“See?” Laurie said quietly. “The head. Look at his head.”
They looked, and they saw. The top part of the ghost’s head was gone. Missing. As though someone had sawn the top of his head right off, directly above the bushy eyebrows. A very neat cut, with not a single jagged edge; a very professional job indeed.
JC moved slowly forward, and the ghost didn’t react. It stood there, glaring at them all. Step by cautious step, JC walked right up to the ghost, until he was face-to-face with it. JC’s breath steamed thickly on the bitter cold air, but no breath moved from the ghost’s lips. JC lifted himself up onto his tiptoes, and looked down into the ghost’s cut-open head. And then he stood down again and carefully backed away from the ghost, never taking his eyes off it.
“Well?” said Happy.
“Well,” said JC. “That’s…really quite interesting, actually. There’s nothing inside his head. His brain has been removed.”
TWO
LAST CALL FOR THE DEAD
“Removed?” said Melody. “You mean surgically?”
“Could be,” said JC. “Or it’s the most extreme case of trepanation I’ve ever seen.”
“What?” said Laurie.
“Where you drill a hole in your head to make yourself smarter,” said Happy. “Trust me, it doesn’t work.”
“Hold everything, shout halleluiah,” said Melody. “I think I know who that is. I’ve seen that face before…in an old photograph. Nothing to do with this case…another case altogether…Yes! Got it! People, we are looking at someone who used to be very famous indeed. This is all that remains of that great Victorian medium and spiritualist, Dr. Emil Todd!”
“You never forget anything, do you?” said Happy, admiringly.
“The name rings a vague bell,” said JC, which was his way of saying he’d never heard of the man but was willing to admit that Melody had. “Still, a dead Victorian medium, and a missing Victorian train. Has to be a connection. But why is he here now?”
“Ask him,” said Happy.
“You ask him,” said JC. “You’re the team telepath. Look inside his mind and see what this is all about.”
“I can’t,” said Happy, frowning. “And not because there’s a whole bunch of fresh air where his grey matter used to be. This is a really powerful manifestation, and it’s very powerfully shielded. I wouldn’t even know this ghost was here if I couldn’t see it standing there scowling at me, and I do wish it would stop doing that.”
“You really think you can get answers out of that thing?” said Laurie.
“Why not?” said Melody. “It’s a ghost. Most of them only stick around because there’s something they need to say to someone. Even if it’s simply Look what you made me do, aren’t you sorry now?”
“You can leave now, if you wish, Mr. Laurie,” said JC. “You shouldn’t have to deal with things like this. Coping with ghosts is our business. We’re trained to deal with things that go Boo! in the night.”
“No,” said Laurie, after a moment, staring steadily at the ghost before him. “Now I’ve seen what it is, up close, it doesn’t seem that scary, after all. It’s a man, isn’t it?”
“Or what’s left of one,” said Happy. “That’s all ghosts ever are, really—people with unfinished business. If you weren’t scared of a man while he was alive, why be scared of him once he’s dead? Even when they walk through walls, or rip their own heads off, they’re only indulging a thwarted theatrical streak.”
“So why is this man running around with his head empty?” said Laurie.
“Because that was the last important thing that ever happened to him,” said Melody. “A ghost’s shape and aspect is determined by its most significant memories.”
“And that certainly made one hell of an impression on him,” said Happy.
“Is this figure what the other volunteers saw, Mr. Laurie?” asked JC.
“I don’t know,” said Laurie. “Maybe. I never saw anything like it before, and I’ve been around here longer than most.”
“Why isn’t he saying anything?” said Melody.
“He’s a Victorian gentleman,” said Happy. “Probably waiting to be properly introduced.”
The ghost of Dr. Todd stood very still, glaring at them all impartially. JC stepped forward again.
“What are you doing here, Dr. Todd?” he said carefully. “What holds your spirit here? Is there anything we can do to help?”
The ghost didn’t speak, didn’t move. His eyes didn’t blink; his mouth remained a flat grey line. He might have been alone in the room.
“This is like when we have an argument,” Happy said to Melody. “And you go stomping around the room, being mad at me but refusing to say what’s wrong because I’m supposed to know. And I never do.”
“There’s no blood on the doctor’s face,” JC said thoughtfully. “Which suggests that the…rather dramatic cranial damage occurred sometime after his death. Ghosts usually like to show off their death-wounds, especially if they’re a bit gory.”
“They do?” said Laurie.
“Oh sure,” said Happy. “Ghosts are all about the show. Bunch of drama queens. Look what happened to me! Aren’t you impressed?”
“It could be surgical,” said JC. “Given the neatness of the job. How did Dr. Todd die, Melody? Do we know?”
“According to the records I am accessing right now,” said Melody, from behind her bank of instruments again, “the files say…nobody knows. He disappeared. Body never found. Big mystery, back in the day.”
“Ah,” said Happy, wisely. “One of those…”
JC nodded to Happy, and they both moved in close, looking the ghost over carefully at point-blank range. He didn’t blink, or flinch, in the slightest. And then they both started shivering violently and quickly backed away. A thin layer of new frost covered both their faces. They wiped it away with their sleeves, looked respectfully at the ghost, and backed off some more.
“Damn, that was cold!” said Happy, beating his hands together to try to force some feeling back into them.
“I could feel the heat being sucked right out of me,” said JC, stamping his feet hard on the wooden floor. “Melody?”
“My short-range sensors are registering a major heat-sink,” said Melody, frowning. “Dr. Todd is still draining energy out of the room to maintain his presence in the material world. Get too close, and he could shut you right down.”
“But it’s not like he’s doing anything!” said JC. “What does he need all that energy for?”
“I think he’s used to scaring people off, simply by turning up,” said Happy. “He isn’t used to people who don’t go all to pieces the moment they see a ghost. I have to wonder: is this all he’s got, or does he have a second act?”
He didn’t have long to wait for an answer. The main-entrance door began to force itself closed. It pushed itself forward, pressing against the wooden wedge set in place to stop it, straining forward in sudden jumps and surges, determined to close. The wooden wedge squealed loudly as it scraped across the wooden floor, and smoke curled up from the contact point. JC moved forward, another wedge already in his hand, only to stop himself abruptly as the wedge under the door exploded, blown apart by the sheer pressure behind it. JC turned his face away as wooden splinters flew through the air like shrapnel. The door surged forward triumphantly. JC ran forward, grabbed the edge of the door with both hands, and threw his weight against it. He struggled for a moment, setting his merely human strength against the implacable unnatural force behind the door. Then JC ripped the door right off its hinges and threw it to one side.