by Brian Lumley
At which time, as he cleared away and washed empty glasses, the call came.
B.J. picked up the telephone in the bar, spoke enquiringly, frowned and turned to Harry. “It’s someone who wishes tae speak tae yeresel’. One o’ yere London friends, perhaps?”
And Harry thought: It could be Darcy at that; perhaps with more news from the Porton Down boffins. And so:
“It’s too busy down here,” he told her. “Okay if I take it upstairs?”
“Aye,” B.J. answered him, lifting an eyebrow. “Why not? Go on—be just as mysterious as ye like!”
“There’s nothing mysterious about it,” he replied, shaking his head, leaving the bar and making for the stairs. “I made a few enquiries, that’s all. This is probably the answer. Please transfer the call when I pick up the phone, will you?”
In their bedroom he waited until he heard the click as B.J. replaced the handset, then said, “Harry here. That you, Darcy?”
“Harry Keogh?” came a phlegmy, guttural query.
Immediately alert without quite knowing why, the Necroscope narrowed his eyes. But he had sensed something unpleasant, perhaps even threatening, about that throaty, gurgling voice. And:
“Yes,” he said. “Harry Keogh, speaking. Who is it, and what can I do for you?”
“Nothing,” said the voice. “It’s what I’m gonna do, and who I’ll be doing it to. That and the pain it’ll cause you!”
Harry’s eyes narrowed more yet. “Who the hell is this?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know?” said the unknown other. “But you’ll know soon enough. You and that bitch, B.J.—and those tasty, juicy whores of hers. That young one’s a real fighter—and she’ll need to be when I catch up with her tonight. Except this time I’ll know what to expect—and it’ll be payback time for that kick in the balls she gave me!”
“You crazy bastard!” Harry growled, as the voice broke out in a spasm of choking, gurgling, almost sobbing laughter.
And then the phone went dead…
His thoughts whirling, straining to fly in a variety of directions simultaneously—picturing in his mind’s eye those routes the girls used, especially young Kate’s routes, her flat at the top of that steep old alley; but also Zahanine’s routes because she, too, had been a target, and this call could well be a ruse to send him stumbling along a false trail—and feeling utterly confused, even to the point of distraction, the Necroscope went slowly back downstairs.
This lunatic…this vampire…this thing: he or it knew who Harry was! Not necessarily what he was, but definitely who! That must mean something, but what? Was this really the work of B.J.’s or her Master’s enemies?—(was a thought that surfaced, flitted momentarily across Harry’s mind, only to submerge again before he could focus on it)—or was it the Necroscope himself who this creature was targeting, by using B.J. and the girls as a lure? That last hardly seemed likely, for all of Harry’s old—and often as not very old—enemies were dead…weren’t they? Also, this sinister episode had begun while Harry was away from the city…or was that just another component of a clever and indeed bewildering ruse?
“Will ye no tell me what’s goin’ on?” B.J.’s enquiry, quiet as it was, nevertheless startled Harry as he reentered the barroom. For she had been waiting for him just inside the door to the stairwell, having stationed herself there in order to catch him out, unprepared, as he returned from upstairs. But B.J. had succeeded only in rousing him from his clouded thoughts, his uneasy introspection, and Harry was rarely at a loss when events dictated a rapid recovery.
“Well, as you know,” he began, “I’ve been doing some investigating, and—”
“—Aye,” B.J. cut him short. “Makin’ a few enquiries, or so ye said. But with whom—if I may ask—and about what? I mean, who can ye possibly talk to, mah wee man, about what’s goin’ on here? For surely ye ken there’s things here that ye cannae ever speak of! So then, what’s yere story, mah brave laddie?”
A moment later, as B.J.’s precepts came into force, if affairs as they stood had been different, impersonal—if anything other than Harry’s metaphysical talents, his previous dealings with the undead, or his connection with the espers of E-Branch had been involved—then he would have been obliged to divulge all. But Darcy Clarke and E-Branch had got to Harry first, preceding B.J.’s post-hypnotic commands with orders of their own; by reason of which these mutually conflicting instructions effectively countermanded each other within their own parameters. And for all that this internal conflict was in Harry’s subconscious mind—or because it was—he knew little of it except perhaps a certain sense of reluctance: that he must now lie to Bonnie Jean. Wherefore:
“B.J.,” he said, “I know very well there are things I can’t speak of to anyone—” (A freakish paradox: that Harry could refer to this without being at all aware in his conscious mind of exactly what he was talking about, let alone that he was fabricating a story) “—and I haven’t and wouldn’t. My only thought was to try and discover if you personally were being targeted—you and the girls, I mean, and through you your Master—or if recently there’d been a pattern of similar attacks elsewhere in the land. If the latter, what has happened here might be purely coincidental, and the attacks could be occurring not because of what you and your girls are but because you are: because you’re female, women, and just like any other woman as far as this mad attacker is concerned. Which is why I contacted my old colleagues in London, who have sometimes had to deal with cases almost as strange as this one.” (An understatement, that!)
“Police, d’you mean?” B.J.’s voice was sharp now, her Scottish accent falling by the wayside.
“Well, of a sort,” said Harry quickly. “Spycatchers, mainly. But really, I can’t speak of them…” (How very true; indeed he was forbidden to speak of them, no less than of Bonnie Jean herself, or more specifically her nature!)
She blinked, nodded, relaxed a little and said: “So, me and mine—?”
“—Are safe,” Harry told her. “At least from my people. But I won’t let up from trying to protect you until I’m sure you’re safe from everyone and anything. So until this is over and done with—until it’s ended, resolved one way or the other—I’ll be going out on the streets of a night, looking after the girls as best I can.”
And with that, even in his semi-trance condition, with Bonnie Jean’s post-hypnotic commands remaining in force, Harry was able to relax a little. He felt a sense of relief that at least the last part of his story, spoken without hesitation, candidly if somewhat robotically, had been the whole truth.
“So then,” said B.J., her Edinburgh twang back again, “Yere auld London friends could’nae help ye, eh? But Harry, was it no daft o’ ye tae imagine they could? I mean: similar attacks, for goodness sake!” And laughing out loud she shook her head. “Just how many rogue vampires do ye think there are in this green and pleasant land, eh?”
Harry stared at her—he stared through her with eyes made vacant by her hypnotic commands—and began to speak. “Rogues? Well I can’t say about rogues.” Again he tried to focus on her, then glanced uncertainly about the barroom. “But there’s—”
At which she quickly cut in with: “No, no, mah wee man! Ye may forget for the moment what I planted so deep inside o’ ye, and answer with a mind that knows nothin’ o’ that and a voice free o’ constraints.” For even in her own wine-bar Bonnie Jean wasn’t willing to listen to the Necroscope listing the names of her moon-children, or nominating her Master; or for that matter including her own name in any sort of inventory of the undead!
Harry blinked and shook his head; his eyes focussed, and he said, “Yes, you’re right: I wasn’t thinking. Maybe I was just a bit panicked. I don’t like to feel that I or anyone close to me is…well, that we’re hunted.” And to himself: For I think of myself more as a hunter than the hunted, B.J.
And deep inside another voice said: Yes, and so is she! But that was Harry’s innermost self speaking, and he wasn’t permitted to pay attentio
n…
X
This time Bonnie Jean made no fuss when the Necroscope went out into the city. It was shortly after midday, sunny and safe—at least for him, who for all that he didn’t much like bright sunlight had no need to fear it—and anyway B.J. knew what he was about: that as best possible he would be seeing to her welfare, on guard against any man or creature intent upon harming her or the pack. And informed by experience, she knew that Harry Keogh was no slouch when it came to looking after people.
Again Harry put the Möbius Continuum to use as he once more checked the girls’ routes, ensuring that the coordinates of any especially perilous place were fixed firmly in his metaphysical mind; in particular Kate’s route, despite her vow that from now on she would go by taxi. Not that she’d be using a taxi tonight for it was her night off. Still the Necroscope couldn’t be sure that Kate would remain in her flat, secure from danger. She was after all a night creature and might decide to venture out; and he couldn’t warn her against such a decision in case she or B.J. should ask why—what it was that Harry feared?—which in its turn might well jeopardize his position in the scheme of things by leading to another bout of hypnotic interrogation.
But the fact remained that if Kate did venture out—even were she to phone for a taxi—still she couldn’t be picked up from or delivered to her door; not in the steep, narrow, canyon-like alley where her flat was located. No, she would be obliged to walk: either to continue on up the alley to some street at a higher elevation, or down one hundred yards or so, and an equal number of time-worn stone steps, to the road at the foot of the alley. And right there—in that poorly lit, high-walled brick tunnel of a place where the terraced dwellings crowding on both sides were often as not unoccupied, their windows and doorways boarded up—that was the most likely spot for an ambush…
Dwelling on such things as he went about his self-imposed duties, Harry could scarcely fend off an involuntary shiver as he stepped from the Möbius Continuum into the alley in question and pictured such an attack on young Kate. Oh, Kate was a moon-child and therefore scarcely innocent in any sense of the word, but she was also vulnerable. And for that matter, who wouldn’t be vulnerable against the toxic and undoubtedly lethal bite of this vampire terror? It was horrible to contemplate the effect such a bite would have on Kate, a creature the Necroscope had come to think of simply as a pretty young girl.
On the other hand—quite apart from not wanting to explain his concerns to Kate or Bonnie Jean for fear of somehow revealing his sources—there was another very much darker reason why Harry might find it self-defeating to reveal the nameless maniac’s threat: simply that it could be as well to let things run their course, using Kate as a lure to draw this plague-bearing lunatic into a trap—even though no such trap had as yet been devised!
The Necroscope didn’t care for that last idea—or that he was even considering it despite that he was!—and as he made a Möbius jump from a shaded doorway to the higher level where the entrance to Kate’s flat lay in a shallow recess beneath an old brick archway, he once more felt the preternatural chill of an involuntary shiver.
But no, it were best to look on the bright side (Harry told himself) and assume that Kate would stay indoors tonight; which considering her recent scare was still the most likely contingency. And if she did, how then might this unknown plague-bearer get to her in the safety of her own place?…Kate’s very own, very lonely place…
And now he was there at the place in question, or at least its entrance; where, in the black brick wall at the rear of the recessed area under the arch, a pair of narrow, iron-clad doors stood side by side. The door on the right had a single bull’s-eye window, dusty and fly-specked; looking in, Harry could only just make out an empty, gloomy passageway extending into impenetrable shadows. This wasn’t Kate’s door, for he remembered her saying that she lived upstairs, on the first floor.
Turning to look back down the alley, Harry saw that no one was in sight. Putting his ear to Kate’s door, and hearing nothing of activity from within, without further pause he conjured a portal of his own, stepped through it and the real door both, and stepped out again on the other side, inside the building.
Now the Necroscope stood at the foot of carpetted stairs in a narrow stairwell that was clean and free from dust; and there too he immediately detected the faintest trace of Kate’s favourite perfume, by which he was doubly assured that the stairs led to her first-floor accommodation.
She would be up there even now, of course, for despite that she was as much or more moon-child than vampire, still it would be no easy matter for her to venture out into broad, sunny daylight. Under a heavy parasol and wrapped as for winter it would be possible but uncomfortable to say the least—not to mention very dangerous. Far better to stay indoors, at least until sunset.
There was a light switch which Harry couldn’t use for fear that it might illumine not only the stairwell but some room in the flatlet overhead, which would surely draw attention to his presence; but in a little while, when his eyes had grown accustomed to the dimness of the place, he was able to see an inner door on a landing at the head of the stairs. A Möbius jump took him to the landing where he stepped forth without a sound immediately outside the stout door. The door had several brass keyholes marked with the scratches of constant use; and Harry felt sure there would be good strong bolts on the inside, even such as Kate had mentioned.
Finally the Necroscope was satisfied that he need go no further. The picture in his mind of a diseased, therefore weakened vampire—a creature which Kate had already fought off on one occasion—didn’t really permit of such a monster breaking down doors as strong as these in order to get at her. Wherefore if young Kate stayed home tonight she was surely safe; in which case, how would the sick monster react finding that she was unavailable, his threat unworkable? Would he simply change his plans to suit and move on to another girl, perhaps Zahanine?
With which questions nagging at his mind, Harry conjured a Möbius door and transferred to the alley’s ancient stone flags in the shade of the wall over the arched entry. And from there, for the moment going on foot, he stepped out thoughtfully down the time-hollowed stone steps, and pondered his next move.
And behind him, upstairs in her flat, young Kate was struck by a sudden wave of unease—a feeling of persecution, perhaps? Of invasion or violation of spirit. And if Harry had chanced to look back just then, he might have noticed a slight movement of the heavy drapes at a single window on the first floor: a sliding window with a single pane of glass, behind a narrow balcony that was little more than a railed ledge. And if Kate had been looking down into the alley instead of gazing out over dreaming Edinburgh, frowning inside at these feelings of gathering immanence, she might have seen Harry as he paced from dazzling sunlight into deep shadow and didn’t step out again…because he was no longer there.
But no, she could only stand to look out on such brilliance for a second or two, following which the curtains twitched back into place again and both Kate and Harry went about their businesses unobserved and mutually unaware…
The afternoon passed; evening came on; soon the velvety dusk of summer was settling on the city. To Bonnie Jean’s surprise Zahanine came in early…while it wasn’t her shift she’d felt out of sorts, fidgety at home; she would be more at ease serving in the bar. Fine by B.J., who was more than grateful, for Margaret McDowell, another of her moon-children, had called in sick; and for more reasons than one it also worked out well for the Necroscope. He wouldn’t have to supply an excuse for not offering to help in the bar—which meant he would be free later to venture out into the night—and at the same time it narrowed down the plague-bearer’s choices further yet.
With Zahanine out of harm’s way, and young Kate safe behind stout doors, who was left for the diseased madman to target? Of course, Kate, Zahanine, and Margaret weren’t Bonnie Jean’s only moon-children. Her pack—the wine-bar staff—was made up of those already mentioned plus two more girls: a willow-slim red
head by the name of Sandra Mohrag, and her raven-haired cousin, Moreen McNiven. These last named shared a house out toward Dalkeith in a well-lit, heavily populated area. But the Necroscope knew they used taxis in the main and normally worked the bar as a team; they enjoyed each other’s company, and anyway there was safety in numbers. To check their taxi routes along Edinburgh’s main thoroughfares would serve no purpose; even if they went on foot Harry would think it highly unlikely that there would be a single ideal spot for any kind of ambush along those routes.
Also, he found that try as he might he couldn’t ignore that certain sick, phlegmy, threatening voice in his head, that kept repeating itself about young Kate being, “A real fighter—” And how she would need to be, “—when I catch up with her tonight!”
Always it came back to that: tonight. And also to Kate, who despite all Harry’s fears was perfectly safe at home tonight—
—Wasn’t she?
As night drew in, Bonnie Jean sensed the Necroscope’s preoccupation, his agitation, and asked him: “So then, what’s wrong the noo, Harry? What’s on yere mind?”
“I think I’ll be going out a little later,” he answered her at once. “I’m not happy that everything is alright. I’m feeling as fidgety as Margaret, unsettled, uncomfortable.”