Chapter Seven

The fourth floor of the Emerald Arch Apartments was nearly identical to the third. Light stumbled meekly out of the dirty oil lamps, testing the floor without really diving down to brighten it. Jackaby hastened to 412 and knocked loudly.

“What are we looking for, exactly?” I whispered to my employer as we waited. I could hear the shuffling of motion from within the room.

“I don’t know,” answered Jackaby, “but I’m excited to find out, aren’t you?”

The door opened to a middle-aged man in an undershirt, pressed trousers, and suspenders. He held a damp towel, and daubs of shaving cream clung around the corners of his jawline. “Yes?” he said.

Jackaby looked the man up and down. “No, sorry. Wrong room,” he declared. “You’re clearly just a man.” With no further explanation, he left the confused fellow to his morning.

Jackaby rapped firmly on 411, and a woman answered. She wore a clean, simple, white dress buttoned neatly up to her neck, and her red hair was tied back in a prim bun. “Hello? What is it? I already told the last one that I didn’t see a thing.” Her accent was distinctly Irish, and edged with quiet annoyance.

“Simply a woman,” said Jackaby after another cursory examination. “No use. My apologies.” He turned on his heel and advanced toward number 410.

The woman, having been far less satisfied with the encounter than Jackaby, came out of her room. “And just what do you mean by that?” she demanded.

I did my very best to blend into the wallpaper as she stalked after the detective. Charlie, I noticed, had taken a keen interest in the points of his well-polished shoes.

“Simply a woman?” she repeated. “Nothing simple about it! I’ve had enough of the likes of you, going on about the weaker sex, and such. Twig like you, care to see who’s weaker?”

Jackaby called backward without looking behind him, “I mean only that you’re of no use at this time.”

Charlie shook his head.

The woman bristled. “I am an educated woman, a nurse, and a caregiver! How dare you . . .”

Jackaby turned at last. “Madam, I assure you, I meant only that you are not special.”

I cupped a palm over my face.

The woman reddened several shades. Jackaby smiled at her in what I’m certain he felt was a reassuring and pleasant manner following a reasonable explanation. He seemed prepared to let the whole thing wash away as a friendly misunderstanding. What he was not prepared for, apparently, was to be socked in the face.

It was not a ladylike swat or symbolic gesture. The force of it actually spun the detective halfway around, and his trip to the ground was interrupted only briefly by the wall catching him on the ear on the way down.

The woman loomed over him, all silky white linen and fury. “Not special? Simply a woman? I am Mona O’Connor. I come from a proud line of O’Connors, stretching back to the kings and queens of Ireland, and I’ve got more fight in me than a wet sock of a man like you could ever hope to muster. What do you have to say about that?”

Jackaby sat up, swaying slightly. He waggled his jaw experimentally, then snapped his attention to his attacker. Thoughts rolled across his gray eyes like clouds in a thunderstorm. “You said O’Connor?”

“That’s right. Have a problem with the Irish, too, do you?” Miss O’Connor squared her jaw and looked down the bridge of her nose at Jackaby, daring him to confirm the prejudice.

Jackaby climbed to his feet, dusted off his coat, which clinked and jingled as the contents of various pockets resettled, and tossed his scarf back over one shoulder. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Miss O’Connor. I don’t suppose you have a roommate?”

Mona’s stance faltered. She looked briefly to Charlie and me, finding only equal bewilderment, and then back at the detective. He smiled at her again with charming, innocent curiosity. The left side of his face was red, and the outlines of four dainty fingers were slowly gaining definition. He was behaving in precisely the manner in which a man who had just been walloped across the face should not behave.

“An old relative, perhaps?” he prompted, continuing as though nothing had happened, “Or a family friend? Been around since you were just a girl, I imagine.”

The red left Mona’s face.

“Getting on in years, I expect, but hard to place just how many?” Jackaby persisted. “Been around as far back as you can remember, and yet she seems just as old in your memory as she is today?”

The rest of the color left Mona’s face as well.

“How did you . . . ?” she began.

“My name is R. F. Jackaby, and I would very much like to meet her, if you don’t mind,” he said.

Mona’s brow tensed, but her resolve had clearly been shaken. “My mum . . . My mum made me promise I’d look after her.”

“I mean her no harm, you have my word.”

“She’s having one of her . . . one of her spells. I . . . Look, I’m sorry about—er—that business earlier, but I think you’d better come back some other time.”

“Miss O’Connor, it is my belief that lives hang in the balance, and so I’m afraid the time is now. I promise to help in any way I can with her spell. May we please come in?”

Miss O’Connor, her guard now thoroughly shattered, walked back to her open door. She paused in indecision for just a moment, then stood aside and gestured for us to enter.

The layout of the apartment was familiar, but it felt cleaner and somehow more open than the other two. Soft daylight drifted through the white curtains to brighten a table with a simple brown tablecloth. This was topped with lace doilies, a vase of fresh flowers, a white porcelain wash basin, and a pitcher. The sofa was small, but well stuffed, with a thick quilt draped over it. In the corner sat a wooden rocking chair. The room was cozy and inviting, a striking contrast to the gruesome scene downstairs.

“Have a seat if you like,” said Mona, and I gratefully accepted the invitation. As I sank into the cushions, I became aware of the toll that the morning’s cold sidewalks had taken on my poor feet.

Officer Cane thanked the woman politely but remained standing by the door. In the light of the room, I got a good look at him for the first time. He really was quite young to be a police detective, even a junior one. While he held himself poised and alert, the angle of his dark eyebrows betrayed a hint of insecurity, and he had to periodically straighten his posture, as though actively resisting a natural urge to slink into himself. His eyes caught mine, and he looked away at once. I hurried my own gaze back to Jackaby and the woman.

Miss O’Connor trod gently to the bedroom door. Jackaby followed, pulling the knit cap from his head as he did. I craned my neck to watch as they slipped in. There were two beds in the room on opposite walls, and just enough room for a shared nightstand between them. The nightstand held a dog-eared book and a silver hairbrush. One bed lay empty, its sheets tucked tightly with hospital corners. The other contained a woman with long, white hair. She wore a pale nightgown and was propped up slightly on her pillows. She seemed to be rocking gently, but more I couldn’t see as Mona and Jackaby stepped into the room in front of her.

“We have a guest,” said Mona. “Mr. . . . Jackaby, was it? This is Mrs. Morrigan.”

“Mrs. Morrigan. Of course you are,” said Jackaby, gently. He knelt down beside the figure. “Hello, Mrs. Morrigan. It’s an honor. Can you hear me?”

I shifted across the sofa until I could just see the old woman beyond Jackaby. She was slender and fair-skinned, her hair a medley of silver and white, but it was her face that captured my attention. Her thin, gray eyebrows contorted in a mournful expression. Her lips were thin and taut, and quavered slightly as she drew a deep breath. Then her head fell back, and her mouth opened wide in a tragic pantomime of a scream. My chest tightened in sympathy for the poor, tortured woman.

Her jaw trembled as she expelled the last of her breath, and I became aware of the overwhelming silence. She inhaled again slowly, and her whole body poured itself into another scream, but still not an audible whisper escaped her delicate lips.

A chill tingled up my spine. Beyond the obvious strangeness of the spectacle, there was something more profoundly unsettling about the woman’s muted cries. An indefinable spasm of grief and dread shuddered through me. Was this the life that Jackaby led? Death and madness and despair behind every door?

“She gets this way, from time to time,” Mona explained to the detective in a voice just above a whisper. “Always has. She can’t control them. They’re like seizures . . . only not like any I’ve seen in any of my medical books. Back home, she would go weeks, sometimes months without any problems. It was supposed to be better here, but we’ve barely had the apartment for a week and now this . . . It’s the worst she’s had. Hasn’t stopped since yesterday.”

“Since yesterday?” Jackaby asked.

“Yes, early yesterday morning, and on all through the night.”

Mrs. Morrigan’s body sagged as the air left her lungs again. Her eyelids flickered open for an instant, and she looked to Jackaby. Her hand reached weakly toward him, and he held it gently, the most human gesture I’d yet seen from the man; then her eyes closed, and the miserable cycle of silent screaming resumed.

Jackaby leaned in very close and whispered something in the woman’s ear. Mona watched him with concern. Mrs. Morrigan opened her eyes again and gave the detective a somber nod. She resumed her muted cries, but her body relaxed slightly into the pillows. Jackaby laid her hand tenderly back on the bed and rose to his feet.

“Thank you,” he said aloud, and stepped out into the apartment’s main room. Mona followed, shutting the door quietly behind them.

The detective pushed his dark, unruly hair roughly backward and screwed the cap back onto his head.

“What did you say to her?” asked Mona.

Jackaby considered his response. “Nothing of consequence. Miss O’Connor, thank you for your time. I’m afraid I cannot help Mrs. Morrigan’s condition for the moment, but if it comes as any consolation, this episode will resolve itself by sometime tonight.”

“Tonight?” she said. “You seem so sure.”

Jackaby stepped into the hallway and turned back. I stood up and slipped out after him. “I feel quite confident, yes. Take good care of your patient, Miss O’Connor. Good day.”

We were at the stairwell before I heard her shut the door behind us. Charlie and I burst at once into questions. What had he said? What kind of seizures were those? How could he be so sure they would end tonight?

“She isn’t seizing, she’s keening, and she will stop tonight because by tomorrow morning Mr. Henderson will be dead.” Jackaby’s voice was without emotion, save perhaps a hint of interest such as a botanist might exhibit when discussing a rare orchid. “Mrs. Morrigan is a banshee.”

The word hung in the air for several steps.

“Keening?” asked Charlie.

“She’s a banshee?” I blurted. “That old woman? So she’s our killer?”

“Our killer?” Jackaby stopped on the landing and turned toward me. I stumbled to a stop. “How in heaven’s name did you make that leap?”

“Well, that’s what you said, wasn’t it? There had been something inhuman in the victim’s room? Something ancient? And banshees . . . Those are the ones whose scream can kill you, right? Aren’t they the ones who . . . scream you to death?”

My words petered out and slipped into the shadows, embarrassed to be seen with me. The look Jackaby was giving me was not unkind, but rather one of pity. It was a look that one might give to a particularly simple puppy who had thrown herself off the bed in pursuit of her own tail.

“So, not our killer?”

“No,” said Jackaby.

“Well, that’s good, then.” I swallowed.

“Keening,” said Jackaby, turning back to Charlie, “is an expression of grief for the dead.” He turned and continued his explanation as we resumed our descent. “Traditionally, women called ‘keeners’ would sing a somber lament at Irish funerals.

“A few families, it was said, had fairy folk as their keeners. These fairy women, who came from the other side of the mounds, were called the ‘women of the side,’ which, in Irish, comes out something like ‘ban-shee.’ They were devoted to their chosen families, and would sing the most mournful laments if ever a member of the house fell dead—even if they were far away and news of the tragedy had not yet reached the homestead. As you might have guessed, Miss O’Connor’s family was among these elite houses attended by a banshee.”

Jackaby paused abruptly to inspect a scuff in the wood of the stairs. Charlie, who was hot on the detective’s heels, had to catch himself on the banister to avoid toppling over the suddenly kneeling figure. Just as quickly, Jackaby stood and continued to climb downward. His gaze hunted the steps for something, but with the foot traffic of every tenant both coming and going, I doubted very much if any significant clues would present themselves here.

“Where was I?” he asked.

“Banshees,” prompted Charlie. “Crying for the folks at home, even if a member of the family died far away.”

“Right. So, the sound of the banshee’s wail became an omen of death. Consigned to their role, over the years, banshees grew still more sensitive. These fairy women gained a precognition, sensing the very approach of death. Rather than keening for the deceased’s surviving relatives, the banshees began to sing their terrible dirge directly to the doomed.

“They are still closely tied to their families, but as their power developed, it extended to all those in their presence. Any poor soul whose time drew near might hear the ominous cry, particularly those doomed to a violent and untimely end. Now, if you were an ill-fated traveler and you heard the wail, you knew death was on your heels. This makes them dreaded creatures, feared and hated by any who hear them, a treatment far disparate from the honor and appreciation they used to receive for their mourning services. Banshees themselves are not dangerous, though, just burdened with the task of expressing pain and loss.”

I thought of Mrs. Morrigan’s face, and was suddenly ashamed of my rash accusation. I was glad that Jackaby had shown her some tenderness, and I realized he had given her what little he could: his thanks.

“It is a kindness that you and I cannot hear the banshee’s wail,” he continued. “It is not meant for us. Henderson hears it because it is his lament, and his alone. Our victim in room 301 heard it also, I’d wager, before his untimely demise. Mrs. Morrigan has scarcely been given a moment’s rest from her dutiful dirges.”

We were rounding the last flight of stairs, and the brightness of the lobby spilled into the stairwell.

“Should we do something for him?” asked Charlie, suddenly. “If a murderer is coming for Mr. Henderson, we can’t in good conscience just wait and let him be taken! Could we move him—hide him? Post guards around his room?”

Jackaby stepped into the lobby. By now the sun was high in the late-morning sky. Clouds blanketed a snow-dusted world, and the soft whiteness of it was blinding. “If it eases your conscience to try, then go right ahead. It will make little difference, though. If he hears the banshee’s cry, then Mr. Henderson’s fate is sealed.”