by James Swain
“Is something wrong?” she asked.
“If it’s all right with you, I’d like to talk out our problems first.”
“Are you afraid of seeing someone? Be truthful.”
“Yes, I am.”
She reached across the table, and placed her hand on top of his. “I really want us to see a professional. You’re different. I have to learn to deal with that.”
“I’m not that different,” he said defensively.
“Oh, Peter, please.”
His cheeks burned, and he glanced down at his unfinished plate of food. “All right. I’m a lot different. But that doesn’t mean we can’t work this out ourselves. We need to try.” He looked up, and saw her studying him. An uneasy silence filled the kitchen.
“Why are you so afraid of this?” she asked.
“I don’t want to betray my friends.”
“Therapists are sworn to secrecy. Something tells me that’s not the reason.”
Peter struggled with a reply. Liza was right. There was another reason, and it had to do with the dark side of his personality that he kept buried within him. That was something he didn’t want to discuss with a therapist, or anyone else.
His cell phone began to vibrate. Liza frowned at the interruption. He pulled it from the pocket of his robe and glanced at the face. Garrison calling. He decided the FBI agent could wait, and placed the phone onto the table. It began to move around by itself, then went still.
“Guess it’s not important,” she said.
“Actually, it’s probably very important,” he replied. “You’re just more important.”
“Who is it?”
“Garrison.”
“The FBI agent? Don’t you think you should take it?”
He leaned forward on his elbows. “I can call him back. How about this? Let’s talk before we go see someone, and set some ground rules.”
“What kind of ground rules?”
“I don’t want to talk about my parents except in general terms.”
“Why not? Your parents are a part of this conversation.”
There were places he didn’t want to go right now, and his parents’ history was one of them. How was he supposed to explain who they were without pushing Liza away from him?
“I have my reasons. Please respect them. That’s all I want. Everything else is fair game.”
“Is there something about your parents you haven’t told me?”
“Yes,” he said quietly.
Her frown grew. “More secrets, huh?”
“I only found out about it recently. I’m still not comfortable with it yet.”
“How are we supposed to have a relationship if you hide things?”
His cell phone rattled on the table. He glanced at the face. It was Garrison, trying to track him down. Why couldn’t he leave a voice mail like everyone else? Peter ignored it.
“I’m not hiding things,” he said. “My parents died when I was seven. There are a lot of things I didn’t know about them, and their past, that I’m only learning about now. It’s making me see them in a new light and it’s not easy.”
Her eyes searched his face. It made him uncomfortable, and he resumed eating his food. His relationship with Liza had never been a struggle, and he wondered if they would ever return to the way things used to be.
“There’s something I want to ask you,” she said. “How does it work with psychics when it comes to relationships? How do they work these issues out? I’m assuming their partners are normal. Or aren’t they?”
He gave her question some thought. Max’s late wife had been psychic, and so had Milly’s late husband. Reggie had been a confirmed bachelor, so he didn’t count. Madame Marie’s husband hadn’t been psychic, but his parents had been, so he’d understood the drill. Peter didn’t know about Lester Rowe, and as far as Holly was concerned, she rarely dated. There was Nemo, who’d changed girlfriends as often as he changed his socks. It occurred to him that none of his psychic friends had carried on a relationship with a normal partner. He wondered how he could tell Liza this, and not make her even more uncomfortable. Before he could answer, his cell phone did a slow crawl across the table. Garrison, calling again.
“Maybe you’d better answer it,” Liza said.
“I want to talk about this some more,” he said, ignoring the phone.
“Then answer my question. How do your psychic friends deal with their relationships? Or is that a secret too?”
“I don’t know. I’ll have to ask them.”
“You don’t know?”
“No.”
Liza picked up her plate, went to the garbage disposal, and dumped her uneaten meal into the trash. Turning around, she gave him a fiery look. “How can someone with the gift of clairvoyance not know how to carry on a normal relationship? I just don’t get it.”
“You’re the first normal relationship I’ve had,” he said truthfully.
“Really. What about that Swedish supermodel you were dating, and the TV actress. Didn’t those last a while?”
“I never got close to them. I couldn’t confide in them like I have with you.”
“You told me what you wanted to tell me, Peter. You didn’t tell me the truth.”
He rose from his chair. She was pushing him away, and he needed to come clean. “I was afraid that if I told you too soon, I’d damage the relationship, and you’d run away.”
“You’ve already damaged the relationship. The question is, how do you plan to fix it?”
“I don’t know.”
“You know, I think that’s the first honest thing you’ve said.”
His cell phone did another little dance. Liza crossed the kitchen, and snatched it off the table. Flipping it open, she abruptly said, “Hello—are you looking for Peter? He’s right here. Hold on,” and shoved the cell phone into her boyfriend’s hands. “Let me know when you’re ready to have a real conversation,” she said, and stormed out of the room.
Peter heard the front door slam as she left the house. He shook his head, wondering how he was going to make this right. He’d wanted to tell Liza about himself for the longest time, but had never been able to muster up the courage to do it. Now, he wondered if it was too late. A voice came out of the phone, and he raised it to his face.
“Hello?”
“You are one hard man to track down,” Garrison said. “I’ve got a big problem, and I need your help.”
“What kind of problem?”
“Wolfe isn’t who we thought he was.”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t want to talk about this over the phone,” the FBI agent said. “I’ll come by your place in ten minutes. Be outside on the curb waiting for me. I’ll explain everything then.”
Peter wasn’t ready for this. He needed to find Liza, and talk things out with her. His personal life had taken enough hits in the past few days, and couldn’t take much more.
“Hold on a second,” he said. “I need to know what’s going on. I have a life, you know.”
“The city is still in danger,” Garrison said.
Peter heard his own sharp intake of breath. He glanced at the window, and saw the rain coming down hard outside. The storm had returned with a vengeance.
“See you in ten,” he said.
46
Peter threw on some clothes, grabbed an umbrella, and went outside his brownstone to wait for the FBI agent’s arrival. His heart was pumping furiously, the images of the Friday night séance still fresh in his mind. Cars burning, people dropping like flies, and Wolfe standing in the middle of it like the Grim Reaper, assessing the carnage. That was the threat he’d seen during his journey to the other side; now that Wolfe was dead, the threat should have passed as well. For Garrison to be telling him otherwise made him shiver uncontrollably.
If there was one constant in his life, it was his ability to predict the future. He’d never been wrong, and could not understand how he’d called this one so badly. He glanced at his watch.
“Come on,” he said impatiently.
Garrison pulled up in his Lincoln, his eyes bloodshot from lack of sleep. Peter went around to the passenger side and jumped in. The car took off before his door was closed.
“How can the city still be in danger?” Peter asked.
“There’s an envelope on the backseat you need to see,” Garrison said. “Take a look at what’s inside. Then I’ll explain.”
Peter retrieved a manila envelope off the rear seat, and dumped its contents onto his lap. Out fell a man’s wallet, passport, an ancient Zippo lighter, and some loose change. The wallet and passport were darkly stained, and he realized they were covered in dried blood.
“Are these Wolfe’s?” Peter asked.
“They are,” Garrison replied. “The police found them on his body last night. I decided to take a hard look at them, in the hopes I might discover how Wolfe was planning to launch his attack on the city. The wallet contained a plastic hotel-room key. We’re trying to track the location right now. There’s also a snapshot of a woman named Rita Tomavich, who’s an assassin for the Israeli government. We’re looking for her, too. The thing that caught my eye was the passport. Open it up.”
Peter flipped through the passport. Wolfe was well traveled, and the pages were filled with colorful stamps from a variety of foreign countries, including Spain, the Philippines, a number of countries in Africa, and Saudi Arabia. Wolfe had murdered three psychics in the Saudi city of Riyadh a few days before an attack on the city, and Peter wondered if that played into this.
“Is this the problem?” Peter asked, pointing at the stamps from Saudi Arabia.
“Very good,” Garrison said. “How did you know?”
“I guessed.”
“You’re a hell of a guesser. Look at the dates when Wolfe arrived and departed from the Riyadh airport. They’re next to the stamps.”
The dates were printed in tiny letters, and Peter had to stare. “Let’s see. It says here that Wolfe arrived in Riyadh on November third, and left on November seventh. Is that significant?”
“Yes. Want to take a stab at it?”
Garrison was making a game out of it, although not in a playful way. Peter thought hard, and finally gave up.
“I don’t have a clue. What does it mean?”
“The attack on the oil pipeline in Riyadh took place on November ninth,” Garrison said. “Wolfe was long gone before it took place.”
“Maybe he slipped back into the country, and carried out the attack.”
“Not likely. Flip the page.”
Peter did as instructed. The next page contained a pair of colorful stamps for Rio de Janeiro. Wolfe had arrived in Rio on November ninth, and left on November fourteenth. Wolfe had been on the other side of the world when the attack in Riyadh took place.
“This doesn’t make any sense,” Peter said.
Traffic ground to a halt. Garrison threw the car into park, and turned in his seat. “My theory about Wolfe was that he killed three psychics in Riyadh, and then carried out an attack on the oil pipeline. That theory isn’t valid anymore. Someone else attacked that pipeline.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know. That’s why I called you.”
“Maybe this is a mistake, and the dates on the stamps are wrong. Have you considered that?” Peter asked.
“Yes, I did.”
“And?”
“I struck out. I stayed up last night checking all the other cities stamped in Wolfe’s passport. In every one, prominent psychics were murdered during his time there, just like in Riyadh, and just like here. Wolfe was sent to those cities to murder psychics. And in every city, a horrible attack of some kind took place a few days after he departed.”
“Are you sure?”
“Damn sure. Wolfe had nothing to do with the attacks in those cities, and wasn’t going to conduct an attack on New York. Someone else was. The fact that Wolfe is dead doesn’t mean the threat is over.”
“But I already looked into the future,” Peter said. “Wolfe was the one.”
“The spirits gave you bad information,” Garrison said. “Ask them again.”
“It doesn’t work that way.”
“What do you mean?”
“The spirits tell you what they want, and that’s it. There are no refunds.”
The line of cars in front of them inched ahead. Garrison threw the Lincoln into drive, and the vehicle lurched forward. The veins were popping on the side of his forehead. He looked like a man ready to lose control. He took a right at the next intersection, and Peter realized he was circling back to the brownstone.
“Head south,” Peter said.
“Why should I do that?” the FBI agent asked through clenched teeth.
“Because I’m going to help you figure this thing out.”
“How? You just said the spirits wouldn’t help.”
“No, but I can.”
“How do you plan on doing that?”
He’d told Garrison more about himself than he would have liked, but was never going to tell him about the demon. The men who ran the Order of Astrum had the same demon inside of them. In that regard, their powers were no greater than his. Peter suspected that if he put his mind to it, he’d be able to figure out what they were up to.
“I can’t tell you that,” Peter said.
“Why the hell not? We’re talking about thousands of lives.”
“I just can’t.”
“You like keeping secrets from people, don’t you?”
Liza had accused him of the same thing over breakfast. Keeping secrets was part of who he was, and he’d never felt ashamed about it before, until now.
“Just go south,” Peter said.
Garrison grunted under his breath. He punched his horn, and traffic began to move.
* * *
Garrison pulled up to the front of the Empire State Building on 34th Street, and parked in a No Parking space. He had calmed down, but only a little. He tossed an FBI sign on the dashboard before joining Peter on the sidewalk.
“So what’s the plan?” the FBI agent asked.
“I’ll tell you when we’re in the observatory,” Peter said.
“No offense, Peter, but the clock is ticking. I can’t be wasting my time sightseeing.”
“Indulge me, will you?”
They went inside. Of all the magnificent structures on the island of Manhattan, the Empire State Building was the best known. Considered one of the seven modern wonders of the world, it towered over every other skyscraper in the city, and offered spectacularly breathtaking views as far as the eye could see. Tickets to the 102nd-floor glass-enclosed observatory were expensive, unless you had an FBI badge you could pass in front of the ticket taker’s face. They rode the elevator to the top with their ears popping.
The observatory was empty as they exited the elevator. Peter made his way toward the north side. He’d been coming to the 102nd floor since childhood, sometimes to think, other times to be by himself, and become lost in the puffy white clouds that often swallowed up the building. He sat down on a bench, and gazed at the storm that had engulfed the city. Garrison joined him.
“You still haven’t told me how you’re going to help me,” the FBI agent said.
“You have a problem that you can’t figure out,” Peter replied. “Problems are mysteries, and I’m an expert at solving mysteries.”
“How so? From being a magician?”
“That’s right. It’s how I learned the craft. Many of the great magicians, like Houdini and Blackstone, coveted their tricks, and refused to share them with other magicians. If I wanted to learn how Houdini and Blackstone’s tricks were done, I had to figure out the method myself. That’s why I’m good at solving problems that other people can’t.”
“And you did it up here,” Garrison said.
“This was one of my favorite places.”
“All right, so what’s going on now.”
“Let’s start from the beginning. We know that Wolf
e was going to cities around the world, and murdering psychics. A few days later, a horrific attack would occur. The Order of Astrum is selling this information to ruthless dictators, who are profiting from it. The FBI originally thought that Wolfe was behind the attacks, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. Someone else is. Does that about sum it up?”
“In a nutshell, yeah.”
Peter put his elbows on his legs, and stared into space. The storm was blocking the view, and he imagined the various buildings and monuments spaced out before him. Several minutes passed before he glanced at the man sitting beside him. “It’s something simple.”
“Why do you say that?” Garrison asked.
“The greatest mysteries are always simple. That’s what fools us. We’re expecting something complicated, and don’t realize the method is staring us in the face.”
Garrison popped a candy into his mouth. “Give me an example.”
“All right. There was a Dutch magician named Kaps. He was really great, and enjoyed fooling other magicians. He came to New York to perform on a TV show. Later, he got together with the best magicians in the city, and did a private performance. One of the tricks got everyone talking for weeks. Kaps borrowed a lit cigarette, and passed it through the center of a pocket handkerchief without causing it to burn. No one had a clue how he did it.”
“Did they ever find out?”
“Eventually Kaps came back to New York, and one of the magicians begged him to explain. Kaps finally gave up the secret.”
Garrison was on the edge of his seat. “Can you tell me how he did it?”
“Sure. There was a slit in the hanky.”
“A slit? You mean a hole? Hell, I could do that.”
“That’s right, you could. Kaps knew that the magicians would never expect him to do something so brazen. It was brilliant.”
“Do you think that’s what’s going on here?”
“Yes. There’s a slit in the hanky, only we’re not seeing it.”
Garrison’s frown said he wasn’t buying it. “How can you be so sure? Maybe the Order of Astrum has another agent who’s carrying out the attacks. Someone we all missed who’s now here in New York, getting ready to strike. It’s the only plausible explanation.”
