He put the extraordinary idea to the back of his mind. Now that Harry Jnr had released him he had places to go, people — dead people — to talk to. There were things he knew which he was unique in knowing. He knew, for instance, that the dead inhabit another sphere; also that in their lonely nether-existence they go on doing all the things they’ve done in life.
The writers write masterpieces they can never publish, each line perfectly composed, each paragraph polished, every story a gem. Where time isn’t a problem and deadlines don’t exist, things get done right. The architects plot their cities of the mind, beautiful aerial constructs flung across fantastic worlds and spanning sculpted oceans and continents, each brick and spire and sky-riding highway immaculately positioned, no smallest detail missing or botched. The mathematicians continue to explore the Formulae of the Universe, reducing THE ALL to symbols they can never put on paper, for which men in the corporeal world should be grateful. And the Great Thinkers carry on thinking their great thoughts, which far outweigh any they thought in life.
That had been the way of it with the Great Majority. Then Harry Keogh, Necroscope, had come along.
The dead had taken to Harry at once; he had given their existence new meaning. Before Harry, each one of them had inhabited a world consisting of his own incorporeal thoughts, without contact with the rest. They had been like houses with no doors or windows, no telephones. But Harry had connected them up. It made no difference to the living (who simply weren’t aware) but it made a great deal of difference to the dead.
Möbius had been one such, mathematician and thinker both, and he had shown Harry Keogh how to use his Mobius continuum. He’d done so gladly, for like all of the dead he’d quickly come to love the Necroscope. And the Möbius continuum had given Harry access to times and places and minds beyond the reach of any other intelligence in all of man’s history.
Now Harry knew of a man whose one obsession in life tad been the myths and legends and lore of the vampire. His name was Ladislau Giresci. How was it going for him now, Harry wondered, in the aftermath of his murder? Max Batu had killed him with his evil eye, for no good reason other than that Dragosani had ordered it. Killed him, yes, but not Giresci’s life-long penchant for the legend of the vampire. What had been an obsession in life must certainly have continued afterwards.
Harry could no longer make any headway with Thibor, and Thibor would not let him get through to Dragosani. His next best bet had to be Ladislau Giresci. How to reach him, however, was a different matter. Harry had never met the Romanian in life; he did not know the ground where Giresci’s spirit lay; he must rely on the dead to supply him with directions, see him on his way.
Across the road from Brenda’s flat — once Harry and Brenda’s flat — there sprawled a graveyard hundreds of years old, containing a large number of Harry’s friends. He knew most of them personally from previous conversations. Now he drifted towards the lines of markers and occasionally leaning tombstones, his mind drawn by the minds of the dead where they lay in their graves communing. They sensed him at once, knew that it was him. Who else could it be?
Harry! said their spokesman, an ex-railway engineer who’d lived all his life in Stockton, until he died in 1938. It’s good to talk to you again. Nice to know you haven’t forgotten us.
‘How are things with you?’ Harry inquired. ‘Still designing your trains?’
The other came aglow in a moment. I have designed the train! he answered. Do you want to hear about it?
‘Unfortunately I can’t.’ Harry was genuinely sorry. ‘My visit is purely business, I’m afraid.’
Well, spit it out, Harry! someone else exclaimed, an ex-bobby of Harry’s acquaintance, late of Sir Robert Peel’s time. How can we help you, sir?
‘There are some hundreds of you here,’ Harry answered. ‘But is there anyone from Romania? I want to go there, and I need directions and an introduction. The only people I know there are. . . bad people.’