The Barker Street Regulars

but really very rude.”
    “In his, uh, recent communications?” I was surprised. I’d always imagined the dead as more courteous than the living, why I’m not sure. Did the Book of Judgment have an appendix devoted to etiquette?
    “No, no, no. All is forgiven now. Jonathan simply did not understand, and Irene naturally has extensive experience in coping very tactfully with the ignorance and hostility of skeptical materialists.”
    “So Jonathan actually met Irene? Before, uh, his—”
    “Before he died. Once one comprehends the word in its true sense, Holly, there is no longer any need to avoid it. All events have their place in the great hierarchy of the cosmos. Death, too. Of course, passing on does express the literal truth. But death, you see, is not death as the agnostic understands it. It is but a trance state. Or as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle so beautifully phrased it, the door is not shut, but merely ajar.”
    I was astounded. “The Sir Arthur Conan Doyle?”
    “Spiritualism was the great passion of his existence in this sphere. Those silly detective stories were simply a diversion. Once he made the Great Discovery, he devoted himself to spreading the joyful news.”
    “The same Sir Arthur Conan Doyle?”
    Put out, Ceci said, “From the moment he departed this life, he has communicated very generously with those who listen. I certainly don’t find anything so surprising about it. After all, When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. ”
    “I suppose so,” I said.
    “Would you care to see Simon’s footprints?” Ceci asked.
     

Chapter Thirteen
     
    B UNDLING HERSELF IN HER winter dog-walking outfit and arming herself with a flashlight, Ceci implored me in hushed tones to use common sense, as she phrased it, by keeping mum about what she’d just told me. “The unenlightened,” she confided, “readily misinterpret the experiences of those who truly see.” She continued, in an apparent non sequitur, “Take this Baker Street Irregulars nonsense. When you think about it, it’s childish, isn’t it? Pretending those imaginary people are real? These people are, after all, adults, and there they are giving themselves these silly nicknames—the Science Master, that’s Robert—and playing all those games about trivial Not that Althea is brainless, far from it, and neither was Ellis, who has, of course, come to view all that foolishness in perspective now, naturally, but a woman beyond the blush of first youth”—she pulled on the tam-o’-shanter—“is terribly vulnerable to misinterpretation and can be robbed far too easily of the opportunity to communicate with those who have passed beyond.”
    “Yes,” I said.
    “And stripped of her right to control her own life. And finances. Not that a guardian or whatever isn’t necessary for someone in Althea’s condition. Fortunately, Jonathan had her power of attorney, not that she has anything, really, but she’s as blind as a bat, you know, and if she fell into the clutches of some unscrupulous person, she’d sign any sort of document that was put in front of her, speaking of which, for goodness’ sake, who is going to manage Althea’s affairs now? There can’t be much more to it than writing checks to the nursing home, I suppose, but I really cannot be expected to deal with her affairs as well as my own. Where was I? Oh, in any event, it’s dreadful enough to have Althea locked up in that place, but there was no choice, really, and my own competence is perfectly evident, but one never knows what misunderstanding may arise, and I’m sure you’ll agree that one shudders to contemplate ending up in an institution merely because one has passed through the doors closed to, well, closed to closed minds.”
    With that, Ceci opened not the sort of door she was discussing, but one of the French doors to the terrace. “The path leads straight down,” she remarked. This time, the reference was not metaphysical. Ceci briskly inarched down the steps from the terrace to a bluestone walk that did, indeed, run straight down the sloping yard toward an area on which Robert and Hugh were now concentrating. The camera flashed.
    “Now, watch that you don’t trip the way Jonathan did!” Ceci called out. To me, she said, “We’ll have to go beyond the gate.”
    Of the pearly variety? But as we approached Hugh and Robert, I pulled out my flashlight and trained it directly ahead. I saw, framed by