I can sense when the spirits are
near. With Mrs. Locke I had a close bond, and sometimes felt I was
able to receive thought messages from her. However, my contribution
to the advancement of Spiritualism has been more in the way of
serving those whose talents and abilities rank far above mine."

Getting comfortable, he leaned back in his chair and crossed one
leg over the other. "Now, how exactly may I help you, Miss-it is
Miss?"

I nodded.

"Miss . . . Jones?"

"By giving me the name of another medium who can be trusted,
whom I may approach with the object of asking if she will guide and
teach my friend."

This request met with pursed lips, a wrinkled brow, and
silence.

I plunged on in what I hoped was my most persuasive manner,
putting a note of desperation into my voice. Indeed, when I thought
of Frances furiously scribbling at her automatic writing, that was
not hard to do. "I know about Ingrid Swann, of course, everyone in
these circles does, but from all I know of her she would be far too
busy. If there is no one else, perhaps I should go to her. Is she
honest, do you think?"

He crossed his arms and looked more like a hawk than ever. What
was going on behind those flat gray eyes?

Making the greatest effort, I summoned a smile and cocked my
head a bit to one side. "What is it, Mr. Rule? What is holding you
back?"

"I've remembered who you are. The woman you were with that night
is known to me: Frances McFadden, the wife of Jeremy McFadden. She
is the friend to whom you refer. Yes?"

Ah well, no ruse is likely to last forever. I nodded. "Yes."

Patrick Rule rose, and when he had unfolded to his full height
and I was looking up at him, he suddenly appeared ten feet tall to
me. Yet I would not get up myself, because to do so would have
indicated a willingness to leave. I was determined to stand-or
sit-my ground. He glared along the sharp planes of that handsome
nose. "What is she up to, this Frances McFadden? Tell me and I may
help you. But I'll give you no further information unless you
do."

For some inexplicable reason, I hadn't anticipated this
question. I wasn't prepared, and stumbled a bit. He did notice of
course; I was sure he noticed everything. "S-she has been taken by
surprise in this," I said, feeling my way along, "and doesn't know
herself what is happening."

"You'll have to be more direct than that, Miss Jones."

"The, ah, terminology doesn't come easily to me."

"That's surprising, isn't it, since you presented yourself as
such a dear friend of Abigail's. You were not her friend, of
course. You breezed your way in here on false pretenses. And if you
were not quite so"-the gray eyes swept over me, and now I
understood his full attraction, and his power, because as his gaze
touched my face, my breasts, sped down the folds of my skirt like
lightning, to rest on my barely visible ankles, the gray eyes
flashed silver-"so obviously a respectable woman, I would send you
on your way."

Now I did stand. "Perhaps I should be going, at any rate."

"No. Sit down. I'll help you."

I expected him to say,
for a price,
and was prepared for
the price named to be in something other than money, but he did
not. So I sat. Patrick Rule remained standing, and crossed his
arms, which made him all the more formidable.

"Now," he said, "you will tell me everything you know about what
is going on with your friend, and when you have done so I'll decide
how best to proceed. We should work together on this, Miss
Jones."

"I don't understand."

"Simply this: Danger came into that seance where Mrs. McFadden
was present and went into a trance of her own. I believe she was
the conduit, the open door, to the kind of malevolent energy that
resulted in my dear Abigail's murder. If it had happened only the
one time, I might not consider this avenue worth pursuing. But you
tell me Mrs. McFadden continues to have . . . visitations?"

"Yes, she does."

"From the same spirit who came through that night?"

I shook my head. "I don't know. I can't be sure. Nor can
Frances." I had my suspicions that this was the case, but I
certainly wasn't going to tell him that-though in truth I could not
have said exactly why.

Now Patrick Rule slid back into his chair, leaning urgently
toward me. "An untrained medium who has made contact is like a door
standing open, with no lock and no hand to close it."

"But what can that have to do with the . . . the murder?"

"More than you know. You must believe me, that's all. I'm
determined to find Abigail's killer. The police will never do it,
you know. A dead medium is of hardly any interest to them. Whereas
I ... I have lost my life as surely as if the unknown perpetrator
had killed me too. Bring Mrs. McFadden to me, Miss Jones, or take
me to her. I was a valued assistant to Abigail Locke, I know how to
draw the spirits out when they show, and how to command them to
leave. I cannot teach anyone to make contact-that part is still a
mystery to so many of us-but once the contact has been made, I'm
expert at eliciting information. In this case, I believe it would
be valuable information. Certainly to me."

Wheels, big wheels, began turning in my mind. "That may produce
something helpful to you, and certainly I'd like to see Mrs.
Locke's killer brought to justice. But all the questioning in the
world will not help Frances to learn to control whatever has begun
to happen in her life. As her friend, that's my primary
concern."

"It's a bargain. Tit for tat. She does this for me; I provide a
teacher for her."

Those wheels gave one last turn and came to rest in a most
satisfactory place. I reached into my pocket and drew out a
business card for the J&K Agency. I put this card on the table
between us, face up. "Mr. Rule, I am a private detective. As
Frances's friend, I cannot advise her to do as you ask, because her
husband could take her to task for it. But if you were to hire me
..."

He picked up on it right away, with enthusiasm. His face lit up
and once again he was a handsome man. "Yes] I can see it! Together
we may move through the shadowy world of San Francisco Spiritualism
in search of the despicable person who stabbed my Abigail through
the heart. Along the way you may, of course, wish to interview
certain people-shall we say 'in my presence?' "

I inclined my head in acquiescence.

"And Mrs. McFadden would be one of them."

I inclined my head again.

"Oh, you were sent by the angels, Fremont Jones."

Well, I supposed that was a little better than having been sent
by God, which had been said of me (with little evidence) in the
past, and so I remarked. This elicited the first smile I'd seen
from Patrick. "Part of the payment for my services as private
detective"-I narrowed my eyes-"will be your delivery of the kind of
help Frances needs, and that part will be due at the outset. Is
that understood?"

"Perfectly."

"Come to my office now, Mr. Rule, and we'll draw up the
contract." I stood decisively. In business I have found it is
always best to continue to move briskly ahead, whether or not one
knows precisely where one is going. The impression of forward
motion is wonderfully effective. "Now, we'll need a letter of
agreement first thing, to specify exactly what I am to do so that
there will be no misunderstanding.''

"Yes, of course. If you will allow me to get my hat? Oh, and
Miss Jones. What are your fees for this service?"

"I have a fee schedule back at the office. I don't carry about
that information in my head."

In truth, I hadn't the slightest idea what to charge. This was
my first real, unsupervised case and I was delighted beyond all
proportion.

In fact, it did occur to me, as Patrick Rule and I descended the
steps of the house on Octavia Street, that I must have a ghoulish
streak, to be so looking forward to my descent (as it were) into
the netherworld of Spiritualism in search of a murderer.

PATRICK RULE and I signed a contract late that afternoon. When
we arrived (I had driven him in the Maxwell, as he did not have an
auto, and he intended to go on somewhere else afterward) at
J&K's offices in the double house on Divisadero, I had to use
my key to let us in. Michael had apparently grown tired of minding
the store alone, so to speak, and owing to one of my more perverse
streaks this pleased me well. I could choose my own time to tell
Michael and Wish of this coup. My first case, and I had landed one
that could make headlines in the newspapers! To think what the
publicity would do for our agency, not to mention my own reputation
as an investigator, a detective if you will. Of course, it was
always possible that I wouldn't solve the case, and nothing would
come of it but a bit of money (though of course I had no such thing
as a schedule of fees, 1 had lied about that, and not being sure
what to charge, I may have made it too little; besides, I was in a
way also being paid by Patrick's taking care of Frances), but even
so . . .

So it was that I managed to keep my good news from Michael all
night, and to make my announcement to both him and to Wish around
the kitchen table during a morning coffee break. They expressed
their individual degrees of surprise and amazement (and on Wish's
part, a bit of envy, I thought), which I accepted as graciously as
if I had been the queen instead of just a penniless private
detective on her first case.

That was in the morning; by noon everything had changed because
another medium was dead: Ingrid Swann.

Frances was our messenger; she delivered this dreadful message
in a hurried, breathless telephone call: "Fremont, Jeremy is in
the-the necessary facility. I must hurry and get out of his study
before he gets back. But I overheard him talking just now on this
very telephone instrument. I was out in the hall-listening on
purpose actually-he has seemed so intense lately, I just can't help
but wonder what is going on, so I eavesdrop."

"Frances," I interrupted her babbling, "you must get to the
point, particularly if time is of the essence."

"Yes, yes, of course. Jeremy said on the phone that Ingrid Swann
is dead, it is to be in the afternoon's
Examiner.
Can you
imagine?"

"Good heavens
¹
." I said. "Another medium. How very .
. . odd. And terrible, of course, it's terrible." As if, I thought
with a chill, someone had decided to murder all the mediums in San
Francisco, one by one. Oh, surely not
¹
.

This new development put a different light upon my investigation
on behalf of Patrick Rule, I saw that right away.

"Who can be doing this, Fremont?" Frances cried, "Who would be
so monstrous as to do such a thing? Right on the heels of
Abigail!"

"I haven't a clue, but I expect I may come closer to finding out
than you can believe, Frances, before this business all plays out."
Then I told her how I'd been hired by Patrick Rule to investigate
Abigail Locke's death.

"We want to interview you,'' I added, in as offhand and casually
nonthreatening a manner as possible. "I could bring him to your
house, by the route I came in the other day. Or if you prefer, you
may come here."

I did not tell Frances what else I intended. She would be
hostile, I was sure, to anything that might affect her free and
easy fantasies about the ghost of this Emperor Norton.