Graham Masterton - The Manitou

The detective made a couple of notes. Then he said: "Ran?"

I spread my arms open. "Don't ask me how, because I don't understand it myself. But she ran up the corridor like a girl of fifteen."

Lieutenant Marino frowned. "Mr. Erskine, the dead woman was seventy-five years old. She walked with a stick. And you're trying to tell me she ran up the corridor? Ran?"

"That's what I said."

"Come on, now, Mr. Erskine — don't you think you're letting your imagination run a little wild? I don't believe you killed her, but I certainly don't believe she ran. "

I looked down at the floor. I remembered the way that Mrs. Herz had skated out of the room, and the way that she'd dwindled away down the corridor as though she were running on rails.

"Well, to be truthful, she didn't exactly run," I told him.

"So what did she do?" asked Lieutenant Marino patiently. "Walked, maybe? Shuffled?"

"No, she didn't walk, and she didn't shuffle. She slid."

Lieutenant Marino was just about to make a note of that, but his pen stopped an eighth of an inch from his paper. He grunted, grinned, and then tucked the paper away in his coat. He stood up, and came over to me with an indulgent smile on his face.

"Listen, Mr. Erskine, it's always a shock when somebody dies. It tends to play tricks on your mind. You should know that, you're in the business. Maybe you just thought you saw something a different way from the way it actually happened."

"Yes." I said dumbly. "It could be."

He laid a pudgy hand on my shoulder, and gave me a friendly squeeze.

"There's going to be a post mortem examination to establish the cause of death, but I doubt if it will go any further than that. I might have to send someone round again to ask you one or two more questions, but otherwise you're in the clear. I'd ask you not to leave the city for a day or two, but you mustn't think you're under arrest, or anything like that."

I nodded. "Okay, lieutenant. I understand. Thank you for coming round so quickly."

"It's a pleasure. I'm sorry your client — you know, departed for the spirit-world like that."

I managed a wan little grin. "I'm sure she'll be in touch," I said. "You can't keep a good spirit down."

I'm sure that Lieutenant Marino thought I was stark, staring mad. He pulled his little black hat over his hedge-like hair, and made for the door.

"So long then, Mr. Erskine."

After he'd gone, I sat down and thought for a while. Then I picked up the telephone and dialed the Sisters of Jerusalem Hospital.

"Hello," I said. "I'm inquiring about a patient of yours. Miss Karen Tandy. She came in this morning for an operation."

"Hold on, please. Are you a relative?"

"Oh, yes," I lied. "I'm her uncle. I just got into town and heard she was sick."

"Just a moment, please."

I drummed my fingers on the table while I waited. The faint sounds of the hospital came down the line, and I could hear someone paging Dr. Hughes, please, Dr. Hughes. After a minute or so, another voice said: "Hold on, please," and I was connected through to another lot of noises.

Eventually, a nasal woman said: "Can I help you? I understand you're inquiring about Miss Karen Tandy."

"That's right. I'm her uncle. I heard she had an operation this morning and I just wanted to check she was okay."

"Well, I'm sorry, sir, but Dr. Hughes tells me there's been a little complication. Miss Tandy is still under sedation, and we're having another specialist come in to look at her."

"Complications?" I said. "What kind of complications?"

"I'm sorry, sir, but I can't tell you that over the phone. If you want to call in, I could make an appointment for you with Dr. Hughes."

"Hmm," I said. "No, don't worry. Maybe I could call you tomorrow to check how she is."

"Okay, sir. You're welcome."

I put down the phone. Maybe I shouldn't be worrying, but I was. The strange way in which the cards had behaved last night, and that unnerving incident with Mrs. Herz, not to mention the odd dreams of Karen Tandy and her aunt — everything was making me feel queasy and suspicious. Suppose there really was something out there, something spiritual and powerful and unfriendly?

I went back to the green-baize table and took out Karen Tandy's letter and drawings. The coastline, the ship and the flag. Three sketchy pictures from the shores of the night. Three imaginary clues to a problem that might not even exist. I tucked them in my pocket, picked up my car keys, and went off to check them out of the library.

It was almost closing time when I reached the library and wrestled my Cougar into a tiny parking space on a pile of brown slush. The sky was a dark coppery green, which meant there was more snow on the way, and a bitter wind sliced through my herringbone overcoat. I locked the car and trudged through ankle-deep drifts to the warm wooden library doors.

The girl behind the desk looked more like a retired madame than a librarian. She wore a tight red cardigan and black piled-up hair, and her teeth would have fitted a horse.

"I'm looking for ships," I told her, kicking the melting snow off my shoes.

"Why don't you try the docks?" she grinned. "We only have books here."

"Ha ha," I replied coldly. "Now will you tell me where the ships are?"

"Upstairs, fifth or sixth shelf along. Under SH for keep quiet."

I stared at her in amazement. "Did you ever think of going into vaudeville?" I asked.

"Vaudeville's dead," she snapped.

"So are your jokes," I told her, and went in search of ships.

You know something. I never realized how many different kinds of ships there are. I thought there were only about two or three varieties — big ones, little ones and aircraft carriers. But by the time I'd skimmed through fifteen books on maritime engineering, I began to appreciate the size of my task. There were dhows and xebecs, barques and brigantines, frigates and corvettes and destroyers and jolly-boats and dinghies and coracles and barges and tugs and you name it. About half of them looked exactly like Karen Tandy's funny little sketch.

I came across the right one almost by accident. I was heaving out a heap of six or seven books, when I dropped the lot with a clatter on the floor. An old guy in glasses who was studying a huge tome on seals (see under SE) turned around and glared me into the ground.

"I'm sorry," I said apologetically, and gathered up all the fallen books. And there it was, right under my nose. The identical ship. To me, all old sailing ships were "galleons," and pretty much alike, but there was something distinctive about the shape of this hull and the way the masts were arranged. It was definitely the ship of Karen Tandy's dreams.

The caption underneath the picture said Dutch Man of War, circa 1650.

The odd prickly feeling went up the back of my neck. Dutch. And what was it that old Mrs. Herz had muttered, back there in my flat? De boot, mijnheer, de boot.

I took the ship book under my arm and went downstairs to the foreign language section. I lifted out an English — Dutch dictionary, flicked through the pages, and there it was. De boot, the ship.

Now I'm as reasonable and logical as the next man, but this was more than a coincidence. Karen Tandy had been having nightmares about a Dutch ship from the seventeenth century, and then old Mrs. Herz had started having hallucinations or God knows what about just the same thing. How and why were questions that I just couldn't answer, but it seemed to me that if Mrs. Herz had been killed by her visitation, then the same thing could happen to Karen Tandy.

I went back to the desk and checked out the book on ships. The old whore with the horse-like teeth and the black hair gave me a sardonic grin, and that didn't exactly make me feel any better. A woman like that was enough to give you nightmares on her own, without worrying about mysterious sailing boats from another century.