Uneasy Spirits: A Victorian San Francisco Mystery (7 page)

Looking over at Kathleen, whose lips were resolutely pressed together, she relented and said, “You know, I was hoping to wear this outfit when Mr. Dawson and I meet on Saturday, so it is doubly important to keep it clean. I hope that he will have had a chance to look into the Framptons. If he comes up with useful information, I may just forgive him.”

Kathleen laughed.

“
Oh, my stars,” Annie exclaimed as they crossed Fifth Street. “What a difference a block makes!”

On this stretch of Harrison, the small businesses had a decidedly melancholy air. Peeling paint, grimy windows, and boarded up doors provided a definite contrast to the prosperity in evidence the block before. When they had reached nearly the middle of the block, trying to find an address that wasn’t obscured, Kathleen stopped and pointed across the street.

“
Ma’am, you said the Framptons lived at 525 Harrison, didn’t you? It must be that large place in the center of the block across from us. It’s ever so fine! I didn’t think they would have such a grand place.”

Kathleen was pointing at a large dark brown house, which was indeed an imposing edifice. This classic Italianate, with the usual flat roof supported by thick brackets, was topped by a short squat cupola, whose arched double windows gave the odd impression of eyes peeking out at the top of the house. The front doorway was framed on each side with narrow double windows, a pattern repeated in the three windows on the second story, and each window had buff-colored shutters that matched the color of the brackets and the cornices along all the edges of the house. Unlike her own home that sat cheek by jowl with its neighbors, this house sat gracefully in the middle of a large lot, set a bit back from the street, a carriage drive on the left and a garden on the right.

My, the Framptons must be doing quite well to be able to afford such a house
, Annie thought to herself.
Such a shame that this prosperity has been built on the pain and delusion of men and women like Sukie Vetch!

The brown and buff paint on the Framptons’ house looked fresh, in stark contrast to the paint on the rest of the houses on the block. The house to its left, although equal in size, had stripes of what must have been its original pale yellow paint alternating with the gray weathered boards, reminding her of a butterscotch tabby cat she had when she was a child. The slightly askew shutters, the missing shingles on the mansard roof, and the padlock and chain around a rusting front gate advertised this as an abandoned house. The house to the right of the Framptons’ was in better repair, and the smoke rising from its chimney testified to occupancy, but its landscaping had run amok. The house was covered with half-dead vines, tall weeds were cheerfully destroying the front walkway, and a row of shaggy firs menaced the fence between this house and the Framptons’ residence.

Annie, checking to see that there wasn’t a wagon or carriage coming down the street, grabbed Kathleen’s gloved hand and pulled her across Harrison to stand at the foot of a short flight of steps that led to a gate in the low wrought iron fence. She glanced over and saw Kathleen pat at the small straw hat sitting at a jaunty angle amidst her curls and then square her shoulders under the tight bodice of her neat herringbone wool dress, as if going into battle.

“
Kathleen, you look the perfect lady’s maid. You will puff up my consequence with the Framptons splendidly. Is the hat new? It is really quite fetching.”

“
Thank you, ma’am, I bought it with last month’s wages.” Kathleen smiled up at her and said, “Let’s go in before I lose my nerve.”

As Annie pushed through the gate and walked toward the small porch at the entrance to the house, she noticed that on closer examination the front of the house revealed a slightly different picture of the Framptons’ prosperity. She could see the glossy brown paint had been hastily applied over the previous un-sanded layers, producing the texture of a scabrous reptile that would most likely begin to peel away with the first storm of winter. To her right, a break in the neatly trimmed hedge dividing the front yard from the side yard provided a glimpse into a garden badly gone to seed, a tangle of weeds and vines that were choking whatever flower beds had existed previously. Even the front door, while a lovely polished oak glowing in the afternoon sun, was marred by a series of long raw scratches above the brass door handle. Unbidden, she saw the image of a decaying corpse, cosmetically enlivened by the embalmer’s arts. Annie shivered as she raised her hand to pull on the doorbell.

“
Mrs. Crindle, Physical and Test Medium, 681 Mission and Third. Correct information on stocks. Circles Friday, Sunday, Tuesday, 50c. Sittings, $1.” —
San Francisco Chronicle
, 1879

“
Mrs. Fuller, so pleased to make your acquaintance. Do have a seat. May Albert pour you some tea, or perhaps some sherry, before he goes?”

Annie permitted Simon Frampton only a brief second to shake her hand before slipping free and turning towards the chair he had pointed out, saying, “No, thank you, Mr. Frampton, that will not be necessary.”

Albert, an imposingly broad-shouldered, middle-aged man dressed in the formal livery of an upper-class butler, bowed slightly to her and pulled the chair back so she could sit down. After nodding her thanks, Annie sat, placing her small beaded purse in her lap before looking up at Mr. Frampton, who stood smiling down at her from the other side of an imposing mahogany desk.

Simon Frampton was a surprise. As had been Albert. When Annie finished ringing the front doorbell, the last person she expected to greet her was a formal butler. She found herself wondering if they had brought Albert over from England with them, and, if so, if he had any other special duties beyond that of butler? And who calls the butler by their first name?

Mr. Frampton, like Albert, revealed his origins in his British accent, but what surprised Annie was how his voice and demeanor quietly asserted that he was an upper-class English gentleman. She realized she had expected Simon Frampton to represent one or the other of the two kinds of Spiritualist impresarios she had encountered in Boston. There were the businessmen, whose waistcoats were always a little too flashy and a little too tight, since shopping the afterlife clearly had provided the cash for sartorial and gastronomical over-indulgence. Then there were the purported ministers or professors, who seemed determined to prove their ready access to a “higher plane” through the emaciated nature of their physique and the seediness of their apparel.

Simon Frampton was entirely different. He was only of moderate height, and he was slim, yet conveyed an impression of strength. He wore a conservative but well-tailored black frock coat, with matching waistcoat and trousers, blindingly white starched collar and cuffs with heavy gold studs. The tasteful navy and burgundy paisley of his silk cravat offered the only hint of color.

There was a sprinkle of gray at his temples, yet his neatly trimmed mustache and beard were quite as black and glossy as the rest of the full head of hair that framed regular features. In fact, on the surface, there was nothing remarkable about Simon Frampton, except the cultured tone of his voice and the intensity of his gaze.

Annie held that gaze, and then looked down again at her lap, her heart pounding. As Madam Sibyl, she made a living by her ability to judge men. Her disastrous marriage had taught her the danger of resting that judgment on what a man wore or what he said. She had learned to dig deeper, gleaning information about the true nature of a person from the tilt of the head, the nervous tap of a finger, the odd habits of phrase, and the slight shift of the eyes. What she had never before encountered was a stare that conveyed such assurance and power. For a split second she had felt a physical pull so strong that she wasn’t sure she hadn’t actually leaned forward towards the man.

“
Dear Mrs. Fuller, don’t be nervous,” Frampton said, sitting down at the desk, “this interview will be completely painless, I assure you. It is really for your benefit. The spirits are such sensitive creatures that they will not tolerate any sort of disharmony. Therefore, it is of the utmost importance that each circle be composed of like-minded souls.”

Annie’s heart rate slowed.
Good, he has misjudged my reaction as shyness. Of course that is how I should play this role, timid, easily flustered.

“
Oh, Mr. Frampton,” Annie glanced up and back down again, letting her voice catch slightly on the first word, “I am afraid I am feeling very unsettled. I’m not even sure why I wrote you. I happened to see your advertisement. Normally I never look at such things, but for some reason it called out to me. I felt compelled to write, as if my dear departed father were whispering in my ear.”

Annie took another artificially short breath and looked up at Frampton, who continued to smile at her encouragingly. “Do you think that is possible? I have been so lost since his death. There was my husband. But, you see, John never understood the bond that I had with my father, and then he died too.” Annie paused, giving a small sigh.

“
Mrs. Fuller, you must believe that the bonds we have on earth are not lightly broken, even by death itself. Do let me get you some sherry, and we will have a comfortable chat.”

As Frampton got up from behind the desk and went over to the sideboard, Annie took advantage of his turned back to glance around. When the butler, Albert, had ushered her into the library, her first impression had been polished wood gleaming in soft lamplight. Now she also saw that a set of dark brown velvet curtains covered the windows, and all the rest of the walls were filled with floor to ceiling bookshelves. A striking oriental carpet of vibrant greens and browns covered almost the entire floor, and Annie could feel its soft deep pile under her feet.

I wonder if they brought the carpet with them from England as well?
Annie had an absurd image of Albert walking off a ship’s gangplank, the rolled carpet on his shoulder.
I can’t imagine it came with the house. It certainly fits with the overall impression of wealth and good breeding that Mr. Frampton is cultivating.

Since Annie had been careful to cultivate a similar image for the parlor in which Madam Sibyl met her clients, she fully appreciated Frampton’s motives. She felt sure that a young woman like Sukie Vetch would have been suitably impressed.

Frampton placed the sherry, in a delicate cut-glass goblet, in Annie’s hand, pulled a chair over, and sat across from her, their knees practically touching, saying, “Mrs. Fuller, you believe that it was your father, Mr. Edward Stewart, who guided you to us?”

Annie took a small sip of the sherry, sending a small apology to Miss Hamilton, her English Literature teacher under whose tutelage she had taken the “temperance pledge” at the age of sixteen. She then put down the glass on the small table Frampton had placed at her side, saying, “Yes, I feel quite sure it was he. However, I am unclear why he should want to communicate with me now. He has been gone for over six years.”

“
If all goes as we hope, he will be able to tell you himself,” said Frampton, leaning over to take Annie’s hand, giving it a warm squeeze. “Now, why don’t you tell me a little bit about your father. Remember I only want to determine if the Friday circle will be right for you. I find that a person’s memories of the departed reveal a great deal about whether they will feel comfortable in the presence of the other spirits attending a particular circle.”

Annie let Frampton continue to caress her hand, glad that she had decided to keep her gloves on for this meeting. Then she pulled away and opened her purse to take out a handkerchief, which she used to dab at imaginary tears as she began to talk about her father.

“
Oh, my, I don’t know. He was a very serious man, always reading the paper and rushing off to business meetings when I was little. Then my mother became ill, and we moved to Los Angeles. Well, a ranch outside of Los Angeles. We had been living here in San Francisco before that. Those years on the ranch were wonderful. Father took me riding. Percy was my horse’s name, a bay. I had my own saddle, and father even let me go on roundup in the fall. Once there was a stampede; I was very frightened. But the little calves were ever so cunning. Mother would be quite cross when I got back, said I was turning into a hoyden. She was a schoolteacher before she married father, so she taught me my sums. I was good at math, not so good at spelling. Then she died.”

Annie let her prattle stop at this point, again using her handkerchief to good effect.
That should give him enough information to work on
, she thought.

“
I am so sorry, Mrs. Fuller. How old were you when your mother passed?”

“
Twelve. I don’t remember much about it; I was here visiting my Aunt Agatha and Uncle Timothy when she died.” Annie paused, then pushed away that painful memory and continued to feed Frampton information, most of which he could easily verify if he had any sources among the San Francisco businessmen who knew her father. She hoped to keep him from feeling the need to dig any deeper in her past, or present.

“
Father took me back east after my mother died. On a large ship, all the way round Cape Horn. We moved to New York City and lived in this ever so grand townhouse. But I didn’t get to see so much of him any more. I attended a very exclusive female academy. I hadn’t had any girls to play with on the ranch, and now I had lots. There were classes, and debate society, and on Saturdays there were piano lessons, and in the afternoon, Cotillion.”