‘They’ll charge us for the paintwork,’ Emory said, opening the door. ‘You’d better come in.’
Linford felt embarrassed. He’d never behaved like that before, never threatened or used emotional blackmail. The feeling of powerlessness, of regression, was crippling. Emory was wearing a long dark-blue robe which hung open. He was naked beneath it. Some cans of beer were chilling in a bucket of ice. He tossed one to Linford. ‘I expect you need this.’
Linford wondered whether Emory was drunk. He had never shunned alcohol but his intake was always moderate. ‘I’m sorry. I...’
Emory waved a hand at him. He was standing at the window staring out through the floor length nets. ‘‘S’OK. Forget it.’
‘Are you all right?’
Emory looked at Linford over his shoulder. ‘Fine. Why shouldn’t I be?’
Because you were virtually catatonic when we brought you back from the site; because you’ve been incommunicado for nearly two days; because you’ve shut both Iliana and myself out, that’s why, Linford thought, but said nothing. His burst of anger had passed. He shrugged. ‘We were worried about you,’ he said.
Emory turned away from the window and flung himself into a large, white overstuffed chair, one leg hung over the arm. ‘I know what you and Iliana have been thinking. You’re thinking I shouldn’t have done it, right?’
Linford sighed and sat down on the edge of the bed, which appeared unslept in, but of course the maids came around regularly. He wondered whether Emory displayed himself to them so blatantly. ‘You know I wouldn’t judge you,’ he said. ‘You did what you felt, at the time.’
‘Which was perhaps the wrong time. I know.’ Emory closed his eyes and rested his head against the back of the chair.
‘Mori,’ Linford ventured timidly. ‘What exactly did you do?’
Emory swallowed, the small convulsion shivering down his long throat. ‘Something natural,’ he said. ‘That’s all. It wasn’t that guy’s time to buy it. It was an accident.’
There are no accidents. There are no coincidences. Those were two of Emory’s maxims. Linford felt uncomfortable. He couldn’t quite rid himself of the suspicion that Emory had done what he’d done simply to display his power. Linford hadn’t imagined that Emory’s powers might encompass anything so potent.
‘Was he really dead?’ Linford asked. He had to. Even though he’d seen the body, that broken scrap so evidently vacated by anything resembling human life, and had spent the last two days trying to convince himself he hadn’t.
Emory gave him a withering glance. ‘You want me to say “no”, don’t you. You want me to come clean and admit it was all some kind of sick stunt. It wasn’t. I’m sorry. You’ll have to live with that.’
‘Mori...’
Emory sat upright, suddenly animated by a spasm of emotion, which looked very like rage. ‘Isn’t this what you all wanted?’ he asked. ‘Haven’t you marketed me as the great saviour of the world? I can’t understand why you’re so pissed off about this.’
‘Emory,’ Linford said, hands extended. ‘I’ve said nothing. How could I? You’ve refused to see me since the incident.’
‘You don’t have to say anything.’ Emory stared at him balefully.
He can’t read my mind, Linford told himself firmly. ‘All I’m worried about at the moment is the way this business has affected you,’ he said, trying to sound calm and reasonable. ‘It’s obviously upset you, otherwise you wouldn’t have hidden yourself away like this.’
‘I’m not upset. I needed to think, that’s all. I needed to think clearly. Much as I love you both, you and Iliana are distractions.’ Emory got up out of the chair and wandered back to the window.
Linford cleared his throat. ‘Well, anyway, I’ll call the promotion people and go over to the site today. We’ll have to wind it down...’
‘No!’ Emory turned round in a whirl of blue cloth.
‘What do you mean, “no”? The followers want you, Emory, nobody else. And you’re here, shut in this damned room. The site is surrounded by weirdoes, who are also all crying for you. It’s got out of hand. We have to fold the show.’
‘You won’t close the site, Linford. It’s not finished.’
‘What isn’t?’
Emory threw up his hands. ‘I don’t know! I don’t know!’
‘Talk to me!’ Linford cried. ‘What is going on, Mori? Everything’s changing, isn’t it? What’s happening?’
Emory curled his lips into a sneer. ‘You don’t want me to talk, you just want reassurance!’
This is like an argument, Linford thought. This is like trouble. He and Emory had never exchanged angry words before, or experienced an uncomfortable atmosphere between them.
Emory leaned against the wall, rubbing his face vigorously, as if to massage something away. Then he dropped his hands and laughed. ‘Shit,’ he said. ‘I’m terrible for you, so much hassle... I know. Come here.’ He opened his arms and Linford walked into the embrace, because he hadn’t the will or desire to refuse. The blue robe enclosed him like a shroud. It felt like goodbye.
Nina read through her notes again on the plane. No flimsy print-out this time but a bound booklet of laser-printed information, complete with comprehensive illustrations and photographs. It was the biography of Emory Patrick’s life. Her job was to fill in the blanks.
According to the DPR data, when he’d been only five, Patrick’s parents had died in the famous Milton Keynes murders, gunned down by a psychotic member of the Pro-Life group, who’d freaked out in a hypermall. Following that undoubtedly traumatic incident, Emory had been entrusted into the care of his Aunt Mary, who had been a devout Christian of the Women’s Institute persuasion. There was no evidence to suggest the woman had forced her own beliefs upon the boy, but Nina envisaged a childhood surrounded by garish representations of nearly naked crucified men and white-robed limpid saviours that might well have had some influence on Emory’s development. He appeared to have enjoyed an unsurpassingly normal childhood in his aunt’s care, although once he went to university, his personality had evidently blossomed. He’d studied psychology and had embraced the teachings of some of the wackiest gurus available to the student population at the time. As well as joining a student band, through which he could exercise a previously unglimpsed musical talent, Patrick had initiated consciousness-raising meetings. By the time he’d achieved his degree, with honours, he was a hero of the social scene and the hub of a thriving self-awareness group. Information had been collected from individuals who’d known Patrick at the time, who claimed he’d had a certain magic, that his touch was healing, that he could influence reality with a single thought.
After he left university, close friends had encouraged Patrick to expand his self-awareness group into the organisation now known as Transmission of Future Light, and he’d eventually met up with Brown and Forsyth, who’d since steered his career in an upwards direction. It had been Brown who’d brought the band to prominence, realising it was the ideal medium through which to reach the youth culture. Patrick’s physical attractiveness obviously contributed to his success. Although his religious beliefs were fairly unstructured and subject to change, and certainly estranged from the established, patriarchal Church, many people believed he really was the New Son of God. Patrick did not publicly concur with this idea, but neither did he deny it.
After one last look at one of the photographs – Patrick on-stage, his shirt falling off one shoulder, hair all over the place, mmmm – Nina closed the binder. She felt a little dazed. That part about Patrick being brought up by his Aunt Mary was just too much, and what percentage of the anecdotes about his college years, gleaned from old friends and acquaintances, was reliable data? Not a great deal, Nina suspected. She was also sure most of the information had been gathered from the newspapers. Although they scanned the media and culture for potential paranorms, both directly and psychically, the DPR had probably thought Patrick was a money-making joke, like all the other New Age manias, until t
he Amsterdam gig. They hadn’t thought him paranormal until now, because he hadn’t really done anything to suggest that.
Nina took another look at the photographs: Emory Patrick talking to crowds of adoring devotees, Emory Patrick singing with his band, Emory Patrick holding group meditation sessions. His charisma shone from the frames; he was indisputably star material. People fell for that; they loved heroes, but only un-Talented ones. So, Mr Patrick, what now? she wondered.
The Dutch authorities were freaked – understandably so – and because Patrick was British, it had fallen to the DPR to investigate and presumably shuffle the New Son of God off the continent and back to the UK. And, she had to admit with a private smile, it would be kind of weird having the New Son of God on the Temps list. What would they call him in for? Divine retribution, when it was needed?
Nina still didn’t believe Patrick was paranormal. Despite her earlier misgivings, she had become intrigued by the Amsterdam affair and was looking forward to delving into it, but somehow the thought that a Talent had been responsible seemed unreal. In her experience, paranorms spent their lives trying to live down their differences, hide them and apologise for them. They did not veer towards flamboyance. Still, if Patrick was a Talent, his days as guru were numbered. Once the public found out, his movement would be history. Paranorms had never been popular, a circumstance initiated by fear and ignorance more than anything. Nina herself never divulged her Talent. It was fortunately easy to conceal, and certainly in the DPR’s interest to keep it under wraps. Even the DPR branch she worked for was a highly secret operation that only a very few people knew existed. Should she ever be unveiled, the DPR would probably deny all knowledge of her. Her name would not be found on any DPR file, and the office she was called to visit in the middle of the night would be as empty and dusty as if it hadn’t been used for years.
Her camera case lay on the rack overhead. The camera was a prop for her Talent, but not essential. It disguised what she could do, just as much as it had revealed what she could do. The memory was mercifully fading with the years, but that time on the shoot in the Lake District still festered darkly in the depths of Nina’s heart. They’d told her to confront it, wear it out by becoming familiar with it. That bitch who tried to ruin my life! God, I have no regrets! But she did. She had so many regrets that she’d nearly lost her sanity. It had been the DPR who’d picked up the pieces after the incident, called in by frantic onlookers who’d realised what was happening. Gervase Allerby had been the suave, dark angel who’d glued Nina back together. She felt he now held the keys to her soul, even though she sailed through her glitteringly successful professional and social life as if she hadn’t a care in the world. In reality, she felt she belonged to the DPR alone, the unacknowledged underworld of the DPR that no one knew about, the truth beneath the bureaucracy and red tape above ground. She had no complaints. Without them, she’d be locked up in one institution or another. So, she did the job, and sometimes the job was tame. She hoped this one would be. Still, the DPR must be frightened of Emory Patrick, very frightened, to put Nina Vivian on his case.
Nina was due to meet a Dutch telepath at the airport, who’d been doing some preliminary work on the Patrick situation. The two of them would work in concert until they’d managed to ascertain whether Emory Patrick was Talented or not. Presumably, once that was established, the telepath would butt out and leave Nina to do what was necessary, if anything was necessary.
The telepath was named Chantal, a skinny, dark-haired gamine, who looked like a refugee from a Delacorta novel. Like most young Dutch people, she spoke flawless, idiomatic English.
‘You’re French?’ Nina asked, as they shook hands.
The girl wrinkled her nose. ‘Yah, sort of. Mother was. Lived here all my life, though.’
Chantal took Nina through the beautifully clean streets of the city to a cool, dark bar, where they sipped champagne, courtesy of Chantal’s agency’s expense account, and swapped gossip about other paranorms they knew. Nina was beginning to feel muzzily philanthropic by the time the subject of Emory Patrick was introduced. Chantal had lit a slim cigar and leaned conspiratorially over the table.
‘I’ve been sniffing round the convention site,’ she said, ‘but the man has gone underground since the incident.’
Nina had lifted her camera out of its case and now peered through the viewfinder at her companion. ‘I expect there are quite a few people sniffing about,’ she said. ‘I’m not surprised you didn’t come up with anything. Patrick’s people must be feeling very paranoid right now, and don’t paranoid people have a tendency to erect their own unconscious mind blocks?’
‘Oh, I found out enough,’ Chantal said. ‘Enough to tell me the Future Lighters are as stunned by Patrick’s Jesus trick as much as everyone else. He’s never pulled a stunt like this before.’
‘There’s mention of healing sessions in the briefing notes I’ve got,’ Nina said.
‘Yeah, but Patrick never claimed responsibility for that. Always said the people concerned had healed themselves through their belief. Nothing paranormal about that. Even your family doctor will prescribe a little positive thinking to kick out the blues nowadays.’
‘That’s true. It’s crazy isn’t it? Along comes someone who might genuinely have the most awesome Talent and the authorities are terrified of him. From what I’ve read, he seems a genuine guy, not even particularly power-hungry. I wonder why the DPR are so nervous about him? Why not just let him get on with what he’s doing, which is basically cheering people up in this goddamned shit of a mess we call a world?’
Chantal shrugged and pulled a face. ‘Perhaps it’s because he’s genuine and not power-hungry that makes your DPR nervous. My lot are the same. Let’s face it, a religious leader who isn’t a bone-deep self-aggrandising bastard and a Talent who isn’t ashamed of his powers makes for one poky individual. Think about it. I reckon if we do find out Patrick is a paranorm and he decides to come out about it, he wouldn’t lose any popularity at all.’
‘Oh, he would! Certainly in the UK. anyway. I know what people are like about paranorms there.’
Chantal shook her head. ‘No, Emory Patrick is different. You don’t understand what he does to people. His followers really love him. Desperately. Wouldn’t make any difference to them what he is. If he confessed he’d killed his parents or a thousand babies, they’d forgive him.’
‘How can you be so sure?’
Grinning, Chantal turned the collar of her leather jacket around to display an Emory Patrick badge. ‘I’ve been close, very close, to members of the Patrick following,’ she said.
‘Wow, paid up member!’ Nina said. ‘Hope your agency picked up the tab.’
‘Naturally. Anyway, it’s up to you to get us close to the man himself now.’
‘Thought it might.’
‘I picked up which hotel he’s staying in from someone at the convention site. We’re booked in there too now.’
Nina lifted her camera to her eye. ‘I’m impressed!’ Then she winked around the camera’s body at Chantal. ‘Take me to your leader,’ she said.
Iliana, lying on one of the two beds in the hotel room she was sharing with Linford, bit through another of her lovingly manicured nails with an audible snap. Linford jerked in irritation, lying on the other bed. Air conditioning hummed into the summer afternoon. Everything was very still in the microcosm of the room. Outside the city buzzed faintly, as if the sounds came to them through a virtually impenetrable shield.
‘Maybe we should go back to England,’ Iliana said, and then spat, expelling a sliver of fingernail.
‘We can’t leave him!’ Linford snapped.
‘I meant we’d take him with us,’ Iliana replied in a flat voice. ‘That was your thoughts speaking, honey, not mine.’
She shifted restlessly onto her side, a shapely odalisque in turquoise leggings and an Emory Patrick t-shirt, silky blonde hair falling over her coquettishly frowning face. Appearances were deceptive, Linford th
ought. He’d always considered she looked like a mindless tart, but the brain inside that cover girl body was as sharp as a hypodermic and capable of injecting equally subcutaneous poisons. It was she who held the business side of the Future Light together; a cage around the men that kept predators away from their meat. Iliana: metal and sharpness. You should listen to her, Linford thought, and then remembered the promise he’d made to Emory earlier, a promise he’d been almost physically coerced into making.
‘The convention’s only half-way through,’ he said. ‘People have paid.’
‘People can be refunded, for God’s sake! We can mail them all a care package as well, if that’s what it takes! This is a mess. I’m confused. I can’t think. We need to lie low for a while, re-evaluate our set-up. Anyway, I can’t see Mori coming out of his room to address the crowds in the near future, can you?’
Linford sighed. ‘I don’t know what he’s thinking. His mood is... strange. He’s shut off from me.’
‘Idiot!’ Iliana exclaimed and thumped the duvet. ‘Idiot! Idiot! Idiot! Why the hell did he have to go and do that?’ She’d already asked this question about a hundred times over the last few days. Linford had run out of answers.
‘I’m going to have to say something I’ve been putting off saying,’ Iliana said into the silence that had followed her outburst.
‘What?’ Linford was apprehensive of her tone of voice.
Iliana sat up on the side of the bed, legs apart, hands dangling between her knees. Linford noticed, for the first time, how tired she looked. She almost looked her age, which was unusual. Although he was unsure what her true age was, she generally looked about twenty-five, and he’d known her too long for that to be the case. ‘There’s something I haven’t been confronting in my head, Lin. Emory really did it, didn’t he? He really brought someone back from the dead. What does that mean?’
‘Something we’ve always believed. That he’s no bullshitter.’