‘I can understand that. But Maisie – does this really work? I mean, you can tell me. It carries me out of my depth.’

‘Out of your depth?’ said Maisie derisively. ‘It carries me out of my depth! But it’s there and it does work. But you – you’re too bound up in police procedures. You imagine that if you don’t understand it, it doesn’t exist! Where was I? Mr and Mrs Tilly. He’s a financier. Their three boys died in Flanders. The eldest comes back quite often. Helps them to bear it. Then there’s Miss Trollope. This is her first visit. She’s hoping for a message from Snowdrop. Her dog.’

‘Any hope?’ asked Joe trying to keep a straight face.

‘Yes. Now if he’d been a cockatoo or a stick insect I’d say no but dogs do come through. They put their noses in your hands sometimes to show they’re there. Then we’ve got Colonel and Mrs Drake. They lost their twin daughters to the cholera in the plains three years ago. They’ve not given up hope yet. Then there’s Mrs Sharpe of ICTC. Her husband never comes with her. She’s trying to contact her mother.’

Joe looked away, but too late apparently to avoid giving Minerva a message he was unaware of signalling. ‘Ah! So that’s your mark! The Saintly Alice? Well, well!’ She gave a cynical smile and went on with her list. ‘And the last name is Cecil Robertson, the jeweller. I think he comes to see if he can catch me out – there’s always one! But also because he’s an expert on religions and he’s, well, I suppose you could say he’s making a study of me and my techniques. Oh, and lastly, a newcomer you can add to the list – Joe Sandilands, policeman, blackmailer and sceptic. With him in the room sneering, the spirits will take a powder and I won’t blame them! Now, that’s all you’re getting! Bugger off! Hecate wants to get back into her chair.’

Joe got to his feet and the waiting cat sprang triumphantly back into its place.

‘I’ll make sure you have no cause to regret what you’ve agreed to do for us, Maisie, and thank you for — ’

‘Cut the cackle, smart arse!’ she snapped impatiently. ‘You don’t need to turn on the smarm for me. I’ve said I’ll do it – leave it there, will you?’

Joe put on a face of blazing honesty, one hand over his heart.

‘I have your word and I trust you, Maisie. I wish you’d trust me a little.’

Maisie Freeman began to laugh. A derisive laugh that made her magnificent bosom quiver and rattled the jet beads around her neck.

‘Well,’ said Joe, ‘why not? I did make it my business to see that that charge sheet against you in London was wiped clean. You’ve been in the clear for four years now!’

He dodged neatly as a whisky glass materialized and flew through the air, narrowly missing his ear.

Chapter Fifteen

«^»

The room when he returned just before eight on Friday evening projected a very different mood. The dark red curtains were drawn and a log fire burned brightly in the hearth. The lighting was discreet but adequate and supplied by two or three Tiffany lamps about the room and a row of tall white candles down the centre of the table.

The cat had been banished from the scene and Minerva Freemantle was alone in the room when he arrived. She was wearing a simple dark green velvet gown, low-cut and sleeveless, he noticed, a clear indication that no trickery was contemplated. Joe allowed his eyes to run appreciatively for a moment over the voluptuous and highly unfashionable curves of her figure, admiring the strong white arms, the waist improbably narrow between swelling bosom and lavish hips. Minerva – as he was beginning to think of her – had chosen her name well. As imposing as any Roman statue that had ever graced the temple of the Goddess of Wisdom, he thought fancifully; and guaranteed to distract the attention of any man lucky enough to be granted a seat at her table. She was still a show girl, he reckoned, and a clever one.

Unusually for India there were no drinks or sweetmeats of any kind on offer. A serious business, a seance, and not to be confused with a social occasion. All had been rehearsed and they moved easily into their routine when the other guests began to arrive. Introductions were made and brief descriptions given but they were not followed up with the usual social chit-chat. The other guests were friendly and greeted him without suspicion but with that automatic reserve which prevents people from starting up a conversation in the waiting room of a doctor’s surgery. They had their own preoccupations and were not disposed to take much interest in his.

Alice Conyers-Sharpe was the last to arrive, surprised but pleased to see him.

‘Well, now we’re all here… Most of us know each other well but we welcome two newcomers to our little band this evening – Miss Trollope who has very recently lost her dear companion, Snowdrop, and who is hoping for a sign that he has safely passed over and will be there to welcome her when it is her turn to make the transition…’

Miss Trollope was a small, fair woman with the wide-eyed and earnest expression of a porcelain doll. She smiled nervously and received sympathetic and encouraging smiles in return. They all had animals they were fond of themselves and would hope to meet up with again in the hereafter.

‘… and a new gentleman.’ (Was there the slightest emphasis on the word ‘gentleman’?) ‘Commander Joseph Sandilands from London. I will let him tell you in his own words what his motivation is in joining our circle.’

She turned to him with a sweet smile. This was not rehearsed. He inferred that he was not forgiven.

‘Minerva and I are old friends,’ he said with engaging sincerity. ‘Our paths crossed many years ago in London Town when she was already quite a star in her own field. I have long appreciated her remarkable talents. I’m here to explore the paths of truth, honesty and love. I open my mind and my heart to an approach from anyone who has passed through ahead of us to the Happy Fields and is prepared to give of his or her precious time to speak words of guidance or comfort to me.’

Everyone nodded fervently in understanding except for Minerva Freemantle whose lips appeared to twitch with suppressed emotion at this speech.

She gestured to the table. ‘If we can all take our seats then? Joe, no penance, I think, if I ask you to sit between two pretty ladies? If Mrs Sharpe sits on your left and Miss Trollope on your right? There we are. Now, hold hands everyone and place your joined hands on the table where we can all see them.’

She doused the electric lamps but left the candles burning. If he had not been anxiously waiting for the performance of his own trick, Joe thought he would have begun to enjoy himself.

The atmosphere was not at all what he had expected. Seated holding the hands of a pair of pretty girls at the walnut table, surrounded by kindly faces, he was more in the mood of cheerful expectancy that came over him at the beginning of a dinner party with friends and not in the dark mood of guarded superstition he had associated with seances.

‘We’ll begin with our usual prayer,’ said Mrs Freemantle without emotion.

Everyone except Joe and Miss Trollope knew the words and began to recite them together.

‘Lord of the Universe, Spirit of Love, we ask you to look with kindness on our gathering and keep all here assembled safe from evil, from despair and from doubt.’

A silence fell but it was a comfortable silence, the silence of an audience who know the curtain is about to go up on a performance they very much want to see. Joe found that he was thinking deeply as he did in those few minutes of private prayer before a church service. The hands holding his were not the source of embarrassment or even arousal that he had anticipated but a comforting touch linking him to the rest of the group. He narrowed his eyes and focused on the candle flame in front of him. He was not sure how many minutes had slipped by when Minerva Freemantle began to speak.