A shaky laugh.
More work notes, almost indistinguishable because of a radio playing in the background, then silence. Still without expression, Bruno turned the cassette over. Now the voice was shrill: ‘ … am I going mad? God, if I have that dream again I'll find a psychiatrist … Elizabeth says she knows a good one in Welbeck Street and she ought to know, by God … what did the devil do to me? No, I can’t blame him. It’s something in me … pills don’t help … ’
Pause. Click.
‘Jeff took me to Trader Vic’s, super meal … brought me home and made a pass … why not? I’m a woman now … but it was awful. He just got me to bed and … and I got such an urge … I was after his blood all right, like the latest dream coming real … I threw him out before I lost control … must have thought I was mad. Bang goes a friendship … Oh God, I will go to Welbeck Street.’
The next recordings related to her work, but Peter was aware of the heightening tension in her voice. Then: ‘ … saw terrible accident in the street, blood on the road hypnotized me … policeman had to lead me away, thought I was in shock — little did he know … Welbeck Street seems promising, but explanations about traumatic first experience and hymenal blood too glib … helps during the day, but he’s started coming back when I sleep … sometimes I almost decide to contact him … he said someday I would … ’
A pause.
A date, then: ‘ … going to Provence. God, I need the break … something dreadful will happen if I don’t get away … tablets useless … thirst so strong bought a pound of raw steak, made me vomit … why did I ever have to meet Stromberg? Perhaps a priest … ’
Peter started at the name and threw a look of inquiry at Bruno who switched off the recorder.
‘What does it mean?’ he demanded.
‘I think you can guess.’
‘Bruno, I’m afraid I’m starting to.’
Chapter 18
‘Before we allow ourselves to come to conclusions let us go a little further,’ said Bruno, placing the small recording machine on the coffee table beside him. ‘From this tape we know Holly met a stranger in Copenhagen with whom she shared some fantastical sexual experience which affected her so much she was heading for a nervous breakdown. About a month ago she got an assignment to cover the Camargue festival, by which time she was living on drink and tranquillizers.
‘At Saintes Maries de la Mer she had a little respite from her troubles. She met us, and I think, without flattering myself, she became fond of me. Listen to this.’
He picked up the Philips. There was a jumble of sounds, then Holly’s voice came through clearly. For a while her words were verbal notes on the Camargue which she would use later for her articles. Then: … Bruno is one of the kindest men I’ve met. How easily I could love him. I am so tempted, especially when I forget the curse that seems to hang over me. At times I think he could save me. But I must not involve him … I thought I was getting over it all, but when he kissed me tonight I had a sudden reawakening of that horrible desire … had to push him away from me … Oh God!’
Agonized sobbing came from the little recorder. Bruno switched it off.
‘What seemed to tip the balance was the accident at the bullring,’ he went on. ‘I was out of the way. Her dark side took over and she surrendered completely to the malaise. Her victim was the Gypsy. She must have introduced him to the same sort of experience she had known in Copenhagen, though this time she played the role of seducer. Please understand I don’t use that word in quite the normal sense.’
Peter nodded and poured himself another drink from the bottle of Bells.
‘Her state was no secret from the Gypsies. Maybe some of them have second sight or ESP or something, but do you remember that hag who read her palm? She must have recognized something. They feared her as an age-old enemy, and once she had corrupted the young Gypsy he became an enemy, too.
These people live in a different time-scale from us, they know things we have forgotten.
‘The tape does not tell us anything more, but from what I found out the climax came at Les Baux when the Gypsy fell to his death. What was he doing at Les Baux in the first place? People like him are not tourists. I believe he was forced to die.’
‘How can you say that?’ Peter asked.
‘I cannot be sure, but I tell you this: when he fell over that cliff he was impaled on a stake. How strange there should be a stake in that exact spot. It was not part of a fence — there were no other stakes within sight. Strange that the pointed end should be sticking upwards! No, my friend, it has a false ring. I believe he was impaled after he was killed. And you know the significance of that?’
‘Certainly.’
‘Okay. Let’s go back a bit. Stromberg, the name Holly mentions as the stranger she met in Copenhagen, rings the bell, eh? You told me about a Stromberg who visited your hospital and was stabbed … ’
‘Hold on, Bruno,’ Peter interrupted. ‘Stromberg is a common Swedish name.’
‘I know, but do you remember I said I’d heard the name before when we were sitting on the beach at Saintes Maries? When I heard Holly’s tape diary I remembered she once asked me if I knew anything of a Dr Stromberg, and was he famous? I believe your Stromberg and Holly’s are the same person.’
‘But I can’t believe an eminent neurologist could … ’
‘There are more things in heaven and earth, doctor, than are dreamt of in your philosophy,’ Bruno said. ‘Listen, I made mv enquiries when Holly disappeared. A press card is a great help. I checked at the nearest airport, which is Perpignan. I found from passenger lists that a Dr Stromberg had arrived on a kte flight from Paris on the Friday the festival ended. I checked with a car hire firm and found a Dr Stromberg had rented a Mercedes that day. I got them to look up their records, and the doctor returned the car next day. He paid for 480 kilometres, exactly the distance to and from Les Baux.
‘Back at the airport I got my friendly, if somewhat greedy, booking clerk to give me the outward passenger lists for Saturday. I found Stromberg had bought an Air France ticket for Helsinki. On the same flight was an English woman by the name of H. Archer.’
Peter looked as if he was going to say something, but Bruno held up his hand.
‘Next I did my research into this mysterious Stromberg. Mainly through my Scandinavian contacts I found this … ’
Bruno rummaged in his Alitalia bag, produced a black note book and read: ‘Stromberg, Axel, and a long list of degrees. Adopted nationality Swedish. Actual nationality unknown. Came from a Red Cross DP camp at the end of the war. Brought up in a home for stateless war orphans in Stockholm where he was given the name of Stromberg (the place is now closed so I could not get a line on his early life). Brilliant at school, went in for medicine, was considered a genius. Worked for a time in a Swedish hospital, then in the States. While he was there amassed an enormous amount of money. No one knows how, but there are strange theories.’
Peter raised his dark eyebrows in query and Bruno explained he had picked up a hint that Dr Stromberg had been in the ‘plasma business’.
‘He had been in Haiti during the Duvalier dictatorship when plasma export boomed. Nothing illegal about it, people can sell their blood if they want to. But it is not something a highly respected specialist should be mixed up in. I have no actual proof, but it is a straw in the wind.
‘Returning to Scandinavia three years ago he obtained permission from the Finnish authorities to build a clinic on the shores of Lake Inari. Said he wanted isolation so he could study extreme cases of psychopathy with the patients under less restraint than was required in populated areas.’
‘I know about that,’ said Peter. ‘He’s trying neurological approaches to behaviour rather than psychiatric. If he could come up with an instant cure it would mean relief for hundreds of thousands of people who spend years as psychiatric patients. Some of the new drugs are doing this already, but how effective over a long term … ?’
‘Okay, doctor,’ interr
upted Bruno with a ghost of a smile. ‘From the Finnish office of the Global Agency I got information on the clinic. It is built on a peninsula on the east shore of the lake, the nearest settlement being Mustola which is hardly more than a name on the map. The Russian frontier is only a few kilometres away. He also got permission to build an annexe on a small island for his most dangerous patients.’
‘Bruno, I can see the case you are building up very clearly,’ said Peter, ‘but your flair for the sensational is carrying you away. Perhaps Stromberg did have some sexual orgy with Holly in Copenhagen, but that’s no crime even for a medical man, provided she was not his patient. Perhaps he did rescue Holly from some trouble in the south of France but that does not make him out to be what you are hinting. In London he behaved perfectly. It was a child who started the bloodthirst business. Stromberg was only a victim of an attack.’
‘I’m nearly done,’ said Bruno. ‘Just answer me this, when Stromberg was stabbed did he lose a lot of blood?’
‘There was severe haemorrhage,’ admitted Peter. ‘He had to have a transfusion.’
‘Right,’ said Bruno waving his glass excitedly. ‘If Stromberg is what I suppose and he lost a lot of blood, what do you think the effect would be — apart from the physical, I mean? He would be desperate for the essence which animates him. I believe it was he who stole the blood from the transfusion bottle, and killed the girl when she saw him drinking it.’
Peter said: ‘It’s too fantastic, Bruno. Look, you know I go along with a lot of this. Because of my theory of contagious blood addiction I was practically kicked out of the London, but what you’re trying to make out is too … ’
‘One last point,’ Bruno interjected. ‘That child patient of yours, what was her name?’
‘Britt Hallström.’
‘Yes. Where did she have her accident?’
‘Her father had taken her on a holiday to Finnmark. I forget the actual name of the place but it was the most northerly town in the world.’
‘Hammerfest?’
Peter nodded. Bruno produced a large map of North Europe, and with a blunt finger pointed to the top.
‘Look, Peter, there is only one road which runs south from Hammerfest in the whole of that territory. See, it goes past the southern part of Lake Inari. Somewhere near there the Hallström girl had her accident, and was taken to a clinic where she was given blood. Don’t you see?’
‘Stromberg’s clinic?’
‘Yes, Stromberg’s. Stromberg who induced the bloodthirst in Holly, and who snatched her away when that poor bastard of a Gypsy was dealt with as vampires have been dealt with for centuries; Stromberg who happened to be present when blood was stolen and a girl killed; Stromberg who was probably mixed up in plasma export and has a Haitian woman as his servant … ’
He trailed off and the two men sat in a moody silence. Bruno poured more whisky. Peter rubbed his hand wearily over his forehead.
‘Okay, Bruno, I’ll agree Dr Stromberg could be victim of this vampire contagion.’
Bruno banged the coffee table with the heel of his hand.
‘Your theory is the wrong way round,’ he almost shouted. ‘Because you are a scientific man you think there is some unknown infection which makes people act like old-fashioned vampires. Don’t you see it is an old-fashioned vampire who is spreading the infection!
‘Damn it, Peter, if a vampire appeared in this modem age what profession would he choose? He could no longer be a count in a Transylvanian castle, slaking his thirst with peasant blood. There is only one profession he could practise and have access to what he wanted without fear of detection.’
Peter gazed at his glass without speaking until Bruno felt impelled to continue.
‘With your scientific training it is hard for you to comprehend anything which cannot be written as a formula,’ he said. ‘You must believe in cause and effect, in rational explanation, in protons and neutrons. Yet our whole culture is based on the irrational. Western history was completely altered by the fact a man once rose from the dead which, as a doctor, you know is impossible. Yet, wherever you go in the world, people live lives which — whether they believe in them or not — are still influenced by long ago miracles.’
‘The key words there are “long ago”,’ Peter said.
‘Listen, if anyone had told your grandfather when he was a boy that one day he might see moving coloured pictures of men driving a horseless carriage on the moon he would have laughed at them for being crazy. Doesn’t it occur to you we may be in the same stage as your grandfather over other things? Might there not be whole areas still to be recognized and comprehended, and that the so-called supernatural could be one of them?’
‘I take the point,’ Peter said slowly, ‘but if Stromberg is a creature of legend, why is he not bound by the laws of legend? Myths say a vampire cannot roam abroad between sunrise and sunset, cannot cross over running water, cannot stand the smell of garlic, and so on.’
‘It could be there are laws which reflect belief. Perhaps vampires could not stand garlic in the days when the world believed they hated it. Today they would be released from such restrictions because the belief has faded. It could be equally true of religious miracles. As a Roman Catholic I know there were times when miracles were almost commonplace. That was in the days when people had unshakable credence in them. Now the world is largely atheistic or agnostic, there is not the belief to create the ambience for them.’
Peter raised his hands in mock surrender.
‘All right, Bruno, you’re only underlining what I was already beginning to believe, although I admit I never associated Stromberg with it. Now, what do you want from me?’
‘I need you, as a doctor, to get me admitted to Stromberg’s clinic.’
‘Bruno, I can do better than that,’ Peter said and handed him the letter he had earlier shown to Tudor Owens.
The Italian read it with his broad brow wrinkled.
‘This I mistrust,’ he remarked, handing it back as though the paper itself was contaminated. ‘Why should he want you there?’
‘Why not? He was very interested in my research at the London. Whatever he is, he is still highly intelligent and no doubt he wants to understand what it is that motivates his kind.’
‘But Stromberg would be afraid you would discover too much.’
‘I don’t think so,’ Peter said thoughtfully. ‘He only wants me there long enough to set up the research technique, and I’m sure the clinic on the mainland is quite bona fide. It’s what he has on his island I should like to see. I’m going to accept the post. The whole thing may turn out to be innocent after all, but I’m going to find out for myself. What strengthens your theory is that he talked Britt Hallström’s father into sending her up there. If he is evil, he may have passed the curse on to her by a transfusion of tainted blood after her accident, and now he wants her back.’
‘Good Christ!’ breathed Bruno. ‘I had not thought of that angle.’
‘If a doctor wants to be wicked he has the opportunity to be very very wicked.’
‘If you accept the post, I am still going too,’ declared Bruno. ‘You should go normally, but I’ll camp secretly near the clinic. You may need a friend on the outside. The weather is good in Lapland at this time of year, and besides I once did a training course with the Bersaglieri so I can live happily in the forest for a few weeks.’
‘I’d be relieved to have a friend at hand,’ said Peter. ‘I’ll cable Stromberg and as soon as I get his reply we’ll take the Citroen up to Finland. You can drop me near the clinic and carry on by car. Tomorrow we’ll get a detailed map of the area and work out a plan of campaign.’
The thought of positive action was a relief, and both were more relaxed than they had been for days when they finally finished the Bells.
Chapter 19
Night was left behind as the heavily laden Citroen sped north along the E4 highway which skirted the Gulf of Bothnia. Taking turns at the wheel, Peter and Bruno had driven no
n-stop since disembarking from the Danish car ferry at Esbjerg. Peter was anxious to arrive according to the schedule set out in a letter from the clinic confirming his appointment and giving instructions for travelling by public transport to Ivalo.
Following the Swedish custom they drove with their lights on as they followed the road through pleasant farmlands dotted with white, red-roofed houses, belts of dark coniferous forest and stretches of delicate, pale green birch. Sometimes they glimpsed the sparkling gulf on their right, and on several occasions had to brake sharply as reindeer, their antlers thick with velvet, trotted out ahead of them.
They left Sweden at the border town of Haparanda and crossed the Tornio river into Finland, and a couple of hours later the road expanded into a wide dual-laned avenue which was the impressive approach to Rovaniemi, the so-called capital of Lapland. Its modernity — surrounded by primeval forest — surprised them. Log cabins would have been more in keeping than the concrete blocks and brightly painted houses which had replaced the old town which the German army had reduced to ashes in 1945.
Bruno glanced at his Rolex watch.
‘We made it all right,’ he said, ‘Over an hour before your bus goes.’
He drove down the Valtakatu, the town’s main street, and parked the Citroen beside the bank of the Kemi river. On the opposite side a choir was practising, and their voices floated sweetly across the log-strewn water.
‘Before you go to the bus depot let’s check the details again,’ said Bruno, producing a large-scale map. ‘Now, I’m going to camp about here where I should have a good view of the clinic on this peninsula … ’
After their plan had been reviewed, Bruno drove to where a large orange bus, with ‘Inari’ on the front, vibrated gently to its idling engine.
‘Good luck, Bruno,’ said Peter, lifting out two heavy suitcases and a canvas rod case. ‘I’ll make contact tomorrow.’
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