Ghost Talker (26 page)

Enzo continued,
I am working my way up to become a more powerful and helpful and good spirit like the Other.

“The Other may be more powerful, and, ah, of higher status than you, Enzo, but he is
not
more helpful, nor nearly as good as you,” Clare corrected.

He should be. He's supposed to be
, Enzo protested.

Clare shrugged. Since Enzo didn't look at her to see the movement of her shoulders, she sniffed disdainfully. She thought she heard a quickly repressed chuckle from her phantom dog.

Anyway, that is what I aspire to, after working enough with you
, Enzo-being said.
The Other is supposed to show me stuff, too.

She doubted that entity aided Enzo any more than the Other assisted her. She answered Enzo telepathically, not sure if their conversation could be heard by anyone else or not—that is, the Other and spirits like him.
I think you are doing VERY well, Enzo.

Thank you. And I know people who hurt because they are left behind when their loved ones die should be helped, and I'm sorry for them, but I am not a big and strong enough spirit to do that kind of work.
Even his mental tone sank low so it merely wisped on a slight string of words in her mind.
I think I might be able to only help one or two before I got shredded to pieces and gone until Someone fixed me.
He shuddered.

She did, too.
I wouldn't like that
, she stated calmly, and bent down to stroke him until her fingers numbed.
I love you, small helpful spirit Enzo.

A sigh and the dog-form rolled, exposing his belly, and she rubbed that, too. Big, dark, foggy eyes looked at her.
I love you, too. I like being here with you and with Zach, and learning about our cases and helping OLD ghosts move on, and doing my job!

“Good,” she said aloud, then asked her next question mentally.
But what of John Dillinger who helped Great-Aunt Sandra?

Enzo sat.
Dillinger really WAS the phantom of a human man of that name.
Enzo looked aside.
I don't think he was a very good man.

“I'm sure you're right,” she said, still speaking.

And I don't think he WANTED to pass on to what COMES NEXT
, Enzo confided, now staring at her with trust in his gaze.

“Not if there's any sort of judgment when someone transitions,” Clare murmured. She'd looked up the judge of the Greek underworld she hadn't known, and found that man, demigod, had been Minos. So far off from knowing the right name . . . but then, her interest had always been in the historical American Old West.

DILLINGER, as a strong phantom, could stay and do the work with talking to new ghosts
, Enzo said.
Maybe he thought being nice would help him, you know, AFTER.

“You could be right.”

Enzo nodded and opened his mouth so his tongue hung out, his smile cheerful, then said,
But I am not like that human-spirit Dillinger and I can't help modern ghosts and help you and help the sad people all at once without getting shredded and gone.

Clare said, “I understand.”

If you wanted to be a medium like Sandra, you would have to convince a ghost to stay and work with you
, Enzo said.
Some ghost who is okay with staying here and in the gray and not wanting to move on.
He glanced down toward the basement safe.
I don't think a good guy like Texas Jack would hang around. It would take a special sort of spirit, I think.

“Like John Dillinger, perhaps a not-so-nice guy.”

Right.
Enzo wagged his tail.

Switching to mental communication again, Clare said,
And who wants to work with a not-so-nice spirit? I don't.
Enzo leaned against her, and she continued,
And I can't imagine asking someone like Texas Jack to remain in the gray dimension so I could be a medium.
No, she couldn't do that.

The realization that becoming a medium was currently impossible for her let her sag back against the couch. So good knowing she wouldn't have to deal with such huge and desperate emotions, with people's expectations of what she should do to make them feel better, with new ghosts.

She moved to stretch out on the couch and wiggled into the soft leather cushions. “No, no John Dillinger for me.”

Zach walked into the room. “Glad to hear it. Guy was a villain. What are we talking about?”

“Great-Aunt Sandra and becoming a medium. You need a ghost—or rather, the Cermak gift needs a ghost of our time period to interface with new ones.”

“Like Texas Jack did with Darin Clavell.”

“Yes, and, I suppose, one who might interact with grieving clients who need answers about their loved ones.”

Zach stilled a moment then came over. She began to sit up, but he pushed her to the back of the couch and lay down beside her.

Who knew, either, if she could find a ghost like Great-Aunt Sandra had, one who'd want to hang around her? Most of them were all too eager for her to solve their problems and transition onto—into?—the hereafter.

Enzo gave his tail a couple of gentle wags.
If you want to be a medium like Sandra, I will have to leave because you will need someone stronger and different.
Huge puppy-dog eyes stared at her and she pushed her thoughts to him quickly.

No, I love you, Enzo, and I want you to stay with me!
One more very good reason not to become a “regular” medium, to hang out a shingle for that business.

She and Zach and Enzo lay together in family silence until Zach's nose picked up the scent of lasagna, then they ate.

Afterward Clare consulted Zach about travel to Lowell, Massachusetts, the next day—chartering a plane, when they could leave, flying into Boston and renting a car, and whether to stay overnight. The flight itself took four full hours, the drive to Lowell from Boston about forty minutes. Another long day whatever they did, so they decided to sleep on the plane coming home.

The whole thing was hideously expensive, so Zach took her out to walk to the local ice cream store and bought her a double scoop.

When they returned, they spoke of the change-around of offices and spent the good part of an hour on SeeAndTalk with Mrs. Flinton and Mr. Welliam, fending off inquiries about future plans regarding Texas Jack. As far as Clare was concerned, this next bit was private.

Zach retired to his space to work on his reports and Clare to her office to work on her case book. She wrote down the events of the last two days as well as everything she'd learned about using her psychic gift for hire as a medium for present-day ghosts. Currently Clare's nine-year-old niece, Dora, would inherit the Cermak ghost seeing gift if Clare perished, and Clare intended to ensure her niece wasn't as ignorant of the gift as Clare herself.

Whenever she understood the rules of her gift, she explained them as completely as she knew how.

Sometime soon Clare needed to speak to her brother, Tucker, and her sister-in-law about the whole matter, but unlike her, Tucker had a more open mind and Dora already seemed to be preparing herself for the psychic talent that would descend to her if something happened to Clare before she had children.

And Clare realized with a shock that over the last two weeks she
had
decided she wanted children. Right now she could only visualize them with Zach's features and mannerisms.

She could also visualize the shock on Zach's face if she told him that.

*   *   *

Once again they rose early, before dawn, so they would be at the airport to take off when the sun came up. This time Clare's usual car service waited at the front gate and drove them all—Clare, Zach, Enzo, and Texas Jack's bone—to the airport.

While Zach and Enzo checked out the plane that looked too small to Clare, and talked to the pilot, she stood off to the side. Opening the pen container, she whispered Texas Jack's name and, sure enough, he materialized, this time in full buckskin regalia as if that comforted him the most.

We are going to Lowell today
, she said mentally to the frontiersman.

Mouth set in an unsmiling line, he dipped his head.
You told me that yesterday. I thank you.

I wanted to confirm that you are attached to the bone.

Now a sudden smile.
I think I've got the hang of traveling with it.
His fog eyes coalesced and glinted with determination.
I WILL reach Lowell with you. And I thank you for taking me.

Enzo ran to them.
It's time to board!

Clare nodded to Texas Jack.
Later, Jack.

See you later.

During the flight, Clare resisted calling on him once they flew over the Mississippi River, but she did hold the pen case in her hand and believed she continued to feel the lively buzz she associated with Texas Jack all through the flight.

When they landed, she sent a quiet thought to Texas Jack.
Are you here, John Baker Omohundro?

Tough trip, but I . . . am . . . here
. A pause.
Wake me from my rest when we get to Lowell.
A touch of yearning throbbed in his voice before he fell silent.

Once in Boston, Zach rented a truck much like his own. Enzo hopped in the back, and they headed out for St. Patrick Cemetery in Lowell. Clare kept the pen case on her lap. She patted it, then murmured, “All these actors.”

Zach glanced at her. “Yeah? So?”

“All these people on stage. Texas Jack and his Giuseppina, Buffalo Bill, even Darin Clavell.” She shook her head. “At some level, I can't understand them.”

“Because you're such a private person,” Zach said.

“But I now seem to be in the entertainment business. That's one designation for funds received for psychic consultations.”

“You could get your private investigator's license, be a real member of Rickman's agency.”

She stared at him.

He sent her a quick grin. “Or not.”

After another couple of miles he said diffidently, “I like you the way you are. How you've defined yourself, how you're growing, but maybe . . .”

“Maybe?”

“Of all those people you're talking about, hardly any of them would be the same on stage as well as off, right?

Clare tilted her head, considering the question. “Mrs. Omohundro gave up the stage later in her life and taught. I'm sure Texas Jack didn't always play himself . . . and I think . . . it seems to me that Buffalo Bill became the showman on and off stage.
He
crafted his part, or let his character become himself or vice versa.”

“And Darin Clavell didn't like himself, so he disappeared into the character of another man,” Zach said.

“That's sad.”

“Yes. But they were all entertainers, and I think some actors have personas they don like masks.” Zach hesitated. “We all wear masks sometimes. Maybe you could craft one, a persona, who could get you through the public part of this business.”

Clare grimaced but said, “You have a point.”

Zach paused to turn between flanking gray stone pillars, through open green iron gates. Enzo barked and sailed over the fence of the same material surrounding the graveyard. Slowly they negotiated the smaller roads until they stopped at the point closest to the grave and walked to the plot.

Though Clare couldn't really feel the weight, the pen case in the pocket of her leather jacket felt heavy. Hope, too, that she could help, had substance.

Like Leadville's Evergreen Cemetery, they had this portion of St. Patrick Cemetery to themselves.

Unlike the cemetery in Leadville, this place had very well kept short green grass, with trees turning more red than yellow, and few evergreens. Yet it smelled like autumn and that had Clare's shoulders relaxing from being high to almost normal. Since they strolled through a new place, she stayed on Zach's left side and kept quiet as he scanned the area, a reflexive action for a law enforcement person.

Markers crowded the grounds in even rows, most of them taller and more ornate than Giuseppina's simple gray granite stone. She lay next to the sister whom she'd nursed and who had died a year before her.

Her tombstone read:
A Faithful Wife, Loving Sister, Affectionate Daughter, and Devout Christian
.

“Faithful wife,” Zach murmured. “And devout Christian. If the faithful wife business is true, maybe she'll be waiting for him.”

Clare bit her lip to stop from making a personal comment, like she would wait for him. Or would he want her to wait for him? Or, even, did he think his brother waited for him? All too very intimate. Instead she said, “Jack waited for her, then missed her. He loved her and believes she loved him. They were, from outsiders' views, a couple who remained deeply in love.”

Zach slid his eyes toward her, then reached out and took her hand, and some of the pent-up breath in her lungs sifted out along with tension. She'd never be stronger than now to aid Texas Jack with his transition. Having Zach here helped immensely.

The morning sunshine soothed her, too. She could ignore the inner nerves. Anxiety besieged her because she so wanted to help Texas Jack. Failure would crush her.

After dropping her hand, Zach turned in place, scanning the area, this time without much of the flat police officer glare. “Another pretty place, but tame. I like it better than Buffalo Bill's monument, less than Texas Jack's.”

“I agree,” she said.

“This cemetery's a lot more neat and tidy than the ones at Leadville and Fairplay,” he teased.

Shaking her head, she said, “Lately, I'm not sure how I've come to prefer the less neat and tidy and more unkempt—” She paused, stared at him, at the dark hair he kept longish because she liked the feel of the thick length on her fingers. “Wild,” she said. “I'm favoring the wild.”

Zach laughed and winked. “You have that gypsy heritage.”

“True.”

“And you're letting it out more. I like that,” he said.

She stepped up to him, put her arms around him and leaned against his broad chest, feeling the complete sturdiness of him. Both of his arms came around her, one holding his cane, but they stood balanced and solid together.

At that moment, Jack materialized beside his wife's grave, his expression tense, holding a top hat in his hands.

Clare blinked. His clothes displayed an elegant man: a dark suit of expensive broadcloth including vest, white linen shirt, and a dark band of a discreet tie popular in that era. Two strands of a gold watch chain looped across his flat chest and abdomen, and the front of his shirt glittered with diamond studs. From his shoulders fell a short opera cape.

“Wow,” she said. “Very man-about-town.”

Zach moved to her side and nodded to the frontiersman and scout, who never looked less like either. “We have a saying, Jack: ‘You clean up good.'”

The phantom laughed and Clare thought they'd accomplished the first tiny goal of this day. Texas Jack, relaxed and confident, ready to meet his fate, and, she hoped, his wife.

He set his hat on his head and tilted it to the angle most of his photographs showed.
Thank you.

“You look great, but Giuseppina
did
fall in love with the scout,” Clare pointed out.

Dipping his head, Jack—who definitely looked like the well-educated John Baker Omohundro of Virginia—said, “I dressed up to honor her with my best. She deserves only my best.”

“I understand,” Clare said. One deep breath in and out and she called, “Enzo?”

I am here! And so is Jack! Hi, Jack!

Hello, Enzo.

Enzo sniffed Jack from shiny shoes to the edge of his opera cape.
You smell happy, Jack.

I am happy, Enzo.

Clare had loaded up with protein and carbs from food on the plane, and had even gulped down a dose of wheatgrass she'd brought with them.

This time she wore an undershirt and leggings of pure silk, the best she could buy, as an investment, though she doubted she'd be able to write it off her taxes if she ever did declare herself a sole proprietor of an entertainment business. Or maybe she could call herself a counselor. She liked that; she'd work in the
counseling
field. And she babbled inwardly to gear herself up for the cold and pain of the ordeal.

Reaching into her coat pocket, she withdrew the wooden pen case that held the top bone of Jack's forefinger and opened it up.

Jack stared at the bone, and she could have sworn she saw him gulp. A lasso appeared in his hands, then vanished quickly. He took off his top hat and turned the brim.
Imagine that, I'm nervous.
He stared at Zach, switched his gaze back to Clare, then looked down at Enzo.
This may take a little while, right? It did when you got it.

“Tell us a story, Texas Jack,” Zach said calmly.

Yes, John Baker Omohundro seemed more defined than she'd ever seen him. Long eyelashes descended for a moment, showed outlined on his pale cheeks, then lifted. He put his hat back on, angled it, and asked,
So, Zach, have I ever told you about my meeting with a grizzly bear?

Zach focused on Texas Jack, who seemed to tell the story easily and with great emotion, gesturing with a cigar that had appeared in his fingers, all the while watching Enzo move next to Clare and begin the energy siphoning. The man had been an actor.

Clare gritted her teeth and breathed through the biting hurt. Moving Jack on would be worse.
Just suffer through this. Just get it done.

Enzo stopped before she cried out, leapt and took the bone from its padding, and sank into Giuseppina's grave.

Clare felt the bond between herself and the Lab, saw it as an insubstantial rope of cobwebs. Staring at the ground, she concentrated only on the phantom dog, the solid bone in his muzzle, and a narrow vision of Giuseppina's remains—her fingers. “Enzo is putting your distal phalange under Giuseppina's left hand,” Clare said, a little breathily, as the ache in her body receded.

That's a fine thing
, Texas Jack said, as soon as he'd finished his story.

Zach glanced at her, narrowed his eyes, and stared. “You're looking pale.”

“Enzo moving objects drains my strength.”

The Lab popped out of Giuseppina's grave, pranced to Jack, and accepted pets from him and praise from all three of them.

For a long few minutes, they stood in the sunlight. If they'd expected Giuseppina to materialize, they'd been wrong.

Taking off his top hat, Texas Jack stood at the foot of his wife's grave.
I love you, and I missed you, and I'm glad we're together now, even if it's only one bone of mine with yours.
His chest compressed as if he'd sighed. Turning to Clare, he inclined his head to her.
Thank you.
He put a palm over his heart.
I do feel closer to my wife.

“I can see that.” And she could. He'd become dense.

He gave her a charming and carefree smile she hadn't seen before.
I'm ready.

“Good.” She inhaled a deep breath, braced herself to walk into him . . . and Zach stepped in front of her.

“Hang on for a minute,” he tossed over his shoulder at Texas Jack.

Sure
, the phantom said, though he turned the rim of his hat around in his hands.

“Clare,” Zach whispered gruffly. He moved close, pressed her body against his with an arm around her shoulders, a hand on her butt so she could feel his desire. Embarrassment flamed in her that Texas Jack witnessed them, then raging sexual need burned away all thought, all feeling, all yearnings but the one to feel Zach. Hot Zach. Hot-blooded Zach, who heated her own blood surging through her veins.

His mouth angled over hers, coaxing her lips open with his tongue, rubbing her tongue with his, sucking it. She trembled with need and fast blood beating through her veins.

Drawing back, he released her, kept his fiery gaze on her, nodded once. “Do it now.”

Yes, all of her hummed with heat, trapped under her skin, pulsing through her nerves, coating the marrow of her bones.

Zach stepped aside and Texas Jack stared at her. With a more serious expression, John Omohundro held out his hand, more like for a handshake than to kiss it, or help her down from a wagon or carriage or whatever. Meant as a friendly but impersonal gesture on his part, which was good. Because she'd never experienced sexual feelings from a ghost and truly didn't want to go there, particularly when she stepped into a male phantom.

She lifted both of her hands and he raised his other one. “I need to grasp yours,” she said. At least she had these rules down solid—how to help a spirit transition from the gray dimension to the next. Jack's moving on would probably vary from the ones she'd facilitated in the past since it depended on the individual, but her actions and procedure remained the same.

She had to initiate contact, and with slow and steady breathing, she took his frost-cold hands and stepped into him. Her breath whooshed out as the cold invaded, instantly icing her, edging her wound with rime.

Then she ignored her own body and concentrated on Texas Jack. John Baker Omohundro. Love for his wife pervaded him, more than any other emotion. He truly couldn't move on because Giuseppina wasn't—hadn't been—with him. Now that his bone mingled with hers, he believed their spirits drew closer. And he was right. Clare sensed another spirit advancing, a small bright yellow sparkle.

The only color she could see. All her surroundings had turned sepia, shades of browns and blacks. No more gray dimension.

And no more steady breathing, but harsh sucking in and out. Her chest pumped raggedly. Her hands and feet, arms and legs had gone numb.

The spark became a firework blossom, then coalesced into a beautiful woman—lovelier and livelier than her photographs—dressed as the Indian maiden she acted in the play
Scouts of the Plains
. Before Clare could blink, her clothes became exquisite and expensive, the height of fashion in 1880, the year Texas Jack had died.

At the sight of Giuseppina, a huge burst of feeling had blown through Jack, now leaving only love and awe and tenderness. He bowed, the southern gentleman.
May I have this dance, my dearest wife?

Giuseppina sank with a dancer's grace into a curtsey, offered her hand.
Yes, my beloved husband.

Clare didn't know if they'd ever danced together at a formal ball. She'd read of the generalities of their lives, but had found few details. She could peek into Jack's memories, perhaps even into Giuseppina's, but he'd been a friend to her, and both spirits deserved their privacy.

And the cold had stopped much of her gift and flowed fast toward her heart.

The moment their hands touched, Jack left Clare. She saw the ghosts come together in a waltz, phantom gazes locked on each other.

Go and be blessed
, she said mentally, since her numb lips couldn't move. A true wish from her to them, but they didn't hear. They whirled away, vital, graceful, complementing each other and in perfect step, and didn't look back.

Applause and shouts sounded in her ears.

The pillar-like icicle holding her still and upright shattered around her as her knees gave way and darkness fell on her hard and cold as a frozen anvil.

“Clare!” Zach yelled. He caught her, held her close, and a couple of those shouts became whistles, a catcall.