Karl Wagner - Why Not You and I?

She made a wry face. “You look big enough to hold another few. A light one,then?”

“Hell, why not. A light one, please.” Probably she would feel more at ease if she supposed his psychiatric powers were disarmed by bourbon.

He paced about the living room while she saw to his glass. Coming to the fireplace, he studied the beautifully engraved shotgun that hung there. It was a Parker. Russ started to touch it.

“That’s loaded.”

He jerked back his hand like a scolded kid. “Sorry. Just wanted to get the feel of an engraved Parker double-barrel. That’s some gun you have to decorate your fireplace with.”

“Thank you. I know.” She handed him his drink.

“Don’t you worry about keeping a loaded shotgun in your living room?” The drink was at least equal to its predecessors.

“I’d worry more with an empty one. I’m alone here at night, and there aren’t many neighbors. Besides, there aren’t any kids around who might get in trouble with it.”

“I’d think a woman would prefer something easier to handle than a shotgun.”

“Come out on the skeet range with me sometime, and I’ll show you something.”

Mandarin must have looked properly chastened. With a quick grin Gayle drew down the weapon, opened the breech, and extracted two red shells. “Here.” She handed the shotgun to him.

“Double Ought,” Russ observed, closing the breech.

“It’s not for shooting starlings.”

He sighted along the barrel a few times, gave it back. Briskly she replaced the shells and returned it to its mounting.

“Might I ask what you do, Mrs Corrington?”

“Gayle. I assume you mean for a living. I own and manage a mixed bag of fashion stores — two here in Knoxville, plus a resort wear shop in Gatlinburg, and a boutique on the Strip by the University. So you see, Doctor, not all working girls fall into the nurse or secretary system of things.”

“Russ. No, of course not. Some of them make excellent psychiatrists.”

She softened again. “Sorry for coming on strong for women’s lib. Just that you find yourself a little defensive after being questioned for an hour.”

“Sorry about that.” Russ decided not to remind her that this was at her own invitation. “But this has been extremely interesting, and Curtiss is like a bloodhound on a fresh trail.

“But how do you feel about this, Gayle?” Do you believe a poltergeist or some sort of spirit has attached itself to the house?”

She gave him a freckled frown and shrugged her shoulders. No, Russ concluded, she wasn’t wearing some sort of backless bra beneath her gown — not that she needed one.

“Well, I can’t really say. I mean, there’s just been so many things happening that I can’t explain. No, I don’t believe in witches and vampires and ghosts all draped in bedsheets, if that’s what you mean. But some of the books I’ve read explain poltergeists on an ESP basis — telekinesis or something on that order.”

“Do you believe in ESP?”

“Yes, to an extent.”

“Do you consider yourself psychic?”

She did the thing with her shoulders again. “A little maybe. I’ve had a few experiences that are what the books put down as psychic phenomena. I guess most of us have. But now it’s my turn. What do you think, Russ? Do you believe in ghosts?”

“Well, not the chain-rattling kind anyway.”

“Then ESP?”

“Yes, I’ll have to admit to a weakness toward ESP.”

“Then here’s to ESP.”

They clinked glasses and drank.

“I’ll second that,” announced Stryker, rejoining them.

“Jesus!” Stryker swore. “Slow down, Russ!” He braced himself with one hand against the dash, almost slung out of his bucket seat as the Jensen took a curve at 70.

“Use the seat belt,” advised Mandarin, slowing down somewhat. After all, he was a little high to be pushing the car this hard.

“Don’t like them,” Curtiss grunted. “The harnesses make me claustrophobic.”

“They say they’re someday going to pass a law making it compulsory to wear them.”

“Like to see them try — we’re not to 1984 yet! Why don’t the prying bastards work to prevent accidents instead of putting all their bright ideas into ways of letting the damn fools who cause them live through it. And speaking of prevention, how about slowing this sports car down to legal velocities. The cops would sure like to nail you on a drunk driving charge.”

“Who’s drunk?” Russ slowed to 65, the legal limit for noninterstate highways.

“Son, you had a few before you picked me up this noon — and Gayle Corrington wasn’t running up her water bill on those drinks she poured for us.”

Russ veered from the ragged shoulder of the old two-lane blacktop. “If she starts the day customarily with drinks like she was pouring for me, I think I know where her poltergeist comes from.”

“You weren’t impressed?” Stryker sounded amused. “But you’ll admit natural explanations get a little forced and tenuous after a while.”

A stop sign bobbed over the crest of a hill, and Russ hit the brakes hard. Four disc brakes brought the Jensen up almost in its length. Stryker uncovered his eyes.

“Yeah,” Russ went on. “There were a number of damned things she said that sounded like telling points in favor of a poltergeist. But you have to bear in mind that all this is by her unsupported evidence. Hell, we can’t be sure she isn’t hallucinating this stuff, or even just making the whole thing up to string you along. Women do get bored at fortyish — to say nothing of what the thought of starting over the hill does to their libidos.”

“She didn’t look bored — and certainly not headed over the hill. Another few years, my friend, and you’ll stop thinking of womanhood withering at thirty. Hell, it’s just starting to bloom. But do you think she’s unreliable? Seemed to be just the opposite. A level-headed woman who was frankly baffled and a little embarrassed with the entire affair.”

Russ grunted, unwilling to agree offhand — though these were his own impressions as well. “I’m just saying you need to keep everything in perspective. I’ve gotten fooled by too many patients with a smooth façade — even when I was expecting things to be different beneath the surface.”

“But you’ll hazard an opinion that Mrs Corrington is playing straight with us so far as signs indicate?” Stryker persisted.

“Yeah,” Mandarin conceded. “But that’s one tough woman lurking beneath all that sweet Southern Belle charm she knows how to turn on. Watch out.”

He turned onto the Interstate leading into Knoxville’s downtown. In deference to Curtiss’s uneasiness with high speed, he held the needle at 80, safely just over the 75 limit of the time. “What’s your opinion of it all, then?” the author prodded.

“Well, I’ll maintain scientific neutrality. While I consider poltergeists improbable, I’ll accept the improbable when the probable explanations have all been eliminated.”

“Nicely phrased, Holmes,” Stryker chuckled. “And taking a position that will have you coming out sounding correct no matter what.”

“The secret of medical training.”

“I knew you’d come in handy for something.”

“Well, then, what’s your opinion?”

The author decided it was safe to release the dashboard and light his pipe. “Well, I guess I’ve used the supernatural too often in my fiction to accept it as willingly as I might otherwise. Seems every time I start gathering the facts on something like this, I find myself studying it as a fiction plot. You know like those yarns I used to crank out for pulps like Dime Mystery Stories , where when you get to the end you learn that the Phantom of Ghastly Manor was really Cousin Rodney dressed up in a monster suit so he could murder Uncle Ethelred and claim the inheritance before the will was changed. Something like that. I start putting facts together like I was plotting a murder thriller, you know. Kind of spoils the effect for me. This thing, for instance…”