Chapter 1 1
Nora Breen walks the shoreline, along the length of the deserted December beach. It is some form of lunacy that has her up and out at first light, every morning, traipsing along the tide’s ragged hem, whatever the weather. Whether the sky is a crisp laundry-day blue, or dawn arrives dark and drear. Wind-lashed, rain-drenched, frozen to the bone, she doesn’t care. It’s an exhilarating communion. Herself, braced against the elements, slipping over shingle, blown sideways, abraded by sand. Her head filled with the boom and hiss of wave over shale and the scream of the gulls as they dip and jibe above. Then back to the boardinghouse with chapped lips, wild hair, a face like a slapped arse, and a thirst for hot coffee. Perhaps this is why she has stayed on at Gulls Nest. Because the first thing she sees through her open curtains, the very instant she wakes, is the sea’s wide horizon. For this she will brave the cursed plumbing, eccentric inmates, and the housekeeper’s indigestible offerings at breakfast and suppertime. And sure, where else in the world would she go?

As Nora traces her steps back up to the house, her mind is occupied by the strangeness—which she will never take for granted—of being at large in the world. Some nights she dreams of her old religious order. She walks again through the whitewashed corridors of a Carmelite monastery. Her feet scuffing in sandals once more. In her sleep she prunes the old-fashioned, heady-scented roses in the monastery gardens. Or greets a long-dead sister with a deferential nod. Or watches, for the span of a whole night, dust motes turn and drift in the chapel. Sometimes Nora’s dreams are not so benign, but are full of motives and chasing, cursing and puzzling. Then she wakes in a tangle of sheets with a thumping heart, drenched in sweat. Nora decides to blame this on her biological predicaments as a mature woman, rather than past hurts and horrors. She has learnt to give the darker contents of her memory a wide and respectful berth, as one would a trunk of vipers. This is why Nora customarily prefers to ignore her mind’s eye and focus on what’s before her actual eyes. Right now: a slope of glistening pebbles, a bank of scrubby grass, the road to the boardinghouse, and a car pulling up to the curb up ahead.

As she approaches, on the opposite side of the road the driver’s window is wound down. Detective Inspector Hilary Rideout peers at her. On his face, the wry smile that Nora particularly likes but in no way would admit that to herself, or to him.

“Are you busy, Breen?”

“I’ve Irene’s kedgeree to tackle.”

“Would you be devastated to miss your breakfast?”

“I might consider it advantageous for the good of my health. What is it, Rideout?”

He looks sheepish. “I’m in need of a chaperone.”

Rideout turns the car around in the road and has them under way toward the town center before he returns her gaze.

Nora doesn’t try to suppress her grin. “Haven’t you thrown quite the shape on yourself, Rideout?”

He grunts. “Chief Commissioner. Wants his detectives to look like detectives.”

“And what do detectives look like?”

“Presentable, apparently.”

Nora smiles. Rideout usually looks and sounds like an out-of-work actor. His clothes are of the finest quality: cotton, tweed, and gabardine, only rumpled and worn. His face, handsome but unshaven. Nora secretly believes his habitually shabby appearance is considered rather than careless, communicating his disdain for polite etiquette and trifling rules, neither of which he abides by. But today, Rideout has made the effort. His light brown hair, graying at the temples, has been combed into a neat side parting. His mustache is waxed and his jaw freshly shaved, the scars he gained in action the more visible for it. His shirt may not be ironed but it’s buttoned up to the neck and joined by a loosely knotted tie.

Nora looks out at the wintry streets, catching sight of herself in a shop window as the car slows for a pedestrian crossing. There she is, peering out, hatless, weather-beaten in an ancient grandfather coat fished from the boardinghouse’s lost property. Her short damp hair drying into some awful configuration. She’s a fine one to be making judgments about Rideout’s sartorial and grooming habits.

They drive out of town toward the suburbs and along the premier streets in Gore-on-Sea. Leafy, wide, quiet, with large and lovely Edwardian houses. Rideout turns onto a gravel drive that sweeps a pleasing crescent in front of a double-bay-windowed beauty. The sign above the porch reads Ravensholme.

Rideout turns off the engine. He frowns up at the house, making no move to get out of the car. “Doreen Chimes lives here. Have you heard of her?”

“The popular psychic. Settled in Gore-on-Sea last summer. Sellout stage shows.”

The detective inspector nods. “She has reported the theft of some valuable trinket and expressly asked for me to investigate.”

“Could she not just ask the dead who stole it?”

“Don’t be facetious, Breen. This is the third callout to her property this week. The first two times I sent Griggs, only she turned him away.”

“Well, she’s a woman of caliber, a celebrity no less. She’ll be expecting the best.”

“For a crime of such magnitude.”

“Small misdemeanors can lead to big crimes; you ought to know that. One day petty theft, the next, murder.”

Rideout snorts.

Nora eyes him with curiosity. “And for this you need a chaperone?”

Rideout grimaces. “Each time Griggs returned to the station in rather a state.”

“Griggs the Steadfast in a state?”

“I’m afraid so; even Griggs has a fretful side. It seems Mrs. Chimes was wearing a negligee.”

“She was?”

“And was suggestive in her manner.”

Nora bites back a smile. “Don’t worry, Detective Inspector, I’ll protect you.”

Rideout grunts. “Let’s get it over with.”

A housemaid with a put-upon look answers the door. Bespectacled, with pale eyes behind greasy lenses and prominent upper teeth. She’s perhaps in her third decade but already with a dowager’s hump. She leads them through the hallway, a camber to her step from her worn-down shoe heels. She’s a little at odds with the smart surroundings. The polished side table with its potted display of orchids, the sweeping staircase, the cut-glass chandelier. Nora takes in the smell of beeswax and comfortable living.

They find Mrs. Chimes semirecumbent on an overstuffed chaise longue in the drawing room. She is as artfully arranged as the vases of chrysanthemums on each side of the marble fireplace. There’s a good fire in the grate and a fat Persian cat stretched out on the hearthrug. Felines of the fancier persuasions, from Burmese to Siamese, Scottish Folds to Manx, claim every comfortable space in this warm and luxurious room. Cats stretch out along brocade sofas, or lie prone on poufs, or drape themselves on the deep-cushioned window seat. Mrs. Chimes is of the variety of woman that Nora’s granny would call handsome. Russet of hair, green of eye, curling of lip, voluptuous of form. And, as Nora’s granny would also say, with the capacity to stand in a storm. Of undeterminable age and boasting a plump pink and milky complexion, the medium rises and crosses the room to greet her visitors. She moves sedately, glidingly, like an ocean liner. She has swapped the negligee that so unsettled Constable Griggs for a becoming low-cut tea dress in emerald dupioni.

She stretches out a languid hand to Rideout, ignoring Nora.

“Detective Inspector, you find me resting. Forgive me, but recent events have taken their toll.” Her voice is honeyed, her accent as flawless as that of a radio announcer. “Gladys, a pot of coffee.”

Rideout extracts his hand and takes off his hat, holding it across his chest in the manner of a talisman. “There’s really no need.”

Mrs. Chimes looks him over with a brightening eye. “Oh, there’s every need.”

Gladys gives a vague bob and limps away.

Mrs. Chimes sails back across the room and regains the chaise longue. She pats the seat beside her. “Do take a pew, Detective Inspector.”

Rideout evicts a disgruntled Cornish Rex and sinks into a chair on the opposite side of the room. He gestures toward Nora with his hat brim. “This is Miss Breen.”

Mrs. Chimes throws Nora a deft workaday glance, as if she’s totting up the milkman’s bill. Finding neither threat nor fascination, she returns her attention to Rideout.

“Detective Inspector, I have heard so much about you.”

“You reported a theft, Mrs. Chimes?”

“Doreen, please. Aren’t you even a teensy bit curious to know what I’ve heard about you?” She lowers her voice, her face grave now. “From beyond.”

Rideout opens his mouth, frowns, hesitates.

“The dear departed whisper in my receptive ear,” continues Doreen. “It’s a glowing reference they give you; loving son, selfless friend, a hero brave—”

Rideout looks awkward, pained.

Nora interjects. “I gather that a valuable trinket has been taken, Mrs. Chimes?”

The goddess in dupioni glances coolly in Nora’s direction. Her dulcet tone sharpens. “A cameo brooch, gold-framed.”

Rideout recovers. “Do you suspect anyone who has access to your home? Staff, visitors—”

“Good gracious, no!” Doreen gives a small and certain smile. “My maid, Gladys, has impeccable references, my gardener is a saint. My private readings are attended by handpicked persons of quality.”

“A burglary, then?” volunteers Rideout.

Doreen considers. “Yes. That’s most likely.”

“Any forced windows? Or strangers lurking about the premises?”

“Not that I’m aware of, Detective Inspector.”

The maid enters the room with a clatter of cups and cutlery. Stalwartly circumnavigating stretching cats and furry rugs, she sets the tray on a low table before her employer. “Will that be all, Mrs. Chimes?”

Rideout addresses the maid. “We’ll need to talk to you too, Gladys.”

“Very well, sir,” says the same, pushing her spectacles up the bridge of her nose with a foggy glance in his direction.

Doreen seizes the opportunity. “Gladys, take—Miss Breen?—into the kitchen and answer any questions she might have regarding my stolen brooch.”

Gladys gives a weary bob.

Doreen turns to Rideout with a sparkling smile. “Which will leave you and I to get better acquainted, Detective Inspector.”

Nora follows Gladys down the corridor through a heavy baize door into the kitchen at the back of the house. Whilst the front of house is spick-and-span, behind the scenes is a different story. The floor is unswept and the sink piled with unwashed dishes. The range is spattered with burnt-on food. A wireless has been taken apart on the kitchen table, and there is a litter of newspapers and a pipe. Gladys frowns and sets about clearing the debris.

“You’ll take a cup of tea, Miss Breen?” she asks resentfully.

“I wouldn’t say no, but don’t let me disturb your work. We can perch there?” Nora points to the clear end of the table.

In answer Gladys shrugs, covers the disemboweled radio with a tea towel, and pulls out a chair.

Nora smiles her thanks and sits down. “So, you have hidden depths, Gladys.”

Gladys turns a cold and murky eye on Nora. “Whatever do you mean, Miss Breen?”

“Mending a wireless, that can’t be easy.”

Nora fancies Gladys colors a little. As if to cover up her agitation, the housemaid crosses to the sink, fills a kettle, and bangs it onto the range. Nora wonders if Gladys doesn’t have a beau; that might explain the pipe and papers. Perhaps Gladys has a fancy man hidden in the pantry?

Nora discerns, from the direction of the kitchen range, the smell of roast chicken. A legion of porcelain dishes have been set ready on top of the sideboard.

“Luncheon for the kitties,” says Gladys, following Nora’s gaze. “They are fed at noon in the conservatory.”

Nora gestures at the gold-banded plates. “Like royalty?”

Gladys gives a snort and sets about making the tea. Nora watches with growing curiosity as the maid flusters about the kitchen. Gladys forgoes the usual practice of heating the teapot and instead spoons the leaves from the caddy straight in, topping with a sloosh of water from a kettle that hasn’t yet reached the boil. She puts a pint bottle on the table, followed by a paper twist of granulated sugar, appearing to forget all about the existence of milk jugs and niceties. With a huff she fetches two mismatched cups with saucers and one teaspoon between them. Nora ponders on what Irene, the formidable housekeeper at Gulls Nest, would have to say about this. It’s all surprisingly slapdash. Maybe Gladys hasn’t been long in service, or else she doesn’t care to uphold even basic standards when unsupervised.

“How long have you worked for Mrs. Chimes, Gladys?”

“Not long.” She takes a chair opposite Nora. “I came with the house. I was in the employ of the previous owner for some years.”

“And how are you finding your new employer?”

Gladys hesitates. “I couldn’t possibly…”

Nora leans forward and touches her arm lightly. “Strictly between you, me, and the gatepost.”

Gladys pushes her glasses back up her nose. “Well, miss, she keeps odd, rum hours, has the butcher run ragged, and owes money all over town.”

“I see.” Nora watches the maid pour their tea. “Can you shed any light on the theft of the brooch?”

“She’s most likely mislaid it.” Gladys heaps three sugars in her cup and stirs anticlockwise. “Or pawned it,” she adds under her breath.

“Money worries?”

“She oughtn’t have with the amount she charges for her table tapping. Only madam likes the finer things in life, and her kitties must have the best too. Lean chops and chicken, when she can get it, and a nice bit of poached cod on a Friday.”

“So, you don’t think Mrs. Chimes’s brooch was stolen? No dubious characters hanging about? No evidence of a break-in?”

Gladys lifts her cup, takes a loud and protracted sip, then answers. “Not that I’m aware of, Miss Breen.”

“What about regular callers?” Nora glances toward the other end of the table, at the mound of disguised wireless parts. “Folks who might drop in and take a cuppa at the kitchen table, for instance.”

“Of course not!”

Nora fancies that Gladys looks mildly incensed, although it’s hard to tell what’s going on behind those foggy spectacles.

“Do you live in, Gladys?”

“Not anymore.” Gladys fishes in her apron pocket and, finding a handkerchief, blows her nose with gusto. “Cat allergy.”

“I’m sorry to hear that. Other than preparing their luncheon, must you have many dealings with them?”

“Well, I must round them up and shut them in the scullery when Mrs. Chimes does her séances, otherwise the dead get spooked, you see. Cats change the vibrations, something about their purring.”

“Fancy that.”

“It’s quite a job lifting the veil between worlds, Miss Breen.”

Nora detects no irony. “Mrs. Chimes holds séances here in the house?”

“In a room fitted out for the purpose called the Spirit Lounge.”

“Are you in attendance?”

Gladys dabs her nose with vigor, then pushes her handkerchief back into her apron pocket. “I sweep and polish the room, draw the curtains, light the candles, answer the door, and show the guests into the drawing room, where madam receives them. After that, they shift for themselves. I won’t stay past the last bus.”

“Then you’ve never witnessed one of her séances?”

Gladys looks down into her teacup. “I wouldn’t dabble in that sort of thing, miss.”

“So, you believe in it?”

“I didn’t before I met Mrs. Chimes. I would have said it was all stuff and nonsense.”

“What changed?”

“She relayed a message from a maiden aunt of mine who passed over.” Her eyes, faraway behind thick murky lenses, search out Nora’s. “Something no living soul could know. Mrs. Chimes may be a tricky customer, but she’s no charlatan.”

“You think she talks to the dead?”

“Of that, I have no doubt, Miss Breen.”

Nora finishes her tea. “I’d better get on and rescue the detective inspector.”

A ghost of a smile haunts Gladys’s face. “Would you like to see the Spirit Lounge?” Her tone is mysterious, mildly cajoling.

“Go on,” says Nora.

Gladys leads the way back along the corridor and opens a door immediately to the left. The room is dark, with heavy drapes drawn against the daylight. There’s a cold stillness of air and a crisp, sweet, floral scent, which instantly reminds Nora of a chapel. Gladys opens the curtains, shedding some light on proceedings. The walls are lined with midnight-blue silk; the drapes are the same color, only edged in silver rope. The room is curiously empty of decorations, with no ornaments or pictures. A single object resides on the mantelpiece: a crystal ball. A perfect glass sphere, clear as a dewdrop, set on a plainly carved dark wood base. Nora crosses the room and peers inside, only to see her face staring back at her, upside down and distorted.

“Cross my palm with silver?” Nora murmurs. “I’m sure Mrs. Chimes would do a brisk trade on the pier come the summer.”

Gladys’s face looms up in the sphere next to Nora’s, similarly stretched and upended, her glasses oddly moony. Nora catches sight of the maid’s mouth momentarily curved downward into a sly smile before quickly re-forming into a pressed and peevish line.

“It’s for scrying, Miss Breen; madam uses it to peruse the visions and messages from the spirit realm.”

“Is that right? Quicker than the postal service, I expect.”

Nora steps away from the mantelpiece and surveys the rest of her surroundings.

At the center of the room there is a circular pedestal table covered with a blue silk cloth. Six upholstered blue chairs are set round it.

“There are always six at her séances,” Gladys explains. “Mrs. Chimes and five sitters.”

The wall sconces are curious, fashioned from smoky glass in the shape of flames. On an antique sideboard, delicate glasses are ranged along with a crystal decanter bearing sherry and an old-fashioned smelling salts box.

“In case the ladies, or gentlemen, become overwhelmed,” whispers Gladys.

Next to these reviving provisions is a bowl of blue hyacinths, the source of the powerful scent in the room. Over the table hangs a fancy chandelier with faceted drops of the same smoky glass as the wall sconces. Tapering white candles are set in silver candlesticks on the sideboard.

“The Spirit Lounge has quite the ambience,” Nora concludes.

“Mrs. Chimes says that her guests, living and passed on, prefer it this way. Intimate, you see. Her séances are only ever by personal invitation, and she only ever invites the crème de la crème. Whereas madam’s stage shows are for the rabble.”

“So, Mrs. Chimes handpicks her sitters?”

“She says every good hostess knows that the success of a party is in the mix, but it’s really the spirits who decide, coming through with their messages for this one or that one. If you’ve seen enough, miss?”

Nora nods. “Thank you, Gladys.”

Gladys closes the heavy drapes with grave deference.

Returning to the drawing room, Nora is surprised to see the detective inspector now perched next to Doreen Chimes on the chaise longue. His hand lies palm upward in Doreen’s own two hands, and his face is ghostly, his gaze riveted to hers.

When Gladys clears her throat at the door, Doreen drops Rideout’s hand and turns to face them with a catty gleam in her eyes. Released from her ministration, Rideout seems to come to, coughing, straightening his tie, leaping to his feet, with the air of a dog shaking off an unfounded fear.

Leaning forward, Doreen opens the leather pocketbook on the table. She holds out a card, delicately, winsomely, between her manicured fingertips. Rideout stares at it a moment then takes it, slipping it into his coat pocket with a gesture that’s somewhere between a nod and a bow.

Rideout steers the car down the gravel drive and out onto the street.

“What was that about?” Nora keeps her voice light. “The hand-holding?”

“Doreen had some insights. She invited me to her séance tonight.”

Nora notes the sudden familiarity. “Ah, so that’s what Doreen’s callout was about.”

Rideout glances at Nora. “What do you mean?”

“Her report of a theft was just a ruse to entice you to her lair for some table tapping.”

Rideout frowns. “I shouldn’t have thought so; I found her very forthright as well as perceptive—accurate, even.”

Nora laughs. “Surely you don’t believe in all that claptrap—summoning spirits, conversing with the dead.”

“That from someone who spent three decades pondering the afterlife,” replies Rideout, acidly.

Nora studies him. She sees the tension in his hands as they grip the steering wheel. He keeps his eyes on the road, his expression dogged. The scars on his neck and jaw are more apparent, in this light, at this proximity. Nora is taken aback with the extent of his wartime injuries. She reminds herself that these are just the hurts she can see.

They drive in silence until they reach the high street.

“Will you go?” she asks. “To her séance.”

“Why not?” Rideout replies in a voice she barely recognizes, flat, bland, and humorless.

Nora wonders what Doreen Chimes said to have made such an impact on the man. “She has quite a setup, you know. The maid let me have a peep in at the Spirit Lounge.”

“And? What was it like?”

“Funereal. Wouldn’t you rather go to the pictures, Rideout? Have a bag of chips, heavy on the vinegar, down by the promenade, and maybe a pint at the Queen’s Head?”

“Is that an invitation, Breen?”

Nora hesitates, aware of a sudden urge to protect him from whatever flimflam Doreen Chimes is planning. She catches his amused glance and is annoyed by the sudden corresponding warmth in her cheeks.

“I have prior plans,” she says primly. “In fact, you can drop me downtown.”

“Ah, your weekly jazz appreciation session with Mr. Hosmer? You haven’t informed him that you can’t stand his music yet?”

Nora scowls, reminding herself to tell this man nothing personal in future. “It’s an acquired taste. I’m persevering.”

Rideout grins. “It sounds like we’re both in line for illuminating times.”

Even from a distance Nora can see that Hosmer’s Photographic Studio has a striking new display in the window. The usual pictures of bouncing babies and newly engaged sops have been replaced by one large, beautifully composed, meticulously hand-colored print displayed on a golden easel. It is a portrait of a woman of indeterminable age with a soap advert complexion, elaborate russet updo, and gleaming green eyes. She leans nonchalantly on a Grecian pillar, her generous bosom swathed in frothy lavender tulle. Around her neck, a choker of amethysts shines. But it’s the woman’s gaze that is most arresting. Forthright, knowing, as if she’s looking right through her beholder into a realm far beyond even the pie shop on the opposite side of the road. Nora curses under her breath and, ignoring the CLOSED sign, pushes open the door.

She can tell by the sound of jazz music, loud enough to drown out the shop bell, that the proprietor is in. Nora crosses the foyer noticing that the usual framed portraits, hung on the walls between parlor palms and velvet chairs, have been replaced. The images are now exclusively of Doreen Chimes. A fan of flyers on a coffee table advertises her upcoming stage show. Nora picks one up:

Join the LEGENDARY

Mrs. Doreen Chimes

World-Renowned Spirit Medium

For an evening of PSYCHIC REVELATIONS!

She will PROVE your DEAR DEPARTED go on!

“In her hole she will,” Nora mutters.

The studio is empty but for a backdrop and Hosmer’s record player, belting out something discordant. Nora flinches: it’s the auditory equivalent of sucking a lemon. Judging by the sound of a man’s voice raised in enthusiastic but tuneless accompaniment, Hosmer is working in the darkroom.

Nora raps on the door. After a moment’s delay it opens, just a crack, and a head appears, bearded, slightly balding. Hosmer greets her with a smile that lights up his eyes.

Hosmer’s office is as cluttered as ever with piles of gramophone records and boxes of photographic negatives, envelopes, and prints. There’s a desk with a red telephone, an ugly square sofa, and a bank of filing cabinets with half-opened drawers that hold plants, crockery, a change of clothes, pillows and blankets, anything but documents, in fact. Nora wonders if he sleeps here too. They sit side by side on the sofa, sipping the strong, sweet coffee Hosmer always serves. Today it is laced with brandy to keep the cold out.

The photographer has propped the door open, so the music filters in from the studio opposite. He’s changed the record to something mellow and less challenging than usual. Nora listens and breathes. Perhaps they’ve turned a corner with the jazz.

He eyes her good-humoredly. “I like this custom we have. I shall miss your company when you move on.”

“Why would I be moving on, Hosmer?”

“I thought… Not everyone wants to settle in this town.”

“You did.”

He shrugs. “I only came to work in Gore-on-Sea for one season. I am an exception: mostly people wash in and out.”

“Like flotsam and jetsam. With an intrepid few putting down anchor.”

Hosmer smiles. “We have to be intrepid, especially during the holiday season.”

“I’m looking forward to the summer madness, although a seaside winter has its own bracing quality.”

Hosmer laughs.

Nora sips her coffee, trying not to cough when it catches the back of her throat, for it is powerful stuff indeed. She glances up to find her friend watching her.

“Ask it, Hosmer. You’ve that expression you wear when you’re brewing a difficult question. But before you do, I’ve barely listened to this track.”

“It’s not about the music.”

“Grand. Go on, then.”

“Would you ever return to the monastery, Nora?”

She swills her coffee, waits for it to settle, like her mind. “No. I think not. That particular door is closed to me now.”

“As is the nature of doors, sometimes they close,” says Hosmer sagely. “And sometimes they open.”

Nora catches the tone of intrigue in his voice. “What are you up to?”

“A friend of mine runs the Gore-on-Sea Herald, which is a very good newspaper. Martine Hartigan is her name. A stubborn, ferocious sort of woman; in fact, I think the two of you would get on well.”

They exchange wry glances.

“Martine is looking for a news reporter,” Hosmer continues.

“Presumably a news reporter with experience?”

He shrugs. “You like asking questions and getting to the bottom of things—how do you put it?—sticking your coulter in? This way you would be paid for being nosy.”

Nora laughs. “Well, I need a job, so I’ll turn my hand to anything. I had considered returning to nursing, but I want to try something new. To go with my brand-new life.”

“Then it is fortunate: I took the liberty of putting your name forward.”

“That was a brazen move.”

“Wasn’t it?” Hosmer grins as he reaches into his inside pocket, extracts a small envelope, and hands it to Nora.

“What’s this?”

“A trial assignment.”

Nora opens the envelope. Enclosed is a short and functional note and a coupon. “There’s a new chef at the Marine Hotel, and Miss Hartigan wants a review.” She turns to the coupon. “A meal for two—a feed into the bargain!”

Hosmer laughs. “Something more palatable than the offerings up at Gulls Nest.”

“Would you join me, Hosmer? By way of thanks for your meddling. Luncheon tomorrow?”

He bows gallantly.

“Splendid. If I make the grade, Miss Hartigan will need to pay me more than a brace of dainty cakes and a soup of the day. I have my room up at the boardinghouse for waifs and strays to cover and Father Conway to keep in the manner he’s become accustomed to.”

“That gull! Well, it will be a better job than selling winkles on the pier.”

“Actually, fortune-teller was my preferred choice. My granny was an oracle with the tea leaves.”

Hosmer laughs. “Most important, working for Martine would give this something to do.” He touches her temple gently.

“That would be a blessing. Do you know, I can’t seem to sit around in quiet contemplation anymore. What I really need is a puzzle to unpick, something devilish and twisted.”

Hosmer regards her closely. “You mean a crime to solve, don’t you? Do not wish for such a thing.”

They sit for a while listening to the music. Hosmer is miles away when Nora asks the question that’s surfaced in her mind.

“What do you make of Doreen Chimes?”

Hosmer opens his eyes and looks at her quizzically. “For what reason?”

“I met her today. I went with Rideout to a callout at her house. As a chaperone.”

Hosmer catches Nora’s meaning. His dark eyes shine with mischief. “Another formidable woman.”

“You know her well?”

“No, only a little. She gave me messages from beyond.”

“The dead are queuing up to chatter in her ear, like the gullible are queuing up to part with their money.”

Hosmer looks wounded. “It wasn’t like that. Doreen Chimes is not a fake.”

Nora resolves to pull her horns in, for people can be surprisingly sensitive when it comes to their faith in the beyond. “I think that might have been the detective inspector’s verdict too.”

“And he is a man of discernment, is he not?”

“Not always; his cravats can be horribly loud, but he ought to be well versed in spotting a swindle.”

Hosmer shakes his head. “You are wrong, Nora, if you think Mrs. Chimes is a fraud.”

“I’m just looking out for Rideout. Lest he be taken in.”

Hosmer’s eyes hold hers. “Let the detective inspector seek his own answers on life and death. What would you have done if someone told you not to believe in your God?”

“That’s entirely different! You’re comparing a religious vocation to a carnival act.”

Hosmer is undaunted. “Belief is belief.”

Nora reaches for her coffee and crossly takes a scalding sip. “Anyway,” she adds mutinously. “He’s not my God.”

The day turns out fine, the sky a clear, lancing blue and the beach a ribbon of glittering silver. Only, as Nora walks back through the town and along the promenade toward Gulls Nest, she cannot enjoy her surroundings. Something rankles. The morning has left her with a sour taste, not in her mouth, but somewhere deep in her mind.

As she climbs the hill toward Gulls Nest boardinghouse, calmed by fresh air and effort, her equanimity is restored. Let Rideout go to his séance. Let Doreen Chimes fill him full of nonsense. Let Hosmer philosophize all he wants. She will mind her own business by applying herself to the task of landing a job. Hosmer is right, a position at the Gore-on-Sea Herald would give permission, not that she ever needed it, to stick the coulter in. What’s more, it would grant her a steady income. The monastery’s stipend was only ever meant to help her find her feet, she can’t rely on it forever. Nosing out stories would be infinitely more interesting than wrapping chips on the seafront. She’d meet all manner of new people in all sorts of circumstances. From the great and the good to the seedy underbelly of Gore-on-Sea that Rideout sometimes refers to in tantalizing snippets.

Of course, a job would be one more reason to stay. Hosmer’s assumption that she would leave made her realize just how connected she’s come to feel to Gore-on-Sea in such a short time. Truly, the town and its occupants have worked a gritty sort of magic on Nora. There are the basics, like knowing where to buy cheap fish and decent tobacco and knowing if you get lost that all roads inevitably lead back to the sea. There are familiar landmarks—the beach shelters and cheap tea shops, the pier and the police station—that hold memories and stories for Nora now. Then there are the folk she knows by sight, if not by name, and all those little exchanges of nods and smiles and a few kind words as everyone goes about their day. And what of her housemates at Gulls Nest boardinghouse, who are quite the jumble of characters? Like the random sticks of mismatched furniture in her own room, they all fit, after a fashion. Maybe that’s the trick with belonging; it works both ways. Nora belongs to this town in the same way it belongs to her. It’s hard not to feel at home when a place offers you a corner, however odd and shabby.

So it is that Nora, sitting at the table by the window in her room, has her letter of application written, signed, and folded neatly into an envelope addressed to Miss M. Hartigan before supper is announced. This evening, as every evening, the residents are called into the dining room by a school bell rung at the foot of the stairs. It’s a quaint ritual for boarders given to nostalgia and rarely needed, for the smell of Irene’s cooking always precedes it. Nora, glancing in her dressing table mirror, smooths her hair as best she can and takes a moment to fortify herself against this evening’s menu.

In the dining room the table is set for three, a small party indeed, for there are many rooms currently vacant at Gulls Nest. This is perhaps unsurprising given the establishment’s recent history: murder, several times over. The house does attract a certain ghoulish attention; mackintoshed figures, with hats pulled down and collars pulled up, bearing box cameras, have been seen skulking behind the yew trees in the front garden. But what Gulls Nest really needs are paying guests. It’s a rum situation and one that Nora has discussed with fellow boarder Bill Carter. Until recently Nora and Bill had been the only guests, and without the buffer of other diners, the pair were thrown together at breakfast and supper. Happily, they found they enjoyed one another’s company, sharing a fascination for people and their secret and not-so-secret lives. Often the chat continued long after the crockery was cleared. Sometimes Bill worked shifts, and then Nora had to sit alone in the dining room feeling oddly bereft. At the monastery she ate in silence for decades, but there were always others around her. And she had to admit that Bill’s gossip and schemes were far more entertaining than the edifying readings at the refectory. Bill, a part-time barman at the Marine Hotel and full-time dealer in whatever you might have a need for, is all about the numbers. According to probability, he observes, there won’t be another murder at Gulls Nest for at least three hundred years, so they can sleep soundly in their beds. And they would, if not for the state of the plumbing, which rattles and knocks nightly in complicated Morse codes of debilitation. However, the fortunes of Gulls Nest could be on the up, for last week they were joined by a third boarder.

Colonel William Fulford is a red-faced, harrumphing, curmudgeonly military type, nudging his seventh decade. He had written from overseas to see if the kind proprietors of Gulls Nest were able to accommodate a foolish old man’s fancy. It appears that Colonel and Mrs. Fulford had rented a room at Gulls Nest for their honeymoon many years ago. After his dear wife passed away, the colonel felt an uncharacteristically sentimental impulse to revisit their newlywed haunts. The room above Nora, of good proportions with a large sea-facing bay window, had latterly been rented by an unhappy couple, with fatal consequences. With a top-notch guest in the offing, it was properly done out. Over the course of a fortnight, Irene had sanded and scraped, papered and painted, arranged furniture, ordered a new secondhand mattress, and run up a set of curtains. The result is a well-appointed double, heavy on the florals. The colonel was duly installed, having paid up front for the best part of a month knowing nothing about the house’s macabre—and disturbingly recent—history.

The two gentlemen rise when Nora enters the dining room. Both are dressed for dinner. Bill Carter with his usual precision: cuff links, tiepin, impeccably trimmed mustache, and thinning graying hair brilliantined to a high gloss. Colonel Fulford is more starched but considerably less dapper, instead presenting an air of tweedy respectability. His shoes are always polished to an impeccable shine, his coat brushed, his waistcoat buttoned. The colonel’s mustache is so stiff it remains in place when his mouth moves.

“How are the men?” asks Nora.

The colonel, who habitually offers sounds in lieu of words when he feels a response is beneath him, gives a derisive snort.

“Colonel Fulford was just telling me about his day,” says Bill. “Below par was the verdict, sir?”

Colonel Fulford grunts and continues on a tirade that brings a liverish color to his cheeks and an affronted quiver to his jowls.

Nora feigns interest. There will be no surprises there then, for the colonel is a creature of habit. He eats the same breakfast daily, then walks the same route into town. He consumes luncheon at the Marine Hotel, dining alone at the same table. He takes The Times and reads it cover to cover and pronounces it drivel.

Colonel Fulford and his tiresome routine have the propensity to lower the mood of the dining room quicker than a damp Sunday. On more interesting subjects, such as his life abroad and what he did in the war, the colonel is stubbornly silent. However guilelessly Nora probes, the old man, with his hemming and hawing, is singularly adept at changing the subject.

Nora is barely seated when the two men rise again at the opening of the dining room door. This time both wear expressions as bashful as they are boyish. Bill’s eyes brighten, and the colonel’s nose blushes a deeper shade of puce.

The lovely Mrs. Helena Wells, Gulls Nest’s landlady in name alone, wafts into the room to make vague and brief inquiries as to the comfort of her guests. This is a new thing. As are the changes to Helena’s wardrobe. Lately she has swapped her widow’s black for frocks of muted bruise-like colors. Dark purple, inky blue, greenish yellow. Bill, ever the optimist, concludes that she is done grieving for her late husband and is showing a modest blooming to attract a new mate. Nora must agree that their landlady is displaying a less somber side, but by her reckoning this has nothing to do with her doting lodger. In truth, Helena could put on the tablecloth and still have the dramatic magnetism of a leading lady. Tonight, with her blond hair in a neat chignon and her face pale and sad, she is particularly exquisite. Behind Helena trails her daughter, Dinah, eight and feral. The child is dressed, as she usually is, in a costume of her own devising: a velvet pin-tucked party dress embellished with a constellation of old-fashioned paste-stone brooches and topped off with a ratty feather boa and beaded opera bag. Dinah’s knotty red hair is tucked haphazardly into a frilled bath cap. She grins at Nora, who is put in mind, not for the first time, of a fox cub. There is something of a young vixen about Dinah’s large and watchful blue eyes and sharp teeth. She hooks her bag over her arm and snarls at Bill, who scowls and looks away.

The two are not friends.

Helena Wells smiles benevolently over her guests. “I trust everything is to your liking?”

“Very much so,” replies Bill, with a starry, sheepish gaze.

The colonel bows his assent, remembering his dash.

Nora has nothing to add.

“Marvelous,” says Helena. “Do be sure to tell Irene if you need anything. I believe you are in for a culinary treat tonight.”

Dinah snorts. The colonel frowns and glances over at her. She pokes her tongue out at him.

“Madam, your child is pulling faces at me!”

Helena smiles indulgently down at Dinah, who turns this mocking gesture on her mother. “For someone who doesn’t talk, isn’t my girl wonderfully expressive?”

Mother and child sweep from the room. Dinah with a final, imperious glance around the table. Nora suspects that she is truly her mother’s daughter.

The gentlemen fall into discussing the child’s ill manners and criminal tendencies. Their predictions are dire: reform school or the madhouse. They attribute blame for missing cuff links, pillboxes, and shoehorns to Dinah’s light fingers. Nora suspects that their accusations are not without foundation but feels it’s her place to defend the child. The gentlemen can identify only one acceptable trait in Dinah: the child makes no sound. Nora, who has never agreed with the children should be seen but not heard rule, heatedly disagrees.

Their debate is cut short by the appearance of Irene Rawlings, the most formidable of housekeepers and resentful of cooks. The arrival of a guest of the colonel’s caliber has had quite the effect on her. This evening Irene approaches the dining table in a starched apron rather than her usual sloppy housecoat. She is also sporting a head of freshly set blue-rinsed curls and an unconvincing smile.

“For supper tonight I shall be serving cream of parsnip soup, followed by liver braised with onions and seasonal accoutrements.”

“Cabbage,” mutters Bill. “It’s always cabbage.”

Irene turns the beam of her smile on him. “Savoy cabbage, if you please, Mr. Carter. And for afters, a rum baba.” Her gimlet eyes fall on the colonel. “Only the best for our residents.”

She bustles from the room, a picture of efficiency.

The old soldier grimaces. “Must liver and onions feature every Wednesday?”

“Sometimes it surfaces on a Thursday too,” Bill observes.

The old man shudders.

Irene returns with a pungent whiff of burnt onions and savory offal, carrying a laden tray. Usually, she dumps the dishes along the sideboard and the guests serve themselves, but since the colonel’s arrival she’s been going above and beyond. Irene ladles and cajoles, badgers and encourages, standing over the colonel until he agrees to a double serving of a soup that bears a resemblance to sump water.

“Will you be taking your nightcap in the drawing room as usual, Colonel Fulford?”

“Not tonight, Mrs. Rawlings. I have an evening engagement.”

Nora and Bill glance over at him with surprise. Even Irene looks intrigued. This is truly a departure from the old gentleman’s routine.

“In fact,” says Colonel Fulford, “I must leave after the main course. I’m afraid I shall have to pass on your baba, Mrs. Rawlings, as fascinating as it sounds.”

Irene’s smile flounders. “Well and good. Our residents are free to come and go on a moment’s whim, without notice, missing meals what’s been carefully prepared for them, willy-nilly—”

“Is it a problem, Mrs. Rawlings?” The colonel fixes her with a baleful eye. “Am I under some sort of contractual obligation to consume my supper here?”

“Not at all, sir.” Irene squares her shoulders and manages an unconvincing breeziness. “I shall let you enjoy your starters. I shall be back with the mains.”

On this ominous note, she departs the room.

“I’m damned if I’ll stay for the liver,” mutters the colonel.

“As a veteran of Irene’s cuisine,” says Bill, “I wouldn’t hold it against you, sir.”

The colonel harrumphs.

Then there is the sound of clinking spoons. Irene’s soup is bland and of a floury consistency. It could be worse.

“Going anywhere nice, Colonel?” asks Nora.

The old man puts down his spoon and dabs his mouth with a napkin. “If you must know,” he replies testily, “this evening’s excursion is the primary reason I came to Gore-on-Sea.”

“Aside from your honeymoon nostalgia?”

The old man throws her a withering look.

Nora, sensing some underlying embarrassment on the colonel’s part, leans in. “Go on.”

“I am going to a séance, of all things.”

“The name of the medium wouldn’t be Doreen Chimes, would it?”

“Indeed. You are acquainted, Miss Breen?”

“By coincidence I met her earlier today.”

Colonel Fulford studies Nora with sour interest. “Your verdict?”

“I haven’t quite decided,” she replies tactfully.

“I gather she’s rather well known, most particularly to my late wife.”

“Prior to your wife’s passing?” Nora volunteers.

“No.” He flushes the color of boiled ham. “After.”

“Mrs. Chimes wrote to you, Colonel, and said your deceased wife had been in touch with her?” Nora surmises.

“I would have been the first to pooh-pooh it, only…” The old man’s color deepens.

“Mrs. Chimes relayed messages that she couldn’t have known, if not from your late wife herself?” Nora assists.

“Inexplicably and precisely that.” The colonel rises, signaling the end of discussions. “If you’ll excuse me.”

With a frigid nod to his fellow boarders, Colonel Fulford is on his way.

They wait until they hear the front door pulled to and the slow and steady crunch of the old man’s feet out across the gravel drive.

Bill turns to Nora. “What did you really think of Mrs. Chimes?”

“She has a knack for reeling them in. Rideout fell for it hook, line, and sinker. As did Hosmer, apparently.”

“Then you think she’s a fake?”

“Almost certainly. I don’t believe in ghostly messages from the afterlife.”

Bill looks uncertain. He opens his mouth then, evidently thinking better of it, closes it again.

Irene clatters in with the next course. “He didn’t even stay for his mains!”

“Lucky bugger,” says Bill under his breath.

Nora throws him an amused glance.

Tutting and muttering disgruntledly on the fickleness of premium guests, Irene clears the soup bowls and leaves the room.

Bill gestures at the serving dish. “We can’t stave off the inevitable, I’m afraid. Shall I be mother?”

Nora nods her assent. She enjoys the flair Bill employs when he serves even the most grotesque of Irene’s cuisine; somehow it softens the blow. With a napkin draped over his arm, he charms Nora into accepting a full helping.

They apply themselves to the liver and onions, frowning at the texture.

“I don’t know why I stay,” Bill mutters.

Nora smiles at him, he meets her eyes and returns the smile. They both know exactly why. Poor Bill is hopelessly enamored with Helena Wells.

“Well and good,” he grumbles. “But what’s your excuse, Nora?”

“The sea view.”

“That’s what you’re telling yourself, is it?” Bill’s grin is mischievous. “How is the job hunting going? We’re looking for a desk clerk up at the Marine Hotel. It’s not ideal, but it might tide you over?”

“Thanks, Bill. I’ll think about it.”

“Imagine the fun you’d have nosing at the guests.”

Nora looks up from her plate, rattled now. “Inquisitive, mildly curious, I’ll take. Nosy is quite another thing—tell me, why does everyone think I’m nosy?”

Bill raises his eyebrows and presses on with his meal.

They eat in silence but for the sawing of cutlery and the frequent sips of water.

“Will you chance a rum baba, Nora?”

“I wouldn’t let you tackle that alone, Bill.”

Nora and Bill take their time over their pudding, which is needful, for the rum babas have the heft of shot puts. Supper accomplished, they move, with effort, to the drawing room, where they toast their survival of another meal. After several drinks they hear the rumble of tires on the drive and see the flare of car headlights through the drawing room window. This is followed by rapid footsteps to the front door and an urgent knock, which summons Irene, judging by the slamming of the door to the kitchen passageway.

Nora strains to hear the exchange. Irene’s tone, grumbling. A male voice, insistent. In moments, Constable Griggs appears in the doorway of the drawing room, hat in hand. The policeman is in his early twenties, blond, with a sparse mustache and a steadfast, solemn air that belies his youth.

“I’m sorry to interrupt, Miss Breen, but Detective Inspector Rideout is in need of medical assistance—not for himself,” he hastily adds, seeing Nora’s alarmed expression. “I’m afraid there has been an incident at the séance.”

“Someone has been scared to death?” murmurs Bill blithely.

“It’s no joking matter, Mr. Carter,” Griggs says, firmly but politely. “One of the sitters has taken bad.”

“Apologies, Constable.”

Griggs nods and turns to Nora. “The detective inspector telephoned me at the station and told me to find a duty doctor, but they are all out on call.”

“So, Rideout asked you to bring me instead?”

“No. That was my idea.” The constable’s expression turns from earnest to beseeching. “Will you come, Miss Breen?”

She will, of course.