"No. That figure was real. I saw it at the previous seance, in three stages: boy, man and elder prophet. So did Agatha Welk. The others saw something then too, but they took it for a hologram programmed by the haunted-house operators. They never saw it with the detail I did, especially when it appeared last behind Gandolph, before he was dead, the mouth saying something--"
"Temple, you've had a trying time. Sit back, relax, drink your drink."
"You're sounding complacent, Max, and I find that annoying."
"I know better than to annoy a redhead, unless she wants me to."
"Well, you're rubbing me the wrong way now. I know what I saw. I mean it! I finally know what I saw, and it wasn't Houdini and it certainly wasn't phantoms from the ingenious mind of Max Kinsella."
He was silent.
Temple picked up the rose. "This is lovely. Thanks. But.. .you gave it to me for the wrong reason."
"How so?"
"You remember when I was trying to come up with the word?"
"Wonderfully ingenious. I had no idea you had researched Houdini enough to know the whole Rosabelle routine. Worked perfectly with my illusions to unhinge the mediums. That's what finally did the trick and loosened their tongues. When you came up with 'Rosabelle.'"
"That's just it, Max. I didn't come up with 'Rosabelle.' "
"But... you said it."
"No, I started to say something like it, and the mediums jumped on it. We've all been looking for the wrong ghost. It's like you always say. People see what they expect to see. People hear what they expect to hear. Even Max Kinsella. Sometimes."
He was listening now, his face serious, sober.
"I was trying desperately to remember the one true thing I saw at the other seance: the figure through the window. And the last time I saw him, the last thing I saw was his lips forming a word over and over. A last voiceless word. He stood right behind Gandolph, and I think he was trying to warn him of danger."
"Why would any ghost want to warn Gandolph.. . unless it was his dead mother--?"
Temple shook her head. "This ghost has a lot in common with Houdini and Gandolph. And you. 'Ghost' isn't an adequate word. 'Spirit' is better. This was a spirit that would not be quenched in life, despite many reasons. A man who was born in Wisconsin on a date very near Houdini's amended birth date. A man who was deeply attached to his mother, though she died when he was still a child. A magician with an intimate connection to Gandolph, and even to you.
"And I didn't realize that until I searched for the word. I work with words. I write them. I used to say them in front of a camera. I can't lip-read, but I have a certain instinct. So I was trying to sound out that unspoken two-syllable word."
"Not 'Rosabelle'?" Max looked bewildered, but like a believer.
Temple shook her head.
"I was just getting it when they interrupted me and declared it to be 'Rosabelle.' But it wasn't."
"What was it, then?"
"One word, a last word, from long ago."
"Temple, don't tease me."
She took a deep breath and inhaled the rose's scent first. And last.
"Rosebud."
Max and Temple were back on the dance floor, stunned in the spotlight.
After a long time, Max spoke.
"The arguing voices the neighbors heard Halloween night."
"Yes?"
"I have an idea, but we'll have to go back to the house."
"Fine."
"Can you wait until after dinner?"
"No."
"Too bad we're not talking about something else."
"First things first."
"I still can't believe it."
"I don't expect you to."
"It changes everything."
"Not everything, but a lot. We'd better go."
Max pulled her closer and rested his chin on the top of her head. "One more number; it helps me think."
"That's a new one."
"The music. Cryptographers use music to get themselves in a decoding mood. Very mathematical and inspiring, music."
Temple smiled. After what she'd told Max, she felt like being held, because the implications were very scary. Being held on a dance floor was both stimulating and safe. Max seemed to think so, too, as they swayed together.
"Oooh! What was that?" Temple asked after a dramatic move.
"A dip. I understand that they're all the rage."
"Where'd you learn to do a dip?"
"Danny Dove isn't a bad example."
"You were all over the romance convention too?"
"Maybe I needed to learn a thing or two."
"I don't think so."
They spun in a tight circle as the music shifted into the intro for another instrumental.
Words were running through Temple's mind. Rosebud. Halloween. Ghosts. Midnight Louie.
Black magic. Spells. That old black magic . ..
Those last words weren't thought, or merely mouthed without sound, or even spoken. They were sung! Temple looked up, appalled, at Max.
He was staring over her head, appalled. "Damn! She's supposed to be investigating a transient murder on the north side."
Instead, Molina's contralto was crooning softly over the micro-phone.
Max backed them out of the light and off the dance floor. They slunk along the sidelines to the door, where Max thrust some bills at the headwaiter.
"Emergency. Got to leave. For that table over there. Waitress in the ruffly thing."
"Max, they're all in ruffly things," Temple whispered as they tiptoed out, much good as discretion did now. "Did she see us? I couldn't bear to look."
"She's onstage. The lights are in her eyes. She wasn't expecting us."
"And vice versa. So she couldn't see us."
"Probably did." Max sounded resigned.
"My purse!" Temple stopped dead in the parking lot.
Max reached into his jacket and produced it.
"Oh, thank God."
She stopped again. "My rose!"
He reached into his pocket, came up with a ten-dollar bill folded into a rose. "I'll have to make you another one."
Temple shook her head. "If she's seen you?"
"What can she do?"
"Arrest you."
"Find me first." He let her in the car and went around. "Sorry about dinner."
"At least we hadn't ordered yet."
"I've still got the linguini Alfredo."
"Done."
The drive back to the house wasn't as self-conscious as the earlier drive.
"I'm almost afraid to go in," Temple commented when they stood in the garage before the connecting door to the house.
"It's not haunted."
The kitchen was so big and impressive it was impossible to be scared once Max had turned on all the under- and over-counter lights.
He rummaged in the cabinets, then turned to consult her. "Do you want to eat here or on the opium bed?"
"You don't eat on that priceless bed?" Temple envisioned cracker crumbs in the fretwork.
"Ah, no," Max admitted. "I thought we could eat... after."
"I think we better talk ... first."
"First wine, then." He ducked through the glass door to emerge with another rare bottle of something. "At least we can drink on the opium bed."
"You seem a little fixated."
"It's comfortable. Besides, all Gary's furniture is huge and clubby. It's my turn to confide a few home truths; let me choose the confessional, at least."
Glasses and wine bottle accompanied them to the bedroom where the opium bed provided the exotic centerpiece.
Temple had to step out of the Midnight Louie shoes like a good little geisha girl before climbing onto the embroidered satin coverlet. The bed was built like a latticed house, even a sort of gazebo, with open roof and sides. It was as cozy as a children's playhouse on a rainy day, despite the inlaid cinnabar and mother-of-pearl Temple could see why Max liked lounging there; it was vast enough to accommodate his length both ways. He installed the wine bottle on a table behind the bed's low back, then settled into a pillow-piled corner.
Temple sat cross-legged beside him, sipping her wine.
"What's your theory?" he asked.