'That's what I have to find out. I can't find out while he's alive, for I know he'll never admit it. So I'll have to find out when he's dead. The dead never refuse me anything. Which means… I have to kill him. And I'll do it my way.'
'It's a very terrible way, Harry,' it was her turn to shudder. 'I know!'
He nodded, his eyes cold. 'Yes, you do — and that's why it must be that way…'
She was fearful again and clutched him to her. 'But what if something goes wrong? Just knowing you're all right, I can lie easy, Harry. But if anything should happen to you — '
'Nothing will happen. It will be just the way I plan it.' He kissed her worried brow, but still she clung to him.
'He's a clever man, Harry, This Viktor Shukshin. Clever — and evil! Sometimes I could sense it in him, and it fascinated me. What was I after all but a girl? And him — he was magnetic. The Russian in him, which was there in me, too; the brooding darkness of his mind, the magnetism and the evil. We were opposing magnetic poles, and we attracted. I know that I loved him at first, even though I sensed his dark heart, but as for his reason for killing me — '
'Yes?'
Again she shook her head, her blue eyes cloudy with memory. 'It was something… something in him. Some madness, some unspeakable thing he couldn't control. That much I know, but what exactly — ' and once more she shook her head.
'It's what I have to find out,' Harry repeated, 'for until then I won't rest easy either.'
'Shhh!' she suddenly gasped, clutched him hard. 'Look!'
Harry looked. A smaller inkblot had detached itself from the great black mass of the house. Manlike, it came down the garden path, peering here and there, worriedly wringing its hands. In its black blot of a head twin silver ovals gleamed, eyes which led it towards the fence at the bottom of the garden. Harry and his mother huddled together, but for the moment the Shukshin apparition paid them no heed. He passed by, paused briefly and sniffed suspiciously — almost like a dog — then moved on. At the fence he stopped, leaned on the top rail, for long moments peered at the river's slow swirl.
'I know what's on his mind,' Harry whispered.
'Shhh!' his mother repeated her warning. 'He can sense things, Viktor Shukshin. He always could…'
The inkblot now returned, pausing every now and then, sniffing in that strange way. Close to the pair, the Shukshin-thing seemed to stare right through them with its silver eyes. Then the eyes blinked and it moved on, back towards the house, wringings its hands as before. As it merged with the house a door slammed echoingly.
The sound repeated in Harry's head, reverberating, metamorphosing from a slam to a knock, to a series of knocks, repeating:
Rat-tat-tat! Rat-tat-tat!
'You have to go,' said his mother. 'Be careful, Harry. Poor little Harry
He jerked awake in his flat. From the slant of the sunlight through the window, he knew that time turned towards evening. He'd slept for three hours at least; more than he'd intended. He started as the knock came again at the door:
Rat-tat-tat!
Who could this be? Brenda? No, for he wasn't expecting her. Although it was a Saturday she was putting in some overtime, dolling up the hair of some of Harden's more 'fashionable' ladies. Who, then?
Rat-tat-tot Insistently.
Stiffly, Harry swung his legs off the bed, stood up and went to the door. His hair was tousled, his eyes full of sleep. Visitors were rare and he liked it that way. This was an intrusion, something to be dealt with swiftly and decisively. He zipped up his trousers, shrugged into a shirt — and the knock came yet again.
Outside the door, Sir Keenan Gormley waited, knowing that Harry Keogh was in there. He had known it coming down the street, had felt it climbing the stairs. Keogh's ESP signature was written in the very air of the place as unmistakably as a fingerprint on clear glass. For like Viktor Shukshin and Gregor Borowitz, this was Gormley's one great talent: he too was a 'spotter', he instinctively 'knew' when he stood in the presence of an ESPer. and Keogh's ESP-aura was more powerful than any he had ever sensed before, so that he felt he was close to some great generator as he stood there at the door on the landing at the head of the stairs.
And now Harry Keogh himself opened that door…
Gormley had seen Keogh before, but never so close. Over the last three weeks, while he had been staying with Jack Harmon, he'd seen him often. Gormley and
Harmon, following Keogh on occasion, had kept the youth under close but discreet observation; likewise on the two occasions when George Hannant had accompanied them. And Gormley had not taken long to agree with both Harmon and Hannant that indeed Keogh was something special. Quite obviously they were correct about him; he was a necroscope; he did have the power of intelligent intercourse with the dead. Gormley had given Keogh's weird talent a lot of thought over the last three weeks. It was one which he would dearly love to have under his control. Now he must somehow find a way to put that idea to Keogh.
Blinking the sleep from his eyes, Harry Keogh looked his visitor up and down. He had intended to be brusque no matter who it was, to deal with the problem and be done with it, but one look at Gormley had told him this was something which wasn't going to go away. There was a quiet air of unassuming but awesome intellect about this man, and coupled with his charming smile and demanding, outstretched hand, it formed a combination which was totally disarming.
'Harry Keogh?' said Gormley, knowing of course that it was Keogh and insisting that the other take his hand by shoving it even farther forward. 'I'm Sir Keenan Gormley. You won't have heard of me but I know quite a bit about you. In fact — why, I know just about everything about you!'
The landing was ill-lit and Harry couldn't quite make out the other's features, just indistinct impressions. Finally, briefly, he took Gormley's hand, then stepped aside and let him in. The contact, however brief, had told him a lot. Gormley's hand had been firm and yet resilient, cool but honest; it had promised nothing, but neither had it threatened. It was the hand of someone who could be a friend. Except -
'You know everything about me?' Harry wasn't sun he liked the sound of that. 'Well that won't come to much. There's not a lot to know.'
'Oh, I disagree with you,' said the other. 'You're far too modest.'
Now, in the brighter light from the windows, Keogh looked at his visitor more closely. His age could be anything between fifty and sixty, but probably at the top end; his green eyes were a little muddied and his skin full of small wrinkles; his well-groomed hair was grey on a large, high-domed head. About five-ten in height, his well-tailored jacket just failed to hide slightly rounded shoulders. Sir Keenan Gormley had seen better days, but Harry Keogh would think he had a way to go yet.
'What do I call you?' he said. It was the first time he'd spoken to a 'Sir'.
'Keenan will do, since we're to be friends.'
'You're sure of that? That we're to be friends, I mean? I must warn you I don't make many.'
'I don't think we have any choice,' Gormley smiled. 'We have too much in common. Anyway, the way I hear it you have lots of friends.'
'Then you've heard it wrong,' Harry frowned, shook his head. 'I can count my real friends on one hand.'
Gormley believed he might as well get straight to the point. And anyway, he wanted to see Keogh's reaction if he was caught off balance. It might just provide the final ounce of proof. 'Those are the live ones,' he quietly answered, easing the smile gradually off his face. 'But I think the others are rather more numerous…'
It hit Harry like a grenade. He'd often wondered how he would feel if anyone should ever confront him like this, and now he knew. He felt ill.