Necroscope: The Mobius Murders (18 page)

This was in no way gauche or thoughtless of the Necroscope. The way his head was bowed, it was as if he sat in a church: it was his way of communing, of showing his respect and even something of his humility. But:

No need, Mr. Keogh
, came that oh-so-distant deadspeak voice in his head.
I know who you are—who you must be—for I was told I would sense your presence like the warm glow of a candle or the glimmer of its flame, which I do! But now I wonder: can the dead really dream?
Is
this a dream, a fantasy, or is everything I believed in life the only
true
fantasy? I knew nothing until your dear mother and her friends sought me out…it was as if I drifted in limbo. I knew only that I was dead and must remain dead forever, and was surprised that I knew anything at all!

Then out of the darkness came your dear mother and the others, and following their visit—indeed
during
their visit—I began to feel awakened, even strengthened! I was still drifting…but in a different, definite direction! It was as if I felt something tugging at me, as if I heard something calling to me, urging me to move on toward…toward—

“—Toward the Beyond,” said Harry, nodding. “Yes, my mother has told me. And I’m only sorry I’ve had to ask you to wait. But it’s so very important, not only to me but even more so to others who have suffered the same fate as you: cruel deaths at the hands of a murderer!”

It’s true that I was murdered
, said the other, quietly,
and that someone should be brought to justice. But I don’t know how I can help you; I don’t know who my murderer was, or why he did what he did to me.

“Can’t you tell me anything about it?”

I shall tell you all I know, all that I remember. It may be that the evil devil had his reasons, or perhaps some modus operandi that you may recognize…I just can’t say, can’t promise anything.

“An evil devil?” Harry knew that thought well enough. “Yes, and I think I may know what makes you call him that. So even if you can’t promise anything, tell me about it anyway.”

And after a moment’s silence:
It was dark
, the other began.
The dusky dark of evening in the woodland near my home, where I walked a familiar path. It was my habit: to walk of an evening, where I could see the lights of my not too distant house twinkling through the trees. The path was white, made of gravel, and easy to follow; I had walked that way many times since retiring from my position at the University.

The night was cool but not cold; the air clean, invigorating, with just a hint of wood smoke from some country cottage hearth. I felt at peace with the world—oh, how little I knew!

I don’t know where he came from; perhaps he was waiting for me? But I heard a crunch of gravel, and before I could turn his hands were on me—on the back of my neck, in the junction with my shoulders. But if his intention was to choke me—well, that would seem strange indeed! And he was strong, so very strong!

I tried to turn but couldn’t; I was forced to my knees; the fiend seemed to be gaining in strength as mine waned! There was this faint pulsating red glow—like a guttering fire’s embers: perhaps my imagination, my mind’s response to some weird disabling agony as I slumped—for suddenly I was weak as a kitten, drained of energy, surrendering to powerful hands that didn’t so much crush as
suck
at me! There’s no other way to describe it.

I knew I was losing consciousness…I could feel my heart hammering, and sensed that burning red glow of death strengthening, suffusing and reducing me.

And he was
grunting
, even
chuckling
as he murdered me! Then I heard other voices: laughter! At the very last moment,
joyous laughter
! Male and female voices, yes: young lovers, walking in the woods, all unawares of what was happening so close by.

He
heard it, too, and his hands left me. And as I toppled I turned. But by then my eyes were dim. I saw him, but briefly—a bulky figure, dark against the darkness—his face, red with what could only be fury, red as fire!

That was all, and I saw no more; but however dimly I heard his hurried footsteps crunching gravel as he ran away, and then nothing…or nothing of any real substance, until your mother came to wake me from that haunted, drifting limbo…

For a moment then it seemed that Calloway’s deadspeak voice had failed him, until finally:
And now you know everything…

“Yes,” Harry nodded. “Yes, I know everything, including the name of your murderer. Let me show you something.”

He searched his memory, conjuring a scene that would probably burn forever—or as long as Hemmings lived—on his mind’s eye. It was that picture of the great leech as Harry had viewed him via the Möbius interface in the alley off Princes Street in Edinburgh: a picture of the fat, blurred, but burning red-faced devil himself as he took Wee Angus’ life and drained him of his soul. And because his thoughts were deadspeak, Latimer Calloway saw that picture, too.

In the next moment the ex-Professor Emeritus cried out his recognition—

—But
only
of the killer’s distorted image, not his name. The bloated, shifting, burning features of the murderer failed to reveal his actual identity; but the
likeness
of what Calloway had seen on the evening of his death was unmistakable. And:

That was him!
he said, in a whisper that was yet more distant.
Harry, it was him!

“Yes,” said the Necroscope, “I’m sure it was. Not only that but I know
who
it was: ex-Professor Gordon J. Hemmings, to whom you gave a well deserved dressing-down on the day he walked out of the University and never went back!”

Gordon Hemmings?
Calloway sounded stunned, astonished.
That strange fellow? But it’s unbelievable…or perhaps not, for I know he hated me; his dreadful, threatening looks as he stormed from my chambers that day! D’you know that old saying: if looks could kill? Well then, enough said! But even so, are you absolutely sure? I mean—Hemmings?

“The same,” said Harry. “And yes, I’m sure.”

Gordon J. Hemmings!
Harry could almost see Calloway shaking his head.
Him and his ridiculous theories! A madman, obviously.

“Ridiculous?” Now Harry’s head was shaking as he denied the other’s assessment. “Well I agree he’s some kind of madman, but not all of his theories are ridiculous. Too few of them in fact. I myself am proof of some of them—and so is he himself—and likewise what we’re doing right now! Hemmings is a mutant; his mutant mind looks beyond the laws of physics as we—most of us—accept them, and it’s possible that to his understanding his actions are justified by his alien nature. He
is
evil, yes, but he does what he does to survive. At least, that’s how I see it. But there are certain matters he hasn’t explored yet, abilities which I daren’t let him acquire. That’s one of the main reasons why I’ve had to track him down.”

And now that you’ve found him, what next? You’ll go to the police?

Deja vu, thought Harry. This was somewhat similar to a conversation he’d had with Darcy Clarke. And smiling however wrily he answered: “No sir, I can’t. For how could I begin to explain that my evidence derives from the memories and thoughts of dead people?”

Ahhh!
said the other.
No, of course not!

“That’s why I must do it myself,” Harry continued. “But as my mother might have explained to you—”

—It’s what you do
, said the ex-Professor Emeritus, simply.

“Indeed it is, sir. It’s something that I sometimes have to do.”

Yes, I see that now. So then, are we finished here, Harry? For if so I think…I think I can feel the Beyond calling to me. And there’s no longer any reason to stay here. I think perhaps I should be moving on.

“I think both of us should be going,” Harry nodded. “Albeit in different directions. I just want you to know that whatever the future has in store for you, my thanks and very best wishes go with you, sir. And now, goodbye.”

For a moment there was no reply, but then from far, oh-so--far away, like the smallest echo of the smallest whisper in the Necroscope’s metaphysical mind—
My thanks to you, my boy
, came ex-Professor Emeritus Latimer Calloway’s reply—
and especially to your mother. Goodbye Haaaarrry.

Then nothing more…

There were things still to be done, final arrangements to make.

At midday, as Harry munched on a tasteless sausage sandwich washed down with coffee, it suddenly dawned on him that he had burned his boats behind him. He’d made promises—of a sort—to the so-called drowned ones, which left him in something of a predicament. They were already mobile, relying on him to do his thing, fulfil his part of the compact: an eye for an eye. Which could only mean that one way or the other ex-Professor Gordon J. Hemmings, the great leech himself, would shortly be going head-first into his own mantrap.

One way or the other, yes.

The preferred way was that the fat man would be taking that final trip—indeed a “one-way” trip—on his own. The other: that Harry would be forced to go with him, whether he wanted to or not. And that second scenario, while undesirable, was not at all unlikely.

This was hardly an unfamiliar situation; no slouch at boat-burning, Harry had been here before on many occasions and felt sure that he would be again, but only if he survived this time around. So now he must work on a plan to make sure that he did.

He spent most of the remaining afternoon in his study, conjuring, tweaking, often ruining and then erasing Hemmings’ variant Möbius formula; only to recreate it time and time over. He practiced altering its structure (however minutely, and hopefully invisibly) even as it formed into doors; this by rearranging the awkward variable that governed spatial coordinates. A quantitatively indeterminate equation, it was flexible to a degree, but had a tendency to reshape itself the moment he relaxed his mental grip on it. And the only way around
that
problem, or so it seemed, would be to make sure that if or when it became imperative (which was to say life-saving) that he meddle with the red devil’s device, he
didn’t
relax his grip on it!

But then there was another problem, for which as yet there was no answer. While these variant doors he was conjuring were exact copies of Hemmings’ doors, they did
not
spring from Hemmings’ mind but from Harry’s. Exact duplicates they may be, but they lacked the fat man’s authority. An imitation van Gogh—no matter how good, how clever—does
not
have van Gogh’s inspiration. Harry could adapt or transmute his own conjurings as much as he liked, but would he be able to do the same with the great leech’s, if or when that became necessary?

Well, only time would tell. And meanwhile there wasn’t much of that left…

Toward evening Harry tried to make contact with the drowned ones. It came as no great surprise when he was unable to do so, for they were no longer anywhere near their original coordinates. As to where they were: he didn’t know for sure, wasn’t even able to say what their plan was; only that for it to work—if it was to work at all—the great leech must be granted an opportunity to dispose of him using the accustomed modus operandi: the variant formula, a Möbius portal, its inescapable route and deadly exit high over the North Sea.

So obviously the dead ones on the ocean floor—or wherever they were now—had plenty of faith in the Necroscope’s skills; all thanks, he had little doubt, to his Ma’s influence with the Great Majority. For if they were
not
sure of him and his abilities, surely they wouldn’t be going to such painful extremes. Or perhaps, determined to avail themselves of this one opportunity for revenge against the creature who had done this to them, they would suffer any and all such trials regardless of the outcome.

Except, the closer Harry came to putting those abilities to the acid test, the more insecure he was starting to feel. Hemmings’ magnetic power—that strange psychic suction that fed on souls—was something he had experienced only through seeing it in action, and then briefly; something of which he had no additional knowledge other than what Latimer Calloway had told him. And while the incredible intricacy of metaphysical Möbius mathematics, in which he excelled, was one thing, facing up to the soul-sucking paranormal potency of a mutant mentality was something else entirely!

But too late to worry about that now; the drowned ones were waiting, and Harry’s boats were burned to ashes…