The Revenant of Thraxton Hall: The Paranormal Casebooks of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (33 page)

*   *   *

Conan Doyle burst into Daniel Dunglas Hume’s bedroom to find the American slumped upon his bed, his head floating on a cloud of pillows.

“I just received the news,” Conan Doyle said.

The American’s ravaged gaze followed Conan Doyle’s journey across the room to his bedside. Hume had the look of a creature fished from the bottom of the sea, and when he spoke, the words came out in an underwater gurgle. “I am on the final journey, sir.” He had to pause to suck in a labored breath before he could continue. “The Genie is just about used up.”

Hume’s face was veiled in shadow. Conan Doyle slid the lamp forward on the bedside table, but to his puzzlement, the shadow remained.

“It is death,” Hume explained. “A shadow no amount of light can chase away. I have kept it at arm’s length for many years. But I can restrain it no longer.”

Conan Doyle nodded sadly as he checked the pulse at Hume’s throat and then pressed an ear to his chest, listening. The American’s congested lungs made a sound like the ocean sucking in and out of a sea cave. When Conan Doyle stood upright, his expression was grave.

Hume smiled up at him, which had a rather ghastly effect. He had lost his good looks and seemed to have aged forty years. His features were sunken, the cheeks gaunt, the eyes peering out from dark hollows like death-row prisoners skulking behind bars. “I’m dying, Doctor Doyle. I can no longer hold back the shadowy tide.”

Conan Doyle nodded.

“So at least I’m no longer a suspect?”

Conan Doyle smiled gently. “No. You were only briefly a suspect.”

“Believe in Fate, Mister Doyle. It controls our destinies, despite our best efforts to elude its influence. Years ago, I foolishly used my powers to foresee my own death. The knowledge was a poison kiss to my soul. I knew I was fated to die here, in this place. I tried to avoid it. I traveled around the world. I have freely spent the money of the rich. I used my powers like a fool. But I was too busy running from death to live the life I had. Sadly, in the final throes, it ends for me as it ends for all men … in a deathbed.”

Conan Doyle contemplated the American’s words for several moments before speaking. “You are a man whose vision penetrates the veil,” he said quietly. “Is there nothing we can do to prevent the murder of Hope Thraxton?”

Daniel Dunglas Hume was about to speak, when his voice cracked and a wicked coughing spasm shook his frame until it seemed it would tear him apart. Conan Doyle held him up with a hand beneath his shoulders as Hume hacked and gagged into the lace handkerchief clamped to his mouth. The coughing spasm finally petered out, not because Hume had successfully cleared his lungs, but because he was simply too exhausted to continue.

“Fate is a slippery path,” Hume gurgled. “We can seek to hide from it. We can dodge it momentarily, but we cannot escape its grasp. For a moment it seemed as though you would not be here for the final seance, but something has drawn you back. Fate is difficult to thwart … although…” He flashed a final, memento-mori smile. “… although I have learned that seeing the future and truly understanding what the vision means are not always the same thing.”

Conan Doyle leaned over Hume and laid a hand on his clammy brow. “If you need anything to make you comfortable … please summon me.”

He went to turn away, but Hume seized his wrist with a bruising grip surprisingly powerful for a man lingering on the verge of death. “Before I kick loose of this earth, I will summon the final glimmerings of everything I am to assist you. I may not be there with you in body, but if I can hold back the hand of death a while longer, trust that I shall endeavor to be there in spirit.” His grip slackened. The hand fell limp. His eyes grew heavy-lidded. Exhaustion dimmed his face. “But now I have a long way to go, and must prepare myself for the journey.”

CHAPTER 27

THE FINAL SÉANCE

Once again the darkened room and the circle of sitters, each holding the hand of a neighbor. A restless sense of unease gripped the members of the Society for Psychical Research. Hope Thraxton lowered her head and said in a shaky voice, “Let the light be dimmed so that the spirits might draw near.”

Mister Greaves turned down the gaslight and the room submerged in twilight—the solitary candle flickering in the center of the table the only illumination.

Everyone jumped at a sharp knock. The door flung open, framing a male silhouette in the doorway. Mister Greaves fumbled to reignite the gas jet, and the amber light revealed the features of Arthur Conan Doyle, his jaw squared, his eyes fierce.

“Doctor Doyle!” Sidgwick blurted in surprise.

“Arthur?” Wilde rose from his seat, his eyes questioning and astonished. “You’ve returned. Whatever happened?”

Conan Doyle held up a hand to quiet them. “Please, everyone, be seated. I journeyed all the way to Slattenmere only to find that the telegram I received was nothing more than a sick and malicious prank.” He eyed the man who had been masquerading as Lord Webb with disdain. “Obviously the work of a degenerate mind.” The dapper figure met his gaze coolly. Conan Doyle looked to Lady Thraxton, whose face flooded with relief. “And so I have hurried back and appear to be just in time.”

The table had been arranged for only eight sitters. The Scottish doctor walked over to grab the spare chair—the chair that, during the first séance, Mariah Thraxton had identified as “Death’s chair.” He dragged it to a place next to the faux lord, and the other sitters moved to make space for him.

Wilde was seated on Lady Thraxton’s right hand. He threw a questioning glance at Conan Doyle, who indicated Lord Webb with a slight jerk of his head. Wilde nodded that he understood.

Conan Doyle had no exact plan, but determined that he would wait for the false lord—Seamus Kragan—to make his move, and then pounce.

Hope Thraxton once again dropped her head and whispered, “Let the gaslight be lowered so that the spirits might draw near.”

The room dimmed to darkness and Mister Greaves quietly slipped out. They heard the key turn in the lock and the rasp of tumblers snapping shut, locking them in.

“Remember,” Sidgwick chided, “for the safety of Lady Thraxton, let no one break the circle.”

“One need not have the mind of a
Sherlock Holmes
to remember that,” Lord Webb remarked.

Conan Doyle eyed the imposter sitting next to him. In the dim light, Seamus Kragan returned the cold stare, the dark brown eyes glinting with flecks of candlelight. It was an odd thing to say, and Conan Doyle assumed it was a thinly veiled jibe against himself. He did not see how, across the séance table, the words “Sherlock Holmes” made Oscar Wilde go rigid, his face turn waxen, and his keen-eyed gaze dissolve into a glassy stare.

Conan Doyle coiled himself, ready to spring.

Hope Thraxton sucked in a deep breath and let it out in a shuddering sigh as she relinquished her body. “Mariah. My friend. My spirit guide. I seek your help. Hear me. I yield my body as a vessel for you to speak.”

A cold draft surged through the séance chamber, drowning the pleasant aroma of beeswax beneath the gagging reek of the grave. The candle guttered in the breeze.

Conan Doyle tensed as a shadowy figure at the far side of the table rose from his seat. In the stuttering candlelight he saw to his surprise that it was Oscar Wilde.

And then he glimpsed the service revolver in his hand.

Aimed at Hope Thraxton.

“Oscar, no!” Conan Doyle shouted, surging up from his seat. His thighs slammed into the edge of the table, jostling the candle in its dish so that melted wax sloshed over the burning wick, extinguishing its flame and plunging the room in darkness.

Two deafening gunshots rang out. BOOM! BOOM! Conan Doyle saw Oscar Wilde’s blank, impassive face briefly lit by muzzle flashes.

A woman screamed. The men shouted out. In the chaotic darkness, bodies collided. A chair toppled and crashed to the floor with a heavy thud.

“Mr. Greaves!” Sidgwick cried out. “Mister Greaves, unlock the door. We need light. We must have light!”

A key scrabbled in the lock and the door swung open, throwing in a slab of illumination. The members were out of their seats, milling in confusion. Mister Greaves lit the gas jet and warm yellow light washed the shadows from the room.

Beside the toppled chair, Lady Hope Thraxton lay slumped on the rug.

The Scottish author gaped in horrified disbelief. Oscar Wilde stood, staring blankly, the service revolver gripped in his hand, smoke purling from the barrel.

“Oscar!” Conan Doyle blurted. “My God! What?”

For a moment the room fell silent. No one moved. And then Wilde robotically raised the pistol and pressed the muzzle to his temple.

“Oscar! No!”

His finger was tightening on the trigger when Frank Podmore lunged forward, wrenched the gun from his hand, and threw it down on the table. Wilde staggered a moment, as if confused, and then raised his empty hand to his head, pulling the trigger of an imaginary pistol over and over.

“Seize him!” Lord Webb shouted. “The man’s a murderer!”

Podmore waved a hand in front of Wilde’s fixated face, who did not so much as blink. “Mister Wilde is in a deep trance,” he said. “He’s been hypnotized”—Podmore threw an accusatory look at Lord Webb—“and I can guess by whom.”

Ignoring all else, Conan Doyle dropped to his knees and tended to Hope Thraxton. The front of her black dress bore two scorched bullet holes—without the slightest fleck of blood. His fingers snatched loose several buttons. Inexplicably, the skin of her chest was smooth and untouched. At that moment, she sighed loudly. Her eyelashes fluttered and then her violet eyes opened. “Wha—?” she began to say, but Conan Doyle put two fingers to her lips and bent low, whispering into her ear. “Lie still. This is not over yet.”

She closed her eyes, and did not move.

“Is she…?” Eleanor Sidgwick asked, breathlessly.

Conan Doyle rose from the body, his face grave. He fixed Lord Webb with a steely gaze. “I’m afraid, Lady Thraxton is dead…” He pointed a finger at Webb and said, “… murdered by this man.”

Webb laughed at the accusation. “Don’t be absurd. We all witnessed what happened. Your friend Wilde is a cold-blooded killer. Caught red-handed. And you blame me?”

Conan Doyle fixed the false lord with a hateful stare. “Mister Podmore is correct. The so-called Lord Webb is a fraud, a music-hall mesmerist. He has used his powers to murder Lady Thraxton by using my friend Oscar as his assassin.”

Webb sneered. “What possible motive would I have for such an act?”

“I have discovered that Lord Webb’s real name is Seamus Kragan. He is the illegitimate child of a union between the head housekeeper and the late Lord Thraxton. After his first attempt at murdering Lady Thraxton, Seamus was banished to Ireland. He has, no doubt, with the aid of his mother, been planning his return and the theft of the Thraxton inheritance. Lady Thraxton was about to reach her majority and inherit the Thraxton family fortune. The executor is the head housekeeper, Mrs. Kragan. If there are no surviving heirs—even though he is illegitimate—Seamus Kragan stands to inherit the family fortune and the house along with it.”

The man that all had previously known as Lord Webb merely snickered, a bemused smile on his face. “That is quite the most outlandish poppycock I have ever heard. I believe, Mister Doyle, that your puerile detective scribblings have deprived you of the ability to discern fact from fiction.” He removed the pince-nez, set them down on the table, and smiled handsomely. “You are delusional. I am not who you claim me to be, nor do I have anything to gain by murder.”

Frank Podmore stood gazing into Oscar Wilde’s blank, unseeing eyes. He snapped his fingers in front of Wilde’s face and said in a commanding voice, “Mister Wilde, at the count of three, you shall awaken. One … two … three. Awaken!”

Wilde did not flinch. Podmore took a step back, perplexed.

“The bumblings of an amateur,” Lord Webb murmured, grinning.

Podmore heard the comment and turned his attention back to Wilde. Struck by a sudden inspiration, he clapped his hands in Wilde’s face and barked the word:
“Watson!”

Wilde started, blinking furiously, looking around in puzzlement. “Where am I?” He seemed to notice Conan Doyle for the first time. “Arthur, you have returned! What’s happening?” And then the realization struck him. “Ah, it’s happened again, hasn’t it? I’ve been hypnotized.” He noticed the others’ stares. “I feel as though I’ve awakened from a particularly nasty dream. I hope I haven’t done anything untoward. Will we all laugh about this episode in the morning?”

“What happened to you, Oscar?” Conan Doyle demanded. “What is the last thing you remember?”

Wilde looked around dazedly at the scene of mayhem—the shocked faces of the SPR members, the toppled chairs, the inert form of Hope Thraxton—quite incapable of taking it all in. “I was walking past the music room when Lord Webb invited me in. We smoked a cigarette together. Or at least, that’s the last thing I remember—”

All eyes turned to look at the dapper man in the handsome suit. When it became clear he had been unmasked, Seamus Kragan lunged forward and snatched up the pistol on the table. The face of the prissy English aristocrat tightened and grew vulpine as he abandoned the pretense. “It seems Fate is on my side, after all,” he said in a broad Irish accent. He pointed the revolver at Conan Doyle’s chest. “Shot with your own pistol, how ironic.” He unleashed a sick laugh.

Conan Doyle stepped forward until the muzzle of the pistol pressed hard into his chest, fearlessly protecting the others with his body.

“Very gallant, Doctor Doyle. Are you so eager to die?”

“You have used two bullets already. I’ll take the third. That leaves you only four bullets left and there are many of us.”

“Three shots are all I need: One for you, one for Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Wilde, and one for the irritating little weasel, Podmore! I’ll reserve one bullet for my escape. I doubt if anyone else will be so anxious to receive it.” The hammer of the revolver rose as his finger tightened on the trigger.

He could not possibly miss.