‘No,’ Monsignor Thomas agreed, ‘not nearly, but these devices are not the source of the energy, only a path to it, a conduit, if you will. The amount of energy in any atom, Einstein proved, is tremendous. If you doubt this then think about the power of our sun or a nuclear bomb. A single nuclear device can level cities and lay waste to entire regions.’ He raised a clenched fist. ‘Yet the bombs dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima at the end of the Second World War each contained a fuel cell for their destructive power no bigger than my fist.’
Karina glanced at his fist. ‘That much power in that small a space?’
Monsignor Thomas nodded, lowering his fist and pointing at a small brass button on his robes. ‘This button maybe weighs a couple of ounces,’ he said. ‘But if I took it and turned it into pure energy right now, it would vaporize this entire cathedral in a spherical explosion that would radiate in all directions at once, including straight up and straight down. The resulting shockwave would level the rest of the block, because the amount of energy in any object of mass is found by multiplying that object’s mass by the speed of light, squared.’
Lopez blinked. ‘That’s a big number.’
‘Big enough,’ Monsignor Thomas replied, ‘to crush an elevator car. I take it that it gets rather cold when the wraith is present?’
‘Bitterly,’ Karina confirmed.
‘It is drawing from its surroundings,’ Monsignor Thomas said. ‘The latent heat energy lost from the atmosphere creates the chill that people often feel when in the presence of what we call ghosts. But a wraith’s power would virtually freeze air if it lingered in one spot for long enough.’
Ethan looked around the cathedral for a moment and then was hit by inspiration.
‘If we could take potential victims to a place where there were no electrical items, it would diminish the wraith’s ability to attack them.’
Monsignor Thomas nodded. ‘It’s possible. Without a means to channel energy efficiently, the wraith’s power would be greatly reduced, although it would still no doubt be able to manifest itself. And that’s what bothers me the most about this case.’
‘Why?’ Karina asked.
Monsignor Thomas frowned thoughtfully. ‘You say that you believe that this wraith is the spirit of a woman, or child, who died recently on Williamsburg Bridge?’
‘My colleague’s family,’ Karina confirmed. ‘Nobody else connected to this case has died, so we figure it must be one of them.’
Monsignor Thomas sat back down on a pew, his features now deeply concerned.
‘What is it?’ Ethan asked.
‘I believe,’ the monsignor replied, ‘that you have made an error of judgment.’
‘How?’ Lopez asked.
‘Well, I’m no expert on these phenomena, so rarely do they occur,’ the monsignor replied, ‘but I understood that crisis-apparitions only appeared to other people at the moment of death.’
‘That’s what we learned a while back,’ Ethan confirmed. ‘They were documented in detail during the First World War.’
‘That’s right,’ the monsignor said. ‘But if this was a haunting, then the wraith, or ghost, would be present on the bridge only. There are literally thousands of cases worldwide of roads haunted by automobile-wreck victims that periodically appear to drivers. Yet you say the wraith is moving freely, almost as if it is intelligent?’
‘It seems to know where people are,’ Lopez replied, ‘if that’s what you mean.’
The monsignor appeared to come to a conclusion, and he stood.
‘Then you’re looking in the wrong place,’ he said. ‘The source of this wraith must still be alive.’
47
The wintry morning air outside the cathedral seemed colder as Ethan jogged down the steps, with Lopez and Karina close behind.
‘We should have thought of that,’ Lopez said. ‘Professor Bowen told us about that poltergeist case in Rosenheim, Germany, where the source was a girl who was alive.’
‘I think we’re out of our depth here,’ Ethan replied.
‘These crisis-apparitions appear when people have just died,’ Karina said. ‘Maybe somebody injured in the accident is in intensive care, slipping in and out of consciousness?’
Ethan looked at Karina. ‘I think that you know more than that about what’s happening.’
Lopez glared at Ethan angrily but he ignored her, staring at Karina until she let out a frustrated sigh and swiped a strand of hair from her face. ‘I don’t know,’ she replied. ‘It was just a gut instinct after what happened in my apartment the other night.’
‘In the kitchen?’ Lopez asked. ‘What did you see?’
‘I didn’t exactly see anything,’ Karina replied. ‘I thought I saw a man standing there in the shadows, watching me, but it wasn’t what I saw that mattered. It was a feeling.’
‘You recognized the person,’ Ethan said with a clairvoyant flash.
‘I don’t know,’ Karina said, ‘but it just felt like Tom was there. After what had happened that day, I got paranoid and decided to check him out. You know the rest.’
Lopez looked up at Ethan. ‘He died on the floor of his apartment.’
‘And then got resuscitated,’ Ethan said. ‘You think it’s worth checking out the times of his cardiac arrest and the murders of the two guys out on Hell Gate Field, see if they match?’
Lopez nodded immediately, but Karina shook her head.
‘Even if they do match, what the hell do we do then? We can hardly arrest Tom for the murders, he was dead on his goddamned couch! And what about the rest of the team? If it’s Tom who’s somehow behind all of this, then he’s hunting them down, too.’
‘For which there must be a reason,’ Ethan said. ‘Karina, we can’t afford to just dismiss this, however crazy it might seem. If we can’t rule out the possibility that Tom is somehow conjuring this wraith up, then we have to assume that, whether he knows it or not, Tom’s our killer. He can’t be prosecuted and the case would be thrown out by any self-respecting judge, so we have to deal with this ourselves. Where has he been the last two days?’
‘Alone at home,’ Karina admitted. ‘But I’ve called him at least twice every day and he’s always picked up. It’s not like he’s tearing around the city killing people. Christ, he’s so depressed he can barely walk most of the time.’
‘Check the times,’ Ethan insisted, ‘and then go and visit Tom, okay? I’ll catch up with you in a while.’
‘Why, where are you going?’ Karina demanded.
‘It’s important,’ Ethan replied. ‘I won’t be long.’
He turned and zipped up his jacket against the cold as he started walking down the sidewalk. He got ten paces when he heard Lopez jog after him and felt her hand on his shoulder.
Lopez looked at him. ‘You want some back-up?’
Ethan shook his head. ‘Probably better if I do this alone. We’ve got a lot to catch up on.’
‘Yeah,’ she replied, ‘that’s what bothers me. It’s been five years, so you don’t know anything about Joanna now, Ethan. She said it herself. Maybe you should take this a bit slower, a bit more cautiously.’
‘Like you would?’ Ethan asked with a smile.
‘Your safety is paramount to me,’ Lopez replied tartly, but there was a twinkle in her eyes. ‘Most all times.’
‘I’ll be fine,’ Ethan said. ‘Just find out what you can about Tom Ross, and get Doug in on this. He might be able to match the name to our list.’
Lopez’s eyes widened. ‘You think?’
‘It’s exactly the kind of thing MK-ULTRA will be looking for. If there’s a history of this in Tom’s family, he might be more than just our killer. He might be a target, too. If the assassin that Joanna claims is following her identifies Tom, he’ll be killed. We need Joanna on our side and Tom safe before we can finish this, okay?’