Even as those three men were about to alight on the Altamonts’ doorstep, a certain young woman of whom Holmes and Watson had heard, but who had not yet confronted them, a pretender to psychic power named Sarah Kirkaldy, accompanied by her even younger brother Abraham, was paying a visit to the Altamont family burial ground. The living members of that family had no more idea than the dead ones that the Kirkaldys were there, and it appeared to the brother and sister on entering the small cemetery that except for themselves the place was utterly deserted.
Sarah, who had prospered greatly in the last couple of years, was well-dressed, dark-haired and attractive, lately well-fed and almost plump, normally busy and bustling in her manner. Her object this afternoon in calling upon her clients’ dear departed relatives had nothing at all to do with establishing communication links between this world and the next–in Sarah’s view only gulls and fools believed such visiting back and forth was possible. Instead, her purpose was eminently mundane and practical–to note down as many as possible of the names and dates engraved upon this library of tombstones which extended back in time for several centuries. Using this material, in conjunction with stories and traditions acquired locally, it should be possible to construct a useful family history.
Experience had convinced Sarah that such a history (nowadays we might call it a database) could be an asset of inestimable value in the séance room, useful in providing identities, credible subjects for conversation to be introduced by talking spirits just arrived from the Great beyond.
Originally Sarah had wanted to conclude this graveyard reconnaissance before the first séance with Mrs. Altamont. but, because of various circumstances, the expedition had had to be postponed until now. And in fact even now the attempt to note down names and dates had not got beyond the first page of the small notebook–because in the past week Sarah had been forced to the conclusion that another matter was far more urgent. That was the real reason she had made the effort this afternoon to get her brother out away from the house, well away from eavesdropping servants and distractions, out here in the open where she could bully him freely, argue with him fiercely if necessary, at all costs get something settled between them that had to be put right.
Abraham, a rather tall, thin youth with mouse-colored hair and an irregular face (in fact he would have made a good stand-in for Poe’s Roderick Usher) stood at the moment staring–though not as if he were actively looking for anything in particular–at the walls of the Altamont mausoleum. This was a rather elaborate construction the size of a two-room cabin or bungalow, mostly marble, decorated by some early Victorian angels and allegorical figures, statues and basreliefs carved in soft stone and already weathering away. There were no real windows. The massive single door, itself securely locked, was also defended by an extra, outer guard of barred iron gates placed at the entry to the small porch. by now, approximately three weeks after Louisa’s funeral, the flowers which had then been deposited both inside and outside her tomb had long since faded and died.
At the moment Sarah was holding notebook and pencil together in one hand, both objects for the moment forgotten. Staring intently at her brother, she asked in a low, sympathetic voice: “Do y’ feel like talkin’ t’ me yet, Abe? Having a real talk?”
Abraham did not immediately look at her. It took him a little time to come up with a reply. “About what?” His voice was soft and tentative, as if here in the cemetery he might be afraid of awaking ghosts.
“You know what. About what happened the last time we sat round the table in the dark. When Mrs. Altamont was with us. It’s a week and a day now.”
No response.
“It’s nae guid, Abe, to just keep on putting me off. We’ve got t’ talk aboot it, before tonight.” Sarah paused again; a Scottish burr that she usually tried to repress, or modify, had begun to show in her speech. “If we dinna talk aboot it now, we might as well forget aboot tonight’s sitting; because I’m nae gang to do it.”
Abraham’s mouth opened, but closed again, hopelessly, without having produced an answer. He turned away.
With relentless patience, the girl walked round him to stand again directly in his line of sight. “That’s it, see. Either talk aboot it, solve it somehow, or gi’e up the whole business. Nae more doin’ spirit-sittin’s for the gentry. Gi’e up and change our names again, and maybe go back t’ hoosehold service, where we were two years ago... if we could get any references now.”
Her brother’s face was becoming heavily clouded with some deep emotion; but still he had nothing to say.
“Abe, you remember what’twas like–being in service? I remember it–verra weel!”
Turning in a small circle like a bewildered animal, he scraped and scuffed his expensive boots in the tall and unkempt grass. He looked decidedly unhappy.
Sarah was not going to let him turn away from her. “If we dinna talk now, Abe, you’d best make your plans to gae back t’ yon. Scrubbin’ oot chamber-pots and livin’ in a closet. because what happened eight days ago scared me, bad. I ken it scared you too. but maybe if we talk aboot it we can find some way t’ go on.”
Still no comment. but Sarah, who knew her brother, decided he was really listening now. She dropped her voice to a more confidential tone. “Let’s just go over what happened last time, love. Ye’ll do that much for me. All right?”
Abe nodded, minimally.
“All right. We sat doon wi’ the auld–wi’ Mrs. Altamont. Things began proper enough, just aboot the way we always do them. Right?”
Another nod.
“Then you went intae your trance–”
Abraham winced, as at a painful memory. He said, in a voice not
