Timothy Flood rolled all this around in his mind, played back all the words she said and replayed what had happened with the Professor and all the ways it could go if he did accept the invitation to present himself to the Royal Psychical Society. He played it all, backwards and sideways. In an average man’s brain, the futures presented would have frozen his brain shut with terror and he would have collapsed into a catatonic fetal ball. But Timothy Flood was not an average man. Timothy Flood was a man who teethed on a conductor’s wooden baton, who grew up in the theatre, a world where fantasy and make-believe didn’t fade away at the end of childhood. Timothy Flood was a man who was forged in a world of ideas and discovery. Timothy Flood was the sort of man who answered each impossible challenge with the simple phrase-

  “Yes…but what if it did work?”

  It was Giselle’s turn to gape. Her mind was not like Timothy Flood’s. While, Giselle Benedict grew up in the same physical space as he did, she was of a more stable mind. Someone had to be. That’s the way it is in this sorts of pair-bonding. If one is a free spirit that soared among the clouds, then one has to be on the ground, holding the string. That was Giselle’s job. She held the string that kept Timothy from floating away and dying in the cold, unforgiving Universe that lay beyond.

  Sometimes that string cut into her fingers so deeply, she longed to let go.

  Giselle Benedict looked into those dark, shining eyes of the boy she had known all of her life and shrugged. “You are impossible, Timothy Flood.”

  A gentle cough alerted them to the Butler’s presence.

  “Master Bridgestone will see you now. Follow me, please.”

  “See? Everything is going to be fine!” Timothy smiled brightly and kissed her on the cheek. “Lead on, man!” He said, bounding up the stairs. “Opportunity awaits!”

  “Oh, boy.” she muttered and followed behind.

  The Butler took them up three flights of winding stairs that led to a plain brown door. “Please, go inside. The Master is within.”

  Timothy and Giselle stepped inside. The door shut behind them with the click of a lock.

  “There’s no one here.” Giselle turned the knob. “It’s locked, Tim! He locked us inside. Why would he do that? Tim?”

  It was too late. Something metal and clanking had caught his eye and the mechanical siren of new toys lured Timothy away from her.

  “Timothy! Did you hear me? He’s locked us inside!” she said and two steps later, she was under the room’s spell. “Oh….boy.”

  The room’s original intent was to be an aviary which explained why it was round and spiraled up into the tall, glass tower. The owner’s great-grandaddy was a fancier of birds, all sorts of birds. Anything with wings, in fact. There was once talk in town that he didn’t keep birds per se in the room but a harem of young women he dressed up as birds and paid them to swing inside cages. It was ludicrous, of course. One girl who came by every second Tuesday was hardly a harem.

  Now, two generations later, it served as the heart of the house. It was now apparent why the vestibule and hallways seemed so bare. Everything that was anything anyone could need had gravitated to this one spot. Bookcases overflowing with leather bound volumes lined the room like a semicircle of mahogany wood. The cases overflowed titles ranging from the Classics to popular literature to obscure penny dreadfuls. Giselle let her fingers roll across the titles. A dog-eared book fell out and landed by her foot. Theatrical Magic. She picked it up and put it back on the shelf.

  She spun around, taking the room in from all angles. Besides the books, there were tickertape machines, spewing out thin rolls of paper, a trophy case full of knickknacks: a hairbrush, a brass weight from a grandfather clock, a glass doorknob and a dozen other ordinary things. In front of each was a small placard with a year presumably when he acquired the object. A placard with the current year stood guard over an empty space.

  Curious.

  Beside the case was a wall of framed photographs. She took a quick look at each of them, not paying much attention to any since awkward groupings of family members posing for posterity held little interest to her. A framed newspaper clipping did, in fact, catch her attention.

  “Oh, boy.” Her eyes widened as she read further. “Ooooh, boy. Timothy! Timothy!”

  “Hmmm?’ Timothy automatically responded. It was his go-to phrase whenever he heard his name called in the tone that meant he had either 1) done something incredibly stupid or 2) something was about to happen because of something in part due to reason #1. He rarely stopped to see which reason applied. Besides, currently he was too transfixed by the technological wonders on the tables before him to really care.

  There were three wooden tables. They were ordinary gaming tables, the sort you’d see at any pub and at each table, there was a game in play. One had chess; the other mahjong and one had a complicated affair that used a topographical map, compasses and tiny soldiers. There was only one chair at each table occupied by a metal automaton. There was no effort made to humanize them with clothing or masks. They were naked, stripped down to their articulated joins. Bronze gears replaced muscle and whirligigs hummed and twirled in lieu of hearts. To a dull, prudish eye, it was a gruesome sight, a dissected corpse laid bare down to nerves and muscles by a morbid anatomist to spend its afterlife as a macabre puppet. To the eyes of Timothy Flood, it was a different sight all together.

  “Beautiful.” Timothy muttered to himself. “Just look at how every movement, every gear and balljoint works together. It flows, seamlessly! This…THIS is Nature captured in steel and wire. Oh, look! The Chess player’s finger taps the side of his cheek as if in deep thought. Oooooh, if I could get my hands on the diagrams….”

  “Timothy!” She grabbed him by his arm and tugged. “Are you listening to me?”

  “Hmmm?” he said as he succumbed the tugging.

  “This!” She pointed to the framed newspaper article. “In your research, did you come across this?”

  Timothy read the headline. “KIDNAPPED SCION RESCUED! TWO YEARS SPENT IN THE CLUTCHES OF CHIMNEYSWEEPER!” Beneath in smaller print, “Vengeful Nanny under investigation for plotting with kidnappers.”

  “Oh…OOH!” Timothy exclaimed. “I remember this story. He was just a toddler, yes? And his Nanny was having an affair with the boy’s father and when he ended their relationship, she handed the boy over to chimneysweepers for spite. Didn’t LeQuirk write a musical based on it?”

  “Yes. ‘From Ashes to Riches’. It was dreadful but it packed the house. He made enough to heat the house for the winter. But that’s not what upsets me. From what I hear, the damage destroyed his lungs and he lives inside an enormous iron lung that breathes for him.”

  “Golly.” Timothy’s eyes gleamed. “I wonder how that works…”

  “Stop it! You know our rule.” She leaned in closer and spoke softly, “Never scam the helpless or infirmed.”

  “Does that include the rich?”

  “Yes! Well, maybe…I can see why they might have it easier than the poor but…NO! No, we won’t go down that slippery slope, Timothy Flood.”

  A reedy voice cut through the sound of whooshing pneumatic cylinders. “Oh, I’m not as infirmed as all that.”

  A chair descended from the rafters hoisted by tubes and wires and stopped in front of the astonished pair. It was a hefty number of the Baroque school, dark walnut veneer over English oak with scrolling foliage and garlands of flowers encircling the monogram, WEB, engraved on the top rail. Sitting on the thick burgundy velvet cushion was a middle aged man. In the center of his chest was a contraption of wheezing tubes and gears that strapped him into the chair. It was impossible to tell how tall the man would’ve been could he stand away from the chair but the square line of his shoulder suggested a strong frame prematurely withered. He had the pallid skin of a shut-in highlighted by shoulder length auburn hair and fierce hazel eyes. He smiled and tipped his head in a slight bow. “Hello, Mr. Flood and Miss Benedict. Welcome to Orbweaver Hall.”

  Timothy’s tongue was held captive as his brain wrestled to catalogue what he was seeing. Giselle took up the slack, as usual. “Good evening, Mr. Bridgestone, thank you for taking the time to meet with us.”

  “Please, call me Web. I won’t take up too much more of your time. I was reading your CV and your proposition-” The grinding of gears as the Chess player made his move interrupted him. “Oh, excuse me for a moment.”

  His chair swooped around them and landed by the chess table. Web studied the board for a second, moved his Rook to D5, typed on a keyboard attached to the automaton’s arm the words CHECKMATE and pressed SEND. Seconds later the head of the automaton slunk down in defeat.

  “HA! Poor old Anton. Such a sore loser! HA!” Web blushed. “Please, excuse my outburst. He’s an old friend, homebound like myself, like all the others I play with. Sometimes I get more involved than is healthy. Still, it is a way to spend the time and to exercise the most important but ethereal muscle we all have: the mind.”

  “Not at all, sir, not at all!” Timothy shook his head, smiling. “As a matter of fact, I would love to get a look at how that-”

  Giselle cut him off. “We are sorry but, upon further reflection, we take back our offer. I’m sure Professor Kirby’s services are exactly what you need to take care of your spectral concerns.”

  “What?” Web shook his head. “Those ponces that were here before? Not a chance.”

  Timothy choked back a laugh.

  “Yes. Would you please summon the…what did you say?”

  “The men in here before. What a stuffy load of snotters. Boring me toothless with all their talk of exorcism, residual energy imprintations and spectral vexations. Bah! Complete poppycock. Let me be frank: I do not believe in ghosts, haunts or bogeys.”

  “But then why did you place an advert for a ghostslayer?”

  The chair lifted and landed between them and the door. “Please hear my story before turning down my offer. Please.”

  Timothy grinned and nodded rapidly. Giselle sighed. “All right.”

  “Excellent! I’d offer you a place to sit but I don’t get visitors so you will have to stand. I promise to make this brief.

  “Duchess Barrow is an old family friend. She’s a lovely woman, really but stable as a cracked chamber pot. She lives in Berrywood, her family estate, and is convinced that the Blood Red Maid is roaming its halls.”

  “The Blood Red Maid?” Timothy shook his head. “I’m not familiar with that legend.”

  “Not surprising. The Barrow family does all it can to quell the legend. In spite of the recent fashionableness of having a haunted hall, they are not keen to have their dirty laundry exposed. See, the story goes that a former lord of the manor took delight and, please excuse my bluntness, Miss Benedict, in deflowering virgins. And, as the story goes, in shame and fury, a maid took her own life by slitting her throat from ear to ear during a family banquet. Now, whenever three or more of the family of Barrow come together in the dining hall, the Blood Red Maid makes an appearance, reenacting her suicide right there at the table to get her revenge.”

  “How?” asked Giselle.

  “By killing appetites, I suppose. But here’s the thing. Duchess Barrow’s great niece is engaged to a fabulously wealthy, older dodger and the last thing they need is for a bloodstained, angry, dead, ex-virgin to nix the deal. While I don’t believe a word of it, poor Bitsie does and, worst of all, the help are flaming the fires by claiming to have seen the blasted thing.”

  “And what do you want us to do?” Giselle asked. “It still sounds as if Kirby is your man.”

  “Pah! Kirby!” Web spit the name. “What I need is theatre.”

  Giselle felt a cold chill go through her. There is more here than we fathom.

  Timothy put on his most charming smile. “Whatever do you mean? We are professional spectral exterminators. Miss Benedict is documented with a dozen apportations, once even apporting a fresh seabass and I can tell you that is no easy task. No other medium in England has her talent, I can assure you!”

  Web steepled his long, thin hands and tapped his chin. “Let me be clear. I know who you are. I know what you are. I even know about your new prop. Very interesting. It is for that reason that I made sure you took notice of my advert. Mr. Green, at the news stall?”

  “He did seem extraordinarily friendly that day.”

  “I’m sure. He was very keen. For a pound more, he would have given you a kiss.”

  “How?” Giselle rolled her veil and pinned it up. “How do you know about us?”

  “Look around you!” His chair shot up to the rafters. “See these telescopes? I have ten of them, all pointing at every corner of London. I have tickertape machines that tap out all day and all night every bit of news from around the world. Darling, I have nothing else to do but keep tabs on everything that goes on outside these walls!” The chair fell back down to their level. “All I want is for you, my fine young thespians, to lend me your talents, put on a séance and convince the dear Duchess Bitsie that you have captured the Blood Red Maid in your ectoplasmic extraction box and chucked her into the Thames.

  “Do we have a deal?”

  Giselle churned the proposition over in her head, turning it, looking for cracks and flaws. She could see nothing, it all fit but the fishy feeling in her gut made her hesitate. Trust your instincts with the man upstairs.

  She stepped up to the floating chair. “Mr. Bridgeston, with the greatest respect, we-”

  Timothy pushed her aside and shook Web’s hand furiously. “We’ll do it!”

  “Excellent! I’ll set up a date with the Duchess. Butler will settle your fee. See yourselves out.” Web began ascending his chair. “Oh, by the way, your friend, LeQuirk, got it wrong. It was my mother, not my father, who ended the affair. Cheers!”

  *****

  It is a universal truth that a full belly and a fat wallet can ward off the angriest of tirades. A gourmet dinner served on fine china plates, good wine in crystal glasses and fresh flowers at the table didn’t hurt Timothy’s chances either.

  “Besides, it isn’t really breaking the rule of not scamming invalids or the helpless if the invalid, who is definitely not helpless, is also in on it.”

  Giselle drained her glass and smiled as the warm spread through her middle. “True. He is definitely not helpless. Flying through the air in his fine, fancy chair!” Her giggle blossomed into a belly laugh. “I made a rhyme. Did you hear me? I rhymed. Maybe I should be a poet? Maybe…maybe my father was a poet? Or maybe my mother?”

  It was good to see a rosy glow in Giselle’s cheeks. Even if it was just the wine, Timothy was happy to see her relaxed. She took on with so much responsibility and troubles, most of them caused by him, he hated to admit, and it was starting to show in her face, like cracks in the veneer. She was only 21 or thereabouts. Neither of them was sure of their true ages. The matrons at the foundling home aged the children by their teeth, like horses. Nevertheless, she should be in the pink flush of her young womanhood, not already graying like a washerwoman.

  “This is how to live, Giselle. This is how we deserve to live.”

  “Pffft. Let’s just enjoy our fat purses while we can, Mr. Flood. Times of plenty are few and far between for the likes of you and I…us…we…which is grammatically proper?”

  “But, I have a plan…”

  “No plans! Enough talk! Don’t ruin this. Just…no plans, no futures, just this...this right now. Tomorrow! Tomorrow, we deal with….tomorrows.” She attempted to stand, wobbled a bit and fell back down to her seat, shaking the table and knocking over her empty wine glass. “I may, however, need your assistance now…”

  *****

  There was a New Moon high in the sky on the night of the séance. A superstitious person would have seen this as an ill omen. New moons were the playground of shady, slippery things, a time of workings in the dark. Mistrust, betrayal and double-dealings.

  A perfect night for a con.

  The sitting room of Berrywood was very much what Timothy expected for an old posh widow. The walls were dark oak and littered with oil paintings of ancestors, each generation fading in looks as the genetic pool became cloudier and cloudier. There were uncomfortable chairs for sitting and a large gilded glass cabinet filled with plates that had never served food, garland crusted porcelain eggs and a bronze urn that held the late Duke’s ashes.

  Timothy scanned the audience while Giselle gave the spiel.

  The Duchess Barrow was exactly as Web had described. An elderly widow, truly a lovely woman but thick as a cube of sugar. She was terrified not only of the prospect of sharing a home with a vengeful dead ex-virgin but also how it would affect the guest list to her next High Tea if the Ladies Rose Appreciation Circle found out.

  Her niece, the Lady Rowena Roxbury, was a thin, nervous woman whose arms fluttered akimbo at every sound.

  The grand niece, the Lady Ava Roxbury nee Wishton, had the flat, bored features of a privileged prat. She yawned and kicked the baseboard of the divan as Giselle spun her story. Timothy hated the Lady Ava instantly. He fingered the smoke bombs in his pocket and decided to target her especially when the time came to summon the spirits.

  There was only one member of the party that gave Timothy any cause for alarm. The Duchess’ brother, Duke Emund Barrow. Roundly obese and suffering from gout, he had jowls like a St. Bernard and heavy-lidded eyes like a snake. Timothy did not trust him for two reasons. Firstly, the Duke stared at the door as Giselle explained what might happen and how to prepare for an eventual spectral attack, usually the most exciting part of her spiel. Secondly, the Duke kept checking his pocketwatch. He had checked it twice in the past ten minutes.