They were all there, gathered around the table. Madam Blavatsky, Pierre Medellin, Guru Shwami, all had come in response to the summons they had recieved.
Davenport Rockefeller, last scion of the Long Island Rockefellers, gazed cooly at each of them in turn while he chewed on his ever-present cigar. "Thank y'all for comin', " he drawled around the cheroot, "y'all know why your here, don'cha?"
Medellin was the first to talk. "You believe the house to be haunted," he replied in his exquisite Parisian accent.
"Darn tootin'!" Rockefeller replied, "and y'all is gonna help me. The feller that owned this house died right here, an' you folks are gonna help me talk to him, kapish?"
Medellin fingered his natty moustache. "That should be no problem," he replied.
Madame Blavatsky nodded, her fat jowls cascading with the rythym. "Mere child's play," she said in a lofty tone, "hardly worth our time."
"Bullpucky!" Rockefeller cried, "Listen lady, I didn't haul your fat Ruskie fanny halfway around the world to listen to you yap." He sized the three mystics up with an appraising eye. "I ain't got time for this shit," he declared, "damn well git on with it."
On with it they got. All three sat around the small occasional table, hands linked. They began to chant, softly at first and then louder, with greater intensity, until with a roar that sounded like thunder their heads snapped back with mouths open, an eerie blue light cascaring from their open mouths. From their mouths also poured steam, a heavy mist redolent of sulphur and decay. As Rockefeller watched the mist coalesced into the cruel, thin visage of a man cruelly pulled back from the very abyss of death itself.
"What do you want, Davenport?" the apparition sneered, "I had little enough time for you in life, what makes you think I have any more for you in death?"
"I moved into your old house in Boston."
The ghostly face seemed surprised. "Lake Street?"
"Fifth and Main."
"Oh, the Lloyd-Wright."
"Yeah, and I got a question."
The face nodded. "Ask what you will. You have summoned me, and I will answer."
Rockefeller smiled. "Good," he said, "What the hell is up with the hot tap in the upstairs latrine?"
"Turn it on and off quickly, then slowly turn it on again. It always was a bugger for banging."
"Thanks, buddy, i'll try that. Say, while you're here, what are those trees out back? I asked the gardener but he says he can't recall when they went in."
"Dutch elms," replied the face, "They'll need pruning in autumn and a good mulching in the early spring."
"Hot dog, thanks a bunch. You're a pal."
"Anytime," the face said, "was there anything else?"
Rockefeller thought for a moment, then snapped his fingers. "Boy, i'll say, I plum forgot. When's bin day?"
"Thursday," the head intoned gravely, "Friday if there was a holiday Monday."