Lair of Dreams

The wind had picked up in advance of the predicted nor’easter. It whipped at the hand-painted banner Mabel and Jericho had hung above the museum’s front doors so that it appeared to spell out TIGHT! DIVERS BIT! Inside, Jericho and Mabel put the finishing touches on the Diviners exhibit. Mabel arranged the small triangles of watercress sandwiches she’d made on silver trays she’d borrowed from the Bennington’s dining room while Jericho put the last of the exhibit’s cards in place.

“Looks nice,” Mabel said, coming to stand beside him.

“It does at that,” Jericho agreed. “I couldn’t have done it without your help, Mabel. Thank you.”

You’re right, she thought. “You’re welcome,” she said.

Sam arrived, shaking the damp from his coat. “Getting ugly out there.”

“I hope it doesn’t keep people away,” Mabel fretted. “You look swell, Sam.”

“Thanks, Mabel. So do you. Where’s Evie?”

“I thought she was coming with you!” Mabel said.

Sam was half out of his coat. With a sigh, he shrugged it back on and buttoned up. He swiped a sandwich triangle from a tray and stuffed it into his mouth. “Keep the exhibit on ice. I’ll be back with the guest of honor.”

“You know where she is?” Mabel asked, rearranging the hole left by Sam’s sandwich grab.

“I got a pretty good idea.”

A short while later, Sam burst into the speakeasy beneath the Winthrop, threading quickly through the crowd. A knot of soused revelers bent over a fountain where someone had dropped a small hammerhead shark into the water. It lurked in the shallows, lost, as the partiers pointed and laughed. Evie held court at a table full of fashionable swells, men and women of facile smiles and fickle allegiances who seemed to be eating up every elocution-perfected word out of her mouth. The man sitting too close to her interrupted, spinning out a story that Sam was certain was a bore. He marched over and tapped Evie on the shoulder.

“Why, hello, Sam,” Evie said too brightly, and Sam knew she was halfway to drunk already.

“Evie, can I have a word?”

“See here, old boy, can’t this wait?” an older man with a thin mustache broke in. “Bertie was just telling us the most amusing story about—”

“I’m sure it’s a real knee-slapper, pal. I might need to go make out a will in the event I die of laughter. Evie, a word?”

“Well, I never,” one of the girls tutted.

“Doubtful,” Sam shot back.

Sensing trouble, Evie hopped up with a blithe “Keep my seat warm and my drink cold, darlings!” and followed Sam to a corner. Her beaded dress had come unstrung and she trailed tiny glass beads like an exotic, molting bird. “What’s the big idea, Sam? Why were you so rude to my friends?”

“Those are not your friends. Your real friends are wondering where you are. Did you forget?”

Evie’s blank expression told him that she had.

“The Diviners exhibit party at the museum. It’s tonight. You’re the guest of honor.”

Evie bit her lip and rubbed at her forehead. “Honestly, Sam. I can’t tonight.”

“Why? You sick?”

Sam pressed his lips to Evie’s forehead, and Evie’s stomach fluttered.

“No. But I… it was a bad show, Sam. Very bad.”

“You’ll have a better show next time.”

“No. You don’t understand,” Evie mumbled.

“I understand that you promised, Evie.”

“I know. I know I did. And I’m sorry. Truly, I am. But I—I can’t.”

Sam crossed his arms. “Why not?”

“I just can’t. That’s all. Oh, excuse me!” Evie called, flagging down a passing waiter. “Could you be an absolute darling and get me another Juice of the Venus de Milo?”

“Certainly, Miss O’Neill.”

“Do you know why they call it that? Because after two, you can’t feel your arms,” Evie said, trying for a smile though her head ached and her soul was weary. And now she was letting everybody down. Well, they’d get past it. It would all go fine without her. She couldn’t face all those people at the museum, not after tonight’s show. She could barely face Sam. He was staring at her with something bordering on contempt that pierced through the alcoholic fog she’d been sinking herself into for the past few hours.

“Is this all you want?” Sam asked bitterly. “A good time?”

“You’re one to talk!”

“I like a good time. But not all the time.” He held her gaze.

Evie blushed. “If you came here just to get a rise out of me, mission accomplished. You can scram.”

“Your friends are counting on you.”

“Their mistake,” Evie whispered. “You want me to go back to that museum? To talk about ghosts? You weren’t there in that house with that… that thing. You don’t know how it was!” Her eyes brimmed with tears as she spat out the words. “Ask Jericho. He knows. He understands what it was like.”

She wanted to wound now, and Sam’s flinch registered as one more sin she’d hate herself for come morning, but now that her tongue was loose, she couldn’t stop the words from tumbling out.