The Last Seance Read online

  He was hammering and pounding with all his might on Lady Carmichael’s door.

  ‘Devil take the woman!’ he cried. ‘She’s locked it!’

  ‘But—’

  ‘It’s in there, man! In with her! Can’t you hear it?’

  From behind the locked door a long-drawn cat yowl sounded fiercely. And then following it a horrible scream—and another . . . I recognized Lady Carmichael’s voice.

  ‘The door!’ I yelled. ‘We must break it in. In another minute we shall be too late.’

  We set our shoulders against it, and heaved with all our might. It gave with a crash—and we almost fell into the room.

  Lady Carmichael lay on the bed bathed in blood. I have seldom seen a more horrible sight. Her heart was still beating, but her injuries were terrible, for the skin of the throat was all ripped and torn . . . Shuddering, I whispered: ‘The Claws . . .’ A thrill of superstitious horror ran over me.

  I dressed and bandaged the wounds carefully and suggested to Settle that the exact nature of the injuries had better be kept secret, especially from Miss Patterson. I wrote out a telegram for a hospital nurse, to be despatched as soon as the telegraph office was open.

  The dawn was now stealing in at the window. I looked out on the lawn below.

  ‘Get dressed and come out,’ I said abruptly to Settle. ‘Lady Carmichael will be all right now.’

  He was soon ready, and we went out into the garden together.

  ‘What are you going to do?’

  ‘Dig up the cat’s body,’ I said briefly. ‘I must be sure—’

  I found a spade in a toolshed and we set to work beneath the large copper beech tree. At last our digging was rewarded. It was not a pleasant job. The animal had been dead a week. But I saw what I wanted to see.

  ‘That’s the cat,’ I said. ‘The identical cat I saw the first day I came here.’

  Settle sniffed. An odour of bitter almonds was still perceptible.

  ‘Prussic acid,’ he said.

  I nodded.

  ‘What are you thinking?’ he asked curiously.

  ‘What you think too!’

  My surmise was no new one to him—it had passed through his brain also, I could see.

  ‘It’s impossible,’ he murmured. ‘Impossible! It’s against all science—all nature . . .’ His voice tailed off in a shudder. ‘That mouse last night,’ he said. ‘But—oh! it couldn’t be!’

  ‘Lady Carmichael,’ I said, ‘is a very strange woman. She has occult powers—hypnotic powers. Her forebears came from the East. Can we know what use she might have made of these powers over a weak lovable nature such as Arthur Carmichael’s? And remember, Settle, if Arthur Carmichael remains a hopeless imbecile, devoted to her, the whole property is practically hers and her son’s—whom you have told me she adores. And Arthur was going to be married!’

  ‘But what are we going to do, Carstairs?’

  ‘There’s nothing to be done,’ I said. ‘We’ll do our best though to stand between Lady Carmichael and vengeance.’

  Lady Carmichael improved slowly. Her injuries healed themselves as well as could be expected—the scars of that terrible assault she would probably bear to the end of her life.

  I had never felt more helpless. The power that defeated us was still at large, undefeated, and though quiescent for the minute we could hardly regard it as doing otherwise than biding its time. I was determined upon one thing. As soon as Lady Carmichael was well enough to be moved she must be taken away from Wolden. There was just a chance that the terrible manifestation might be unable to follow her. So the days went on.

  I had fixed September 18th as the date of Lady Carmichael’s removal. It was on the morning of the 14th when the unexpected crisis arose.

  I was in the library discussing details of Lady Carmichael’s case with Settle when an agitated housemaid rushed into the room.

  ‘Oh! sir,’ she cried. ‘Be quick! Mr Arthur—he’s fallen into the pond. He stepped on the punt and it pushed off with him, and he overbalanced and fell in! I saw it from the window.’

  I waited for no more, but ran straight out of the room followed by Settle. Phyllis was just outside and had heard the maid’s story. She ran with us.

  ‘But you needn’t be afraid,’ she cried. ‘Arthur is a magnificent swimmer.’

  I felt forebodings, however, and redoubled my pace. The surface of the pond was unruffled. The empty punt floated lazily about—but of Arthur there was no sign.

  Settle pulled off his coat and his boots. ‘I’m going in,’ he said. ‘You take the boat-hook and fish about from the other punt. It’s not very deep.’

  Very long the time seemed as we searched vainly. Minute followed minute. And then, just as we were despairing, we found him, and bore the apparently lifeless body of Arthur Carmichael to shore.

  As long as I live I shall never forget the hopeless agony of Phyllis’s face.

  ‘Not—not—’ her lips refused to frame the dreadful word.

  ‘No, no, my dear,’ I cried. ‘We’ll bring him round, never fear.’

  But inwardly I had little hope. He had been under water for half an hour. I sent off Settle to the house for hot blankets and other necessaries, and began myself to apply artificial respiration.

  We worked vigorously with him for over an hour but there was no sign of life. I motioned to Settle to take my place again, and I approached Phyllis.

  ‘I’m afraid,’ I said gently, ‘that it is no good. Arthur is beyond our help.’

  She stayed quite still for a moment and then suddenly flung herself down on the lifeless body.

  ‘Arthur!’ she cried desperately. ‘Arthur! Come back to me! Arthur—come back—come back!’

  Her voice echoed away into silence. Suddenly I touched Settle’s arm. ‘Look!’ I said.

  A faint tinge of colour had crept into the drowned man’s face. I felt his heart.

  ‘Go on with the respiration,’ I cried. ‘He’s coming round!’

  The moments seemed to fly now. In a marvellously short time his eyes opened.

  Then suddenly I realized a difference. These were intelligent eyes, human eyes . . .

  They rested on Phyllis.

  ‘Hallo! Phil,’ he said weakly. ‘Is it you? I thought you weren’t coming until tomorrow.’

  She could not yet trust herself to speak but she smiled at him. He looked round with increasing bewilderment.

  ‘But, I say, where am I? And—how rotten I feel! What’s the matter with me? Hallo, Dr Settle!’

  ‘You’ve been nearly drowned—that’s what’s the matter,’ returned Settle grimly.

  Sir Arthur made a grimace.

  ‘I’ve always heard it was beastly coming back afterwards! But how did it happen? Was I walking in my sleep?’

  Settle shook his head.

  ‘We must get him to the house,’ I said, stepping forward.

  He stared at me, and Phyllis introduced me. ‘Dr Carstairs, who is staying here.’

  We supported him between us and started for the house. He looked up suddenly as though struck by an idea.

  ‘I say, doctor, this won’t knock me up for the 12th, will it?’

  ‘The 12th?’ I said slowly, ‘you mean the 12th of August?’

  ‘Yes—next Friday.’

  ‘Today is the 14th of September,’ said Settle abruptly.

  His bewilderment was evident.

  ‘But—but I thought it was the 8th of August? I must have been ill then?’

  Phyllis interposed rather quickly in her gentle voice.

  ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘you’ve been very ill.’

  He frowned. ‘I can’t understand it. I was perfectly all right when I went to bed last night—at least of course it wasn’t really last night. I had dreams though, I remember, dreams . . .’ His brow furrowed itself still more as he strove to remember. ‘Something—what was it? Something dreadful—someone had done it to me—and I was angry—desperate . . . And then I dreamed I was a cat—yes, a cat!
Funny, wasn’t it? But it wasn’t a funny dream. It was more—horrible! But I can’t remember. It all goes when I think.’

  I laid my hand on his shoulder. ‘Don’t try to think, Sir Arthur,’ I said gravely. ‘Be content—to forget.’

  He looked at me in a puzzled way and nodded. I heard Phyllis draw a breath of relief. We had reached the house.

  ‘By the way,’ said Sir Arthur suddenly, ‘where’s the mater?’

  ‘She has been—ill,’ said Phyllis after a momentary pause.

  ‘Oh! poor old mater!’ His voice rang with genuine concern. ‘Where is she? In her room?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘but you had better not disturb—’

  The words froze on my lips. The door of the drawing-room opened and Lady Carmichael, wrapped in a dressing-gown, came out into the hall.

  Her eyes were fixed on Arthur, and if ever I have seen a look of absolute guilt-stricken terror I saw it then. Her face was hardly human in its frenzied terror. Her hand went to her throat.

  Arthur advanced towards her with boyish affection.

  ‘Hello, mater! So you’ve been knocked up too? I say, I’m awfully sorry.’

  She shrank back before him, her eyes dilating. Then suddenly, with a shriek of a doomed soul, she fell backwards through the open door.

  I rushed and bent over her, then beckoned to Settle.

  ‘Hush,’ I said. ‘Take him upstairs quietly and then come down again. Lady Carmichael is dead.’

  He returned in a few minutes.

  ‘What was it?’ he asked. ‘What caused it?’

  ‘Shock,’ I said grimly. ‘The shock of seeing Arthur Carmichael, the real Arthur Carmichael, restored to life! Or you may call it, as I prefer to, the judgement of God!’

  ‘You mean—’ he hesitated.

  I looked at him in the eyes so that he understood.

  ‘A life for a life,’ I said significantly.

  ‘But—’

  ‘Oh! I know that a strange and unforeseen accident permitted the spirit of Arthur Carmichael to return to his body. But, nevertheless, Arthur Carmichael was murdered.’

  He looked at me half fearfully. ‘With prussic acid?’ he asked in a low tone.

  ‘Yes,’ I answered. ‘With prussic acid.’

  Settle and I have never spoken of our belief. It is not one likely to be credited. According to the orthodox point of view Arthur Carmichael merely suffered from loss of memory, Lady Carmichael lacerated her own throat in a temporary fit of mania, and the apparition of the Grey Cat was mere imagination.

  But there are two facts that to my mind are unmistakable. One is the ripped chair in the corridor. The other is even more significant. A catalogue of the library was found, and after exhaustive search it was proved that the missing volume was an ancient and curious work on the possibilities of the metamorphosis of human beings into animals!

  One thing more. I am thankful to say that Arthur knows nothing. Phyllis has locked the secret of those weeks in her own heart, and she will never, I am sure, reveal them to the husband she loves so dearly, and who came back across the barrier of the grave at the call of her voice.

  The Blue Geranium

  ‘When I was down here last year—’ said Sir Henry Clithering, and stopped.

  His hostess, Mrs Bantry, looked at him curiously.

  The Ex-Commissioner of Scotland Yard was staying with old friends of his, Colonel and Mrs Bantry, who lived near St Mary Mead.

  Mrs Bantry, pen in hand, had just asked his advice as to who should be invited to make a sixth guest at dinner that evening.

  ‘Yes?’ said Mrs Bantry encouragingly. ‘When you were here last year?’

  ‘Tell me,’ said Sir Henry, ‘do you know a Miss Marple?’

  Mrs Bantry was surprised. It was the last thing she had expected.

  ‘Know Miss Marple? Who doesn’t! The typical old maid of fiction. Quite a dear, but hopelessly behind the times. Do you mean you would like me to ask her to dinner?’

  ‘You are surprised?’

  ‘A little, I must confess. I should hardly have thought you—but perhaps there’s an explanation?’

  ‘The explanation is simple enough. When I was down here last year we got into the habit of discussing unsolved mysteries—there were five or six of us—Raymond West, the novelist, started it. We each supplied a story to which we knew the answer, but nobody else did. It was supposed to be an exercise in the deductive faculties—to see who could get nearest the truth.’

  ‘Well?’

  ‘Like in the old story—we hardly realized that Miss Marple was playing; but we were very polite about it—didn’t want to hurt the old dear’s feelings. And now comes the cream of the jest. The old lady outdid us every time!’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I assure you—straight to the truth like a homing pigeon.’

  ‘But how extraordinary! Why, dear old Miss Marple has hardly ever been out of St Mary Mead.’

  ‘Ah! But according to her, that has given her unlimited opportunities of observing human nature—under the microscope as it were.’

  ‘I suppose there’s something in that,’ conceded Mrs Bantry. ‘One would at least know the petty side of people. But I don’t think we have any really exciting criminals in our midst. I think we must try her with Arthur’s ghost story after dinner. I’d be thankful if she’d find a solution to that.’

  ‘I didn’t know that Arthur believed in ghosts?’

  ‘Oh! he doesn’t. That’s what worries him so. And it happened to a friend of his, George Pritchard—a most prosaic person. It’s really rather tragic for poor George. Either this extraordinary story is true—or else—’

  ‘Or else what?’

  Mrs Bantry did not answer. After a minute or two she said irrelevantly:

  ‘You know, I like George—everyone does. One can’t believe that he—but people do do such extraordinary things.’

  Sir Henry nodded. He knew, better than Mrs Bantry, the extraordinary things that people did.

  So it came about that that evening Mrs Bantry looked round her dinner table (shivering a little as she did so, because the dining-room, like most English dining-rooms, was extremely cold) and fixed her gaze on the very upright old lady sitting on her husband’s right. Miss Marple wore black lace mittens; an old lace fichu was draped round her shoulders and another piece of lace surmounted her white hair. She was talking animatedly to the elderly doctor, Dr Lloyd, about the Workhouse and the suspected shortcomings of the District Nurse.

  Mrs Bantry marvelled anew. She even wondered whether Sir Henry had been making an elaborate joke—but there seemed no point in that. Incredible that what he had said could be really true.

  Her glance went on and rested affectionately on her red-faced broad-shouldered husband as he sat talking horses to Jane Helier, the beautiful and popular actress. Jane, more beautiful (if that were possible) off the stage than on, opened enormous blue eyes and murmured at discreet intervals: ‘Really?’ ‘Oh fancy!’ ‘How extraordinary!’ She knew nothing whatever about horses and cared less.

  ‘Arthur,’ said Mrs Bantry, ‘you’re boring poor Jane to distraction. Leave horses alone and tell her your ghost story instead. You know . . . George Pritchard.’

  ‘Eh, Dolly? Oh! but I don’t know—’

  ‘Sir Henry wants to hear it too. I was telling him something about it this morning. It would be interesting to hear what everyone has to say about it.’

  ‘Oh do!’ said Jane. ‘I love ghost stories.’

  ‘Well—’ Colonel Bantry hesitated. ‘I’ve never believed much in the supernatural. But this—

  ‘I don’t think any of you know George Pritchard. He’s one of the best. His wife—well, she’s dead now, poor woman. I’ll just say this much: she didn’t give George any too easy a time when she was alive. She was one of those semi-invalids—I believe she had really something wrong with her, but whatever it was she played it for all it was worth. She was capricious, exacting, unreasonable. She complained from
morning to night. George was expected to wait on her hand and foot, and every thing he did was always wrong and he got cursed for it. Most men, I’m fully convinced, would have hit her over the head with a hatchet long ago. Eh, Dolly, isn’t that so?’

  ‘She was a dreadful woman,’ said Mrs Bantry with conviction. ‘If George Pritchard had brained her with a hatchet, and there had been any woman on the jury, he would have been triumphantly acquitted.’

  ‘I don’t quite know how this business started. George was rather vague about it. I gather Mrs Pritchard had always had a weakness for fortune tellers, palmists, clairvoyantes—anything of that sort. George didn’t mind. If she found amusement in it well and good. But he refused to go into rhapsodies himself, and that was another grievance.

  ‘A succession of hospital nurses was always passing through the house, Mrs Pritchard usually becoming dissatisfied with them after a few weeks. One young nurse had been very keen on this fortune telling stunt, and for a time Mrs Pritchard had been very fond of her. Then she suddenly fell out with her and insisted on her going. She had back another nurse who had been with her previously—an older woman, experienced and tactful in dealing with a neurotic patient. Nurse Copling, according to George, was a very good sort—a sensible woman to talk to. She put up with Mrs Pritchard’s tantrums and nervestorms with complete indifference.

  ‘Mrs Pritchard always lunched upstairs, and it was usual at lunch time for George and the nurse to come to some arrangement for the afternoon. Strictly speaking, the nurse went off from two to four, but “to oblige” as the phrase goes, she would sometimes take her time off after tea if George wanted to be free for the afternoon. On this occasion, she mentioned that she was going to see a sister at Golders Green and might be a little late returning. George’s face fell, for he had arranged to play a round of golf. Nurse Copling, however, reassured him.

  ‘“We’ll neither of us be missed, Mr Pritchard.” A twinkle came into her eye. “Mrs Pritchard’s going to have more exciting company than ours.”

  ‘“Who’s that?”

  ‘“Wait a minute,” Nurse Copling’s eyes twinkled more than ever. “Let me get it right. Zarida, Psychic Reader of the Future.”