The Grub-And-Stakers House a Haunt (6 page)

Characteristically, she got straight to business even though Mr. Glunck would have preferred to tell her first about his new artifact. “Mr. Glunck, would we happen to have a letter in the files somewhere around a hundred years old, addressed to one Hiram Jellyby and containing a roughly drawn map that shows where a trunkful of gold pieces is buried?”

“Why, no,” said Mr. Glunck after a moment’s cogitation, “I don’t recall that we do. Of course there’s that photograph of Mr. Jellyby with his four-mule team.”

“There’s what?”

“Yes, indeed, Mrs. Monk, a perfectly splendid photograph, taken by your own husband’s great-greatgrandfather.

Eliphalet Monk was, as you may not have been aware, a true artist of the lens. He spent the best years of his life with his hand on a squeeze bulb and his head inside a black velvet bag. Thanks to the generosity of our chairman of trustees, we have a fine collection of Eliphalet’s work. Miss Arethusa Monk is, of course, Eliphalet’s great-granddaughter; I’m sure I didn’t have to tell you that.”

Actually, he didn’t. Dittany would have been quite capable of figuring out the connection for herself, had she not been preoccupied in regretting that she hadn’t told Arethusa about Zilla’s new boarder. Arethusa might have remembered the photograph. More likely, she mightn’t.

Nor would Arethusa have remembered not to go around shooting her mouth off about why the photograph had suddenly become important.

There were people in town who already considered Zilla Trott somewhat eccentric. In fact Dittany couldn’t think offhand of many outside her immediate circle who didn’t. Zilla’s tale of a muleteer’s ghost oozing through her woodshed wall would probably not fail to convince. What it would convince most Lobelia Falls residents of, however, was that Mrs. Trott had oozed herself clear around the bend and somebody had better slide over to that allegedly haunted woodshed and pinch Zilla’s hatchet in the interests of civic responsibility.

But with photographic proof of the muleteer’s former existence, the outlook would be less dismal. Asking Mr.

Glunck for the photograph of Hiram and his mules would have been superfluous, the curator was already rooting through the archives like a beagle after a badger. In a matter of moments, he had taken the stiffly matted artifact out of its acid-free envelope, turned on his gooseneck desk lamp, and handed Dittany his own personal magnifying glass so she wouldn’t miss any of the nuances.

“Eliphalet Monk was one of Canada’s pioneers in the use of the platinum printing process, you know, Mrs.

Monk. Or perhaps you don’t, but he certainly was. Yes sirree, Bob! When it came to platinum prints, old Eliphalet was right up there with the best of them. Actually he was right up there by himself a good deal of the time because there were darned few photographers around who had both the inclination and the money to buy the platinum.

You don’t see many photographers making platinum prints these days. At least I don’t, and it’s a darned shame, if you’ll pardon my language. There’s a special virtuosity to platinum printing. You just don’t get the same effect with all these newfangled chemicals. Masterful, isn’t it?

Just look at that depth of focus.”

“I’m looking.”

Moreover, Dittany was thrilled by what she saw. Not that Hiram Jellyby would ever have been shot for his beauty, but Eliphalet’s depiction of him was truly superb.

Every wart and wrinkle, every bristle of the muleteer’s beard showed up with amazing clarity. She could count the pebbles in the dirt road, she could even see the eyelashes on the mules. “Are you positive this man is Hiram Jellyby?” she asked.

“As positive as anyone can be. That’s another great thing about Eliphalet Monk, he was very careful about labeling his work. It’s right on the back of the mount.

Allow me.”

With reverent care, Mr. Glunck turned the photograph over and pointed to the yellowed label attached to the equally yellowed mount. In clear Spencerian script was written: “Hiram Jellyby of Scottsbeck, en route with his mule team to the NWMP barracks with supplies. Taken at Lobelia Falls October 2, 1889.”

“This is wonderful!”

Dittany meant that this would be a wonderful way for Zilla to tell whether her ghost was really Hiram Jellyby or some spectral interloper trying to trade on Hiram’s former reputation. Mr. Glunck, however, assumed understandably that she was talking about the platinum printing process.

“Absolutely masterful! I’ve been thinking, Mrs. Monk, that we really ought to set up an exhibition of Eliphalet’s work. What would you say to our packing away the ThorbisherFreep Collection-only temporarily, of course -and utilizing the display cases to show the photographs?”

Dittany was not at all surprised by the curator’s suggestion. She’d suspected all along that Mr. Glunck had welcomed the ThorbisherFreep acquisition not for the theatrical memorabilia but for the handsome glasstopped cases that housed the collection. She didn’t blame him a bit.

“I’d say let’s. These photographs would certainly be more appropriate as records of Canadian life in the early Lobelia Falls period than those ruffled pantalettes Claude Rains was alleged to have worn when he played Little Nell as a child actor, wouldn’t they?”

“Definitely. But do you think the other trustees will concur?”

“I’ll tell you what, Mr. Glunck, I’ll take this photograph with me right now and show it to them. Once they get an eyeful of all this virtuosity, they’ll be onto your idea like a flock of hawks on a henyard.”

“But couldn’t we call a meeting here in my office, Mrs.

Monk? I know I’m an awful Nervous Nellie, but I do hate to see an artifact taken out of the museum.”

“Mr. Glunck, this particular artifact must have kicked around Arethusa’s attic for half a century or more without coming to any harm. We can’t call a meeting this week and maybe not next because most of the trustees are up to their eyeballs in our community garden project. If I just go and show them this photograph, I’ll have your answer on the display cases by the end of the day. Would you happen to have a clear plastic envelope to keep their fingerprints off the mat?”

Knowing it was useless to try to talk Trustee Monk out of anything she’d set her mind on and seeing the force of her argument, not to mention the prospect of getting to use the ThorbisherFreep display cases in a truly meaningful way, Mr. Glunck had no course but to acquiesce. So he did.

I wasn’t having a pipe dream after all.”

Zilla was studying the photograph, shaking her head in amazement. “That’s exactly how Hiram Jellyby was dressed when I saw him. Gives a person a funny feeling.

I must say that’s a fine-looking team of mules, though I’m just as well pleased he didn’t bring ‘em along last night.”

“You’re sure he didn’t leave them in the woodshed?”

said Dittany.

“How the heck can I be sure of anything? I don’t know but what I’d just as soon have had the mules instead of Hiram. They’re a darned sight better-looking, that’s for sure. And I’ll tell him so to his face if he shows up again yammering about his cussed old bones. Here, you’d better take this. I’m getting muddy fingerprints all over the mount.”

“No, you’re not, they’re only on the plastic. Mr.

Glunck wouldn’t mind a few smudges anyway, you’ve just authenticated an artifact for him. What do you think of the platinum printing process?”

“Oh, what do I care about a bunch of old photographs?

Tell Mr. Glunck he can do as he pleases, for all I care.

Dittany, you’re not going to blab to the rest of the trustees about Hiram, are you?”

“Well, his name’s written on the back, but I won’t tell them he’s the one you’ve been hitting the camomile with.

Only you’d better let Minerva know so that she’ll quit suspecting you’ve addled your brains eating too much tofu. Where is Minerva, by the way? I took it for granted she’d be out here with you.”

“She was, but she had to go. That Melloe woman came along and reminded her this was the day they’d set to go over their family trees together, and you know Minerva.

She didn’t have the heart to tell that old besom to go climb her own branch and stick there. Just as well she had to quit digging, I suppose; Minerva’s rheumatics have been acting up on her again since the weather changed. I told her to drink lots of sweet cider, but she claims it gives her the gripes.”

“What a shame. I must say, though, I find it rather pushy of Mrs. Melloe, tracking Minerva clear out here.”

“Of course it was pushy. Tell me one thing about Mrs.

Melloe that isn’t pushy. You going to dig awhile, or just hang around and get in the way?”

“I’m going to show this photograph to the rest of the board, then take it back to Mr. Glunck before he gets in too much of a swivet. After that, I’m going home and take care of my babies. Osbert’s been stuck with them ever since we left your house. Who else is here?”

“Therese, of course.”

That figured. As president of the Gruband-Stake Gardening and Roving Club and ex-officio member of the museum’s board of trustees, Therese felt it her duty to make at least a token appearance at any event in which club members were taking a hand, or a voice, or a shovel, as the case might be. Dot Coskoff, as treasurer, was probably here, too. Hazel Munson almost certainly wasn’t. This was her day to get her hair done, and Hazel wasn’t one to deviate from her schedule except in emergencies.

No matter, Dittany could catch Hazel under the dryer on her way back downtown to give Mr. Glunck back his artifact. She interrupted Therese and Dot long enough to give them a quick briefing on the platinum printing process and Mr. Glunck’s hopes for the ThorbisherFreep display cases. They agreed it was a far, far better thing their curator was planning to do, and suggested that Dittany send Osbert out to lend a hand with the digging, since he wasn’t doing anything but sitting around the house making up tall stories.

“And putting Pablum in his children’s mouths,” Dittany added somewhat snappishly. “Just because my husband doesn’t tootle off to an office every morning, that doesn’t mean he’s free to drop his typewriter at a moment’s notice and take a hand in any jolly game that happens to tickle his fancy. He can’t come because he’s minding the kids and rustling some elk.”

“He’d come fast enough if Sergeant Mac Vicar asked him to.” Dot’s tone was a trifle acrimonious also, perhaps because she’d got a speck of dirt in her eye.

“Don’t rub it, Dot. Pull on your eyelashes and blink.

Osbert’s situation with Sergeant MacVicar is quite different.

He has to go once he’s been deputized.”

“He doesn’t have to keep letting himself get deputized, though.”

“Certainly he does, it’s his civic responsibility. Speaking of which, hasn’t Pollicot James hove into sight yet?

Arethusa deputized him to come out and dowse us some water so we’ll be able to take care of the garden without breaking our backs.”

“Fancy that!” cried Therese. “Isn’t it amazing how efficient Arethusa can be once she puts her mind to a project. Who but she would have thought of dowsing? I wonder if it really works. And she’s actually persuaded Pollicot James to join us? Wouldn’t it be lovely if she could get him to map out all the town water mains?”

Neither Therese nor any of her clubmates liked to speak harshly of the late John Architrave now that they’d inherited his property, but even his former cronies down at the fire station could not deny that John’s name ranked high on Lobelia Falls’s roster of all-time knuckleheads. As hereditary chief of the town’s water department, John had been just shrewd enough to refrain from letting anybody else know where he and his father had laid the mains, thus assuring himself a lifetime job. Perhaps he’d meant to reveal the secret on his deathbed, but that had died with him quite suddenly one day on the Enchanted Mountain.

Great had been the local frustration ever since; what a relief it could be for the town if Pollicot James’s dowsing really worked.

And here came Pollicot now, in a dashing red sports coupe with a good deal of shiny chrome trimming designed, no doubt, for the bachelor-about-town and paid for, Dittany assumed, by his doting mama. She further assumed that, as Arethusa’s relative by marriage and actual instigator of his coming, it was up to her to do the honors, such as they might be.

“Mr. James?” She wasn’t about to risk calling him Polly by accident and have him flounce off in a huff. “I’m Dittany Henbit Monk, Arethusa ‘s niece-in-law. She wanted me to thank you for coming and explain what we’re doing here. Not that there’s much to explain, really. I expect you’ve already heard that we’re getting the ground ready for next spring, when we intend to plant a big community garden and raise food for the underprivileged of Lobelia County. We’ve been told there used to be an underground spring around here somewhere and we’re hoping you can find it for us so that we don’t have to spend all next summer doing rain dances or trucking in water. Oh, and would you mind letting our club’s president, Therese Boulanger, take some pictures of you in action?”

Therese had her camera slung around her neck, of course, Dittany had known she would. Therese deemed it a president’s duty to make sure all the doings of the club she headed were properly immortalized for posterity. This was a very good thing, since they’d never have been able to get a real newspaper photographer over here on such short notice, even assuming they’d got around to asking for one.

Having graciously conceded Therese permission to shoot at will, Pollicot carefully removed his tweed shooting jacket and laid it on the seat of his car, leaving himself suitably clad in a heather-mixture Shetland pullover, a soft tweed hat, and gray flannels tucked into the tops of olive-green Wellington boots such as any landed squire might properly wear whilst demonstrating his civic responsibility by means of a divining rod.

The rod itself, when he’d extracted it from its suedelined leather case and twiddled it into shape for business, was seen to be no mere forked hazel twig but a fairly complicated affair of assorted metals. Brass, copper, and a few snippets from an old zinc-lined bathtub, Dittany decided; though of course she was only guessing about the bathtub. Anyway, Mr. James grasped its two handles, if that was what they were supposed to be called, in a light but purposeful grip and scanned the by now pockmarked terrain with a keen and practiced eye. Therese nodded approval and took his picture.