F. Paul Wilson - Haunted Air

First the craziness this morning with the first three sitters, seeing into their lives, their pasts, their futures-what little there was for each of them. Now this. He felt as if his world was coming apart.

"But you can't leave. We're a team. The Kenton brothers have always been a team. Who brung ya, Charlie?"

Finally Charlie looked at him. His eyes glistened with tears. "You think I want to? I don't. We still a team, Lyle, but not in this game, yo. And not in this house."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean we bust outta here together and start all over, givin' value for value, like Jack said."

Jack... for a moment Lyle wished he'd never heard of him.

"You mean dump the game?"

"Word. And yo, the way you playin' the game lately, y'know, cancelin' sitters up and down, ain't gonna be a game left, know'm sayin'?"

Lyle winced. Charlie had a point. Lyle had canceled the morning's fourth sitting along with the whole afternoon. He couldn't handle any more. He hadn't told Charlie why.

Should he tell him now? No. It would only reinforce his determination to leave.

"But we don't know anything else, Charlie. We'll starve!"

"No way. We two smart guys. We get by."

"Get by? Since when is getting by enough? I want to make it, Charlie. So do you."

"Not no more. 'What profit it a man if he gains the whole world but loses his immortal soul?' I wanna save my soul, Lyle. And yours too. That's why I want you to come with me."

"And if I don't?"

"Then I got to roll on my own."

"Roll on your own?" Lyle gave in to a blistering surge of anger. "Why don't you think on your own?"

"Say what?"

"This isn't you talking. This is that preacher down that brimstone-breathing, tongue-speaking, snake-handling wacko church you found, right?"

"We don't do no snake handlin'."

"You're such a sucker for these guys. It was the same back in Dearborn when that Reverend What-his-name-"

"Rawlins."

"Right. Reverend Rawlins. He's the guy who told you to boycott the Harry Potter movie."

"That's because it promotes witchcraft."

"How would you know? You never saw it. You never read a line of one of the books. And neither did Rawlins. He got the word from someone else who hadn't read or seen them either. But you all fell in line, marching lockstep against Harry Potter with not a scrap of firsthand knowledge."

Charlie lifted his chin. "Don't gotta do a drive-by to know it's wrong."

"Reading a book to make an informed decision is hardly the same as shooting someone. But you're doing the same thing here. It's this preacher at this new church, right? What's his name?"

"Reverend Sparks."

"It's him, right? He's the one who's put you up to this."

"Didn't put me up to nothin'! He told me this ain't no ghost, it's a demon and it's after our souls!"

A demon? Good thing Lyle hadn't mentioned the morning's strangeness. Charlie would probably think he was possessed and try to drag him off to an exorcism.

"Has he been here, Charlie? Has he seen and heard and experienced what we have? No. Has he sifted all the evidence that points to this being the ghost of a girl murdered back in the eighties? No. He hasn't moved his ass from his church down there in Brooklyn but somehow he's got a lock on what's happening in our house, knows it's not Tara Portman but Beelzebub instead. And you fall right in line and go along." Lyle shook his head, dismayed. "You're a bright guy, bro, but you put your brain on standby whenever one of these ministers opens his mouth."

"Don't have to listen to this." Charlie turned away and returned to emptying his dresser.

Lyle sighed. "No, you don't. But what about that pin on your shirt? WWJD. What Would Jesus Do, right? So why don't you ask yourself that? Would Jesus run out on his brother?"

"Jesus didn't have no brother."

Lyle almost said that some experts thought the apostle James was Jesus' brother, but he wasn't going to get into that now.

"You know what I mean. Would he?"

"Who you to talk 'bout Jesus?"

"Come on, Charlie. Answer me. You know he wouldn't. So how about you putting up with me for two more days?"

"Why?" Charlie didn't look up. "Why should I risk even one more minute?"

"Because I'm your brother. Because we're blood and we're the only family we have. How long've we been a team now?"

He shrugged. "Who knows."

"You know. Tell me."

"A'ight." He looked up, his face a mask of resentment. "Fifteen years."

"Right And how long've we been in this house?"

"'Bout a year. So what?"

"So, with all that behind us, why can't you give me two more days?"

"What for? Where's it go? We on a dead-end street, Lyle."

"Maybe not. Think for yourself a moment instead of letting the Reverend Sparks do it for you. Help me dig around that cellar."

"No. Uh-uh. That's the demon's crib."

"Says who? Some guy who's never been here?"

"Reverend Sparks knows about these things."

"But he's not infallible. Only god is infallible, right? So Sparky could be wrong. Go with that a moment. What if he's wrong and what we've experienced here isn't a demon but really the ghost of a murdered child? What if we find her remains and give them back to her folks for a proper burial. Won't that be doing god's work?"

Charlie snorted and looked away. "Yeah, right. You doing God's work."

"Take it a step further: What if those remains lead the cops to her killer and bring him to justice? Won't that be a good thing? Won't that be doing god's work too?"

Lyle wanted to ask Charlie why the hell god would let a child be murdered in the first place, but sensed his brother wavering and didn't want to blow it.

"Two days, Charlie. I bet if Jesus had a wayward brother he'd give him a couple of days if he asked for them."

Charlie shook his head as his lips twisted into a reluctant smile. "Dawg, I hear talk 'bout a silver-tongued devil, and now I see I'm related to him. A'ight. Two days and not a minute more. But this gotta be a two-way deal: Nothin' crackin' by Friday night, I'm geese and you with me. Deal?"

Lyle hesitated. Me too? He hadn't figured on that being part of the deal, but then, he couldn't go on as Ifasen without his brother. And if what had happened this morning was the start of a pattern, he wasn't sure if Ifasen had any future at all, at least in this house. So he could see no downside in agreeing to Charlie's terms.

But they were going to find Tara Portman, or what was left of her. He could feel it.

He stuck out his hand.

"Deal."

10

"Mr. Bellitto!" Gertrude cried in her booming voice as Eli stepped through the door. "You should be upstairs resting!"

She was so right. Barbed wire raked across his groin as he shuffled toward the Carrera marble sales counter. He should have stayed put, but he'd been feeling better after lunch and a nap, and so he'd given in to the urge to see his store, examine his stock, peruse the sales book. By the time he'd reached the sidewalk he realized his mistake but by then he was beyond the point of no return: Unable to face, even with Adrian's help, the prospect of turning and challenging the narrow Everest between him and his bed, he'd pushed on.

"Nonsense, Gert." He leaned heavily on his cane as he neared the counter. "I'm fine. But do you think you could bring that stool around front?"

"Of course!" Her tightly pinned-back hair gleamed like polished onyx in the light of the overhead fluorescents. She lifted the stool as if it weighed an ounce or two and bustled her hefty frame out from behind the counter and set it before him. "There."

She gripped one arm and Adrian the other as he eased himself back onto the seat-not sitting, merely leaning. He wiped the cold sweat from his face with his shirtsleeve. The new clerk-what was his name? Kevin? Yes, Kevin-came over, feather duster in hand, and gawked at him.