Dangerous Spirits Read online

  “Given what has happened, and the success of my attempt at psychometry, I say we cease speculating and ask Rosanna what she wants directly,” Lizzie said. “As she seems eager to communicate through writing, we’ll hold a séance and I’ll—”

  “Absolutely not!” Vincent exclaimed. “Look at what happened to Sylvester’s hands. Worse—what happened to Norris. You’d be killed for certain.”

  “You don’t know that,” Lizzie replied. “And I’ll thank you not to take such an imperious tone with me again.”

  Ortensi chewed on his lower lip. “Any medium will be in danger, but we must do something. One of us will have to channel her sooner or later.”

  “No, you won’t.” Henry’s heart beat faster. “We can use the Electro-Séance.”

  Ortensi stared at him, as if he’d said something mad. “Electro…Séance? Really, Mr. Strauss—”

  “No, wait, Henry’s right.” Vincent sat forward in his chair. “The Wimshurst machine will provide her the energy to manifest without a circle.”

  “She doesn’t need a circle to manifest now,” Ortensi replied, annoyance creeping into his tone.

  “No, but without a séance, we have no control over where she appears.” Excitement for the plan unfolding in his head flooded through Henry. “Surely she’d be drawn to an easily accessible source of energy like the Wimshurst machine. And once she manifests, we trap her inside the phantom fence.”

  “The phantom fence,” Ortensi repeated in disbelief.

  Henry forged on. “It uses the principles of electromagnetism to keep spirits out—or in. If we wish to be doubly sure of Rosanna manifesting where we wish, we could set our trap in the churchyard, where her lover’s remains lie. If you’re right about her wanting his bones, then his grave and the Wimshurst machine together will offer a potent lure. When she enters the interior of the fenced area, we connect the batteries and trap her there. I’ll have the ghost grounder on hand, and—”

  “Really, Mr. Strauss,” Ortensi said, “it sounds as if you’re trying to sell us some sort of patent medicine.”

  Henry’s cheeks burned. “I had ad copy in mind when I devised the names, yes,” he admitted. “But they work.”

  “I assure you, Sylvester, the machines are quite effective,” Vincent said.

  “When they don’t backfire and give the ghost more energy to attack us,” Lizzie added wryly.

  “It only happened once!” Henry protested. “This will be different.” It had to be.

  Ortensi contemplated Vincent and Lizzie. “You think Mr. Strauss’s plan will work?”

  “Yes,” Lizzie said. “I do.” Vincent nodded as well.

  “Very well.” Ortensi settled back. “I suggest we work quickly. It would be best to have everything in place and ready by sundown.”

  ~ * ~

  “May I speak to you privately, Vincent?” Sylvester asked.

  They stood outside the cemetery, the low sun casting their shadows ahead of them. Inside, Henry and Jo busied themselves setting up the phantom fence, ghost grounder, and other equipment. Lizzie opted to remain back at the hotel until closer to sunset, while Vincent and Sylvester helped Henry carry his devices to the graveyard. With that task done, there remained little for the two mediums to do save wait.

  “Of course,” Vincent replied. Turning back to the cemetery, he called, “We’re going for a stroll, but we’ll return shortly.”

  Henry waved a hand to indicate he’d heard. Vincent followed Sylvester away from the cemetery and back through the town. Norris’s body had been returned to Devil’s Walk, although its condition meant it lay in the receiving tomb rather than in his parents’ parlor. No doubt it would remain there until the local pastor returned from the other communities in his charge.

  Would there be a wake tonight? Given the nearly deserted streets, Vincent doubted it. No one seemed to want to venture outside even in the daylight. Even most of the shops were already shuttered.

  “What did you wish to speak of?” he prompted, when Sylvester remained silent.

  Sylvester sighed. He’d removed the bandages from his hands, although the skin was still pinker than usual. “You weren’t with Mr. Strauss during his encounter with the ghost earlier today, correct?”

  “No,” Vincent said. “Why?”

  “There’s no easy way to say this, but…are you certain it wasn’t a hoax on Mr. Strauss’s part?”

  Vincent came to a halt. “Of course! Henry hates such fakery more than anyone I’ve ever met. He’d never make up such a tale. Why would you even suggest it?”

  “I mean no disrespect,” Sylvester said hastily. “But the message. ‘Help me.’ Doesn’t it strike you as…odd? As Miss Strauss said, what does a ghost have to fear?”

  Vincent tensed. Taking a deep breath, he pulled back his temper. Sylvester didn’t know Henry, didn’t realize how good and honest he was. “Surely you don’t mean to suggest Henry just happened to set up a hoax in the exact place Mr. Norris’s body was concealed.”

  “Perhaps he spotted it hanging in the tree canopy?” Sylvester replied with a shrug. “I don’t know, Vincent, and surely I’m wrong. The entire incident simply strikes me as strange, that’s all.”

  “I don’t understand.” Vincent glanced back at the distant iron fence of the cemetery. “You seem determined not to trust Henry. I thought it was simply the unfamiliarity of his devices, but there’s more, isn’t there?”

  “I’ve traveled the world. Performed in front of kings, yes, but also investigated ancient ruins and sought out half-forgotten tribes. My life has been saved by guides and interpreters, or put in peril by unscrupulous innkeepers willing to murder for a pocket watch.” Sylvester shook his head. “The very fact I’ve lived to tell you this is proof I’ve honed my instincts to a sharper point than most. And every instinct I have says your Mr. Strauss is lying about something.”

  “In this case, your instincts are wrong.” Vincent crossed his arms over his chest. “Henry is the most honest man I’ve ever met. Or…or perhaps what you sense as a falsehood is merely his concealment of my role in his life, which of course must be kept secret by its very nature.”

  “And what is your role in Mr. Strauss’s life?” Sylvester cast him a look that held a trace of pity. “What is it really? He has ambitions, Vincent. I can tell. And ambitious men will leave others behind when they’re of no more use.”

  “Henry would never do such a thing,” Vincent insisted.

  Sylvester didn’t argue. “Perhaps we should return to the graveyard and see if our assistance is required.”

  “Yes,” Vincent agreed.

  Sylvester didn’t know Henry, that was all. Yes, Henry had ambitions, but it didn’t mean he’d leave Vincent behind.

  The Psychical Society had already turned Vincent away thanks to his Indian blood. Vincent had assumed Henry would clash with the society if he found out…but what if that wasn’t the case? What if he already knew? If the president mentioned it the other night, perhaps after Henry’s lecture?

  Henry dreamed of the sort of life Sylvester lived—world tours, his name in fifty-point type in the newspapers, the adulation of the masses. But he’d gone into business with an Indian and a woman who couldn’t risk seeking out the limelight, as Sylvester put it.

  Had he realized his mistake? Even if no one at the society brought up Vincent’s rejected application, Henry was no fool. He could see the posters and newspaper articles as well as anyone. Famous mediums were always white, and often female. After the heady first days of their relationship, had he begun to view Vincent as a liability?

  No. No, this was foolish. Sylvester was wrong. Vincent knew Henry, and Sylvester didn’t. Yes, Sylvester had excellent instincts under ordinary circumstances. But Henry’s unorthodox approach to the spirit world put him off, and it colored his normally good judgment.

  That was all. And if not…Vincent would deal with it when it came.

  ~ * ~

  Henry stood in the growing darkness amidst the g
raveyard, trying to keep his hands from shaking.

  This would work. It must work. He’d capture Rosanna, drain her energy, and let the mediums step in to send her to the other side once and for all.

  They’d go back to the hotel, have a celebratory dinner. He’d admit the Psychical Society rejected him. Lizzie would deride the society as fools, and Vincent forgive Henry for his harmless deception. Tomorrow they’d all go back to Baltimore, and he and Vincent would fall asleep in each other’s arms until dawn. Ortensi would leave for Europe, and everything would be fine.

  Absolutely fine.

  “You set up Franklin bells at the cemetery entrance, I noticed,” Lizzie remarked. She wore a dark blue dress and hat, a veil drawn across her features.

  Henry nodded. “There’s another, further along the street as well. I thought they might give us warning.”

  The cemetery gates stood wide, breaking the line of iron laid protectively around the graves inside. Thank heavens the local pastor was at one of his other parishes this week. Henry wouldn’t have liked explaining their actions to a man of the cloth, who might be less than sanguine about them setting up their equipment on top of Zadock’s grave. The Wimshurst machine sat on a folding table, as did the piezoelectric dispeller. A pile of salt covered the battery waiting to be hooked up to the dispeller, to prevent Rosanna from draining its energy. The copper wires of the phantom fence formed a loose circle around the grave. A small gap would let Henry pass in and out of the fence.

  Ortensi stared at the arrangement rather skeptically, but said nothing. Henry’s spine stiffened beneath his judging gaze. It didn’t matter what the man thought. Soon enough, he’d see Henry’s true mettle.

  A beam of light cut through the darkness, where Jo waited among the graves, a short distance away from the phantom fence. Jo had asked to try out her new headlamp. Wires connected the arc lamp on the front of the headband to the heavy batteries inside a pack strapped to her back. Salt encased the batteries to keep them safe.

  “How is the headlamp?” he called.

  “Hot,” came her reply. “But it works!”

  “So I see.”

  “Are you ready?” Vincent asked.

  Henry drew a deep breath. The warm summer air lay damp against his skin, and not even a breeze stirred.

  “I’m ready,” he said, and stepped into the circle of the phantom fence.

  “Are you sure you don’t want me to help?” Jo asked. “I can turn the crank and leave you free to use the ghost grounder.”

  “No.” Henry picked up a heavy rubber glove and placed it on his left hand. Normally he’d hold the ghost grounder in his right, but the injury to his left shoulder would never let him turn the crank on the Wimshurst machine with his off hand. The ghost grounder itself—a simple copper rod, connected to a wire grounded to an iron rod he’d driven into the earth just outside the fence—lay waiting beside the dispeller. “This will be dangerous enough with only one of us inside the fence.”

  “Henry,” Vincent started, then stopped.

  The concern embodied in the single word warmed Henry’s heart. “I’ll be fine,” he told Vincent. “Now, let’s begin.”

  He went to the Wimshurst machine and began to turn the crank. The brushes ticked past one another, and a loud crack sounded as they discharged. Ortensi jumped at the sound, and it was all Henry could do to suppress a smile.

  Hoping the charge was adequate, Henry said, “Now, Vincent.”

  Vincent’s voice rang authoritatively through the graveyard. “We wish to make contact with the spirit of Rosanna,” he said. “Spirit of Rosanna, use the energy provided by this machine and reveal yourself to us!”

  The first set of Franklin bells began to ring.

  Henry’s heart beat faster, but he continued to turn the crank.

  The second set, just within the cemetery gates, clanged to life.

  “She’s here,” Vincent said, and the flame of the lantern in his hand went from bright orange to sickly blue.

  The air around Henry grew colder and colder. The galvanometer went mad, registering a spike of electromagnetic energy, and another—then the hand remained pressed to the maximum side of the dial.

  His breath caught in his lungs. She must be right on top of him.

  Something flickered beside the table. A hint of flame. The edge of a dress.

  Then she was there, just inches away. Her cooked-egg eyes stared into his, and the roasted meat of her face cracked as she lunged for him.

  Chapter 10

  “Henry!” Vincent shouted.

  Henry leapt back, the ghost grounder already in his left hand. He thrust it out like a fencer, skewering Rosanna where her heart would have been. She jerked to a halt, and a shriek like the breaking of a thousand windows split the night.

  “The dispeller!” Henry cried.

  Curse it—Henry couldn’t reach the dispeller and hold off Rosanna at the same time. Ignoring Sylvester’s warning shout, Vincent slid through the gap in the phantom fence and dove for the table. The icy cold air made his fingers clumsy as he attached the wires, but at least the water inside hadn’t frozen.

  A moment later, a fine mist rose into the air from the dispeller. “That’s it!” Henry shouted. Rosanna shrieked again, but the sound lacked the same violence. “Now go!”

  Vincent went, Henry directly behind him. As soon as Vincent was out, Henry halted in the gap in the fence. “Jo—the fence!”

  She connected the battery. Now trapped inside the fence, the ghost writhed, the flames of her hair and dress seeming to fade.

  “Rosanna,” Vincent said. The amulet would prevent any ghost from possessing him, but it didn’t sever his connection with the otherworld. It wasn’t the same as channeling, but he might be able to force her to listen to him. “Leave this place. Those who wronged you are long dead. They can’t hurt you any more. They have found peace, a peace you deserve as well.”

  “We’re trying to help you, as you wanted,” Henry added. “Leave this place and find your rest, just as Zadock has found his.”

  She howled in rage, like the roar from a furnace door, suddenly opened. The flames enshrouding her blazed, as she directed all her remaining energy into them. A wall of heat struck Vincent, as if he stood inches from a roaring bonfire. The copper rod flared red hot, and the stench of burning rubber filled the air.

  Henry let out a cry of pain, and the grounder fell from his hand. He staggered back, stripping off the smoking rubber glove and flinging it away.

  Sylvester appeared on the other side of the phantom fence, his face lit by fire. “Begone, spirit!” he boomed, the force of his command like a strong wind against Vincent’s skin. “Leave this place, and trouble those here no more!”

  Lizzie appeared at Vincent’s elbow, her face pale but calm. “Begone, spirit,” she said with Sylvester, as he began again. Vincent hastily added his voice to hers, turning all of his will on the spirit trapped within the fence.

  The mist from the dispeller ceased, its battery dead or its water boiled away by the heat of the ghost’s rage. A horrible look of triumph twisted her charred features, and fear slicked Vincent’s spine. With all the malevolent will of the dangerous dead, she reached out and deliberately grasped the copper wire of the fence with her hands.

  It took only an instant. The copper glowed hot, but this was no sturdy rod, but merely a thin strand. It sagged, melted…and broke.

  Before Vincent could react, she exploded outward, shrieking her fury. The temperature went from furnace hot to winter cold in a second as the ghost sucked every particle of available energy from the air around her.

  The hem of Lizzie’s dress burst into flame.

  “Lizzie!” Vincent shouted, and ran to her with a wild idea of smothering the flames with his coat. But before he took another step, Rosanna’s heat-shriveled hand struck his chest.

  All the air burst from his lungs, and for a moment his feet left the ground. Then his back and skull collided with something hard and unyielding
. The flames and frantic screams grew farther and farther away, until they vanished in darkness.

  ~ * ~

  Vincent crumpled to the base of one of the oaks, like a thrown rag doll. Henry waited for him to twitch, to get up, to do anything but lie there motionless. The seconds ticked by, each one stretching into an eternity, and no, Vincent couldn’t be dead, because that would mean the whole universe would go dark forever.

  Vincent’s eyelids fluttered.

  The world snapped back into focus, even as relief stole the strength from Henry’s knees. Heat brushed his skin, and he turned from Vincent to see Rosanna advancing on Jo and Lizzie. Jo’s hands were full of loose dirt from one of the newly dug graves, and she heaped it atop Lizzie’s skirts to smother the flames.

  “Jo!” Henry shouted a warning.

  She looked up, the bright beam of her headlamp cutting the darkness. Rosanna seemed to flicker and pale. Then Ortensi appeared in the light and flung a handful of salt straight into Rosanna’s face.

  “Be gone, spirit, and trouble us no more!” he thundered.

  She flickered again, the beam of light showing through her as she grew less substantial. Henry’s ears popped, and she vanished.

  “Elizabeth!” Ortensi exclaimed. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine, thanks to Jo’s quick thinking.” She held out her hand and let Ortensi help her to her feet, graveyard dirt sloughing from her skirts as she rose.

  Henry ran to Vincent’s side. Vincent struggled to sit up, but still looked dazed from his impact with the old oak. Henry dropped to his knees, his hands trembling. “Vincent? Are you all right?”

  Vincent winced and put his hand to the back of his head. “What happened?”

  “The ghost struck you.”

  He started to shake his head, then stopped. “I don’t remember.”

  “We should get him to the doctor,” Ortensi said, joining them.

  “Agreed.” Ignoring Vincent’s protests, Henry hauled an arm over his shoulders, while Ortensi took the other.

  “Should we come?” Lizzie asked anxiously.

  “I don’t think it will be necessary,” Ortensi replied. “You should probably retire to the hotel. Miss Strauss, can you clean up this…mess?”