Under the Skin (22 page)

Friday, May 25

A
fter lunch and some free time—napping or meditation was suggested—we convened in the parlor. Dark shades were drawn at the windows and a temporary drape had been rigged over the arched opening that led to a smaller room, making the space dim, but by no means dark. Once again we took our places in a ragged circle. And once again I was at the end of the sofa with Gloria on my left. The chairs had been drawn in closer to the sofa, I noticed, so that we were almost elbow to elbow.

Giles waited, relaxed in the wing chair, till everyone had taken a seat and then, in the most matter-of-fact voice imaginable, he asked, “How many of you have ever attended a séance?”

Several hands went up—Dawn, Ree, and Charlene.

“And how many of you had satisfactory experiences?”

Ree’s hand came down at once. Dawn’s hand came down, started back up, then came down again.

Giles nodded. “That’s interesting. Now to begin with, a few housekeeping details. We’ll be here for an hour or more; if anyone wants to visit the loo, this would be the time. And this is also the time to turn off your
cellphones—right off. Not set to vibrate but entirely off.”

There was a fumbling in pockets and purses and several people left the room for the suggested bathroom call. People were talking to one another in low tones as Giles moved around the group, speaking to each person individually. Gloria glanced over at me, her eyes bright with excitement.

“Oh, Lizzy, I’ve got such a positive feeling about this! I really think—”

“What about smudging?” Charlene’s strident voice caught everyone’s attention. She was offering Giles a little bundle of something that looked like dried leaves. “At the séances I’ve participated in, we always began by smudging the room to get rid of any negative energy.”

There was an amused look on the medium’s face. “If you like,” he said. “I don’t find it necessary but if no one here has a problem with smoke, then by all means …” He made a polite gesture.

“Oh, but shouldn’t I wait till everyone’s here—in case anyone’s carrying negative energy?”

Negative energy. I hoped that wasn’t me. I wasn’t a believer by a long shot but I felt that I could keep an open mind. I had done so in the past … and I remembered the time I’d been called to a neighbor’s house to stop a nosebleed by reading a particular Bible verse. I’d made a conscious effort to believe in what I was doing … or at least, not to scoff at it … to allow for the possibility. And it had worked. The nosebleed had stopped—whether because of or in spite of me.

“Elizabeth.”

Giles was in front of me now, bending down to speak close to my ear. “Don’t worry, Elizabeth. I feel sure that you’ll be a stronger link than you might have imagined. If you can only look past the trappings …”

He nodded toward Charlene, who, now that everyone was assembled, had lit the little bundle of leaves and allowed it to flare up before she blew the flame out. Now she was waving the smoking bundle back and forth and muttering something as she walked clockwise around the room.

“The trappings and the terminology, as I said yesterday, are merely constructs—a way for us to deal with something far beyond our understanding.”

I nodded and started to say that I’d do my best. But he had passed on to Steve and Dawn. It helped that Giles was so ordinary, that he didn’t spout a lot of metaphysical stuff. Or, at least, if he did spout, I could comfort myself by thinking of it as a metaphor.

“Thank you, Charlene,” he said as she completed her circuit of the room and stood at the doorway, one hand holding back the drapes while with the other she seemed to be shooing the smoke out of the room. “Well done. And now …”

With a scant tilt of his head, he motioned her toward her chair. As he took his own, a little shiver of anticipation ran round the circle.

“Now”—Giles spoke in that low tone that had each of us straining forward to catch his words—“I should tell you that while there are many different ways to conduct a séance, my …” he hesitated, “my particular method has proved to be satisfactory again and again. I will ask you all to keep that in mind as we proceed.

“For those of you who’ve never participated in a séance, you should be aware that spirits may communicate by knocking or rapping or some other nonverbal sound. Or the spirit may speak to one of you in your mind—and not necessarily to the one asking the question. If we’re very fortunate, the spirit may speak aloud—through one of us.”

“Wait a minute. Not just through you … but
any
of us?” Steve looked alarmed at the thought.

Giles hastened to assure her that it was only a remote possibility, then gestured at our circle. “We’ll begin the session by joining hands. It helps us to focus but, contrary to what some believe, it’s not a requisite. As the time goes on you may find that maintaining that hand clasp is causing fatigue which is working against your concentration. If you find this happening, please, let go. It will do no harm. Are there any questions?”

Giles looked around the circle of expectant but silent faces. “Very well, then. We’ll begin with a few minutes of silent meditation. Each of you should concentrate on the spirit you hope to contact, as well as the question that you have for that spirit. At the end of this period of silence, I’ll ask one of you to begin and we’ll all bend our minds to trying to contact that particular spirit. Remember, we’ll have one more session today and three more tomorrow so there’ll be ample time for each of you.”

So saying, Giles put out his hands and closed his eyes. Somewhat self-consciously, the group joined hands and we began.

The only meditating I’ve done has been in a bathtub of hot water. And it’s been of the “think of nothing” variety. But this … would I be a spoilsport, a big old load of “negative energy,” if I didn’t try to contact someone? And which someone would it be?

Sam. Of course that’s who Gloria felt was the logical choice. She had said something earlier about how good it would be if I could have “closure” with Sam. Maybe so. But how strange it would seem, assuming this contact occurred, to be speaking to my beloved late husband almost on the eve of marrying his best friend. Certainly there were unresolved questions I
could ask—several battered at me. But did I want the answers? Moreover, did I want Gloria to be privy to my doubts?

No, I did not. Sam, wherever he was, would not be on my calling list. But then, who …? My mother … no … Papa … oh, how tempting, but, again, too personal. And for all I knew, he could still be alive—no point seeking someone who hadn’t crossed over, as they say.

At last I settled on Gramma. If anyone was going to speak to me or send me a message, I thought I’d like it to be Gramma. So I composed myself to meditate on Gramma, her comfortable plump figure, usually with an apron over her dress, her soft brown eyes, her … and I wandered off into days of remembered bliss … Gramma … Gramma …

“Let’s bring our meditation to a close now. We’ll begin by all concentrating on the spirit that Xan is hoping to contact. Xan, will you give us the name?”

I opened my eyes to see Xan, quivering like a greyhound as Giles looked at him. Xan took a deep breath and made his request.

“My brother … my brother Rob. Robert MacNaughten.”

“Thank you, Xan.” Again Giles’s gaze swept round the circle. “Let us all hold that name in our minds and silently ask Robert to come among us.”

And so we did. At least, I did. Mindlessly concentrating on the name Robert MacNaughten, over and over, I could feel Glory’s hand trembling in my left hand and Dawn’s, still and icy, in my right. Somewhere in the distance I heard the muffled rattle of a diesel truck starting and forced myself back to the task at hand.

Robert MacNaughten, Robert MacNaughten …
Beneath this mantra ran a magpie jumble of thought.
MacNaughten
sounds Scottish, Xan must be short for Alexander … Robert MacNaughten, Robert MacNaughten, Xan wants to talk to you … I wonder if this is an older or younger brother we’re calling and how long he’s been dead. Oh hell, I’m wandering … Robert MacNaughten, Robert MacNaughten …

I had closed my eyes in order to concentrate better but the absence of sight only seemed to sharpen all my other senses: the sound of the group’s breathing and the prissy little sniff that appeared to be habitual with Dawn, the lingering smell of the smoke from the burning sage of the smudge bundle … 
dammit, I’m wandering again … Robert MacNaughten, Robert MacNaughten …

What happened next is hard to describe. At last my busy mind shut down and it was as if the words
Robert MacNaughten
were being played on a continuous loop. I was conscious of nothing more than the fact that my breathing had become very slow and steady and I had the feeling of being connected to something—almost as if I were a conduit of some sort. There was a central core of empty space and my being was wrapped around it and I was cherishing it and protecting it even as the words
Robert MacNaughten
pulsed through that core and …

A cascade of sound erupted from the piano standing in the bay of the room, a glissando—if that was the word for a tumble of notes from high to low, as if the pianist had run his thumbnail along the piano keys—and my eyes popped open and my head turned in the direction of the sound.

Again and again, an unseen hand made the instrument ring out. The notes crowded upon one another, deafening, maddening, till I felt that I would have to cover my ears, but just as they seemed to reach an unbearable frenzy, Giles spoke.

“Robert, thank you for joining us. Xan is here. Will
you speak with your brother? One note for yes, two for no.”

All eyes were turned toward the piano and I heard a muffled sob that must have come from Xan. “Rob,” he begged, “Rob, will you—”

A single plangent note rang out, reverberating in the stillness of the dim room.

Friday, May 25

S
orry, guys, it’s just me. She won’t be back till Sunday.”

Three wagging tails slowed then drooped and the dogs looked beyond him in hopes of seeing Elizabeth coming up the path. Shaking his head, Phillip climbed the porch steps, threading between Molly and Ursa who seemed determined to ignore him. James, however, gave up the vigil and followed Phillip into the house, dancing and yapping as a reminder that it was well past feeding time.

In spite of the noisy little dog, the house seemed strangely deserted. On a normal day, Elizabeth would have been in the kitchen, putting the finishing touches on dinner while listening to an audiobook or to NPR and
All Things Considered
. There would be good smells and she would turn to him with a smile and …

James’s barking grew more frantic. The smiling image faded and Phillip dropped his battered briefcase on the kitchen bench.

“Okay, buddy, I’ll get the chow.”

He was just setting down the third bowl of dog food on the porch when he heard the phone in the house ringing. Smiling at the thought that it would surely be Elizabeth,
he hurried into the little office and snatched up the phone.

“Who’s this?” was the abrupt response to his eager hello. A deep voice. A man’s voice.

“Who are you calling?” he countered.

“Is this Ms. Goodweather’s place?”

Phillip admitted that it was, adding that Ms. Goodweather wasn’t in.

“Gone off somewhere with Gloria, I’ll bet—no, don’t bother making something up. You must be the boyfriend, am I right?”

Phillip took a deep breath.
And you must be the husband
. “This is Detective Phillip Hawkins of the Marshall County Sheriff’s Office.”
That’ll give this sucker something to think about
. “Ms. Goodweather and I are getting married next month. And you are …?”

“Well, I guess I’m your future brother-in-law,
Detective
Hawkins. You can call me Jerry. You know, I’m glad it was you that answered. There’s something you need to know about.”

“That’s right, the same black Hummer I told you about before. I’m not sure what he has in mind—but if anyone spots the vehicle, let me or Sheriff Blaine know right away … Yeah, they’ll be at the Mountain Magnolia all weekend—should be secure there but … Okay, then, ’preciate it … You too.”

Phillip glanced at his watch: six-thirty. He needed to tell Elizabeth and Gloria about Jerry’s call but it would have to wait. They were probably eating dinner or already in a workshop session. Besides, he knew from experience that Lizabeth would have left her phone in her bedroom, turned off. They had agreed to talk every night at ten—or every morning at seven.

He wandered kitchenward through the quiet house. Might as well get something to eat. Then he would put
in some time with the never-ending paperwork that was part of modern law enforcement. The sound of his footsteps on the wooden floors seemed magnified in the silence; for a fleeting moment, he felt like an intruder in a strange house.

Lizabeth had insisted on leaving the refrigerator well stocked. He’d reminded her that he’d survived for many years as a bachelor but evidently she had no opinion of his ability to fend for himself and had left things in the refrigerator that he could heat up. She had carefully pointed out some meal options before she left: a container of chicken and yellow rice, ham and cheese for a sandwich, a creamy glob of noodles and something …

He ended up on the porch with a thick peanut butter sandwich and a beer. The dogs would clean up the crumbs and he’d enjoy the view and the frogs’ chirping in the fish pool. The quiet of the country was still a novelty to him—there had been so few occasions that he’d been here alone for any length of time. Somewhere down the hill he could hear the
putt-putt
of the tractor—Ben, working late to take advantage of the cool of the evening. He’d seen Amanda making her way up the road to the cabin; she too put in long hours at this time of year, readying the gardens of summer residents so they could brag about their green thumbs to their houseguests all summer long.