“Dr. Floyd, what do you mean? Is something wrong? Is the town in trouble? Do you think people will come and . . . and take it away? Like the bank took Mr. Colby’s house?” A phrase leaped to mind, but I caught it before it could escape my mouth. I did not say, Do you think someone will burn it down? But I probably thought it really loud. She probably heard me.
Dr. Floyd shook her head. Her hair was piled up under a smallish hat, and the result was stunning—both in appearance and in curiosity. I didn’t see any hatpins and wondered how she kept it in place. “Nothing like that, no.”
“Then . . . like what? Are you afraid of something?” I asked bluntly. “I get the feeling you’re afraid.”
“Afraid? That’s too strong a word. I’m cautious by nature, but I don’t live in fear.”
“Then what’s bothering you?” I pushed.
“Nothing is bothering me,” she said flatly. I didn’t have to be clairvoyant to know she was lying. “I’m merely distracted, and concerned for Mr. Colby.” Once again, the flicker in those baby-bright blue eyes. Once again, she looked down just a little too late to keep me from seeing it.
To hell with it. I went ahead and asked, “Why are your eyes doing that thing?”
She dug in. “My eyes aren’t doing anything. Now, we’re here to discuss you and your studies, and your progress here in the camp. So let’s be productive, shall we? First, which of the meetings have you attended? I know you attended the visitors’ seminar ‘Auras, Lights, and Crystals,’ and I wanted to hear what you thought of it.”
“I thought it was strange and silly.”
“That’s unkind.”
“I’m only being honest.”
“Honesty is no excuse for unkindness.” She chided me, but she was happy to have the change of subject (happier than I was, I believe). She chased it down and forced it forward. “If it wasn’t to your taste, or you didn’t find it accessible, or you weren’t drawn to Mr. Schumacher’s philosophy and findings . . . you can say so without being rude.”
I was feeling rude, but she was right and I’d already done enough to irk her for one day. I took it down a notch. “Fine. I did not find his . . . his research plausible, and I’m not sure there’s anything to this whole ‘aura’ business, but I’m sure he’s a lovely man and I meant him no disrespect.”
“That’s a fib if ever I heard one, but you were able to put it pleasantly, so I’ll take it—and call it an improvement in your attitude. Now, did you attend Dr. Mason’s workshop on prayers and meditation?”
“I meditated so magnificently that I fell asleep.”
“Oh, for Spirit’s sake . . .”
• • •
ATTITUDE.
I hated that word. It made me want to sulk, but I didn’t want to sulk in front of Dr. Floyd, so I hope that I hid it well enough to fool her. I probably didn’t. I mostly concealed my irritation by stuffing the last half of a piece of toast into my mouth. Because two could play that game, that’s why.
• • •
“DR. Floyd?” A short, stocky woman in her forties with thick black glasses approached the table with a stride of confidence.
“Imogene, yes? Can I help you?”
Imogene pulled up a chair as if she’d been invited to do so, and dropped herself into it. She opened her mouth to say something to the pastor, then changed her mind and spoke to me, instead. “Well, hello there. You’re the girl who did the thing at the open reading—then pulled a straight-out faint, after a damn fine show.”
I blushed and nodded, but I blushed a little coldly. I wasn’t sure if I liked this woman, who strolled about as cocky as a man and made herself comfortable at someone else’s table. Also, I didn’t like being called a girl, and I was well aware that I had fainted. No need to bring it up.
“Imogene Cook,” Dr. Floyd introduced the pair of us, “this is Alice Dartle. She’s new, but she’s learning. Mabel has taken her under her wing.”
“Good for Mabel. I couldn’t stand to do it myself. You look like a dear, don’t get me wrong. I’m just real shit for a teacher, that’s all.” I couldn’t place her accent, but it was from farther north than Georgia and farther south than Ohio.
“So far, I’m only a middling student,” I said modestly, mostly to prove that I wouldn’t flinch at her language (since Dr. Floyd hadn’t).
“You’ll come around. That’s what everyone says.”
“Everyone’s talking about me?”
The pastor chose this moment to interrupt, heading her off. “Imogene, darling. What can I do for you today?”
“Oh, right. David’s back from his sabbatical.” She said the word like it was code for something else. “And Perry Riffle wanted a word with you before the day gets too much longer.”
“What on earth for?”
She shrugged. “I’m only the messenger, Doc. But it’s something to do with a council meeting, now that Oscar’s back.”
“Right. I have . . .” She used her fork to poke thoughtfully at the last of her salad. “I have . . . something I’d like to bring up for discussion, now that we’re all back in town. So it’s just as well. See if you can round everyone up for a three-o’clock session on the second floor of the Brigham house.”
“Why not the Harmony Hall office?”
“We might need more room than that.”
I was lost, and no one was on the verge of filling me in, so I asked, “Something to bring up for discussion? Do you mean me?”
Dr. Floyd veritably snapped back, “Not everything is about you”; then she softened it by adding, “darling.”
I stopped talking and pulled my napkin up out of my lap, wadding it into a ball just to give my hands something to do. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t trying to—”
“No, I’m sorry. What I should have said was simply, ‘There’s camp business to discuss, and it’s nothing to do with you, or your progress, or your training—all of which is going smashingly. Mabel says you’re a strong learner with a good deal of patience. You’re fitting in nicely, and I’m concerned about something else. It’s nothing that should worry you.’”
Imogene Cook looked like she couldn’t decide whether to stay and watch the drama or excuse herself to escape it. She erred on the side of beating a retreat. “Three o’clock you said?” She stood up. “I’ll go round up Oscar and the rest, and I’ll see you then.”
When she was gone, I fidgeted with the napkin a little and asked quietly, “Is she on the council, too?”
“Imogene? No, but she might as well be.” She sighed heavily, and again she begged my pardon. It took every ounce of willpower I possessed to keep from apologizing right back at her, but since she’d told me I did it too much, I stayed quiet. “I didn’t mean to be harsh with you. I have no excuse to be rude, and I’m setting a terrible example.”
“You could talk to me about it, if you wanted. I’m a good listener,” I fibbed. I was a much better talker than listener, but I didn’t want our session to close on such a sour note.
“I don’t wish to burden you with it, as there’s nothing you can do to help.”
• • •
I like Dr. Floyd a great deal, and I have tremendous respect for her, but neither one of us was in the mood for this talk anymore—so we ended the meal as soon as we were able, and went our separate ways.
She walked away from me a little too briskly, looking back once, then twice. She glanced up and down the street and looked up into the sky, checked her watch, and darted over to the bookstore. Before she let herself inside, she looked back and forth along the porch, and back down the avenue into what could best be described as “downtown.” I don’t know what she was looking for, but she was acting like she thought she was being watched.
All right, obviously I was watching her, but she wasn’t worried about me. As she’d reluctantly confessed, she was bothered by something el
se.
So now I was in a mood, and now Dr. Floyd was off to fret in the bookstore or wherever—but the rest of the camp was bustling with a new trainload of sunlight seekers and seminar enthusiasts, some of them with tents rolled up and stored with their trunks. They were just in time for a rousing class called “Fears, Foes, and Familiars”—by Miss Theresa Gains of Albuquerque. Lucky them.
A dozen or more cars were parked in front of the hotel, each one laden down with so much luggage that the tires sagged. All along the wraparound porch, people occupied every rocking chair and every table. People played checkers and people sipped sweet tea, or else they read newspapers and discussed the weather—because the weather was something to behold if you came here all the way from New England. On my way down the steps I heard one man declare that there were two feet of snow back home, and I’ve seen two feet of snow before. It’s miserable.
I’ve seen a hundred degrees for a week at a time as well, and that’s miserable, too. January’s muggy warmth suggested that I might see more than a week of that weather to come, maybe as early as spring. But I still had months, at least, before the subtropical sun came back with all its terrible vigor. I still had months to pretend that nothing would change, and I would live here in comfort and harmony for the rest of my days.
If you could really call this “harmony.” I was happy to be in Cassadaga, and thrilled that I’d been accepted . . . but also frankly disappointed in how things had stalled since my arrival. I suppose I’d expected to be inducted into a world of arcane secrets and furtive ceremonies . . . when I’d mostly been attending meetings and snoozing through lectures that all had three equally dull elements in their titles.
I suppose that Dr. Floyd’s irritable restlessness had rubbed off on me, and now I was fussy and bored.
I didn’t want to attend another stupid seminar, as I’d done plenty of those over the last couple of weeks, and there wasn’t anything on the hotel bulletin board that appealed to me. I knew, because I’d checked it first thing in the morning, like always.
I had no interest in “The Laughing Dead: Humor, Surprise, and Joy on the Other Side,” or “Drawing Your Spirit Guide: Flattery, Mimicry, or Insult?,” much less “Beyond Palmistry: The Lines of the Face, Feet, and Back.”
But if I remembered correctly, there was a movie playing a block away, in the tiny one-screen theater named the Cassadaga Calliope. I couldn’t recall what was showing, or what time it would be shown—so I went back inside to look at the bulletin board again.
“The Mark of Zorro,” I read aloud, and to myself. The first show was at noon, and the clock on the wall behind me said that I still had an hour before I should bother to find a ticket and a seat. Rather than sit around the hotel and resume the sulk I’d worked up while talking to Dr. Floyd, I decided to walk down to Spirit Lake and perhaps visit a couple of the little gardens along the way.
The whole camp meeting isn’t more than a couple of miles square, I don’t think, and although the day was a little warmer than I would’ve liked, I had nothing better to do than get some fresh air and poke around.
Past Harmony Hall and the other grand old houses I strolled, parasol in one hand and fan in the other. As I walked, I bobbed my head in a friendly fashion to any hat that was tipped my way, and responded in kind to any of the ladies who said, “Spirit be with you.” Down by the water I passed the pavilion with its enormous white shades rippling in the lazy breeze, and upon the stage I saw Mr. Fine and Edella Holligoss. They were sorting through hymnals and picking out numbers for the hymn boards.
Beyond the pavilion was the lake, or honestly a pond, I think—but I shouldn’t call it that out loud. It has a name, and that name has a “lake” in it, so I should respect the designation. Never mind that it’s hardly anything more than an extra-wet spot in a swampy marsh.
Swampy marsh or no, people were out there having a good time. Two boys were fishing from the end of a brief and narrow pier, and a set of young parents had brought their little one down to the water’s edge to squish barefoot in the soggy sand. It looked like fun, but it also looked like a good way to get your toes nibbled on by snakes, so although I could see the appeal, I ruled against the impulse to whip off my shoes and go wading.
I turned back toward the pavilion just in time to collide with somebody. I jerked back, and my fan went flying. My parasol almost took off after it, but I grabbed the handle just in time to keep it from flinging itself into the road.
“Are you thinking about a dip?”
“Good God, no,” I responded before I could think of anything nicer.
The somebody I’d greeted so roughly was a nice young man about my own age. He wore a seersucker suit with navy pinstripes and an apricot-colored pocket kerchief sticking out. His shoes were very shiny and his smile was very encouraging. He was an odd-looking fellow, with a face like a handsome foot—all funny angles and unexpected proportions, but nice details.
“Me, either,” he confessed. “Not least of all because I can’t swim.”
“Oh, I can swim just fine. I just didn’t bring . . . didn’t bring anything to wear . . .” I took a step back and to the side and scanned the ground for my fan.
The nice young man found it first. He picked it up, shook off a dusting of sandy dirt, and handed it back to me with a flourish.
“Thank you.”
“Please, allow me to introduce myself—I’m David Fine. My father is the president of the camp.”
“How nice for him. And for you. I . . . um . . . I know your father. I met him a few nights ago. He seemed . . . pleasant.” I sounded like an idiot. I could feel myself pinking up, from the warmth and from the conversation alike. “But we haven’t met. You and I, I mean.”
“No, that’s why I introduced myself. And you are . . . ?”
I straightened up. “Alice Dartle. I’m a medium and a clairvoyant, and I’ve recently come to stay here.”
He nodded smoothly. “I thought it might be you. You’re making quite an impression.”
“Oh dear. I mean, oh good. That’s what I meant.”
“I’m certain that you did. So tell me, if you aren’t considering a dip in the lake, how are you planning to spend your afternoon? Will you catch one of the new speakers? I hear that Mrs. Campbell is a marvel to behold. Her physical phenomenon is unmatched in the field. Her seminar ‘Manifesting Proof’ is alleged to be superb.”
His smile was so distracting, I just wanted to agree with everything he said. “Yes, she’s grand. Or that’s . . . that’s what I’ve heard. Just now. From you. Because until ten seconds ago, I’d never heard of her—I’m so sorry, I’m not usually such a mess. It must be the heat, or something from breakfast just isn’t agreeing with me.”
“Then perhaps it’s time for lunch?”
“No, no,” I said, though my first thought had been, Yes, yes. “It’s only been . . .” I didn’t have a watch, so I didn’t know for certain. “Fifteen minutes or so. It was a late breakfast.”
“Coffee, then?”
“Never cared for it.”
“Tea?”
“Hot or cold?”
“Which do you prefer?” he asked, with admirable determination.
“Whichever goes best with bourbon.”
“Bourbon? Have you ever had ginger beer with rum?”
I shook my head. “Everything is rum around here, isn’t it? That’s never been my first choice. I’ve never had a rum drink that wouldn’t be better with bourbon instead.”
“Then, please, allow me the opportunity to surprise you.” He held out his arm, elbow crooked, like I should just take it and walk alongside him.
So I did. I took it and walked alongside him, falling into step easily and a little more comfortably than I expected. He was quite tall, and he stooped a little to both dodge my parasol and keep me from standing on tippy-toes.
“Where are we g
oing, to test this combination of peculiar ingredients in a glass?” I asked. It sounded more clever before it came out of my mouth. That’s my only excuse.
“How do you feel about Candy’s?”
“The lunch counter? I’ve been there once or twice, and Mrs. Pearson seemed lovely. I don’t recall seeing anything with rum on the menu.”
“Of course you didn’t see it, because of course you wouldn’t. The whole country’s gone as dry as a bone, haven’t you heard? And besides, spiritualists skip the bottle. Or they’re supposed to, I think. But plenty of them don’t—especially not the snowbirds. Most of those darling Yankees are here for sightseeing as much as spiritual communion. They want their drinks hard, and they want their ladies fighting for the vote.”
“Is that true?” I asked. “Wait . . . do the spiritualist ladies want to vote?”
“Some do, some don’t. Like so many other things, Cassadaga doesn’t have a firm opinion on the matter. How long have you been here in town?”
“A couple of weeks, I think?”
“And you’re not bored out of your mind yet?” He gestured at the pavilion as we passed it, asking, “Can you stand to sit through another workshop? Aren’t you exhausted by the sermons and messages?”
“Not in the slightest.”
“You’re a filthy liar.”
“We don’t know one another well enough for you to call me that.”
“All right, I’ll save the name-calling for after your first drink.”
“Splendid,” I said. “But does it have to be rum?”
He laughed in reply. “We’ll have to see what Mrs. Pearson has on the shelf. No promises, you hear?”
We arrived shortly enough at the lunch counter everyone called Candy’s, presumably because the woman who ran it was named Candice Pearson. She was standing at the register when we came in, but she left it to come and sweep David up in a hug—squeezing him like she meant to break him.
“David, you monster. When did you get back into town?”
“This morning, and please release your grip, madam! For the world has but one of me.”