Bodies from the Library 2. Группа авторов

as much as you do about this murderer.’

      ‘You mean—? Oh, my God!’ Fear rose up, choking him, darting questions scuttled about in his mind like rats. ‘You think I’m him? You believe I’m the killer? You suspected it once before …’

      ‘And you immediately came across with a ‘proof’ of your innocence. You gave us his name.’

      ‘Well, there you are then!’

      ‘But after all, that could have been yourself ringing up and confirming yourself.’

      ‘How could I, if I didn’t know the code word?’

      ‘Ah, but, Mr Hawke,’ said Superintendent Tomm, ‘what does that make you, if you did?’

      He sat for a long time saying nothing, and slowly the hysteria ebbed away, leaving his mind cold and clear. He said at last, slowly: ‘If I tell you something, will you swear—?’

      ‘I’ll swear to nothing. But I won’t unnecessarily give away your secrets.’

      ‘Well, then. I see now that I have to convince you that I am not No Face; whatever conclusion you in the end might come to—if such a rumour got about—God help me! So I must tell you. I saw him. Not in the crystal—I saw him in a church. I noticed this man go into the confessional box. He was there a long time and when he came out he flung himself down on his knees and buried his face in his hands. And the priest came out of the box and went away quickly and he was as pale as death. I followed, I saw the priest kneeling out of sight of the rest, before a side-altar, with his hands clasped, looking up at the crucifix, tears pouring down his face. I knew then that he had heard something terrible, but he couldn’t break the seal of the confessional, he was powerless to do anything about it. And there was a mass murderer abroad.

      ‘I went back down the aisle. I touched the shoulder of the kneeling man and spoke some name. He shook me off, muttering, “No, no. Go away!” I gave him a sort of apologetic pat on the head and said, “Sorry, mate!—I thought you were someone I knew!” But in those two moments—we’re trained in these tricks, Superintendent, that’s how we get our information—I’d flicked the handkerchief out of his breast pocket and seen the name printed across the corner; and I’d gently shuffled back the nylon wig and got a glimpse of the red hair underneath. And that’s all there was to it.’ He gave a small, despairing shrug. ‘So now you know. But at least it proves that to know what I knew about him, I didn’t have to be the killer.’ He shrugged again. ‘I suppose if, after that, I swear to you that I do sometimes exercise the true psychic gift, you will simply think me a fool.’

      ‘A fool?’ said the Superintendent. ‘No, no, on the contrary. I think you are a very clever man.’ He fell to musing upon it. ‘A very, very, very clever man,’ he said.

      Delphine appeared in the doorway. ‘Oh—I’m sorry—’

      ‘No, no, Miss Grey. It was really you I came to see. This may be just a little to your comfort. After you’d left this morning, we had one of his calls. Out of the usual horror emerged the fact that he was gloating over the two people murdered last night. In his childhood, he’d witnessed a double killing—a fight between his parents. With knives—so one up to you, Mr Hawke, you always suggested something of the kind!—and recently, I suppose, something triggered off the reaction. He has a craving, like a drug, for what he calls the smell of death.’

      ‘Yes—he said that to Mr Hawke, during last night’s séance.’

      The Superintendent did not look at Mr Hawke. ‘He didn’t mention the word “surfeit”? No, the séance took place before the double killing. But he said it this morning, over and over. I’m hoping it just may mean that he’s satisfied. All the same …’ He suggested to Delphine: ‘You’ve had a bad time—this is twice he’s threatened you. You wouldn’t consider getting out of town for a bit?’

      ‘Oh, she can’t do that,’ said Joseph Hawke. ‘I need her here.’

      She remained but now she was given police protection indeed, with safe-conduct to and from her home, a man posted all night on duty at her block of flats, even prowling the corridors outside of Joseph Hawke’s apartment. The work was ever-increasing, but they had been able to rent, from people fleeing from danger, a flat in the same building and there install a couple of secretaries. Three months passed by: No Face, appetite apparently appeased, struck no more. Gradually she seemed to forget her terrors, gave herself over to her study of the crystal ball. A success; she invented a little gimmick of her own, allowing the sitter to peer over her shoulder down into the wavery depths of the globe on its bed of black velvet then, once they were sufficiently mesmerised, slipping under the crystal a picture or photograph—by that time, almost anything more would do—and with a little guidance soon having them in amazed recognition of the dear old homestead complete with lost loved ones right down to dead doggie, Rover. But she herself proved somewhat too susceptible to the hypnotic effect—like gazing into deep, deep water, she would dreamily say, moving gently to a cloudy turbulence. An evening came when, after a particularly long, hard day’s work, he found her apparently unconscious, sitting nursing the glittering ball in her hands. ‘Delphine?’

      No flicker of response. He was about to bring her round, gently, when she began to speak, to mutter in the high, bird-like voice she affected for her professional sessions. ‘Something moving. In the crystal—moving.’

      To be clever at interpreting nonsense was one thing; a genuine rivalry in scrying was quite another. ‘What do you mean?’ he said sharply. ‘Moving?’

      She seemed not to hear him. ‘Shadowy … All swirling … A picture of, a picture of …’ And she cried out suddenly: ‘It’s my flat! I can see the clock. The clock says midnight. It’s midnight. It’s tonight. There’s a girl—’ The high voice faltered. ‘There’s blood, there’s blood!’ and she gave a sharp scream and cried out ‘No! No! NO!’ and her hands dropped away from the crystal globe, she fell across the arm of the chair and lay there, still.

      Oh, dear God—Delphine! His gentle and loyal Delphine, the only true friend that in all his life he had ever known—butchered to death by a maniac come alive again to his craving for blood! But it’s all right, he thought; there’s masses of time to warn the police, she can stay in the office flat, she needn’t go back home …

      On the other hand …

      He sat for a long, long time, watching her. Almost certainly what she had seen in the crystal would be obliterated from her mind. Let her go, then; and then inform the police, let them set a trap and—maniac caught red-handed in a murder attempt, and all through his own amazing predictions.

      And yet, again …

      She had seen in the crystal the spilled blood of a deed accomplished. She had seen into the future. What use, after all, to interfere, to protect, to warn?—only to have the prediction of the crystal come true; to be seen to have failed. Should not one simply ‘foresee’ what inevitably must be?

      But foreseeing, why not have warned in advance? I must leave it to the last moment, he thought, pretend to have just come out of trance, rushed to the telephone. Then immediately call the media and … The maniac caught, not in the attempt but actually in commission of the deed: a small man, red-headed, whose name would prove to be F. O. Cane. Just dare the very universe, after that, to question the psychic powers of the great Joseph Hawke!

      If in his heart he recognised that here was an infamy beyond the imagination of any decent man—his mind over-rode the thought. Within him the passion to be accepted for what he knew himself indeed to be had grown like a weed, to suffocate all other caring. At five minutes to midnight, call the police, call his contacts; and meanwhile let her, in happy ignorance, go home.

      She stirred at last, opened her eyes, looked mildly astonished. ‘Oh, dear—did I pass out? This thing—I fall for it far too easily. Like staring down into a pool, into swirling water.’

      He said: ‘Did you see anything in the water?’

      ‘Well—I