‘I was part of it,’ she finally admitted. ‘But not with.
that.’ Her blue eyes flickered towards the machinery, back to Harry. ‘I’m a telepath. I read his thoughts while they…’
‘While they erased them?’
She hung her head, then lifted it and blinked away tears. ‘Why have you come here? They’ll kill you, too!’
Harry looked down at himself. He was becoming aware of his nakedness. At first it had been like wearing a new suit of clothes, but now he saw it was only flesh. His flesh. ‘You haven’t sounded the alarm,’ he said.
‘I haven’t done anything — yet,’ she answered, shrugging helplessly. ‘Maybe you’re wrong and I am crazy. .
What’s your name?’
She told him.
‘Listen, Zek,’ he said. I’ve been here before, did you know that?’
She nodded. Oh, yes, she’d known about that. And about the devastation he’d wrought.
‘Well, I’m going now — but I’ll be back. Probably soon. Too soon for you to do anything about it. If you know what happened last time I was here you’ll heed my warning: don’t stay here. Be anywhere else, but not here. Not when I come back. Do you understand?’
‘Going?’ She began to feel hysterical, felt ungovernable laughter welling inside. ‘You think you’re going somewhere, Harry Keogh? Surely you know that you’re in the heart of Russia!’ She half turned away, turned back again. ‘You haven’t a chance in —,
Or perhaps he did have a chance. For Harry was no longer there .
Harry called out Carl Quint’s name into the Möbius continuum, and was at once rewarded’ with an answer. We’re here, Harry. We’ve been expecting you, sooner or later.
We? Harry felt his heart sink.
Myself, Felix Krakovitch, Sergei Gulharov and Mikhail Volkonsky. Theo Dolgikh got all of us. You know Felix and Sergei, of course, but you haven’t met Mikhail yet.
You’ll like him. He’s a real character! Hey — what about Alec? How did he make out?
No better than you, said Harry, homing in on them.
He emerged from the infinite Möbius strip into the blasted ruins of Faethor Ferenczy’s Carpathian castle. It was just after 3.00 A.M. and clouds were fleeing under the moon, turning the wide ledge over the gorge into a land of phantom shadows. The wind off the Ukrainian plain was cold on Harry’s naked flesh.
So Alec copped it too, eh? Quint’s dead voice had turned sour. But then he brightened. Maybe we’ll be able to look him up!
‘No,’ said Harry. ‘No you won’t. I don’t think you’ll ever find him. I don’t think anybody will.’ And he explained his meaning.
You have to square things up, Harry, said Quint when he’d finished.
‘It can’t be put right,’ Harry told him. ‘But it can be avenged. Last time I warned them, this time I have to wipe them out. Total! That’s why I came here, to see if I could motivate myself. Taking ,life isn’t my scene. I’ve done it, but it’s a mess. I’d prefer the dead to love me.’
Most of us always will, Harry, Quint told him.
‘After what I did to Bronnitsy last time,’ Harry continued, I wasn’t sure I could do it again. Now I know I can.’
Felix Krakovitch had been silent until now. I haven’t the right to try and stop you, Harry, he said, but there are some good people there.
‘Like Zek Föener?’
She’s one of them, yes.
‘I’ve already told her to get out of it. I think she will.’
Well, (Harry could hear Krakovitch’s sigh, and almost picture his nod,) I’m glad for that at least.
‘Now I suppose it’s time I got mobile,’ said Harry. ‘Carl, maybe you can tell me: does E-Branch have access to compact high explosives?’
Why, Quint replied, the branch can get hold of just about anything, given a little time!
‘Hmm,’ Harry mused. ‘I was hoping to do it a bit faster than that. Even tonight.’
Now Mikhail Volkonsky spoke up: Harry, does this mean you’re going after that maniac who killed us? if so, maybe I can help you. I’ve done a lot of blasting in my time — mainly with gelignite, but I’ve also used the other stuff. in Kolomyya, there’s a place where they keep it safe. Detonators, too, and I can explain how to use them.