Unsettled Spirits (33 page)

But nobody needed to worry about me not being a good girl. I took care of myself and followed Doc Benjamin's directions to the letter. In truth, I felt so horrid, I couldn't have got out of bed and run around if I'd wanted to. All I wanted to do was sleep. I had a terribly sore throat, and pretty soon my voice deepened so much, I could have sung bass in one of the Van der Lindens' operettas.

The phone rang off the hook, in a manner of speaking, but Pa told everyone who called that I was extremely ill and couldn't take calls. I got the feeling Mrs. Pinkerton had an even worse week than I did, since she wasn't accustomed to
not
having her every need administered to instantly every time she called. I knew she was upset about Stacy's engagement to Percival Petrie, for which she had good reason although she didn't know it yet, so she was undoubtedly in hysterics that grew worse with each passing day during which I remained unavailable.

In fact, I
knew
she was hysterical, because Pa finally admitted as much to me. This was on Thursday morning, and I was finally beginning to believe I'd live through my ordeal, although there was no way I'd make it to choir rehearsal that night, and probably wouldn't be able to attend church the next Sunday. I was sorry about that, since that Sunday's anthem was "Now Thank We All Our God," a pretty hymn which, while written by a German, I liked anyway. Anyhow, that German had lived in the sixteen-hundreds and didn't have anything to do with mustard gas or Kaiser Bill.

In actual fact, when Pa told me about Mrs. Pinkerton's annoying persistence, I was sitting up in bed, my head flopping to the side occasionally as I succumbed to exhaustion. When sitting upright, however, I perused the book Miss Petrie had been kind enough to bring me from the library when she heard I was sick:
The Black Oxen
, by Gertrude Atherton. One of the reasons my head kept nodding was that this book wasn't precisely the type of novel I preferred to read. I like stuff that makes me laugh.
The Black Oxen
dealt with a truly pathetic woman who didn't want to get old. Well, I don't suppose any of us
wants
to get old, but there's not a whole lot we can do about it, unless you take Billy's way out, and that hurts other people even more than if one is taken off by the influenza.

"Do you think you can take a call from Mrs. Pinkerton next time she rings, Daisy? I hate to ask you, but she's really upset, and she's starting to... Well, she's about to make me lose my temper."

I lifted my head, which had just flopped to the side once more, and blinked at Pa. "Wow, that's not like you, Pa."

"I know, but the woman is a pest. She's really upset about something and claims she needs you desperately."

I tried to sigh and coughed instead. When I caught my breath again, I said, "She's always upset. But I think I can crawl to the 'phone when she calls." I sounded kind of like a foghorn according to Sam (I'd never heard a foghorn, so I wouldn't know), so at least the pesky woman would understand I wasn't merely avoiding her for no reason.

"Thanks, sweetheart. I don't know how you deal with her the way you do. She'd drive me batty."

"She drives me batty, too, but I'm used to her."

Right after that conversation, I decided to heck with
The Black Oxen
, set the book on the night stand, and curled up to sleep some more. Until I got that nasty 'flu, I didn't perfectly understand how weak a body could get under its influence.

The ringing of the telephone jarred me awake I don't know how much later. Since, no matter when the telephone rings, it's always for me, I attempted to brace myself. I sat up, hunched into my bathrobe, and had just stuck my feet into my slippers when Pa came to my door. I glanced up at him through bleary eyes. "Mrs. P?"

"Mrs. P," said he, sounding as if he wished it weren't.

"Be right there."

"I don't think you should get out of bed," said Pa, even though he'd asked me to take her next call.

"It's all right. I'll be fine." My voice was
extremely
deep and scratchy. Strange not to sound like one's usual self.

I dragged myself to the telephone on the kitchen wall and said, "Mrs. Pinkerton?" Pa brought a kitchen chair over to me, so I could at least sit whilst talking to the pestilential woman.

After quite a pause on the other end of the wire, Mrs. Pinkerton said, "Who is this?"

Good Lord. "It's Daisy, Mrs. Pinkerton. I've been quite ill."

"Oh, Daisy! Oh, I'm so sorry! Oh, I didn't mean to drag you out of your sick bed. Oh, I just didn't know."

Right. Even though Pa had been telling her I was sick for a week. Well, almost a week. "I have the influenza, and I'm not quite ready to work yet. I'm sorry I can't assist you immediately. Would you like me to telephone you when I'm well enough to come over with the Ouija board and the tarot cards?"

"Um... Yes, that would be nice. Um... I don't suppose I could visit you for a session? I don't want to impose, but..."

Good Lord again. She was talking to me on the telephone, hearing my voice, knowing I was sick as a dog—well, sicker than Spike—and she didn't want to impose, but she wanted to come over and have me do a special reading for her? I guess when you've never had a responsibility in your life, you sort of don't realize other people have their limits. However, I'd reached mine.

"I'm terribly sorry, Mrs. Pinkerton, but the doctor won't even allow me to have visitors." Told you I could lie when it was necessary. Darn the woman, anyhow!

"Oh, Daisy, I'm so sorry. Please take care of yourself, dear, and call me as soon as you can."

"I shall. Thank you for your understanding." Huh. Understanding? I think not.

"Get well, dear."

"Thank you."

We hung up, and I crawled back to bed.

I learned about an hour later that I'd perhaps wronged the lady. The doorbell buzzed—we had one of those twisty bells that make a grinding sound when you turn them—and when Pa went to the door, Harold Kincaid stood there with a cardboard box stacked to the brim with all kinds of things: flowers, candies, books, a beautiful silk shawl, and I can't even remember what all else.

"From my mother," said Harold as he staggered into the entryway. I know he staggered, because Pa told me so. "She even made me go to Jurgensen's and get some pickled herring, because she said fish is good for you. Don't know about that. It stinks something awful."

Pa laughed. "Thanks, Harold. The smell reminds me of my youth in Massachusetts. We down-easterners eat all sorts of things folks in California don't even know about."

"Not sure I wanted to know about pickled herring," said Harold. I heard him plop the box on the dining room table.

"If Daisy doesn't want it, I'll eat it."

"Good. Hate to have it go to waste." He and Pa both laughed at this piece of nonsense. "Is Daisy fit to be seen? I know she told Mother she couldn't have visitors, but I think that was self-defense on her part. I know my mother."

"I'm sure she'd love to see you. Go ahead. She's in her bedroom there."

I'm sure Pa pointed to my room, because Harold knocked at the door and entered without waiting for me to tell him to come in.

Chapter 27

"Hey, Harold," I croaked from my bed. I'd managed to sit up when I heard him enter the kitchen and realized he was he. Or whatever I mean.

"Good God, you look like hell. Sound like it, too," said Harold.

"Thanks a lot, Harold. You always make a girl feel special."

"You look as bad as when you got sick in Turkey." I'd had a ghastly case of what they called Pharaoh's Revenge then, which is basically the stomach 'flu. Don't know why they called it Pharaoh's Revenge in Turkey, but they did.

"Thanks. You're so encouraging."

With a laugh, Harold said, "It's all right, Daisy. You'll get well, and then Mother can relax and give the rest of us a... well, a rest."

"Lucky me."

"Yeah, but you're used to it." He plunked himself down at the side of my bed, which dipped under his weight, and I had to grab the backboard so as not to end up on the floor. "By the way, did you manage to dig anything up about the Franbold and Underhill cases? I know you're sick, but I also know you, and I know you must have done some sleuthing before you got sick."

Aha! I could tell Harold about Betsy Powell's semi-confession and see what he said. Harold had tons of common sense, so he could advise me about whether or not to tell Sam Betsy's dark secret. So I revealed all.

Harold's eyebrows lifted. "Good God, so she really did try to poison the bastard, did she? But she didn't do in Mrs. Franbold?"

"Nope. She was trying to kill Mr. Underhill that day when Mrs. Franbold died and Betsy thought she'd managed to kill the wrong person by mistake. But Mrs. Franbold died of natural causes, and Betsy claims never to have tried to poison anyone again. So I still don't know who did in Underhill, but it wasn't Betsy. If she was telling me the truth, and I think she was. She was too miserable to lie."

That didn't make sense even to me, but never mind.

"That doesn't make any sense, Daisy," said Harold, blast him. "People can always lie. You must know that as well as anyone."

"I guess so, but I don't think she was lying."

"What about her gentleman friend?"

Shaking my head, I said, "I don't even know the man. He got mad at me for pestering Betsy about poisoned communion cups after choir rehearsal a week or so ago."

"Does he work at the Underhill plant?"

"Yes. He's an engineer. Or a chemist. Something like that. I saw him when Robert Browning—"

"The
poet
?"

"For heaven's sake, Harold, That Robert Browning has been dead for decades. No, this fellow is about Billy's age, and he can't help it if his parents named him Robert. Anyhow, he took me on a tour of the plant, and I saw Mr. Gerald Kingston doing something in a laboratory in the upstairs area of the chemical plant."

"He might have access to poisons, I suppose."

"I suppose he might, but unless Betsy Powell has told him her deep, dark secret, and she claims she's afraid to do so for fear he'll think she's a loose woman and abandon her—"

"A loose woman?" Harold interrupted me. "Have you been reading Victorian novels again, Daisy?"

"Oh, shut up, Harold. You know what I mean."

"I guess so, but I didn't think anyone cared about stuff like that any longer. This is the nineteen-twenties, my dear. Unmarried people have affairs with married people all the time these days, and nobody even notices."

I stared, appalled, at Harold. "You're joking, right?"

Harold squinted at me. Then he sighed. "You're such a sweet, innocent thing, Daisy."

"I think you're judging everyone based on your stratum of society, Harold. People in the lower echelons still care about fidelity and decency and stuff like that."

"Right. Like that bastard Underhill. He cared a whole lot."

"Well, he was in the upper classes of society—"

"New money," Harold scoffed. "He's the only one who thought he was special."

I tried to sigh and coughed instead. I was
so
tired of being sick. "Maybe you're right. Betsy Powell isn't from old money or new money or any other kind of money, and she's ashamed of herself, both for succumbing to his charms—"

"
Charms
! Name one charm that son of a bitch had."

"I can't. I didn't like him, and now I know he was a monster and am glad he's dead. But that doesn't negate the fact that Betsy Powell feels guilty for wanting to murder him, even though she didn't succeed. According to her."

"Bully for her. What about Sam? You haven't told him about this idiot woman's confession yet, right?"

"Right," came out on a fabulously deep cough. Gee, maybe I could make my fortune as a female bass. But I'd not be a bass forever, so I reckon that notion was over before it began.

"Hmm. Maybe I can find out for you if this Kingston chappie could get his hands on poison."

"How?"

"I know the junior Underhill. He'd know, if anyone would."

"I guess so. At least Emmaline's friend knows Mrs. Franbold wasn't murdered, so that cleared her friend's fiancé of murder."

"Not necessarily. Her friend's fiancé is Barrett Underhill, and her friend's father is one of the firm's head guys. And, according to everything I've heard, Underhill
was
murdered. With cyanide. Right there at your church." He squinted at me. "A whole lot of strange things happen at your church, Daisy Majesty. I wonder why that is."