The Girl in the Glass (4 page)

"I gave you the books, right?" he asked. He'd lent me his Hindu texts, translations of holy books I was to scour for incomprehensible phrases that would dazzle Western minds.

I nodded.

"You got the turban?"

I nodded.

"You're working on the voice? Let me hear something," he said.

"May Shiva dance like a flame in your heart," I said, in the rigid-tongued, singsong method that he'd taught me.

He smiled. "You're a swami's swami."

I laughed.

"Okay, kid, here's the last thing I'm gonna tell you. Maybe it's the most important." He reached over and gave me a gentle slap on the cheek, something he did often when teaching me. At first I'd been angry at these intrusions on my personal space, but over time they'd become for me like pats on the back. "I hope all of this nonsense helps you out, but you've gotta promise me one thing. Never forget who you really are. What we're doing here is actually an abomination. We're not swamis, we're the swamis of peoples'

imaginations, swami knockoffs out for a buck. For us, the turban's a job, you see? Always remember that." He laid three quarters on the counter and hopped off his stool. I stood up next to him.

"Thanks for everything," I told him.

He reached up and swatted me again across the cheek, but this time harder than usual, so that it stung.

"Adios, Diego," he said. As he walked away there was a crack of thunder, and it instantly started to pour. I glanced up at the sky, and when I looked back, he'd vanished.

"Thanks, Morty," I whispered to the corpse and then leaned over and lightly petted Wilma's hood. I turned away from the coffin and went to sit with a dozen people discussing some intricate con Schell had worked when he was younger. It involved a hansom cab, a cop, and a red balloon filled with helium, but I wasn't able to piece it together. Every once in a while, one of them would call back to Schell, who sat by himself in the last row of chairs, "What was the take on that little mission, three grand?" or, "The bull was McLaren, wasn't it?" and I'd see him force a smile and nod. In another small group, Antony was regaling three women with his exploits in the traveling carnival trade, specifically his act in which he stopped a cannonball with his gut.

I slipped away and went to join Schell. Neither of us spoke for a few minutes. Finally, I asked him how long he'd known Morty.

"Long time," he said. "When I was a kid and my father would be gone for days on end, Morty let me come and stay at his place. I'd sleep on his couch, and he'd have Wilma do tricks for me. Sometimes he'd read me a book."

"He was good," I said.

"They're all good," he said, nodding at the assembled mourners. Time passed and people started heading out. Antony approached and leaned over us. "Boss," he said.

"Do you mind driving home? I think I'm gonna stick around and spend some time with Vonda over there."

"Who's Vonda?" asked Schell.

"You know," Antony said, pointing backward with his thumb, "the Rubber Lady. We're gonna go and get a few cocktails."

"The Rubber Lady?" asked Schell.

"Hey, she's got a friend," said Antony. "You should join us. We can put the kid on a train, and he can catch a cab from the station."

"Thanks, but I think I'll pass," said Schell.

Antony leaned even closer to Schell and I heard him whisper, "I hear she's a sword swallower." Schell begged off, and soon after, he and I said our good-byes and left. On the long drive home, he said nothing. Later that night, as I lay in bed nodding off to sleep, I heard the strains of melancholic music drifting down the hall from Schell's room.

I was awakened the next morning by the sound of Antony's voice, yelling, "Come off it," and realized Schell must have just informed him that he would be playing Ma Parks. I got dressed and went out to the kitchen.

"This was your doing, you little piss nob," said Antony as I entered the kitchen.

"What?" I said but couldn't hold a straight face.

"Old lady Parks," he said.

"Typecasting," said Schell, who looked as if he hadn't slept all night.

"I heard you yesterday, Antony," I said. "You said I was a genius."

"I take it back," he said and got up to get himself a cup of coffee.

"How was the Rubber Lady?" asked Schell.

Antony poured cream and stirred. "My little pretzel? I told her about how I used to let cars run over my head, and she was swept away with me."

"A true romantic," said Schell.

"I spent three hours waiting for the first train out here this morning. Didn't catch a wink. I'm gonna hit it for a while."

"I'll call you at one," said Schell. "We have to go to the Salvation Army and see if we can find a nice dress for you."

"You two are just jealous," he said, leaving the kitchen.

"I have a new makeup for you to try," said Schell. "It glows in the dark." From down the hall, we heard, "I
hate
being dead people."

MANY DOORS ARE OPENED

P
athetic" might just have been an apt description of Parks's existence, for the night of the séance, when we arrived, he informed us that he could find no one among his acquaintances or family who would participate in it with him. It was to be only Schell and Parks and myself. This then, as it looked from the outset, promised to be the equivalent of shooting fish in a barrel. All the better, as I was somewhat distracted, hoping for another glimpse of Isabel, whom I hadn't been able to get off my mind since we'd been there a week earlier.

We met the tycoon in the same room his butler had led us to on our initial visit. After the normal pleasantries, Schell described the rules of engagement for calling forth the dead: breathe deeply and regularly so as not to hyperventilate; do not shout (it might scare the spirits away); keep your distance from any visual or physical manifestation that might coalesce (to make contact with it could possibly be fatal); be solicitous of the dead (humor them); do not leave your seat unless otherwise instructed. Parks nodded eagerly, obviously anxious to get through the preliminaries and on with it. His voice had gone up an octave or two, and he swung his legs back and forth while sitting in his throne. We moved to the room that Schell and I had reconnoitered on our last visit, a small drawing room on the eastern side of the mansion. It was at ground level and had a pair of wide glass doors that gave a view of a landscaped terrace with faux Greek statuary and a series of waist-high hedges. The room itself was comfortable, not quite as large as we liked but with a nice round wooden table and rafters over which we could toss a line in order to levitate an object.

Before we began, as Schell lit the candle at the center of the table, Parks made a request. "I don't know if this is possible or warranted," he said, "but, please, Mr. Schell, if my wife tries to…come through, please do everything in your power to prevent it."

"I understand," said Schell. "Her death is too close to you right now."

"Something like that," said Parks.

Schell nodded to me, an indication that I should turn off the lights. This I did while he assumed the mediumistic state. When he went under, so to speak, it was a sight to behold. His entire body trembled, eventually giving way to what appeared to be a kind of living rigor mortis. The eyes turned upward so that the pupils were hidden beneath lowered lids, and his mouth opened wide in a grimace. Parks was entranced by the performance, giving me the opportunity to toss a length of near-invisible thread, a small washer attached to the end to give it weight, up over a rafter. Just as it cleared the beam and began its descent, I took my seat and let loose a string of incomprehensible gibberish. Parks's attention now swung to me, and as it did, Schell caught the end of the line and pulled it down next to him, where it couldn't be detected in the dim candlelight. When Parks turned back to look at Schell, he was again wrapped in his rictus of spirituality.

Before long, there came from out of the darkness a low murmuring, the candle flickered as if caught in a breeze, and sounds of weeping filled the air. Schell, far more expert at projecting his voice than I, covered the murmuring, and I was responsible for the weeping. Parks looked everywhere, up and down, wide-eyed. When I rapped my toe against the bottom of the table, he nearly jumped out of his seat. Schell lifted his arms in the air and said in a low, croaking voice, filled with urgency, "The gates to the other side open," and a dozen pine whites suddenly appeared between his hands. They swarmed in a chaos of pale, fluttering wings above the table and then made for Parks, who'd already been marked with sugar water. The millionaire panicked and began swatting the air in front of him. Schell then had a chance to slip from beneath his jacket and attach to the end of the line a toy bear we'd picked up at the Salvation Army.

"Georgie, Georgie," came a voice from above. "It's me, your mother."

"Mother?" said Parks. "I can hear you." He raked his fingers through his hair, and within seconds his eyes glistened with tears. "Mother," he called, looking around the room feverishly. As Parks looked behind him, Schell blew a few grains of flash powder into the candle flame and there was a tiny, bright explosion in the middle of the table. Parks covered his eyes and when he looked again, the bear hovered in the air five feet above our heads.

"I've brought your bear, darling," said the ghostly female voice. Parks began to stand, as if to grab for the toy, but I cautioned him, "Remain seated, sir. To touch this apparition could mean your life."

He sat back down, but his hands remained thrust upward, the perfect image of a child begging to be carried.

"George, I've been watching you."

"Yes, Mother," he said.

"You've not been on your best behavior."

"I have, Mother. I have."

"No you haven't. If you lie to me I'll go away."

"I'm sorry," cried Parks, "please don't leave."

"Caroline is here with me, George."

Parks groaned.

"She said you were unkind to her."

"I wasn't," he said.

"Good-bye," said the voice.

"All right, yes, I didn't like her. She was too…forceful. I'm sorry."

"That's better, dear. To make up for it, I want you to be kinder to others. Treat the young woman Isabel nicely. She works so hard."

"I'll raise her salary," said Parks.

"That's an excellent start. Be kinder to everyone, George. That way Death will treat
you
kindly when it's time for you to make the voyage."

"Yes," he said, his voice and body trembling.

"I'm on the terrace, dear. Come to the glass and I will let you see me, but you mustn't open the doors." Parks looked over at me. I nodded. He got out of his chair, and Schell and I also stood. We moved toward the glass doors, I in front of Parks, and Schell bringing up the rear.

"Behold, sir, your mother's ectoplasmic form," I said.

He stepped up next to me and pressed his face against the glass. Outside the wind was blowing through the giant oaks that bordered the property. There was a half moon that night, its pale light shining through a very light mist. Standing behind one of the hedges, so that she was visible from the waist up, was the glowing form of Ma Parks, a good deal larger in death than life. She wore a wide-brimmed hat as she did in three of the photos in Parks's parlor, and stared directly at us. Through the glass, we could hear her repeating the name "Georgie."

Parks lost control and started fumbling with the knobs on the doors. I put my hand upon his shoulder and cautioned him not to open them. He paid no attention to me, and I tried to restrain him long enough so that Schell could get a hand on him. But Schell just stood there, staring at the glass, a strange look on his face, completely immobile. Then Parks rammed me with his elbow and sent me tripping backward onto my rear end.

From where I lay on the floor, I expected to see Schell jump to action, but he didn't. Parks got the doors open and slipped out onto the terrace. He ran toward the apparition, screaming, "Mother!" I scrambled to my feet just in time to see him reach the hedge behind which the ghost stood. Schell finally came to and lunged forward out the door after him. As Parks reached out for the object of his affection, his mother's spirit feinted to the side and threw a right cross. The punch caught him on the jaw and dropped him, unconscious, onto the grass.

I reached the scene in time to see the ghost of Ma Parks, now grown to something well over six feet tall, lumbering across the perfectly manicured lawn toward the circular driveway at the front of the house.

"Help me lift him," said Schell.

He took the arms and I the legs. There were a hundred questions I had concerning what had just happened, but I knew to keep my mouth shut, not sure as to how deeply Parks was under. We managed to get him inside and lay him on a divan in the drawing room. As Schell tried to gently revive him, I latched the glass doors and wound up the line we had used for the levitation. I left the bear at his spot on the table, a sort of party favor to make up for the séance having ended with him getting slugged. When I was finished with these small tasks, Schell instructed me to turn the lights on and blow out the candle.

"He's coming around," Schell whispered, crouching next to the divan. I stood at a short distance and watched as Parks surfaced, calling for his mother.

"Lie still," Schell said to him. "You're all right. You've had a physical encounter with the void. Breathe deeply."

Parks's eyes were wild, and he was agitated to the extreme. He flung his legs over the side of the divan and sat up, rubbing his jaw.

"I warned you not to make contact with the materialized forms of the dead," said Schell, "and now you see why."

"The veil must remain intact," I said.

Parks calmed down and winced as he touched his chin. "I'm okay," he said. "I apologize for getting carried away." He couldn't look directly at either of us.

"Window," he said, addressing me. "There's whiskey and a tumbler in that small bar in the corner. Please pour me a drink."

"Ondoo, your excellence," I said as I moved to the task.