But the chill abruptly went away, and the air grew warm again without any supernatural violence.
Whatever had been there a moment ago had now gone.
* * *
Uhlander’s gaze had drifted back to the mosaic of stained glass through which the room’s only light rose in colorful beams. Though he stared at the scene depicted on the shade, he did not seem to see it; the unfocused nature of his stare was reminiscent of Melanie’s haunting detachment. The author was probably seeing his future in that light, although his future was only darkness. In a thin and tremulous voice, he said, ‘Lieutenant, listen, please … you don’t have to like us … to take pity on us.’
‘Pity? You think it would be an appropriate expression of pity for me to blow the brains out of a nine-year-old girl?’
Trembling, Palmer Boothe swung back to him. ‘It won’t just be our lives you’ll be saving. For God’s sake, don’t you see? She’s running amok. She has a taste for blood, and it’s not very damned likely that she’ll stop with us. She’s crazy. You said so yourself. You said we drove her crazy and she’s not responsible for what she’s done. All right! She’s not responsible, but she’s out of control, and she’s probably getting more powerful all the time, learning more about her psychic abilities every hour, and maybe if somebody doesn’t stop her soon, maybe nobody will ever be able to stop her. It’s not just Albert and me. How many others may die?’
‘No others,’ Dan said.
‘What?’
‘She’ll kill the two of you, the last of the conspirators from the gray room, and then … then she’ll kill herself.’
When he put it in words, it hit him hard. A sudden, heavy ache bloomed in his chest at the prospect of Melanie taking her own life in despair over what she had done.
‘Kill herself?’ Boothe said.
‘Where’d you get an idea like that?’ Uhlander asked.
Succinctly, he told them about Laura’s hypnotic-therapy sessions and about the strange things that Melanie had said regarding her own vulnerability. ‘When she said It would come after her once it had killed everyone else, we had no idea what the creature might be. Spirit, demon — it seemed impossible that such a thing could exist, but we saw evidence that something strange was loose in the world. Now we know it wasn’t a spirit or a demon, and we know that … well, once she’s eliminated the two of you, she plans to take her own life, turn her psychic powers upon herself. So you see, the only lives hanging in the balance are yours and hers, and I’m afraid hers is the only one I have any chance of saving.’
Boothe, whose morality was about as admirable as that of Adolf Hitler or Joseph Stalin, who had hired torturers and murderers with a clear conscience, who would clearly have committed any number of murders with his own bare hands if that were the only way he could save his own damned skin, this thoroughly corrupted and corrupting snake was aghast that Dan, an officer of the law, was not only going to let them die but seemed to welcome the idea that they would soon be removed from this world. ‘But … but … if she kills us, and you could have stopped her and didn’t … then you’re just as guilty of our murder as she is.’
Dan stared at him, then nodded. ‘Yes. But that doesn’t shock me. I’ve always known I’m like everyone else in that regard. I’ve always known, given the right circumstances, I have the capacity for cold-blooded murder.’
He turned his back on them.
He walked away from them, toward the library door.
When Dan was halfway to the door, Uhlander said, ‘How long do you think we have?’
Dan paused, looked back at them. ‘After reading part of your book this morning, I thought I understood at least some of what was going on. So when I left them, I warned Laura to keep Melanie awake and to keep her from slipping into a deeper catatonic state. I didn’t want her to come for you until we had a chance to talk. But tonight I don’t intend to keep Melanie from going to bed. And when she goes to bed and finally sleeps …’