The Luminaries

One of the diggers pulled the widow to safety, and two others cleared the sofa; the fire was doused with shawls and blankets; the lamp was knocked away; everyone was talking at once. Charlie Frost, wheeling round in the sudden darkness, saw that Anna Wetherell had not moved, and her expression had notchanged. The sudden blaze of the fire did not seem to have alarmed her in the slightest.
    Someone lit the lamp.
    ‘Was that it? Was that what was supposed to happen?’
    ‘What did she say?’
    ‘Clear a space, would you?’
    ‘Coo—to see us all lit up like that!’
    ‘Some kind of primitive—’
    ‘Make sure she’s breathing.’
    ‘Have to admit, I didn’t expect—’
    ‘Did it mean anything, do you think? What she said? Or was it—’
    ‘That wasn’t Emery Staines, sure as I’m—’
    ‘Another spirit? Working through—’
    ‘The way the lamp moved of its own accord like that!’
    ‘We ought to ask the johnnies. Hi! Was that Chinese?’
    ‘Does he understand?’
    ‘Was that Chinese, that she was speaking just now?’
    But Ah Quee did not appear to understand the question. One of the diggers leaned over and tapped him on the shoulder.
    ‘What was that, eh?’ he said. ‘What was it that she said? Was it Chinese, what she was saying? Or some other tongue?’
    Ah Quee returned his gaze without understanding, and did not speak. It was Ah Sook who answered.
    ‘Lydia Wells speak Cantonese,’ he said.
    ‘Yes?’ Nilssen said eagerly, swivelling about. ‘And what did she say?’
    Ah Sook studied him. ‘“One day I come back and kill you. You kill a man. He die—so you die. I come back and kill you, one day.”’
    Nilssen’s eyes went wide; his next question died on his lips. He turned to Anna—who was looking at Ah Sook, her expression faintly perplexed. Charlie Frost was frowning.
    ‘Where’s Staines in all of that?’ demanded one of the diggers.
    Ah Sook shook his head. ‘Not Staines,’ he said quietly. He got up from his cushion suddenly, and walked to the window, folding his arms.
    ‘Not Staines?’ said the digger. ‘Who then?’
    ‘Francis Carver,’ said Ah Sook.
    There was an explosion of outrage around the room.
    ‘Francis Carver? How’s that for a
séance
—when he isn’t even dead? Why—I could talk to Carver myself; I’d only have to knock upon his door!’
    ‘But he’s at the Palace,’ said another. ‘That’s fifty yards away from where we are.’
    ‘That’s not the point.’
    ‘I mean you can’t deny that
something
strange—’
    ‘I could have talked to Carver myself,’ the digger repeated, stubbornly . ‘I don’t need a medium for that.’
    ‘What about the lamp, though? How do you account for the lamp?’
    ‘It jumped across the room!’
    ‘It
levitated
.’
    Ah Sook had stiffened. ‘Francis Carver,’ he said, directing his question to Harald Nilssen. ‘At the Palace Hotel?’
    Nilssen frowned—surely Ah Sook knew this already! ‘Yes, Carver’s staying at the Palace,’ he said. ‘On Revell-street. The building with the blue edging, you know. Next to the hardware store.’
    ‘How long?’ said Ah Sook.
    Nilssen looked even more confused. ‘He’s been here for three weeks,’ he said, lowering his voice. ‘Since the night—I mean, since the
Godspeed
came to ground.’
    The other men were still arguing.
    ‘It’s not a
séance
unless it’s talking with the dead.’
    ‘No—when you talk to Carver, it’s
you
who ends up dead!’
    They laughed at this, and then the digger’s mate said, ‘Rum do, you’re thinking? Some kind of a hoax?’
    The stubborn digger looked inclined to agree, but he cast a glance over at Lydia Wells. The widow was still unconscious, and her face was very pale. Her mouth was partly open, showing the glint of a molar and a dry tongue, and her eyes were fluttering weakly beneath the lids. If she was shamming, the digger thought, then she was shamming extraordinarily well. But he had paid fora communion with Emery Staines. He had not paid to hear a string of Chinese syllables and then watch a woman fall into a faint. Why, how could he be sure that the words were even Chinese? She might have been speaking gibberish! The Chinese fellow might be in on the secret, and she might have paid him a fee, to corroborate the lie.
    But the digger had a cowardly temperament; he did not voice these opinions aloud. ‘Wouldn’t want to say,’ he said at last, but he still looked surly.
    ‘Well, we’ll ask her, when she