Read Online Sleuths by Bill Pronzini - Free Book Online Page B

with phony psychics before, Sabina when she was with the Pinkertons in Denver and on two occasions since they had opened their joint agency here. But Cyrus Buckley wasn't half so sanguine. "You'll not have an easy time of it," he'd warned them. "Professor Vargas is a rare bird and rare birds are not easily plucked. A medium among mediums."
    Medium rare, is he? Quincannon thought as he twisted the doorbell handle . Not for long. He'll not only be plucked but done to a turn before this night is over.
    The door was opened by a tiny woman of indeterminate age, dressed in a flowing ebon robe. Her skin was very white, her lips a bloody crimson in contrast; sleek brown hair was pulled tight around her head and fastened with a jeweled barrette. Around her neck hung a silver amulet embossed with some sort of cabalistic design. "I am Annabelle," she said in sepulchral tones. "You are Mr. and Mrs. John Quinn?"
    "We are," Quincannon said, wishing wistfully that it were true. Mr. and Mrs. John Quincannon, not Quinn. But Sabina had refused even to adopt his name for the evening's play-acting, insisting on the shortened version instead.
    Annabelle took his greatcoat and Sabina's cape, hung them on a coat tree. According to Buckley, she was Professor Vargas's "psychic assistant." If she lived here with him, Quincannon mused, she was likely also his wife or mistress. Seeking communion with the afterworld did not preclude indulging in the pleasure of the earthly sphere, evidently; he had never met a medium who professed to be celibate and meant it.
    "Follow me, please."
    They trailed her down a murky hallway into a somewhat more brightly lighted parlor. Here they found two men dressed as Quincannon was, in broadcloth and fresh linen, and two women in long fashionable dresses; one of the men was Cyrus Buckley. But it was the room's fifth occupant who commanded immediate attention.
    Even Quincannon, who was seldom impressed by physical stature, had to grudgingly admit that Professor A. Vargas was a rather imposing gent. Tall, dark-complected, with a curling black moustache and piercing, almost hypnotic eyes. Like his psychic assistant, he wore a long flowing black robe and a silver amulet. On the middle fingers of each hand were two enormous glittering rings of intricate design, both of which bore hieroglyphics similar to those which adorned the amulets.
    He greeted his new guests effusively, pressing his lips to the back of Sabina's hand and then pumping Quincannon's in an iron grip. "I am Professor Vargas. Welcome, New Ones, welcome to the Unified College of the Attuned Impulses." His voice was rich, stentorian. "Mr. and Mrs. Quinn, is it not? Friends of the good Mr. Buckley? Your first sitting but I pray not your last. You are surrounded by many anxious friends in spirit-life who desire to communicate with you once you have learned more of the laws which govern their actions. Allow your impulses to attune with theirs and your spirit friends will soon identify themselves and speak with you as in earth-life . . . ."
    There was more, but Quincannon shut his ears to it.
    More introductions followed the medium's windy come-on. Quincannon shook hands with red-faced, mutton-chopped Cyrus Buckley and his portly, gray-haired wife, Margaret; with Oliver Cobb, a prominent Oakland physician who bore a rather startling resemblance to the "literary hangman," Ambrose Bierce; and with Grace Cobb, the doctor's much younger and attractive wife. Attractive, that is, if a man preferred an overly buxom and overly rouged blonde to a svelte brunette of Sabina's cunning dimensions. The Cobbs, like the Buckleys, had attended the professor's previous séance.
    Margaret Buckley looked upon Vargas with the rapt gaze of a supplicant in the presence of a saint. Dr. Cobb was also a true believer, judging from the look of eager anticipation he wore. The blond Mrs. Cobb seemed to find the medium fascinating as well, but the glint in her eye was much more predatory than