I saw a way out of this entanglement. “If you can convince Sheriff Lens, I’ll go along with it, too.” It seemed a sure bet that the sheriff would have nothing to do with such a thing.
That’s where I was wrong.
Sheriff Lens phoned me the following afternoon. “Hello, Doc. Still surviving married life?”
“There’s nothing like it,” I assured him. “Have you decided to run for another term?” It was a question I asked every four years and the answer had always been yes. He’d been elected sheriff for the first time in 1918, almost four years before I came to Northmont, and was completing his sixth term.
“In a weak moment I promised Vera I wouldn’t run again this time. She says twenty-four years is enough for anyone, but hell, Doc — what would I do? Retire to a farm and raise chickens? I told her with the war on and all I had to serve one more term and she agreed.”
I had to chuckle silently at that. I couldn’t imagine Northmont with someone else as sheriff. “Anyway,” he went on, “what I called about is this seancé business with Art Hale and his wife.”
“Forget about it, Sheriff. I told them I’d come if you did, but it was just a way of getting out of the whole thing. I’m sorry they lost a son, but I can’t encourage them. It’s obvious this Sandra Gleam is just out for their money. She wants to do the seancé here so she can get a look at their home and decide how much she can get out of them.”
“Isn’t that all the more reason we should be there to protect them and expose her?” the sheriff argued. “Who could do it better than us?”
I had to admit he had a point. “Do you really want to do this?” I asked.
“I think we should, Doc.”
I sighed in surrender and asked, “When is she coming?”
“Saturday. She’ll stay with them overnight and return to Boston on Sunday.”
“Is she driving down?”
“Taking the train. Gasoline is scarce with the rationing and all.”
As a physician, I was allowed a bit more gasoline than the average person, but I had to display the colored sticker Iwas issued for it on my front windshield. Train travel was becoming more popular, especially for our town, far removed from any commercial airport. “All right, Sheriff. If you’re game, so am I.”
Art and Kate Hale met the train with Sandra Gleam on board late Saturday afternoon. As it turned out, that was June 6th, exactly six months since our wedding day, and Annabel had expected us to celebrate with dinner out or at least a private evening at home. All I could promise her was that I’d return as early as possible, and that didn’t go over well.
I picked up Sheriff Lens in my Buick and we set off for our destination. “Been listening to the news, Doc? There are rumors of a big sea battle out around the Midway Islands in the Pacific.”
“I hope we’re winning.”
I’d been to the Hale home a few times on house calls, and I was familiar with the impressive brick facade. It had once been a church perched on a hilltop at the end of Meadow Lane. No one seemed to remember what had happened to the congregation, but it had been remodeled into a private home in the 1920s. The layout was a bit awkward and they’d ended up with a windowless storage room across from the kitchen. Some thought the house had been partitioned that way to provide a so-called “thunder room” for those afraid of violent storms, but others offered a more prosaic explanation. The house had been remodeled during prohibition and a garage had been turned into the windowless room to serve as a storage area for cases of illegal scotch smuggled into the country.
In any event, it was empty to the bare walls and concrete floor now, except for a single card table and three folding chairs. An open bottle of white wine and three glasses stood on the table. A ceiling light provided the only illumination. Art and Kate Hale had been awaiting our arrival, and quickly introduced us to Sandra Gleam. As Kate had said, she was a woman in her late forties, with jet-black hair worn to shoulder length. Her figure was surprisingly trim and her dark eyes seemed to study each of us intently. She wore a long black dress with a pink scarf at her neck. It was her only touch of color. She was not the sort of woman I would have wanted for an enemy, yet she had a certain animal attraction. The three chairs around the card table told me that she had already excluded the sheriff and me from the seancé.
“Dr. Hawthorne,” she said when we were introduced. “Kate has told me much about you. I have looked forward to this meeting.” I tried to read her eyes, but it was impossible. She might have been flirting with me, for all I knew.
“And I look forward to sitting in on your seancé,” I informed her.
“Alas, that will not be possible tonight. If I am to have any success in reaching the spirit of Ron Hale, only his closest flesh-and-blood relatives can be present.”
Sheriff Lens didn’t like the sound of that. “Look here, I have to be certain that no crime is being committed.”