Living Spectres: a Chesterton Holte, Gentleman Haunt Mystery Read online

  LIVING SPECTRES

  a Chesterton Holte,

  Gentleman Haunt Mystery

  ALSO BY CHELSEA QUINN YARBRO

  Saint-Germain, Olivia and Madelaine Series

  Hotel Transylvania

  The Palace

  Blood Games

  Path of the Eclipse

  Tempting Fate

  A Flame in Byzantium

  Crusader’s Torch

  A Candle for d’Artagnan

  Out of the House of Life

  Darker Jewels

  Better in the Dark

  Mansions of Darkness

  Blood Roses

  Communion Blood

  Come Twilight

  In the Face of Death

  A Feast in Exile

  Night Blooming

  Midnight Harvest

  Dark of the Sun

  States of Grace

  Roman Dusk

  Borne in Blood

  A Dangerous Climate

  Burning Shadows

  An Embarrassment of Riches

  Commedia della Morte

  Night Pilgrims

  Sustenance

  Fantasy

  Ariosto

  A Baroque Fable

  The Vildecaz Talents

  To the High Redoubt

  Horror

  Beastnights

  Firecode

  The Godforsaken

  A Mortal Glamour

  Sins of Omission

  Taji’s Syndrome

  Trouble in the Forest: A Cold Summer Night

  Trouble in the Forest: A Bright Winter Sun

  Mysteries

  Napoleon Must Die (with Bill Fawcett)

  Death Wears a Crown (with Bill Fawcett)

  Against the Brotherhood (with Bill Fawcett)

  Embassy Row (with Bill Fawcett)

  The Flying Scotsman (with Bill Fawcett)

  The Scottish Ploy (with Bill Fawcett)

  Alas, Poor Yorick

  Science Fiction

  Apprehensions and Other Delusions

  False Dawn

  Hyacinths

  Magnificat

  Time of the Fourth Horseman

  Western

  The Law in Charity

  Young Adult

  Arcane Wisdome

  Four Horses for Tishtry

  Nonfiction

  Fine-Tuning Fiction

  More Messages from Michael

  This book is a work of fiction. References to historical, world-wide events have

  been used as context, however the characters, businesses, corporations, and

  incidents in this work are the product of the authors’ imagination. Any

  resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Copyright © 2016 Chelsea Quinn Yarbro

  All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the

  scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without

  the permission of the publisher constitutes unlawful piracy and theft of the

  author’s intellectual property.

  If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review

  purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the

  publisher at [email protected].

  Smoke & Shadow Books

  Cleveland Writers Press Inc.

  31501 Roberta Dr.

  Bay Village, OH 44140

  www.clevelandwriterspress.com

  Printed in the United States of America

  First Edition: October 2016

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Smoke & Shadow Books is an imprint and trademark

  of Cleveland Writers Press Inc.

  The publisher is not responsible for websites

  (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data on file with publisher.

  Hardcover ISBN-13: 978-1-943052-36-3

  eBook ISBN-13: 978-1-943052-37-0

  Cover Design by Patricia Saxton

  Edited by Patrick J. LoBrutto

  For

  Maureen and David

  CONTENTS

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  TWENTY-FOUR

  TWENTY-FIVE

  TWENTY-SIX

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  TWENTY-NINE

  THIRTY

  THIRTY-ONE

  THIRTY-TWO

  THIRTY-THREE

  THIRTY-FOUR

  THIRTY-FIVE

  THIRTY-SIX

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  THIRTY-NINE

  FORTY

  EPILOGUE

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ONE

  “HOW IS THE PACKING GOING?” CHESTERTON HOLTE ASKED AS HE EMERGED from the corner of Poppy Thornton’s bedroom; his form was insubstantial but sufficient to be familiar to her. Outside the front-garden window—and somewhat visible through Holte’s nonmaterial form—was a cluster of three poplars, the edges of their leaves hinting that autumn was on its way, and that the very warm afternoon which enveloped Philadelphia would soon be a thing of the past; occasional clouds gliding through the skies were starting to gather together, bringing the threat of rain and blustery wind. Holte found this change mildly surprising, unaware that he had been gone long enough for the leaves to start to turn, but in the last two days that he had been returning sporadically to Josephine Dritchner’s house, he had begun to think that he had been away longer than he had first assumed.

  “Does this mean you’ve decided to rejoin me, or are you just stopping by? I was beginning to think that the charms of Philadelphia were starting to pall on you. Either that, or you were avoiding me because of the move. I wouldn’t blame you if that were the case.” Poppea Millicent Thornton looked up from her perch on the upholstered stool in front of her vanity and gestured to the stack of boxes standing in the opposite corner of the room, each one carefully labeled and closed with glue-backed paper shipping tape.

  “How long ago did you decide on this?” he asked, aware that the packing must mean something more than a vacation.

  “About six weeks ago, when Aunt Esther made the offer that I live at her house. She saw at once how things were with Aunt Jo and me. She’s still at sea until tomorrow, and won’t be back here until Friday.”

  “Matters are not well, then.” Holte moved a little nearer to Poppy. “I gather you’re making progress on your move?”

  “Simply oodles,” Poppy replied sardonically, then shook her head. “You see how well it’s going, and this is my fourth day of it, and I have six more days to go before I have to be out; I had no idea I had so many things to take with me,” she said, sounding a bit forlorn. “I’ve been at this since breakfast, and those eight boxes are all I’ve managed to get packed; I’m taking today and half of tomorrow off—without pay. Yesterday Lowenthal told me to go home; I was too distracted to finish my story on the latest arrests
in the counterfeit antiques scandal, and he was right. I spent the last weekend sorting through all my books and papers; those boxes are in the library. This week, I’ve sorted through most of my seasonal clothes. At this rate, it’s going to take me ten more days to be ready to leave, and I’m scheduled to go next Monday. Lowenthal is giving me the Monday off to do it, thank goodness. Even though I’m planning to move by increments, it’s going to take time.”

  “Next Monday? So soon?” he asked.

  “It isn’t soon to me.” She sighed and asked a second time, “So, are you back at last? And where have you been?”

  “It’s likely I’ll be around,” he said, answering her first question. “Have you missed me?” Holte seemed genuinely curious, although it was hard to tell since his features were a blur, and the tone of his voice was echoey.

  “In a manner of speaking; after all, you saved my life,” Poppy answered.

  Holte did the equivalent of a shrug. “By the way, what do you mean by at last?” he inquired politely. “How long have I been gone?”

  “Most of June and all of July and August,” she told him. “We’re just into September. It’s the second. I move on the eighth.”

  His features were not clear, but there was an attitude of surprise in his posture. “I hadn’t realized it had been so long.” He drifted pensively toward the ceiling, thinking, that explains the changing leaves. He felt nonplused, and it took him a little time to compose himself sufficiently to resume the appearance of his living self, however flimsily.

  Poppy observed his rematerialization with an unanticipated sense of respite. “What were you doing? I thought you might be gone for good.”

  “Not yet; I was trying to find Alexandre and Yvette Bastin.” There was a note of chagrin in his voice.

  “In the dimension of ghosts?” she asked.

  “Yes.” He descended and went back toward the window. “They sheltered me for several days in 1915, and when one of my German counterparts found out, he killed them in a fit of pique, because I was already gone by the time he arrived. I knew I had to search them out, not an easy thing for those without physicality.”

  “How could you make recompense to them for that?” Poppy could not see how he could—as he called it—balance the books with ghosts.

  “As I’m doing with you, because of your father; I am sorry that he was shot on my behalf, as I am sorry about the Bastins,” he said with a careful gesture. “The Bastins have a grown son, who is in a…facility.” He glided back toward her.

  The reporter in her was becoming more forceful, and she could not keep from asking, “What kind of facility?”

  “One for those with…mental problems: an asylum, in fact.” He turned away, looking downcast. “Reynard—the son—was damaged by the Great War, and had become unable to care for himself; he’s hardly the only one to have such trouble. There are thousands like him, as well as more thousands of damaged refugees. I was hoping that I could alleviate some of his misery, but he began screaming when I finally tried to introduce myself; the nurses had to come and sedate him. I will have to find another way to aid him.”

  “Why did that take so long?” Poppy persisted.

  Holte bent as if to apologize. “One loses track of time in the dimension of ghosts. It took quite a while to locate Alexandre and Yvette, and more time again to find Reynard.”

  “Why was that? I understand about the ghosts, at least I suppose I do,”—she waved at the air to encourage him to comment, to no avail—“but what makes it difficult for you to locate the living?” She was a bit surprised that he was so reluctant to tell her, but then, she told herself, he had been gone almost three months, pursuing his other obligations, and that might account for his reticence.

  “I can find those whom I know, in my way, but when I don’t know them, it’s harder to get a fix on them. It took me a while to locate you at first, and I knew where to begin.” He sidled over to the chair and tried to settle into it, but ended up about four inches above the seat. “Without some connection, I’m like a bloodhound without a scent to track.”

  “So it took over two months to accomplish finding Reynard, and it didn’t go well. I’m sorry the son isn’t able to cooperate with you. That must be difficult for you.” She got to her feet and went to pick up another packing box from the stack in front of the closet. “You’ll have to pardon me, but I should keep at it.”

  “I’d help if I could,” he said, sounding a bit chagrined.

  “Noncorporeal,” she said. “I know: it’s the nature of ghosts.” Poppy was unnerved to hear how readily she said it; during the time he had been gone, she had got out of the habit of thinking of him as anything more than an illusion. But now, she had the odd sensation that they were resuming a conversation that was much more recent than the three months that had gone by. His reality, if such a word was applicable for a self-proclaimed ghost, perplexed her, because it assumed he was what he claimed to be; she had come to accept his affirmations last spring, but in his absence, her doubts had sprouted anew—after all, it was 1924, and no one believed in ghosts any more—and now she would have to give up her dubiety again. She went to her chest- of-drawers, opened the next-to-lowest drawer, and began to remove sweaters and vests from it, placing them in the packing box with a kind of automatic neatness.

  “Is your Aunt Jo still miffed at your decision to leave? I’m guessing that she isn’t taking it well,” Holte ventured, becoming more than a pale smudge in the air near her bedroom chair, but once again fading from full materialization as he drifted around the room. Fortunately, his face was clearer, making it easier for Poppy to read his expressions.

  “Not miffed any more: resigned and fatalistic. She says no good will come of it.” Shortly before Holte had gone on the ninth of June, Poppy had broached the possibility of her departure to her aunt, and had been greeted with disgruntled animadversions on the evils of such a move. “When Aunt Esther made her offer, Aunt Jo gave in to tirades at first, but that didn’t last very long. She hasn’t resorted to a rant for more than a month now, though she does spend a lot of time in the music room, playing dirges, or in the sitting room, expressing her dismay to Duchess and drinking sherry. She won’t talk to anyone outside the family and her immediate circle of friends, not even the minister at Saint Clement’s, and she’s known him for thirty years.” Poppy was often amazed at the patience of the elderly spaniel; Duchess did not become alarmed when Josephine wept and declaimed for her missing son, but would wag her tail and offer a crooning howl from time to time. “She is afraid that my association with Aunt Esther will lead me into all kinds of folly.”

  Holte moved toward the end of Poppy’s bed. “That’s very like her—meaning your aunt, not Duchess.”

  “It certainly is. Occasionally Aunt Jo still reminds me of her worries for me. She’s afraid I’ll ruin my reputation, living in Aunt Esther’s house. But she also knows I can’t stay here—she can’t bear hearing that I hold Stacy responsible for what happened, which I do—and, ye gods, living with Tobias and his family is out of the question; even Aunt Jo knows that would be a disaster.” The very thought of living under the same roof with her unctuous older brother dismayed her; the actuality would be unendurable for both of them.

  “Is that the only reason she doesn’t want you here?” He drifted over to her side, hovering about a foot away from her.

  “Her disapproval of what I do for a living has contributed to her wanting me gone, but the primary reason, of course, is the same reason I think I ought to go: Stacy.” She finished unloading the drawer, closed it, and opened the one below, where her cold weather jackets and coats were stored.

  “Oho,” Holte said, moving back to her side. “Tell me more.”

  Poppy tried not to sigh, and nearly succeeded. “She declares that Stacy is falsely accused, and that it’s my fault,” she told him, managing a lop-sided smile. “If I hadn’t involved the police, Aunt Jo is certain that Stacy would not have fled to wherever he has gone. She beli
eves if I had kept quiet about it—although that was impossible, considering what happened—Stacy would still be here, and exonerated of all wrong-doing.”

  “She’s deluded: the District Attorney was after him, and not for an illconsidered…” Holte shook his misty head. “Does your aunt understand that Stacy locked you in a warehouse basement, tied to a chair, and left you there, no one knowing where you were? Does she comprehend how easily you could have died?” His non-voice had a quality of resentment to it; he drifted a short distance away from her.

  “Well, because of you, and, thanks to your efforts, and the efforts of Inspector J. B. Loring, I didn’t,” she said, shuddering a bit at the memory; she rubbed absentmindedly at her wrists, as if the scabs from the ropes still bound her. “But no, she doesn’t see it that way—she’s convinced herself that it was one of his pranks that got out of hand.”

  Holte made a kind of sound that would have been a sarcastic laugh if he had been alive. “That’s quite a feat, in its own way, turning attempted murder into a bit of scampery.”

  Poppy reached for a crayon to label the box before her. “Well, it’s that or admit that her youngest son is a criminal, and that is more than she’s capable of doing.”

  Holte nodded. “She’s quite resourceful, in her own way.”

  “And to make it more difficult, she is distressed that I’m going to Aunt Esther’s because she takes it as a criticism of my time here—she’s convinced that staying with Aunt Esther will guarantee that I will be an old maid, the worst fate for a woman, so far as Aunt Jo is concerned.” She gave a single laugh. “Josephine and Esther: for two sisters, they are as different as—”

  “—as chalk and cheese, as they say in England,” Holte finished for her.

  In spite of her current dejection, Poppy chuckled. “That’s very apt. The two are very unalike.”

  He moved in a way that suggested a bow. “Courtesy of my time in Oxford.”

  As Poppy had wondered whenever he spoke of his education, she could not decide if this were true or not, and found herself tempted to write to Brasenose College to ask if they ever had a Canadian student named Chesterton Holte enrolled there in the decade before the Great War, but so far she had been unable to bring herself to do it; as peculiar as it was, she preferred to believe him rather than seek for confirmation—an inexplicable quirk in a crime reporter. “It’s a great expression.”