Deadspeak

At last Papastamos turned to him. 'My friends, too!' he said, with a lot of feeling. 'I only knew them for a day or two, but they were nice people! And I tell you, not everyone I meet is so nice!'

'Then you must understand how we feel,' Darcy answered, 'who knew them a long time.'

Papastamos was quiet a moment then shrugged again, perhaps apologetically, and nodded. 'Yes, of course I understand. Is there anything else I can do?'

'Oh, indeed there is!' Darcy knew it was all right between them now. 'Like I said, we'd be lost without you. And that still goes. We'd like you to exert whatever pressure you can to get that autopsy over and done with, and then to have poor Ken Layard cremated as soon as possible. And that's just for starters. You'll also need to keep tabs on this gang of drug-smugglers, for right now you're the only one who knows anything about them. We will eventually have some more people flying out, and you'll also be required to brief them. And finally, if it's at all possible ... do you think you could arrange a car for us?'

'No problem!' said the other, expansive as ever. 'It will be here tomorrow morning.'

'Then that's about it for now,' Darcy smiled. 'We'll just trust you to see to your end of this thing, for after all, that's what's most important. And you must trust us to do the things we have to do. We're all experts in our different ways, Manolis.'

Papastamos scribbled a number on a scrap of paper. 'You can get me here any time,' he said. 'Or if not, you'll get someone who knows where I am.'

Darcy thanked him again and said good night. And as the taxi drew away he went back in through the squeaking gates...

The three went out to eat, and to talk.

'But why out?' Darcy wanted to know, after they'd found a taverna fronting on a quiet street, with small stairways to private tables on internal balconies, out of earshot of other patrons. And when they were seated in just such privacy: 'I mean, wasn't the villa private enough?'

'It could have been too private,' Harry told him.

'Too private?' Sandra was still a little shaky from the brief mental contact she'd made with something unthinkable in the mind of Trevor Jordan.

'There are people here,' Harry tried to explain something he wasn't himself sure of. 'Other minds, other thoughts. A background blanket of mental activity. You two should understand that better than I do. I don't want us to be found out, that's all. You think you espers are clever? Well, and so you are - but the Wamphyri have powers, too.'

Wamphyri! It was a word Darcy Clarke couldn't hear without remembering the Yulian Bodescu affair. And he felt a familiar shiver down his spine as he asked: 'And you believe that's what we're up against, right? Another like Bodescu?'

'Worse than that,' Harry answered. 'Bodescu was an open book compared to this. He didn't know what was happening to him. He wasn't an innocent himself - hadn't even been innocent from a time before he was born - but he was an innocent in the ways of the Wamphyri. He was a beginner, a child learning how to run before he could walk. And he made mistakes, kept falling down. Until one of his falls was fatal. But this one isn't like that.'

'Harry,' said Sandra, 'how do you know these things? How do you know what we're up against? Yes, I sensed a mind in there with Trevor's, a powerful, totally evil mind ... but couldn't it have been another telepath? They were on a drugs job, Ken and Trevor. What if the big-league criminals have set up their own ESP-units? It could happen, couldn't it?'

'I doubt it,' Harry answered. 'From what I've seen of espers they don't work for other people.'

'What?' Darcy was surprised. 'But we all do. Ken, Trevor, Sandra, myself. And you, once upon a time.'

'Worked for a cause,' said Harry, 'for an idea, a country, for revenge. Not for the gain of other people. Would you, if you were as powerful as the one Sandra sensed? Would you sell your talent to a gang of thugs who'd destroy you the moment they began to fear you -which they would, eventually?'

'But what about Ivan Gerenko, who - ?'

'A madman, a megalomaniac!' Harry cut him off. 'No, even the necromancer Dragosani was working for an ideal - the resurrection of old Wallachia. At least until his vampire took control. Listen: how many people know you have your talent, Darcy? And Sandra, how many people know you're a telepath? I've only known it myself for a few hours. You didn't go around advertising it, did you? Take it from me, the ones who do tell all are the fakes. Mediums and spoon-benders, mystics and gurus - fakes every one!'

Darcy snorted his derision. 'So you're saying that all of us espers are good guys, right?'

'No such thing,' Harry shook his head. 'No, for there's plenty of wickedness in the world, even among "all you espers". But think about it: if you're evil and you've mastered a special talent, why would you want to sell it to someone else? Wouldn't you use it - in secret - to make yourself mighty?'

'The fact is,' said Darcy, 'I've often wondered why they don't! The people in E-Branch, I mean.'

'I've no doubt that some do,' said Harry. 'No, I'm not talking about E-Branch, but others, people we know nothing about. There must be many talents loose in the world. How do we know that so-called "business acumen" isn't just another talent? Did this man make a million because he has a "knack" for wheeling and dealing, or was it because there's a special something guiding his hand? Something which he himself might not even know about? Is the war hero really as brave as we believe him to be, or has he - like you, Darcy, or even like Gerenko

- got a guardian angel watching over him? Did you know that the casinos have a list of people they won't let in, professional gamblers who have the winning "knack", and that an awful lot of them are rich as Croesus?'

'That's all very well,' said Darcy, reasonably, 'but still you have no proof that this one is a vampire!'

'Proof, not yet,' Harry answered. 'But evidence, plenty. Circumstantial, but still it's there.'

'Such as?' said Sandra.

Perhaps exasperated, he turned to her. 'Sandra, the closest you've been to a vampire is in reading my case file. I take it you have read it? It's a standard text in E-Branch, as a guard against "the next time". But I do know what I'm talking about, and so does Darcy. So while I don't want to be hurtful, still I think you'd best just sit still and listen. Especially you, for we don't yet know that when you saw him - whoever he is - in Trevor's mind, he didn't see you!'

She gasped and sat up straighter, and Harry reached across to pat her hand. 'I'm sorry, but now maybe you can see what's worrying me. Some of it, anyway. Me? -I've been here before, or at least in a similar position. But you? - God, I don't want anything to happen to you!'

Darcy said: 'But you did mention evidence.'

Before Harry could answer, a waiter came to take their order. Darcy ordered a full meal, Sandra a salad and sweet, but Harry only asked for a portion of chicken and plenty of coffee. 'A full stomach always makes me sleepy,' he explained, 'and alcohol is worse still. And I intend that you understand how deadly serious I am about this thing. But if you really want to drink that brandy, just go ahead, Darcy.'

Darcy looked at his brandy glass and the large measure of golden liquid it contained, and put it aside.

'Evidence, then,' said Harry. 'For more than four years the dead haven't attempted to contact me. Or if they have, I haven't been aware of it. Oh, my mother may well have come to me in my dreams; in fact I'm sure she has, for that's her nature. And yet now, suddenly, they've placed me in jeopardy. All right, the fact of them attacking Wellesley was circumstantiaclass="underline" they just happened to be there when he'd planned to murder me. But they were there, delivering a message. And they were doing it, possibly (a) for my mother, or (b) for themselves, out of their concern for me, or (c) for Ken and Trevor, who had been trying to reach me in my dreams.'