Another man, also dressed in a dark suit, approached from the other side and placed his hands on Lucy’s shoulders, guiding her away from Mathias who walked forward towards the swelling cacophony of shouts and applause which filled the hall. As the lights inside the building were flicked on once more he gazed out at the dozens of people who stood watching him. Dozens? Hundreds? He wasn’t sure how many. Some could not stand because they were in wheelchairs. Some could not clap because they had withered limbs. Some could not see him because they were blind.
He raised his arms once more, a gesture designed to encompass them all.
The applause and shouting did not diminish for some time, not in fact, until Mathias turned and walked off the stage, the cries still ringing in his ears.
And some of them were cries of pain.
Mathias entered his dressing room and slammed the door behind him, as if eager to be away from any more prying eyes. He leant against the door, wiping the sweat from his face with one blood-smeared hand.
He crossed to the washbasin on the far side of the small room and turned the cold tap, splashing his face with water. As he straightened up he gazed at his own reflection in the mirror above.
Jonathan Mathias was a powerfully built man, his jaw square and heavy. Clean shaven and carefully groomed, he looked younger than his forty years, particularly when his eyes sparkled as they did now. Nevertheless, his forehead was heavily lined and his thick eyebrows, which strained to meet above the bridge of his nose, gave him a perpetual frown. He dried his face and sat down at his dressing table. Even now he could hear the persistent applause generated by those who had yet to leave the hall.
It was like this every time. At every meeting.
He held three a week. The one today had been conducted in a large red-brick building on New York’s West Side. Next time it might be in Manhattan, Queens or the Bronx. Or maybe somewhere in one of the city’s more affluent areas.
Over the years he had found that the rich needed his attentions as badly as anyone else.
Those he didn’t reach in person could see him twice a week on CBS, his hour-long television show attracting an audience in excess of 58,000,000. He was known throughout the country and most of Europe for his abilities as a psychic but, of the man himself, little had ever been revealed. He spoke with a New York accent but the harder edges had been smoothed off and he came across as a cultured man, though he was respected and ridiculed in roughly equal proportions. There were those who still branded him a fraud and a charlatan. With an annual incorhe of 20,000,000 dollars, the barbs seemed to cut less deeply than they might otherwise have done.
He smiled at his own reflection and began wiping his face with a paper cloth.
There was a light rap on the door and Mathias turned in his seat as if he were expecting to see through the partition.
‘Who is it?’ he asked.
‘Blake,’ a distinctively English voice told him.
‘Come in,’ he called, his smile broadening.
As David Blake entered the room, Mathias studied the newcomer warmly.
He was twenty-eight, about five-ten, dressed in a pair of faded jeans and a.
sweatshirt which, despite the folds of material, could not disguise the
powerful frame beneath it. A packet of cigarettes bulged from one of his pockets and, as the young man sat down, he took one out and lit it up.
‘Very impressive,’ he said, re-adjusting the tinted glasses on his nose.
it isn’t intended to create an impression, David,’ said the psychic. ‘You know that.’
own body is a skill which can be learned.’ ‘I agree.’
‘Then I don’t see what this has to do with your powers. I can control other people’s Astral bodies.’ Blake frowned, taken aback by the psychic’s words.
Mathias returned his gaze, unblinking. There was a twinkle in his blue eyes which Blake mistrusted. He studied the American as if he were an exhibit in a museum, trying to muster his own thoughts, it’s impossible,’ he said, softly. ‘Nothing is impossible, David,’ the psychic told him. Blake shook his head.
‘Look, I know plenty about Out of the Body experiences,’ he countered. ‘I’ve met dozens of people who’ve had them but the idea of being able to manipulate someone else’s Astral body …’ The sentence trailed off as he felt his body stiffen. It was as if every muscle in his body had suddenly contracted and the sensation forced a gasp from him.
Overwhelming, numbing cold enveloped him until he felt as if his blood were freezing in his veins. He shuddered, the flesh on his forearms rising into goose-pimples. He caught sight of his own reflection in Mathias’ dressing room mirror and his skin was white. As if the colour had been sucked from him.
Mathias sat unmoved, his eyes never leaving the writer who was quivering violently.
He felt light-headed, a curiously unpleasant sensation of vagueness which made him grip the chair as if anxious to assure himself he were not going to faint.
Mathias lowered his gaze and Blake felt the feeing subside as quickly as it had come. He sucked in a deep breath, the warmth returning to his body.
He shook his head and blinked hard. ‘Are you OK?’ Mathias asked. The writer nodded.
‘Very clever, Jonathan,’ he said, rubbing his arms briskly.
‘Now do you believe me?’ the psychic wanted to know. ‘Can you deny what you felt?’ if you have this ability, how does it tie-in with the faith-healing?’
‘I can reach inside people. Inside their minds. Their bodies.’
‘Then it would have to be a form of hypnosis, to make the subject believe you could cure them.’
I can’t give you all the answers, David,’ Mathias answered, it doesn’t matter.
You can’t alter the facts, you can’t deny what you saw on that stage tonight or what you yourself felt here in this room.’
Blake chewed his bottom lip contemplatively.
‘Think about what I’ve said,’ the psychic added.
Blake got to his feet and announced that he had to get back to his hotel. The two men shook hands and the writer left the building via a side entrance. The sun outside was hot and the pavement felt warm beneath his shoes in a marked contrast to the coolness of Mathias’ dressing room.
He spotted a cab and sprinted across the street, clambering into the vehicle.
As the cab pulled away, Blake glanced over his shoulder at the red brick building, watching as it gradually disappeared from view.
Jonathan Mathias sat before the mirror in his dressing room contemplating his own features. He rubbed his cheeks and blinked hard. His eyes felt as if they had grit in them but, as he sat there, he allowed his hands to drop to his thighs, one hand curling into a loose fist. He inhaled and looked down, his fist opening as he did so.
Cradled there, now shrunken and withered like rotten, foul smelling prunes, were the three growths he’d taken from the body of Lucy West.
towards the bathroom once more.
The steam still swirled around and Blake almost slipped over on the tiles. He lifted the toilet seat and urinated noisily; then, discarding the towel, he turned towards the bath.
There was a body floating in the water.
Blake took a step back, nearly overbalancing, his eyes glued to the naked body before him. The entire corpse was bloated, the skin tinged a vivid blue, mottled from what appeared to be a long time in the water. The mouth was open, lips wrinkled and cracked. A swollen tongue protruded from one corner.
Blake shook his head, studying the face more closely.
He may as well have been looking in a mirror.
The corpse in the bath was identical, in every detail, to himself. He felt as if he were staring at his own dead body.