"I'se here," the voice cried. "It's Silver-Bell, mammy, I'se here."
I smiled to myself in the Harlem dusk. It was so obviously the usual racket. There was the medium in her ten cent trance—the voice of her "control" was coming through. I had only to ask and I would receive a vague and blotting paper reply to any question.
"I'se here, mammy," the child's voice repeated. "What you want, mammy? Silver-Bell's here."
Madam la Lune snorted and snored on the couch. My eyes had become more accustomed to the dim light and I noticed how she had loosened her blouse so that her superb bust rose in twin-peaked Kilimanjaro against the wall.
"Silver-Bell's here, mammy," the child's voice said again. "What you want?"
"I want," I said, "to speak to Frank Jacklin. He died in the North Pacific about three weeks ago."
There was a pause, during which the snorting breaths of the medium were the only sound in the smelly little room. Then the child's voice rose, shrill and petulant.
"You funning, mammy, you funning. They ain't no Jacklin over here. Jacklin ain' dead. Jacklin sittin' right by yo' side, mammy. He police, mammy, he police."
Madam la Lune stirred and I sensed her sightless eyes turning, turning toward me in the dark.
"No, I'm not police, Silver-Bell," I said. "If you can't find Jacklin, I want to speak to Winnie Tompkins."