Wamphyri

‘Roberts here,' the scryer spoke into the telephone. ‘What is it, Peter?'

Keen passed his message.

‘Travel agency?' Roberts frowned. ‘Yes, we'll get on to it at once. Your relief? He's on his way right now. Trevor Jordan, yes. See you later, Peter.' Roberts put down the telephone and picked up a directory. Moments later he was phoning the travel agency in Torquay, whose name and address Keen had given him.

When he got an answer, Roberts held a handkerchief to his mouth, contrived a young voice. ‘Hello? Er, hello?'

‘Hello?' came back the answer. ‘Sunsea Travel, here —who's calling, please?' It was a male voice, deep and smooth.

‘Seem to have a bad line,' Roberts replied, keeping his voice to a medium pitch. ‘Can you hear me? I was in, oh, an hour ago. Mr Bodescu?'

‘Ah, yes, sir!' The booking agent raised his voice. ‘Your Romanian inquiry. Bucharest, any time in the next two weeks. Right?' Roberts gave a start, made an effort to keep his muffled voice even. ‘Er, Romania, yes, that's right.' He thought fast — furiously fast. ‘Er, look, I'm sorry to be a nuisance, but —‘

‘Yes?'

‘Well, I've decided I can't make it after all. Maybe next year, eh?'

‘Ah!' There was some disappointment in the other's tone. ‘Well, that's the way it goes. Thanks for

calling, sir. So you're definitely cancelling, right?'

‘Yes.' Roberts jiggled the phone a bit. ‘I'm afraid I have to... Damn bad line, this! Anyway, something's come up, and —,

‘Well, don't worry about it, Mr Bodescu,' the travel agent cut him off. ‘It happens all the time. And anyway, I haven't yet found the time to make any real inquiries. So no harm done. But do let me know if you change your mind again, won't you?'

‘Oh, indeed! I will, I will. Most helpful of you. Sorry to have been such a nuisance.'

‘Not at all, sir. Bye now.'

‘Er, goodbye!' Roberts put the phone down.

Darcy Clarke, who had been party to this exchange, said, ‘Sheer genius! Well done, Chief!'

Roberts looked up but didn't smile. ‘Romania!' he repeated, ominously. ‘Things are hotting up, Darcy. I'll be glad when Kyle gets his call through. He's two hours overdue.'

At that very moment the phone rang again.

Clarke inclined his head knowingly. ‘Now that's what I call a talent. If it doesn't happen — make it!'

Roberts pictured Romania in his mind's eye — his own interpretation, for he'd never been there — then superimposed an image of Alec Kyle over a rugged Romanian countryside. He closed his eyes and Kyle's picture came up in photographic — no, live — detail.

‘Roberts here.'

‘Guy?' Kyle's voice came back, crisp with static. ‘Listen, I intended to route this through London, John Grieve, but I couldn't get him.' Roberts knew what he meant: obviously he would have liked the call to be one hundred per cent secure.

‘I can't help you there,' he answered. ‘There's no one that special around right now. Are there problems, then?'

‘Shouldn't think so.' In the eye of Roberts's mind, Kyle was frowning. ‘We lacked a bit of privacy in Genoa, but that cleared up. As for why I'm late: it's like contacting Mars getting through from here! Talk about antiquated systems. If I didn't have local help... anyway, have you got anything for me?'

‘Can we talk straight?'

‘We'll have to.'

Roberts quickly brought him up to date, finishing with Bodescu's thwarted trip to Romania. In his mind's eye he saw, as well as physically hearing, Kyle's gasp of horror. Then the head of INTESP got hold of his emotions; even if Bodescu's plans to come over here hadn't been foiled, still it would have been too late for him.

‘By the time we've finished over here,' he grimly told Roberts, ‘there'll be nothing left for him anyway. And by the time you've finished over there... he won't be able to go anywhere.' Then he told Roberts in detail exactly what he wanted done. It took him a good fifteen minutes to make sure he covered everything.

‘When?' Roberts asked him when he was finished.

Kyle was cautious. ‘Are you part of the surveillance team? I mean, do you physically go out to the house and watch him?'

‘No. I co-ordinate. I'm always here at the HO. But I do want to be in on the kill.'

‘Very well, I'll tell you when it's to be,' said Kyle. ‘But you're not to pass it on to the others! Not until as close as possible to zero hour itself. I don't want Bodescu picking it out of someone's mind.'

‘That makes sense. Wait — ‘ Roberts sent Clarke into the next room, out of earshot. ‘OK, when?'

‘Tomorrow — in daylight. Let's settle for 5.00 P.M. your time. By then we'll have done our bit, just an hour or so earlier. There are certain obvious reasons why daylight will be best, and on your side of the job one not so obvious reason. When Harkley goes up, it'll make a big blaze. You'll need to make sure local fire services don't get there too soon and put it out. If it was at night, the flames would be visible for miles. Anyway, that's for you to work on. But the last thing you want is outside interference, OK?'

‘Got it,' said Roberts.

‘That's it, then,' said Kyle. ‘We probably won't be talking again until it's all finished. So good luck!'

‘Good luck,' Roberts answered, letting Kyle's face fade in his mind as he replaced the receiver in its cradle.

Most of Monday found Harry Keogh trying without success to break the magnetic attraction of his son's psyche. There was no way. The child fought him, clung to both Harry and the waking world alike with an incredible tenacity, would not go to sleep. Brenda Keogh marked the baby's fever, thought to call a doctor, then changed her mind; but she determined that if the baby stayed as bad tempered through the night, and if in the morning his temperature was still on the high side, then she'd get advice.

She couldn't know that Harry Jnr's fever resulted from the mental contest he waged with his father, a fight the infant was winning hands down. But Harry Snr knew it well enough. The baby's will — and his strength — both were enormous! The child's mind was a black hole whose gravity must surely pull Harry in entirely. And Harry had discovered something: that indeed a mind without a body can grow weary, and just like flesh be worn down. So that when he could no longer fight he gave in and retreated into himself, glad that for now his vain striving and struggling were over.

Like a game fish on the end of a line, he allowed himself to be reeled in, close to the boat. But he knew he must fight again when he sensed the gaff poised to strike. Incorporeal, it would be Harry's last chance to retain an individual identity. That was why he would fight, for the continuation of his existence, but he couldn't help wondering: what did all of this mean to his son? Why did Harry jnr want him? Was it simply the terrific greed of any healthy infant, or was it something else entirely?

As for the baby himself: he recognised his father's partial surrender, accepted the fact that for now the fight was over. And he had no means by which to tell this fantastic adult that it wasn't a fight at all, not really, but simply a desperate desire to know, to learn. Father and son, two minds in one small, fragile — defenceless? — body, both of them took the welcome opportunity to sleep.

And at 5.00 P.M. when Brenda Keogh looked in on her baby son, she was pleased to note that he lay still and at peace in his cot, and that his temperature was down again .

About 4.30 P.M. that same Monday afternoon, in lonesti:

Irma Dobresti had just answered a telephone call from Bucharest. The telephone conversation had grown sufficiently heated to cause the rest of the party to listen in. Krakovitch's face had fallen, telling Kyle and Quint that something was amiss. When Irma was through and after she'd hurled the phone down, Krakovitch spoke up.