We sat at a small round table on comfortably upholstered dark velvet armchairs. The table had a white cloth and three candles, two white and one violet. Madame handed each of us a candle, she had one herself. “Picture the peacefulness of this candle.” She lit them. “Close your eyes and imagine the smoke coming from this candle. The smoke represents peacefulness arising from this candle and slowly making its way to the sky, the place of the spirits.” We all held our candles, and meditated on them before we placed them in front of us, in their small white ceramic holders.
Then Madame Petrovsky led us through deep breathing exercises for a few minutes to help us relax. We sat silently for a few minutes. I felt very relaxed. I think I was starting to enjoy myself—quiet music, nice waxy smelling candle, and Veronica nearby and not angry at me. I knew that she was eating this up. Maybe there is something to this.
Madame put both of her hands on the picture of the bowl and looked up again. She closed her eyes for just a moment and then reached into a pocket of her dress and pulled out a stone which she placed on the picture of the bowl. The stone was dark and shiny, about the size of a peach pit but a little flatter. At least it looked like a stone to me at first but it might have been some electronic device. It looked like there was a light inside which changed the way the surface looked—not bright, but subtle light. She reached for us and we all held hands together.
In Veronica’s soft, warm, hand I could feel her excitement. I wasn’t courageous enough to look at her. I sneezed. They both jumped back, startled by the sound. Veronica gave me a look that could melt steel.
“Sorry,” I said as I used my Kleenex. There goes the mood.
Our hands in hers, Madame Petrovsky lightly shook them to get us back to the moment, to the task at hand. “We will contact a spirit who has been a help to me for a long time. Repeat this with me,” she asked in an unexpectedly friendly voice. She smiled. “Our beloved, Halliburton, we ask that you commune with us and move among us.”
So the three of us said, “Our beloved Halliburton, we ask that you commune with us and move among us.” We did this several times and then I noticed a chill. Veronica did too because her hand shook when she shivered.
“He is with us,” Madame Petrovsky said. She readjusted herself in her chair.
“Beloved Halliburton, do you recognize this bowl pictured here?” I heard, or felt, an almost unhearable click or tap. That, and the chill in room, gave me goose bumps. Veronica was still shaking. I felt sorry for her discomfort—or fear. What could I do to help her? I could give her my sport coat but that would disrupt everyone’s concentration and she’d yell at me. I sat still, trying to regain my concentration. Am I becoming a believer?
“That tap that you heard meant yes. When he means no, he taps twice.” I nodded my understanding and Veronica continued shaking. Although it had lessened it was still there and her hand now felt cold.
“Beloved Halliburton,” Madame Petrovsky continued, “is this bowl close to us? Could we get to it in a day?” Again, the oh-so-faint tap.
“Is the bowl in harm’s way?” This time I heard two taps.
I felt Veronica’s grip of my hand loosen. I looked at her and she was leaning forward. I let go of Madame and grabbed Veronica’s shoulders as she continued falling toward the table. I stood and pushed her back on the chair. Her head fell forward, her beautiful hair covering her face. What happened to her? I was just about to yell something, what was going on here? I’m here with strangers and Veronica conks out. I stood up.
Charles quickly crossed the room and pushed a bottle of something under her nose. “Smelling salts, she’s fainted.”
Veronica pulled her head back from the bottle, her long brown hair still covering her face, and said: “No, don’t!” Her eyes were still closed. She put her hands on the table and rested her head on them, like she was going to take a nap. Charles, who was almost in front of her, pushed her shoulder back and applied the bottle again. She twisted and pushed him away and said, “Don’t!” again. I know that by my witnessing this, I was going to be in hot water with her again—or still. Somehow this was all going to end up being my fault. I don’t know how she’ll do it but she will, and she’ll have me believe it too.
She came around in a few moments. While she was out, Madame blew out the candles, fearing that Veronica’s hair would catch fire. I was pretty nervous as they stood around Veronica’s chair. I was still seated.
When she came to, she was very embarrassed and was apologizing to Charles and Madame—no mention of me however. It felt like she was out for hours. She said to Madame, who was still standing, “Can we go on now? Can we ask him more questions?”
“No, my darling, we can’t.” She held Veronica’s hand in both of hers. “Halliburton has gone for the evening.”
“I’m so sorry for spoiling everything.” She looked at the stone on the table. The light had gone out of it. It didn’t have that electronic glow that it had before. She touched it and quickly withdrew her hand. “Yipes!” She jerked her hand away. She looked at Madame Petrovsky. “It felt tingly when I touched it.”
“Yes, I know. It’s a special stone. It’s called a spirit stone. I use it to increase my energy and it helps me communicate with Halliburton. He is one of my guides. Sometimes I can see his face on its surface. I hope I didn’t anger him by leaving so abruptly.”
“I’m sorry,” Veronica said.
“There, there.” Madame smiled and patted her hand. “I’ll talk with him again later tonight.”
We said goodbye, thanked them for their help, gave them a bunch of twenties and left. Veronica was too embarrassed to stop for dinner even though I pleaded with her. “Then how about a drink?”
“Absolutely not. That would be all socializing and not business. I told you that I wasn’t going to socialize, especially after what happened at the séance.” She was quiet for several minutes then she said: “How could you let that happen?”
“Me? What could I do? One minute you’re listening to spirit knocks and the next minute you’re out.” I knew she was going to do this.
“You should have known that I was going to faint. You knew that it was very scary. And, when you felt my grip loosen, you should have done something immediately so I wouldn’t have been so embarrassed. I don’t even know why I even talk to you. I shouldn’t have allowed Professor Palma to talk me into going with you tonight. This was probably all your idea anyway. Just be quiet and drive me home. Stop for a drink? Not bloody likely!” She was steamed—again.
“We need to stop for gas,” I said.
“And another thing, if you tell anyone about tonight, you’ll be sorry!”
It looks like I need two sets of notes: one for this investigation and one for this investigation with all mention of Veronica deleted.
“I mean it, Ralphy Diedrich!”
We both forgot about the note with the bloody dagger.
Chapter 17
Discussions of the Séances
I gathered everyone at my office on Thursday, after school, to discuss the weekend events at Madame Petrovsky’s. Fay had, at my request, brought in some cheese, crackers, and cola. They all sat in chairs in front of my desk.
“Well, what did you learn, Veronica, besides that cars need gas?” Jason said this while holding a cracker with cheese in each hand and a cola between his knees.
She didn’t know how to start because she didn’t know how much he knew about all of the embarrassments that had befallen her at the seances. “According to Madame Petrovksy, the bowl is not far away from us. Her spirit guide told her that. He also said that the bowl wasn’t going to be damaged. I think that helps us in our investigation. Don’t you Professor?”
“Yes, it helps, but not much,” I said. “We still don’t know where it is or who took it but we know that it is still in the area. That is, if we can believe Madame Petrovsky.”
“It wasn’t Madame Petrovsky who said it. It was her spirit guide, Beloved Halliburton,” Veronica said.
“And what did you learn last night?” Jason asked her.
“That was last night. We didn’t learn anything on Tuesday, did we?” She looked at me and Monica.
Monica shrugged her shoulders. “Yeah,” I said, “that’s about it. But another thing, Madame Petrovsky called me today. She said that she talked to her spirit friend…”
“Guide, Professor, guide.” Veronica was exasperated.
“Sorry, guide, again last night. He told her that the bowl was very important to two people and it wasn’t being used for the forces of evil. She also mentioned that she would like to help us find the bowl.”
“We’re getting closer to it. I can feel it, here.” Veronica pointed to her heart.
“Did she say anything else?” Ralphy asked.
“She did say that she would like to help us in any way that she can,” I said.
“Getting back to the car. Did you put gas in the car, Ralphy?”
“Yeah, we ran out of gas. It was real strange…”
“The gas line was cursed,” Veronica said anxiously.
“What do you mean, ‘ran out of gas?’ It should have been about half full.”
“We were driving and then the car just stopped going. I mean the engine just quit. Just like that. We waited for a few minutes and some weirdo came along and said we were out of gas.”
“He wasn’t a weirdo,” Veronica added.
“You didn’t think that last night,” Ralphy said. Veronica shrugged. “Anyway, we were sitting there, waiting for the guy to come back with the gas and the car started. It was so strange.”
“That’s because the gas line was cursed,” Veronica said.
“Oh no, I should have told you,” I said. “The car has two gas tanks. If you’re out of gas, flip the switch and you can use the other one.”
“Now you tell me,” Ralphy said, banging his hands on his knees.
“I still think the gas line was cursed,” Veronica said. “Why did we run out of gas right there, huh? Why did we run out of gas where that strange guy could observe us? Cursed, I still think the gas line was cursed.”
“Well, enough about the gas, or lack of it. You were able to go to Madame Petrovsky’s and you weren’t too inconvenienced. I’m sorry that I didn’t mention about the way the gas tanks worked, I should have told you. But let’s move on.”
Veronica turned and whispered to her sister. “I still think it was cursed.” Monica nodded in agreement.
“We still don’t know what to do or where to go, do we?” I asked.
Jason said, “It looks like the bowl is being used by some spiritualist or witch or something like that. I think we should see what we can learn about other people like this around here. Even the ghost said that it’s in the area.”
“He’s not a ghost, Jason, he’s a guide,” Veronica said.
“Whatever. It should be in the area,” Jason said.
I heard the phone ring in the outer office. A moment later Fay came in and said: “You have a call. It’s Ms. March.”
“Thank you,” Fay left. “OK, guys, think about what we should do next and we’ll meet here same time tomorrow,”
Veronica put on her coat. “Oh, oh, another one!” she said.
Everyone turned toward her. “Another what?” her sister asked.
“Another drawing. We saw one like it in the Professor’s car last night.” She held a small yellow post-it in her hand. “I just found this in my pocket.”
“Let me see!” Ralphy said.
She leaned over and put the note on my desk. It was like the one I had gotten, a dagger with blood dripping from its tip.
“I found one of these earlier,” she said, “in the glove compartment of the Professor’s car last night.”
“Why didn’t you tell me, Veronica?” her sister asked.
“I forgot. I didn’t think it meant anything. Do you think it’s anything, Professor?” Veronica said.
“No, I don’t, but now that I see these others appearing, maybe it is,” I said. I didn’t realize that I had gotten two notes.
“You mean the thief is warning us to back off or else?” Veronica asked.
“Well, Veronica, what do you make of it?” I asked.
“Yes, I think he is telling us to stop investigating,” she said.
“Well, I think the girls shouldn’t go out investigating, just do research,” Jason said.
They got up and were leaving when Fay switched the call to me. Ms. March asked me to stop by the library. I told her I’d be right there. I grabbed my coat and told Fay that I’ll see her tomorrow. On the way to the library I thought about Ralphy and Veronica. What was going on? They really seemed hostile to each other today.
* * *
Ms. March was in her office. “I’d like to help. What can I do to get our bowl back?” she asked me.
I took a seat and said, “I don’t know. We’ve spent a week looking around and we’re no closer than last week.”
“I could do some research, the web, ebay, people who bought similar things recently,” she said.
“That might give us a list of people we could call. I doubt if our perpetrator is on the list but someone might know someone.” She continued. “I could call some other librarians at schools that have collections and see if they’re missing anything,” she added.
“That sounds good,” I said. “Tomorrow we are going to have a meeting. It would be great if you would be there.” I got up to leave.
“Maybe.” Myrna March smiled and waved good bye.
Chapter 18
The Dinner
I reserved a room at Maurice K, a restaurant not far from the Bar Bar, our normal meeting place. My office wouldn’t accommodate everybody and I thought it would be nice to go to a special place. They were expected at five except Monica who said she wouldn’t be able to make it at all. I like these frequent restaurant meetings. They add a festive or lightheartedness to the investigation and I feel like Gertrude Stein with my discussion group, albeit not a literary discussion group, but a group none the less. And now that I’m getting grownups involved, we might have the mix to brainstorm our way to a solution.
I’m really not satisfied with the work that I have done so far, but I always say that. It’s like that darkest before the dawn cliché but that’s the way that it’s worked for me in my previous cases—nothing and then a breakthrough and the answer pops right up. I stood up to address my group.
“First, I’d like to thank all of you for coming. I took the liberty of ordering for all of us—spaghetti with a vegetarian red sauce, bread, Italian sausage with stewed green peppers, risotto, salad, red wine, and some appetizers. It’s family style so you can pick whatever you want.
“I thought that we could jump into our discussions after we introduce ourselves to each other. Better yet, since I know everyone, why don’t I do it?” Heads nodded in agreement.
I was sitting at the head of a longish table. It had a white cloth and candles, which were the only illumination in the room. Not unlike Madame Petrovsky’s but warm not spooky.
“On my left is Ralphy Diedrich and next to him is Jason Malone and next to him is Madame Petrovsky. And, on my right is Veronica LaMonica, and next to her is Charles. Charles I don’t know your last name.”
“It’s Case.”
“Thank you,” I said. “And next to Charles Case is Myrna March, our assistant librarian. At the other end of the table is Fay Munson. She works at my office and is the voice that you hear on the phone when you call me. She’s our communication’s core. Charles and Madame Petrovsky did several séances with us to narrow down our area of investigation. And Ralphy, Jason, and Veronica are students of mine who interview, research, and analyze our data. Thanks again for making it.” Everyone was dressed very nic
ely, appropriately for this cordial dinner.
We looked more like a birthday party than a team of hardened criminal investigators—smiling faces everywhere. The wine and bread were passed around the candlelit room as was an appetizer of cantaloupe wrapped in a thin piece of Italian ham. I overheard Myrna March asking Charles what he did, but I didn’t hear the answer because Ralphy whispered something in Jason’s ear and they both burst out laughing.
“Professor Palma?” Veronica asked.
I turned to my right. She was wearing a fuzzy sweater with a fuzzy sweater over it. They could kill a man with allergies. “Yes?” I said.
“The reason Monica is not here tonight is that she is taking chemistry this semester and she is having a lot of trouble with it. She just can’t get it. I thought it was hard but she’s having more trouble with it than I did. And I don’t feel comfortable enough with it to help her so all I can do is sympathize with her and help her with her other subjects.”
“Jason could help. Couldn’t you, Jason?” Ralphy said while pulling off a piece of bread from one of the skinny loaves that were in the basket.
“Look out!” Veronica said, putting her hands up to her face.
Ralphy was looking at Jason while vigorously pulling the bread. His arm touched his wineglass and it wobbled, looking like we all were going to take a wine bath.
“Sorry,” he said with a goofy grin.
Oh brother! Too much wine already? I hope not. Veronica looked at Ralphy with a knitted brow.
“Yeah, Veronica, I could help Monica with chem,” Jason said.
“Thanks, I’ll tell her,” Veronica said.
“Have you selected your topic for the lit paper?” Ralphy said to Veronica.
“Nick Carraway. I found a lot of stuff about him on the net. What about you, have you selected one?”
“I think I’ll go with Montag.”
“Fahrenheit 451?” Veronica asked.
“Yeah,”
They both stopped talking and started working on the bread.
“Jason?” I said.
“Yes, Professor?”
“I’ve got a job for you.”
“What’s that?”
“How hard would it be to start up a web page for us, for our investigation?”
“Not hard. We could get a free one on the school’s server, and they have templates so it wouldn’t be tough at all. You want me to do that, Professor?”