The Last Aerie by Brian Lumley

The easy way out was to mention Harry, but slightly out of context. That way, Tzonov would ‘know’ what I thought he thought and look no further. You see, David, through you we’re reasonably certain that something of Harry Keogh has come back into our world. But the Opposition knows nothing of that, not yet.” He smiled. “It’s just one more reason why I won’t take you east with us. You’re much too valuable right where you are.”
    He stood up and saw Chung to the door. Out there, the long central corridor was empty now, silent. Chung said, “What about Harry’s room?”
    Trask nodded. “It can’t hurt to look inside. What was that you said about it? Always cold in there?”
    As they walked down the corridor and paused at the door in question, Chung answered, “Cold, yes. Always. The heating is on but the room stays cold.” He reached for the doorknob …
    … And the door opened!
    Both men gasped and started, then breathed mutual sighs of relief, glancing at each other sheepishly as the cleaning lady, Mrs. Wills, came into the corridor. Armed with her appointments—galvanized bucket, short-bladed squeegee, mop and dusters—she perspired freely.
    Sure that his shock was still registering, Trask made an effort to cover his embarrassment. “Well … Mrs. Wills doesn’t look very cold,” he said. And speaking directly to the cleaning lady, “Mr. Chung was telling me how this room always feels too cold. How do you find it?”
    Mrs. Wills was a short, rather stout, fiftyish Londoner. Not especially bright, she was a hard worker and had a heart of gold. She was the only permanent member of staff who was in no way “talented”, and in all her fifteen years’ service to the Branch she had never had the slightest idea what it was all about, except that its simple rules were for obeying and its people not for talking about. Indeed, Mrs. Wills had been chosen for her singular lack of curiosity. Now her face lit up ruddily as she beamed first at Trask, then Chung: two of the gentlemen “what she did for”.
    Finally Trask’s question got through to her. “What, Mr. ‘arry’s room, sir? Cold, did yer say? Can’t say I’ve noticed it meself. But the ‘eating’s working, all right!”
    Concerned, she followed them in. At the back there was a recess with a sliding door, containing a wash basin, shower, and toilet. In front … just a small overnight bedroom, maybe four paces by five, from the days when the top floor, too, had belonged to the hotel. The floor space along one wall was occupied by an obsolete computer console, with a chair and space below for the operator’s feet, plus a second swivel chair and ample work surface. In a corner, a small wardrobe stood open; it was equipped with coat hangers, and shelving to one side.
    Chung nodded to indicate the wardrobe’s interior. “Some of Harry’s things,” he told Trask. “A shirt of his, trousers and a jacket. A bit mothy by now, I should think. Plus a few other bits and pieces on the top shelf there. The other items were left behind —” (he glanced out of the corner of his eye at Mrs. Wills, who had found a speck of dust to wipe from the computer console),”— by people we lost from time to time. I kept them … because I didn’t like to destroy them. As a locator, I’d used them all in my time. Stuff belonging to Darcy Clarke, Ken Layard, Trev Jordan. These things formed my link with them in the field …”
    As Chung talked Trask was looking into the wardrobe, but he wasn’t seeing. Rather, he was feeling. And Chung was right: the room was cold. Or if not cold, empty. Despite the computer console, the wardrobe and its contents, it felt like an empty space, as if nothing was here. Not even Trask, Chung, and Mrs. Wills. Trask felt like an echo of himself in this room, like a shadow. He felt if he stood here just a little while longer he might fade into the walls and disappear forever. The place was psychically charged, definitely. And the