Mind to Mind: Ashton Ford, Psychic Detective

by Don Pendleton

  I told her, "Maybe so, but the shotgun does his bidding. I could take no chances with that. Thank you for seeing us. We really must put this problem to rest."

  She said, "Yes. I understand. Earth Mother understands." She looked again at Alison, said to her, "Are you the one?"

  Alison sighed, replied, "Yes."

  "Does he understand?"

  Another sigh. "Not really."

  I gave them both a dirty look and said, "I'm still here, you know. Please speak to me, not about me."

  Oom told me, "Earth Mother would give you understanding. But you must be pure."

  "I can't guarantee that," I replied. "For what it might be worth, though, I'd like to help."

  "You must be pure or you will not survive."

  "What do you mean by pure?"

  "If there is evil in your heart, it shall burst."

  I asked Alison, "Exactly what are we talking about here?"

  "Don't do it," Alison replied, hardly breathing.

  "Don't do what?"

  "Whatever she wants you to do. Don't do it."

  Oom said, "Earth Mother would give you understanding.

  I looked from one to the other, said to Oom, "How will she do that?"

  "She will take you." 'Take me where?" 'To our land." "Where is that?"

  Oom made a delicate little gesture with both hands. "It is here. But across." "Across what?" "Ashton, don't go." "Think I'm not pure enough?"

  "Please. Don't do it. I don't know what she's talking about, but...well, I know what she's talking about, but I'm not sure it's possible. For us, I mean."

  "What is she talking about?"

  "Another place, another time."

  "Come on now!"

  "No, honestly. The So-hay-bi-hee-jee are a very ancient people. And they're niched."

  "They're what?"

  "They are in a cosmic niche, a mini-dimension." "A what?"

  "You just can't go there, dammit!"

  I looked at Oom. She was regarding me with a very sober, reflective frown. I asked her, "How do we get there?"

  She replied, "Earth Mother will guide you."

  “How long will it take?”

  She showed me a puzzled smile. "But it is here." She did another of those delicate gestures. "It is now."

  “Here and now?”

  "Yes."

  I snapped my fingers, asked, "Like that?"

  She smiled. "Yes."

  I looked at Alison. "Convince me," I pleaded.

  "Ashton, they are isolated in time and space. Their time does not move. Their space does not evolve. There is no change. Think of a snapshot. A still picture. Forever held in place. We believe that is what they have, what they are."

  “We believe?”

  "You know who I mean, dammit! Our group has been in touch with the So-hays since early in this century. They are a marvelously gifted people, and they have much to share with us. But they cannot function in our dimension without creating havoc. You've been exposed to some of the myths and legends, I'm sure—the wizardry and witchcraft, demonology, all that—much of it is based on contact with these people. They cannot remain in our dimension except for brief visits, and those visits create havoc."

  I was thinking of my own experiences of the past few days when I said, "Amen to that."

  "Earth Mother will take you now," Oom said softly. "Please remove all clothing."

  Alison cried, "No, Ashton, please! Don't risk it! This is not necessary!"

  I was coming out of my jacket, removing the shoulder holster. I said to Alison, "If they can cross, why can't I cross?"

  She slumped into a chair with an exasperated grunt, scratched at her face, blew out her breath, said, "Okay. Go be the big hero. I don't give a damn, Ashton. Go get yourself stuck in an ancient snapshot."

  I was removing my shoes. I requested, "Give me all you've got, please. I'd like to go smart, not dumb."

  Oom said, "You must hurry."

  Alison said, "I don't know much more than I've already told you. They can materialize here only very briefly. Their women, though, can hang on if they conceive from one of our men—or so it seems. Once they've given birth, they lose that hold, but the child cannot return with them. My group has been encouraging this interbreeding process."

  I had a quick vision of Vicky and Manuel. "And you take responsibility for the foundlings."

  "Yes."

  "Are they always damaged like that?"

  "Not all. We've been working on the problem. Even with the birth defects, though, they are truly superior children."

  I said, "Yeah," and took off my pants. I glanced at Oom, asked Alison, "Is she pregnant?"

  "I don't know. Ashton, must you really do this?"

  I said, "Yes, Alison, I really must do this."

  I was already "seeing" the Earth Mother. She stood at the wall, smiling at me. May-un-chee-tee stood beside her. Both were naked. But they had very little substance. I asked Alison, "Can you see them?"

  She glanced all around, replied, "No, I..."

  It happened, then, even as Alison was speaking. Like at the grove that night. I saw myself walking toward the misty women, and I guess maybe I was a bit misty myself, but it was me, viewed from the rear, walking away from myself. Both women held out their arms in welcome, embraced me, and instantly my viewpoint shifted, I was looking back at myself, at the front of myself as that self stood gawking at me; there was a split of some kind, a partitioning; I don't know how to describe it, but I could see Alison and Oom, both of whom were staring at my other self, but all three figures were frozen like, as Alison had said earlier, a snapshot, a still.

  I had no sensation of moving, not from the new point of view, but the frozen scene was receding, blipping out, and suddenly I was in what I can only describe as Paradise.

  The colors were absolutely magnificent. I had never seen a sky so clear and star-spangled, a valley so beautifully glistening in the moonlight. The air was sweetly scented, and the grass beneath my bare feet was soft and moist and cool. We were walking, yet it was a floating sensation, as though my body were just barely heavier than the air itself; I knew that if I were to crouch and spring upward, I would just float away and soar through the air like a bird. May-un had me by one arm, Ah-ree by the other, and they were clinging tightly to me. There was no conversation—nothing spoken, anyway—but they were telling me things, pointing out things, and suddenly I realized where I was. I was still in the Ojai Valley, but it was a somewhat different Ojai, primal, pristine. The trees were much larger and the distant mountains a bit foreboding—alive, somehow; active. Now and then I got a whiff of sulfur in the air. I saw large herds of some kind of animals, but they seemed to be sort of static, no movement within the herds. Now and then I saw people—but again, static, just there, not really doing anything. I asked Ah-ree why everyone was just standing around, and she replied that it only appeared so.

  I couldn't accept that answer, pressed her for a better explanation. She said something to the effect that we moved only between them, not with them, and I knew it was the only answer I would get.

  You can call this experience whatever you'd like. I do not know what to call it myself. But I came away from the So-hays with a greatly uplifted spirit and a totally different sensing of the self. I can do no better with this than to quote again St. Paul from II Corinthians 12:3-4:

  "... and I know that this man, was caught up into Paradise—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know, God knows—and he heard things that cannot be told, which man may not utter."

  I could now sympathize with Paul. Some experiences are simply beyond the reach of mere words. But I knew one thing for sure: The Twelve, or whoever, were right. An "interbreeding process" with these people had to be the greatest idea since sex.

  But I also "knew" that it was an idea whose time had come and gone. There would be no more Vicky Victorias or Manuel-Manuels, no more "Jane Does" or parties in the sacred grove.

  Somewhere a door had closed, a "ni
che" sealed over and consigned to its proper place in space-time gone by.

  This was the "understanding" that Ah-ree-pat-muh wished to convey.

  But this "Earth Mother" had left us a precious gift. We had some new little angels on earth. That could not be all bad.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight: Wrapped

  Alison said, "I don't see anyone."

  I told her, 'Too late. They're gone," and began hurrying into my clothes.

  Alison cried, "My gosh!"

  "What?"

  "Oom-ray-key-too! Where'd she go?"

  Yeah, she was gone too. Alison was not aware of any passage of time. I suppose there had been none, from this frame of reference. Her opening statement to me was actually a continuation of a remark begun before I hit the crossover. My head was spinning a bit, I'll admit, but I was thinking of that frozen photograph I'd left behind me here. Could I have slipped out through a small crack in time? Could all that have happened—actually happened—in a finger snap? Evidently so, if happened it had. And I believed that it had.

  Alison was helping me into my clothes. "Thank God you've come to your senses," she muttered.

  "I didn't," I muttered back. "I went."

  "What do you mean?"

  "I mean, I was caught up into the third heaven, or some such. I went with Ah-ree-pat-muh and May-un-chee-tee. I went to their Ojai Valley. Let me tell you, Shangri-La never saw it so good."

  Alison was confusedly checking her watch. She commented, "You haven't had time to leave the room. Are you okay?

  She meant was I sane...not healthy. I asked her, "Did Oom not have time to leave the room, either?"

  I could see it dawning in her eyes then, if not acceptance then at least wonderment and a predisposition to accept.

  I said, "I bring you bad tidings, kid. It's over. They've killed the project. Or I think you called it 'the process.' Whatever, they've decided it wasn't such a great idea, after all. Maybe they figure this place is not worth colonizing. So if that was your mission, to save the show, then I'm afraid you have a failure to report. It's over. Sorry. I had nothing to do with that. Once I've had time to think it through, I'll probably feel as bad about this as you."

  She bit a lip and said, "Damn it, Ashton, if you're making this up..."

  "I'm sure I'm not," I told her.

  I became even more sure of it a moment later when Frank Valdiva and a Ventura sheriff's posse came through the door.

  "We got your boy," Valdiva told me. "He's got a hell of a mouse on the jaw, though. What'd you hit him with?"

  "Moral contempt, maybe." I sniffed. "Did you find the evidence?"

  "Yeah, and it's nice and legal, fully warranted. In the van, as you suggested." He smiled at Alison. "What's your problem, young lady?"

  She replied in a dazed voice. "I'm okay. Just trying to come to grips with...all this."

  He said, "Well, you're the psychologist. So maybe you can tell me about those guys outside here."

  She asked, "Which guys?'

  He replied, "Those guys out on the lawn. Couple dozen of them, apparently having a homosexual romp through all this. Keep insisting they were with women, but there's not a woman among them." He tossed me a wink, asked Alison, "Know anything about that?"

  I did, and it was the convincer for me. I knew where their women had gone. I pulled Valdiva aside, quietly suggested that he allow "those guys" to discreetly withdraw, assured him they had no direct role in the case.

  Gordon Campbell, though...yeah, a very direct role. This guy was a classic. You could find his kind anywhere and everywhere—the world model of the eminently practical, small-minded man. He was the Barnum-style showman who found King Kong in a crack in time and brought him to civilization not for scientific enlightenment but as a sideshow exhibit; the weekend hunter who shot and skinned and cooked a Sasquatch because it had been a bad day at the hunt and he was cold and hungry; the petty thief who found himself in possession of a priceless vase from the Ming Dynasty but tossed it away because it was cracked; the Siberian tribesmen who...well, you get the idea.

  This guy had stumbled on to something in his own backyard that conceivably could astound mankind and lead to a new world vision—or maybe even a whole new world—but he was content to sit on it and milk it for the few bucks it could bring into his petty little life. Apparently he never made an attempt to understand, never really questioned or even wondered about the truly magical qualities of his "sacred mound," a temporary gateway in time and space to what many would regard as Paradise.

  Alison's "group" could not—would not—work with such a man. But they used him. And fed his carnival instincts. I feel no particular respect for them in that. They allowed him to convert a world-shaking "experiment" into a pornographic sideshow because that served their secrecy as well, and beautifully covered their own involvement in the "process."

  I feel that it was a combination of that manipulative secrecy and crass pornography that set the stage for Jim Cochran's murder. I believe that Jim was indeed giving me "God's truth" in the telephone message he left for me just shortly before his death. How could he possibly have known or even guessed at the incredible truth about Jane Doe? He was an unwitting accomplice, drawn into the thing by lust, but then converted to a cause he really knew nothing about through an appeal with a winning combination: money and wish-fulfillment.

  Alison's "group" recruited Valdiva as well, with pretty much the same appeal. I learned that Valdiva had been orphaned himself at a tender age. He had a soft spot there. And a guy can always use a few extra bucks. He was in a great position for official influence in the placement of foundlings, and it was a job he loved to do. He could bend his moral sense to an acceptance of the quasi-legal position this placed him in.

  I tried to blame "the group" for the way the whole thing soured, but there again we should not leap to harsh judgment. If they are who I believe they are, then "secrecy" is their charter and service to mankind their pledge. Their motives were good. And it just goes to show that no wisdom is ultimate—not on this plane of existence, anyway.

  They did not tell Valdiva or Cochran or any of the foster parents the true story about these kids. How could they? Or why should they? The kids would tell their own stories one day, simply through their accomplishments in a world sorely in need of finer influences.

  And how could "the group" have known that one of these "alien mothers" simply could not totally let go of the fruit of her womb? May-un-chee-tee could not do so. So try to put yourself into the Cochrans' shoes. How would you deal, or try to deal, with such strange intrusions into the life of your child? I believe Cochran's story. I believe Georgia knew about it too. But what the hell could either do about the situation? They had two sweet kids to worry about.

  Jim was wrong, yes. He was wrong first in swinging a crowbar, he was wrong secondly in trying to cover up the crime, he was wrong finally in the continued deceit when the thing came back to haunt him. I believe Valdiva had some wrongness here too. I believe that he suspected or guessed or wondered but held his peace. But try to put this all in the context of incredible events and perhaps the judgment will not be too harsh.

  Gordon Campbell somehow got the drop on Jim Cochran and put a bullet between his eyes. He did that not from anger, nor in the defense of his own life or any other's. He did it because he is what he is, a petty asshole, and because he feared that Jim Cochran was about to blow the whistle on his sweet little carny. Oom had tried to assure me that Campbell was "not an evil man." I believe what she meant was that he simply was not intelligent enough to be truly evil. And, yes, she sent Campbell to the L.A. hospital to release May-un from the bonds of this earth. I do not fully understand the process here, but apparently the violence done to her on this side of the cross somehow impeded her ability to cross back.

  The "group" knew this. Alison was sent to assist. I think possibly I was "sent," too, but I'm still trying to find the vehicle for that. At any rate, the best solution had apparently come from the other side. They
slew the body on this side and raised it up again on the other side. Please don't ask me how they did that. How did Jesus "raise" Lazarus, and how did he appear before Paul on the road to Damascus? You tell me, I will listen.

  I will listen to most anything these days.

  I have not seen Alison in the flesh since that night. I dropped her off at her place and she walked back into nowhere. She has called me a couple of times, just to say hi, and I believe I may have caught a glimpse of her on television just the other day, in coverage of a United Nations "save the children" event. I don't know who the hell she is, really, or what her name is or anything else about her. Last time she called, I tried to pin her down on those "shoes that bind" that she mentioned in connection with my birth. It's sort of a shivery thing when you really think about it. But you know Alison well enough by now to know how evasive she is. Even if she knew for sure that my mother is not really my mother, she would not tell me so.

  I guess Georgia is doing just fine. She's back into acting, has a small part in a new sitcom scheduled for next season. I drop by now and then to see the kids. Manuel-Manuel told me, last time out, that Vicky Victoria has "settled down" quite a bit. He also told me that she is psychic. I advised him to therefore treat her kindly. He rolled his eyes at that and assured me that he always knocked before he entered her mind. I can't wait to see these kids grown up. And I have no idea whatever how many other little "angels" are scattered about this side of the cross.

  Also talked to Valdiva just the other day. They've got Campbell nailed on the Cochran murder. Dug the lethal bullet out of the floorboards of his van, found some bloody rags. The guy is a jerk. Good thing too. He could have built a circus defense from the facts of this case, but he has been predictably practical. He has agreed to cop a plea in exchange for twenty at San Quentin.

  That about wraps it, I guess. If I have not given you sufficient cause to buy this story, or to at least admit to its possibility, let's still try to be friends. I won't hold it against you if you won't hold it against me.