… Until she came starting awake to an unnatural psychic stillness or pent awareness which had its origin in Jake. Next door, he was motionless and physically asleep; but psychically his mind was something else. It, too, was still — breathlessly still — like a cat watching a mouse emerge nervously from its hole; or more probably (Liz decided), like someone in an empty house, suddenly aware of an unusual sound in the night.
He was listening to something — but so intently! — and for a moment Liz thought he had detected her presence. But no, while Jake's attention was definitely rapt upon a subconscious something, it wasn't focussed on Liz at all. On what, then?
And so for an hour Liz 'listened' to Jake as attentively as he was listening to some sensed but unheard other or others, but with little or no result. On occasion he would come alive and ask, 'Who are you?' Or he would say: 'I know you are there — I hear you whispering — so why not talk to me instead of about me?'
But even though Liz was given to understand something of this, she sensed rather than 'heard' what he said, because (a) Jake wasn't speaking to her directly, and (b) his recently discovered shields, while they weren't fully engaged, were neverthless shrouding his thoughts.
Until unable to bear the not-knowing any longer, she tried to break in on him and ask, 'Who is it, Jake? Do you know them?
What are they talking about?' At which the doors of Jake's mind at once slammed shut and she found herself locked out entirely. For a while, at least.
But lying there on her bed, Liz believed she knew who he had been trying to talk to. And that was knowledge that sent a shudder down her spine, so that even in the oppressive heat of this El Nifio night, still she felt cold. And she also knew how he had detected her and shut her out. It was the difference.
For the precog lan Goodly had had it right when he'd said: 'When you heard Jake speaking, or thinking, that was your telepathy working. You heard him because he's alive. But the others… they were in a different category, using a different mode.'
Deadspeak, yes. The difference between a live conversation and a dead one…
They were talking — arguing among themselves — about him, Jake Cutter. And Jake knew it. More than that, he knew or suspected who or what they were, which was something he had yet to remember and admit in his waking hours, perhaps because no sane man would ever want to admit such a thing. Well, with the possible exception of a handful of dubious psychic mediums.
The dead in their graves were talking about him, and Jake could hear them like the buzzing of bees in a clover field, or more properly the rustle of dry leaves on a wintry garden path. For bees and flowering clover are redolent of burgeoning life, while the rustle of fallen leaves… isn't.
All of the voices belonged to strangers; he didn't know — or hadn't known — a single one of them. And while it was quite obvious that they heard him, no one bothered to answer Jake on the few occasions when he felt galvanized to break in on their conversation; but his brief bursts of eager questioning invariably found long-drawn-out silences following in their wake.
And the worst of it was that these voices seemed afraid to talk out loud: they whispered, so that he found it difficult to follow what they were saying. But they seemed to be arguing the pros and cons, Jake's merits against his drawbacks, to what end he couldn't rightly say.
We don't — we daren't — let them in among us! one of the voices said quite clearly. While another mumbled:
But he isn't one of them. See, his light hums like a lantern in the dark, and we feel its warmth. Only the Necroscope — only Harry Keogh and his sons were ever like this — beacons in our everlasting night, or places to warm ourselves in the presence of the living; our only contact with the world and all the loved ones we left hehind.
And another voice said, But in the end even the Necroscope succumbed. Is that what you would have us doP Befriend this one and give him access to the deadPAndifhe, too, were seduced — what then? A vampire in our midst, and. one who knows our every thought and secret? But the difference between a Necroscope and a necromancer… 15 vast.
Andmonstrous! said yet another, whose voice shuddered. We can't risk giving such a gift to anyone who would misuse it.
But he already has the gift! said the voice, or its owner, who spoke in Jake's defence. And given to him by Harry himself, if we can believe what she has said.
Ah, but she's not long cold. Naive in the ways of the long night, what can she know?
She knew Harry,
And what good did that do herp Like so many others before her, and like Harry himself, she too became a victim. No, she's no guarantee. And as for Harry: don't speak of him. The teeming dead know all about him.
But Harry never harmed us! He was our friend and champion, right to… to the end. But here the defending voice grew very quiet and uncertain.
And what an end, said another small voice, when the Necroscope must Jlee his own world in order to keep faith!
She was the last of the living who Harry spoke to, the one who was unafraid came back. She says he made promises — and he kept them.
True, said another, more doleful voice. But Harry isolated himself for the sake of the living, not for the dead.
I say we should trust the woman, the other insisted.
No, said the doleful one. For in the end she brought down a DOOM upon herself. Why, she was fortunate that she only died! And now— if we trust this one on her word — perhaps she will bring a DOOM on all of us.
At which point:
'Zek?' Jake tried again to cut in. 'Is it Zek you're talking about? Zek Foener?'
And again a long, cold silence. Until out of nowhere:
I presented your case, Jake, and now we must let them talk it through. (Zek's voice, which he recognized at once.)
'Talk what through? I'm not with you.'
If the Great Majority, the teeming dead, decide that they don't want you to have or to use deadspeak, Zek explained, then you can talk all you like and they won't listen. They'll simply ignore you. Oh, they're drawn to you — we're all drawn to your warmth, Jake — but at the same time they're afraid of you. They were afraid of Nathan, too, once upon a time, but Nathan proved himself, showed them they were mistaken. If he was here now… well, he could far better plead your case than I can.
'And what about Harry?' Jake said. 'Where is he? Couldn't the Necroscope, er, "plead my case" — whatever that's supposed to mean — even better?'
Nof any longer, Zek answered.
'He did something to upset them?'
Something… happened to him, she answered carefully.
'So/ Jake tried to reason it out, 'Harry is dead, but the Great Majority won't have any truck with him. Yet you get along okay with him, and that thing in the sump was positively clinging to him. All very weird.'
IfE-Branch, or Harry himself, had wanted you to know certain things, then I'm sure they would have told you, said Zek.
But Jake was still puzzling it out. 'Trask, lan Goodly and Lardis — yes, and Liz, too — they've all had a go at hinting at something without being specific. They seem concerned that once I know the whole thing, or when I can see the big picture, then I'll run from it. But surely it would have to be something terrible to scare the Great Majority, who have absolutely nothing to lose! Yet even the dead won't spit it out up front. They speak in whispers, as if afraid to even talk about it. Not only that but Harry Keogh, a once-powerful metaphysical mind, is now an outcast among his own kind. So what in hell did he do…?'