01 - Goblins (20 page)

“He’ll follow us.”

“No, I don’t think so. We can’t disappear, Mulder. The senator, remember?”

He almost stopped then, but her momentum pulled him along.

“Carl.”

“What about him?”

Mulder stared into the rain, willing Hawks to come in at speed. “According to
his notes, he was asking around about the goblin.” His chest tightened, his
stride quickened. “Cleaning up, Scully. I think someone’s scared, and the
goblin’s cleaning up.”

The telephone rang only once before Rosemary snatched up the receiver. She
listened and said, “What are you doing, calling here? Suppose
he
had
answered?” Without thinking, she began to weave the cord between her fingers.
“Well, you’re lucky he’s not. He’s downstairs now. Those FBI agents were here,
and he thinks they lifted his damn keys.” She watched the door without seeing
it. “I think, if they didn’t know before, they know now.”

Her gaze shifted to the window, to the trails of water almost invisible against the grey air, the grey sky.

She stiffened.

“You can’t do that. No. It’s bad enough, but you can’t touch them.”

The goblin cleared its throat painfully. “Yes, I can.”

Rosemary almost rose out of the chair. “Damnit, will you listen to me?
Just… just what we agreed, all right? Don’t make it worse than it already is.”

“Doctor, I can do whatever I want.”

She couldn’t believe it. First Tymons, now this.

“In fact, I think all that stuff you’ve been telling me is plain bullshit.”

“Look—”

“You know, I don’t think I’m affected much at all.” It laughed softly, and
wheezed. “And if I am, Doctor… whose fault is that?”

She did stand then, angrily shaking her hand until the cord fell off.
“Goddamnit, listen to me, you idiot! If I have to—”

“Doctor.” The voice was calm. Very calm.

Rosemary closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “What?”

“We have an agreement. I’ll do what you want.”

She leaned forward, bracing herself on the desk with one hand. “Thank you.
It’ll be fine, just fine, as long as we don’t panic.”

“I’ll do what you want.”

She nodded. “Yes.”

“Are you listening?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Then don’t, Doctor. Don’t
ever
talk to me like that again.”

“Oh, really? And what if… hello? Damnit, hello?”

The line was dead.

She gaped at the receiver, then slammed it back onto its cradle. Calm again;
she had to regain calm again, be the eye in the storm. It was not, yet, a
disaster that those damn agents probably knew something. They could snoop around
all they wanted, but they didn’t know it all. As long as she made sure she, and
Joseph, didn’t panic, they never would.

At least not until it was too late.

But she was afraid for the goblin. Despite her assurances, she knew what
little control she had was practically gone. Like all the others, those too deep
in the woods to be found—here, and elsewhere—the strain and the treatment had
proved too much.

This one had lasted the longest, however.

This one was the proof of her triumph.

She grabbed her purse and coat and hurried from the office. Joseph would have
to come to her for a change, once he stopped blowing off pompous steam. She
still had some last-minute packing to do.

Just a few more weeks, she prayed as she made for the elevators; just get me
out of here in one piece, give me a couple more weeks, and if it’ll be over.

Really over.

The door slid open as the overhead bell chimed softly.

She took a step, and froze.

The car was empty. She could see that, but she still couldn’t bring herself
to go in.

With a low groan of frustration she used the fire stairs instead, yanking on
her coat, cursing her own weakness, but oddly grateful for the harsh sound of
her heels on the steps.

Scully decided her vacation hadn’t been nearly long enough, not by half. A
Marville patrol car had picked them up minutes after they left the hospital,
just about the time the rain had stopped. The driver, though polite, refused to
answer any of Mulder’s questions.

“Talk to the chief,” was all he would say. It sounded to her as if Hawks’
equanimity at having the FBI in town was being sorely tested.

Now they sped toward town, and she couldn’t help feeling that everything was
moving too fast. She needed time to think, and she wasn’t getting it. She was
reacting, rather than acting; otherwise, she never would have taken Mulder’s
leap from experimental camouflage to full-blown, controlled human chameleon, with no stops along the way.

It wasn’t like her; not at all.

She braced herself when the car momentarily lost traction on its way around a
bend, and wished she had tried to get a hold of Webber instead. And when the
driver said, “Sorry, ma’am” once he regained control, she almost snapped his
head off.

Not like her at all.

Then Mulder folded his arms on the back of the seat and rested his chin on
them. He said nothing, but she could feel him at her shoulder. Her eyes closed
briefly at a flurry of leaves across the windshield.

“Mulder, I’m sorry about Carl.”

He grunted.

She realized then that that was part of her problem. She hadn’t liked
Barelli; he was crude, too slick, and too full of himself. But for reasons she
would never understand, he had also been Mulder’s friend, and she hadn’t said a
single word of sympathy, of commiseration. The moment she had seen the
reporter’s body, she had clicked into professional mode.

She hadn’t let the murder touch her.

It had obviously touched her friend.

“We have to get to Elly,” he said at last.

She agreed, and asked the driver to take them there instead of the station.

“I don’t know,” he said doubtfully. “I was told—”

“Don’t worry about it,” Mulder said. “We’ll take the heat. You can tell him
we pulled rank. FBI, pushy feds, stuff like that.”

For a second, Scully thought the man would flat out refuse. Then he grinned,
shrugged, and: “Whatever you say, sir.”

“So punch it.”

“You got it.”

And it took all of Scully’s self-control not to grab the dashboard.

Traffic increased as Marville began, Saturday shoppers and wanderers taking
their time to make the business district last as long as they could make it. The
driver took a back-road, corner-cutting shortcut to avoid the main street, and
pulled up smoothly in front of the apartment building.

“You want me to wait?” He sounded hopeful.

“Yes,” she told him as she opened the door.

He took the radio mike and called in: “Maddy, this is Spike. We’re at the
Goblin Lady’s place. Maybe the chief should meet us here, huh?”

The radio hissed. “I’ll tell him. Watch your back.”

“You got it,” he said, and hooked the mike back on its cradle.

“That’s it?” Mulder asked, sounding disappointed.

“You mean, ten-four, that kind of stuff?” The driver shook his head. “The
chief hates radio talk. He says it makes us sound too much like cop shows.” He
laughed. “Besides, half the guys keep getting the numbers wrong anyway. Maddy
knows what we’re saying, so…” He shrugged.

Scully was already outside, looking up at the bay window. The curtains were
closed. She turned slowly as Mulder left the car, and clamped a hand hard
against her chest.

“Mulder!”

Immediately she ran across the street without checking for traffic, heading
straight for the small park and Elly Lang, sitting motionless on her bench. The
old woman faced the empty ball field, bundled in a black coat, a black umbrella
canted over her head.

She didn’t turn when Scully called her name.

No, she thought, leaping the curb and racing across the wet grass; damnit,
no.

“Elly!”

She heard Mulder behind her, drifting to her right to come up on her flank.

“Elly!”

She grabbed the bench back and propelled herself around, damning herself for
not thinking of this sooner.

If they were too late, she would personally rip Tonero’s medals off, one by
one, and pin them back on his bare chest. One by one.

Suddenly a hand snapped out from beneath the umbrella, and she yelped as she jumped to one side when a stream of
bright orange nearly caught her on the chest.

The old woman stared at her without blinking. “Oh. It’s you.” And she tucked
the spray can back into her purse. “I must be getting slow.”

Scully didn’t know what to say, could only nod while she tried to catch her
breath. “I thought—”

“Yes,” Elly said. “I can see that.” Her gaze shifted when Mulder came up
beside her. “They won’t hurt me, you know. Never have. I figure they figure an
old lady can’t do them much harm.”

“Ms. Lang,” Mulder said, “this one is different.”

Scully dropped onto the bench and gently pushed the umbrella to one side.
“It’s killed at least three people that we know of, Ms. Lang. We think you could
be in danger.”

Elly humphed. “You don’t know much about goblins, young lady.” She shook a
bony finger in Scully’s face. “You should study more. You’re a smart girl. You
should learn more. Goblins,” she said, “don’t kill anyone. Never have.”

Dana looked to Mulder for support, and he hunkered down in front of the old
woman, one hand gently on her knee so he wouldn’t topple. “Ms. Lang, this one is
sick.”

“They don’t get sick.”

He shook his head. “Not that kind of sick.” He tapped his temple. “This kind.
It isn’t like the others. It’s…” He swallowed, and let his hand slide away. “It’s evil,
Ms. Lang. I don’t know any other way to put it.”

Scully saw it then, the doubt and the birth of fear in the woman’s face.
Suddenly she seemed two decades older. “You shouldn’t be sitting out here,” she
said quietly. “You should be someplace warm. It’ll rain again soon.”

“The children,” Elly whispered.

“I don’t think they’ll be playing much today.”

She stood, sliding her hand along the woman’s coat until she grasped her
hand. The fingers twitched, then curled around hers, and she pulled Elly slowly
to her feet, the umbrella dropping forgotten to the ground.

Mulder retrieved it as Scully pointed to the cruiser. “See that man there?
His name, if you can believe it, is Spike. I think I can talk him into staying
with you for a while.”

Arm in arm they walked across the grass.

“Is he married?” Elly asked.

“I don’t think so.”

Mulder went ahead, keeping himself between the women and the driver as he
spoke. Scully blessed him for that.

“He’s a nice boy,” Elly said, using her chin to point at Mulder.

“Yes. I know.”

In the middle of the street, Elly stopped, her lower lip trembling. “Is he
right about this goblin?”

She nodded.

“I’m not ready to die yet, you know.”

Dana squeezed the woman’s arm. “I know. And you won’t.”

“Too mean, too cranky.”

Dana smiled, although the woman didn’t see her. “Well… I don’t think so.”
She urged them forward again. “You’re just tough, that’s all. A good thing to
be.”

“Are you?”

Scully didn’t know how to answer that one, and was saved from stumbling by
Todd Hawks’ arrival. It didn’t take long to get Elly camped in her apartment,
and not much longer than that, once they were outside again, to tell the chief
they suspected that someone attached to, or working for, the Special Projects
Office at Fort Dix was responsible for the murders. Someone, she added, who was
extremely skilled at blending in.

“Disguises, you mean?” Hawks asked.

“You could say that.”

“A real expert, one of the best,” Mulder said, following her lead. Then he
smiled so quickly she almost missed it. “You could say it gives a whole new
meaning to the word wallflower.”

“Son of a bitch.” Hawks checked the sky as if daring the rain to add to his
misery. “Damn, I don’t need this. I really don’t.” He shook his head and looked
up at Elly’s apartment. The curtains were open; a lamp burned in the window. “If
you don’t mind telling me, you got anyone in mind?”

He sounded neither bitter nor imposed upon; he only sounded as if he wanted
this to be over, so his town could get back to what passed for normal.

“Because,” he added flatly, “what I’ve got is three goddamn corpses, and
three families and some local politicians on my ass demanding explanations.” He
looked at Mulder then, eyes narrowed. “And would you happen to know why, while I
was poking around Vincent’s house this morning, a United States senator called
my office?”

Oh, great, she thought; just great.

Though she could hear traffic in the distance, the neighborhood was quiet. A
few lights on porches, in front windows; an old black dog trotting along the
gutter; a large crow strutting across the ball field.

Like her, it seemed in a state of anticipation.

“Chief, can you patch Mulder through on your radio, to try to locate the rest
of our team?”

“No problem,” he said with a wry smile. “They were on their way to the
station when I left, trying to find you.”

When Mulder questioned her with a look, she shook her head slightly, waiting
until Hawks was on the radio. “We’ve been sloppy,” she said, matter of fact, not
a scolding. “The major’s ready to bolt, and all we’ve been able to do is run
from one killing to another.”

“The restaurant,” he suggested.

She frowned. “Why?”

“Hank does his best thinking in front of a plate of pancakes.”

“Mulder,” she started, then waved herself silent. “Okay.”

Then she hurried inside to be sure Elly was all right, a concern quickly
allayed when she saw Spike on the stool, cap in his lap, avidly listening to the
old woman describing her lifelong hunt for goblins.

Neither noticed her in the doorway; neither noticed when she left.