Poltergeist

She laughed again. "I know the early days were faked. Seeded, you could say. We no longer need that crutch. We control Celia through our committee of the mind now. No one's faking anything." She chuckled. "Anything.”

"How do you know?”

"Mark told me how it's done. Once I knew what to look for, I could spot it. Now I never see it. We're clean." She sounded rather smug as she wedged herself into another chink in the overhanging surface. She checked her position. "What time is it?" she asked.

I looked at my watch. "Three twenty," I called back.

"Good. Almost done here. If you have any other questions, you'd better ask quickly.”

I asked her what she thought of the rest of the group. She replied they were pleasant enough but, like her husband, she found the college students a bit silly and not of her social class. She also didn't like Patricia and called Wayne, the retired military man, "a likable sot." The only people she seemed to truly like aside from herself were Tuckman and Mark. I kept speculation to myself on why she liked Tuckman, and I wondered why Mark had told her about the faked effects and how she'd react when she found out he was dead.

By the time she'd finished answering my question, she had come to the apex of the climb. She hooked onto the rappelling rope and glided down, chalk-streaked, her thin shoes crunching into the gravel in front of me.

Carolyn didn't look the least chilled or uncomfortable. I held in a shiver, realizing how damp I'd gotten standing in the drizzle while she clambered above me. She was breathing a little fast, but not much, and she glowed through the sheen of sweat and rain with more than exertion and health. She fixed me with brilliant blue eyes and looked me over, nodding. Then she gave a very small smile. "You can call me Cara. Any other questions?”

"Not right now," I replied. It was strange to feel my height was, for once, no advantage. Cara radiated assurance beyond physical stature, though she certainly wasn't short. I was irritated at my small pleasure in her evident approval. I squashed it with quick self-reproof. Cara Stahlqvist was a first-order opportunist, driven by ambition. There was nothing soft to her, inside or out. She didn't like people, she used them and thrived on competition.

"Are you satisfied with your investigation thus far?”

"It's about what I expected." I looked at my watch again and snuck a peek at her through the Grey now that the sun was no longer obscuring my view. Like the others, Cara had a thin yellow thread mantling her head and shoulders, but nothing like the shifty aura that had surrounded Ken or the strange colors around Ian.

She glanced down at her left hand and frowned at a bleeding scrape. She had removed her wedding ring, but I noticed there was no band of unta

"Three thirty.”

"Then your time is up." She looked back into my face. "If there's anything else, call me.”

I let my eyes narrow. I didn't like her and she didn't have to like me. "I'll be in touch.”

She gave me a cooler smile and strode away into the building. I gave her time to get into the locker room before I followed through the building and back out.

I headed for Queen A

But before I could argue with Tuckman about the poltergeist's power, I'd have to prove to him that none of his people could have faked the phenomena physically. And I still needed to know how that could—or couldn't—be done.

CHAPTER 14

Ben sat at a small wooden table in the Five Spot's bar with a canvas book bag beside him. The seasonal menu looked to be Hells Kitchen Italian, to judge from the collection of American tin advertising signs and picturesque laundry arrayed overhead while the Bobby Rydell version of «Volare» played in the background. Excess is the Five Spot's stock-in-trade, though they'd forgone the red-and-white-checked tablecloths in the bar. I slid into the bench opposite Ben's chair.

"Hi. I thought I'd be ahead of you. It's not four yet." "Mara shooed me out of the house early. I tried to call you a little while ago, but I just got your voice mail.”

I snatched the cell phone from my pocket and saw I'd never turned it back on after leaving the theater. "Damn," I muttered. "This thing has the worst ringer—some kind of a

"Can I take a look at it?" Ben asked, holding out his hand. I shrugged and handed it over.

Ben poked at it and the phone made several aborted yelps and squawks before giving forth a rich purr. "There. That should do it." I peered at him. "How did you do that?”

"It's the buttons on the side. You press the top one to unlock the mode, then poke the bottom one until the screen says Vibrate' and then lock it again." "Now I feel stupid.”

"Don't. I had to get one of my students to show me three or four times." He handed the phone back to me and I tucked it back into my jacket pocket. "Do you want a drink?" Ben asked, putting his hands flat on the table.

"Not yet. What are you going to show me about séance tables and knocks?”

"Well, not a lot. My technique is pretty rough." The table lurched toward Ben, kicking its feet up at me and sending the candle on the tabletop clattering to the floor. I yelped and slid back in my seat.

"Oops," said Ben as the table settled back onto all fours. I ducked down and retrieved the candle, replacing it on someone else's table.

"What do you think?" he asked. "Did that look familiar?" "Sort of. How did you do it?”

Bens smile split his dark beard. "It's almost too easy. This technique was very popular with spiritualists and phony mediums at the begi

"OK, I think I get this, but what's the difference between a Spiritist and a spiritualist?" I asked.

"Oh, Spiritism was the movement, and people who adhered to the Spiritist Church or beliefs called themselves Spiritists—so did a lot of frauds. Spiritualist was and is a much looser term.”

"OK. So, yeah, what about this technique?”

"It's all just friction and leverage. See how my hands are flat on the table? So long as I have friction on the surface and can exert force outside the fulcrum point of the legs, I can tilt the table just by pulling my hands toward myself while not allowing them to slide across the surface. See?”

The table lurched again and I noticed that it leaned down toward Ben. I looked under the table. It was resting on the two feet closest to Ben with the other two feet in the air about an inch. Ben eased the table back down until it hit the floor with a bang.