Calvin did not.
I set the partially eaten sandwich down, found my magnifying glass in my bag, and moved to the front of the room. I took in the images as a whole—six snapshots blown up to 8x11 in size, held in place with magnets—each a different angle and distance of the same spiritoscope I’d held with my own two hands. The background was nondescript. Interior, that much I was certain of. The spiritoscope appeared to be set on something wooden—a floor perhaps, a table more likely. There was nothing else to look at. Nothing to indicate the location, the crime, the very reason for the apparatus’ presence.
How exactly was I meant to help?
I let out a breath, put my hands on my hips, and still studying the whiteboard, said, “You know what this is like? Before everyone realized how blind I was, Ms. Bart was asking us to come to the chalkboard and connect uppercase with lowercase letters. Only, I couldn’t read the letters, so I ended up connecting capital J to lowercase S and everyone laughed.”
“We’re not here to laugh,” Calvin said coolly.
“I know.” I glanced at them over my shoulder. “But I’m staring at these pictures, wondering what you’re hoping to glean, and feel like all I can do is make something up.”
Calvin had set an elbow on the tabletop and leaned his chin on his raised fist. He hadn’t touched his breakfast yet, but the plastic tab on the lid of his coffee was pulled back. “During dinner last night, you mentioned the Fox sisters.”
I nodded.
“Everything that resulted from Spiritualism can pretty much be traced back to them? The claims of mediumship, of spirits, as well as followers and disbelievers?”
“Sure, I’d agree to that.”
Calvin lowered his hand and tapped his fingertips steadily against the table as he mulled that over, likely trying to align history with learned details of a contemporary murder. “Robert Hare. Is there any evidence he ever interacted with the sisters?”
It was a good question. I spun the handle of my magnifying glass between both hands. “I know of at least one written account where he met one of the sisters—he didn’t specify, but they had been in the midst of conducting a séance, so it would have been either Kate or Maggie—when the Foxes were living here in the city.”
“Is that relevant?” Radcliff asked me.
I shrugged. “You tell me. Hare only dedicated a few sentences to the memory. He was preoccupied with a few other mediums who, in my opinion, fed off an old man’s familial losses. He believed to have been put in contact with his older siblings, Martha and Charles, who’d both passed, as well as the five-month-old spirit of his lost son, Theodore.”
Quinn made a sound of disgust. “Heartless charlatans.”
“Explains why a man of science converted so suddenly,” Calvin answered.
I nodded. “And with emphatic sincerity. He argued that proof of spirits and the afterlife in which they resided made mourning rituals moot and selfish. Prince Albert passed a few years after Hare wrote to the Church, and Queen Victoria, for lack of better description, revolutionized mourning, so his notion was tossed out the window pretty quickly.”
“Incredible,” Radcliff stated.
“What’s that?” I asked.
“You—knowing this—all of it, really. Maybe I’d have enjoyed history class more if someone like you had been my professor.”
“My father is the professor in the family. Believe me when I say I would not be longing for tenure after grading mediocre, Wikipedia-sourced papers written by PBR-drinking undergrads who submit a corrupt file at eleven fifty-nine so as to buy themselves a few extra hours to finish, then feign ignorance when the professor emails in the morning reporting a problem with the attachment.”
“That’s very specific,” Radcliff said.
“I don’t like kids. And yes, I include college students in that sweeping statement.”
Radcliff was smiling again, like I’d told a joke and wasn’t actually dead serious in my declaration. When I glanced at Calvin, he was staring at Radcliff with a somber gaze and raised chin.So… it occurred to me that my husband was looking to throw down, and by the grace of God—or maybe it was that decade spent in the military—he was keeping the desire contained. For the most part, I mean. If I didn’t know him as intimately as I did, I’d have likely missed that hint of contempt in his expression.
I said quietly, “Calvin?”
He turned in his chair to look at me.
“Is there anything else you can share with me?” I hastened to continue when he opened his mouth. “I’m not trying to get the scoop on the case or the victim or anything like that. But if this is all I have access to”—I jutted a thumb at the whiteboard—“I think I’ve told you everything there is to know.”
A pregnant pause was broken only by Radcliff unfurling the corners of his foil-wrapped food. “What would it hurt?” he asked, the question clearly directed at Calvin, but he didn’t look up from breakfast.
Calvin turned to Quinn. And because their partnership was absolute aces, that unspoken exchange of raised eyebrows and a lopsided shoulder shrug translated into an entire fucking conversation I wasn’t privy to. Calvin sighed, collected the crime scene photos, sifted through them until he came upon whatever it was the three of them had been referring to, and stood. He moved to join me at the whiteboard, tacked the picture beside the six spiritoscope images, then stared at me expectantly.
I took a step closer and held my magnifying glass to the photo. It was a hand—palm up, fingers curled in that natural, at-rest position. I assumed the victim was a woman, based on the appearance of soft skin, thin fingers, and painted nails. She had a number of small, oddly shaped items in her hand.
