“That’ll do,” Judith said. “They mustn’t know I’m observing. It could break the spell.”
“Got it. I’ll leave now.” Ian squeezed past Judith and Renie.
Judith leaned into the peephole area. “Darn. I can’t see much.”
“Who can?” Renie said with a martyred air.
Judith focused on the back of a man’s head. “Seumas, but not Jocko,” she murmured. “No Jimmy, either.” The third man turned slightly. “Will Fleming.”
“Will?” Renie frowned. “Who else?”
Judith wished she had a wider view of the darkened room. “They’re at a table…four of them…Kate and another woman.”
“Who’s the medium?”
“Nobody’s talking. They’re just sitting, holding hands.”
A moment later a woman’s high voice spoke in a slow, drifting sort of tone: “What to do? What was Harry going to do? Answer, Eanruig.”
“Earwig?” said Renie, trying to lean closer to the peephole.
Judith shook her head. “Kate’s late husband.”
“I must know how to act,” Kate begged. “Please, Eanruig, speak!”
A long pause followed, broken by Seumas’s impatient voice. “This isn’t working. May I suggest common sense?”
“No!” Kate snapped. “Eanruig will tell us. He never rushed into business decisions. I insist on more time to reach him!”
“Nonsense!” Seumas snarled.
“Oooh…” The woman whose face Judith couldn’t see was groaning. “Buona notte,” she said in a deep voice. “Who will avenge me?”
Renie stared at Judith. “What? It sounds Italian.”
Judith nodded. “It’s the woman with her head down.”
“No!” Kate cried. “We want no intruder! Eanruig, speak to me!”
A tense silence followed; the unidentified woman rocked back and forth in the chair.
“It’s over!” Seumas shouted. “We’re done here!”
Will Fleming sighed and leaned forward. “Darling! Wake up!”
The woman who seemed to be acting as the medium jerked in her chair and sat up straight. “What? Where am I?”
“It’s Marie Fleming,” Judith said, surprised.
“Bedbug City,” Renie muttered.
Judith kept her eye on the gathering as the lights were turned up and the quartet rose from the table.
“I told you this wouldn’t accomplish anything,” Seumas said to Kate. “It’s all speculation. Harry had no real knowledge of alternative energy or renewable sources. He was showing off.”
Will Fleming turned a stern face to Seumas. “I told you Philip should be here. What can have happened to him?”
“He’s lost his only son,” Kate retorted. “Where’s your pity?”
Judith couldn’t see Seumas’s expression. He merely shrugged and put on his hooded jacket. Marie spoke to Kate, apologizing for her lack of psychic ability.
Kate nodded. “I’m sorry, too, but you’ve had flu. It must affect your contact with the spirit world. All those dreadful germs.”
They started for the door. “Maybe,” Will said, “I should phone Philip to find out why if he—” The door shut behind them.
After their footsteps had gone past the storage room, Judith closed the peephole’s flap. “Whose idea was this?”
“The séance? Or the peephole?”
“I figure the answer is the same for both.” Judith smiled wryly at Renie. “Kate Gunn. But what’s she up to?”
“No good?”
“No doubt.”
17
That bunch was in the dark in more ways than one,” Renie remarked as they walked into the pub’s empty serving area. “If some of them didn’t know why Philip Fordyce wasn’t there, they haven’t heard about Chuckie. Now what?”
Judith saw Ian hang up the open sign. “Let’s drink beer.”
“And eat. Hey, Ian!” Renie motioned to the young publican. “Who’s cooking?”
“Me mum,” he said. “She’s in the kitchen.”
Judith joined Renie and Ian. “How often are these séances held?”
Ian scratched his high forehead. “Once a month? Nae—four, five times a year? I’ve only worked at the pub since last summer.”
“Why have the séances here instead of a private home?”
“This was Mr. Gunn’s favorite place,” Ian replied, acknowledging a trio of young men who had just entered the Rood & Mitre. “To drink and eat, that is. Mrs. Gunn thinks his spirit is close by.” He uttered a short laugh. “People act odd sometimes, don’t they?”
“True,” Judith agreed. “Did Mrs. Gunn come with her husband?”
Ian cocked his head to one side and grinned impishly. “Never. He came alone.” The lad lowered his voice. “Me mum and dad own this pub. They could tell some tales about the local folk. Me dad said Mr. Gunn jumped from the frying pan into the fire when he’d stop for a pint or two.” Ian winked. “Coming from the lady friend’s, going to the wife.”
Judith nodded. “The lady friend who owned the house where Mrs. Gunn lives now.”
“Aye. Mr. Gunn built it for Mrs. B.P.”
“You mean,” Judith corrected politely, “for Porter-Breze, right?”
Ian ran a hand through his shaggy magenta hair. “Aye, but me mum always calls her Mrs. B.P. because Mr. Gunn gave her a big chunk of Blackwell Petroleum.” A half dozen other customers had entered the pub. “Pardon, I must serve these regulars.”
Judith moved closer to the bar, trying to get a peek at Ian’s mother. She could see the service counter at the back, but a canvas flap hid the opening to the kitchen.
“If we ate something,” Renie said, sidling up to Judith, “we could offer our compliments to the chef in person.”
“True,” Judith said. “Ian’s mother sounds like a useful source.” She gazed around the pub where four older people were sitting down while Archie Morton came through the front door. “Don’t look now, but your foe in a potential bar fight has arrived.”
“Who?”
“Archie.” Judith moved to a barstool and sat down. “Ignore him and order something when Ian finishes with his other customers.”
Renie bristled. “Wish I could see out of both eyes. Where is he?”
“Coming to the other end of the bar,” Judith replied. “He’s sitting next to a guy in a hat.”
“What guy? What hat?”
Judith took a quick peek at the man who was a dozen barstools away with a couple of younger men in football jerseys sitting between him and the cousins. “Slouched posture, hat pulled down, raincoat collar pulled up. What some might call suspicious.”
“You suspect he’s—?”
Ian pushed the food orders under the canvas flap and started pouring drinks only a few feet away from the cousins. “Yo!” Renie called to him. “How about a couple of dark ales and a menu?”
Ian nodded. “Be right back after I set up these pints.”
Judith discreetly watched Archie talk to the man in the hat. “I think,” she whispered, “the mysterious stranger is Jimmy Blackwell.”
“In semidisguise?” Renie nodded. “That figures. It’s stupid, but it figures. Jimmy’s well known around here. If he doesn’t want to be recognized, he should be dressed as a bottle of Scotch.”
The pub was filling up not only with drinkers but with supper customers. Judith noticed that no one seemed to be paying attention to Archie and the man she thought was Jimmy Blackwell.
“Typical,” Judith remarked sadly. “A terrible murder occurs and causes a big fuss for a short time—then people return to their self-absorption and go on with their lives. It always strikes me as sad.”
“They have to make sure that they’re still alive,” Renie pointed out. “Or else they think death is contagious.”
Ian had come back to the bar where he took the cousins’ orders for salmon, chips, salad, and two glasses of a reddish-hued beverage.