The manitou by Graham Masterton

could happen to
Karen Tandy.
    I went back to
the desk and checked out the book on ships. The old whore with the horse-like
teeth and the black hair gave me a sardonic grin, and that didn’t exactly make
me feel any better.
    A woman like
that was enough to give you nightmares on her own, without worrying about
mysterious sailing boats from another century.
    “Enjoy your
reading,” she grinned, and I pulled a face at her.
    Outside, I
found a phone booth, but I had to wait in the freezing wind and snow while a
short fat woman called her ailing sister in Minnesota. It was one of those
conversations that chases its own tail, and just when
you think they’re going to wrap it up, they start all over. In the end, I had
to bang on the glass, and the woman glared at me, but at least she finished her
epic dialogue.
    I got into the
phone booth and thumbed in my dime. I dialed the Sisters of Jerusalem Hospital,
and asked for Dr. Hughes; I had to hang on for four or five minutes, stamping
the circulation back into my feet, and at last the
doctor answered.
    “Dr. Hughes
here, can I help you?”
    “You don’t know
me, Dr. Hughes,” I said. “My name is Harry Erskine and I’m a clairvoyant”
    “A what?”
    “A clairvoyant. You know, fortunes told, that kind of
stuff.”
    “Well, I’m
sorry Mr. Erskine, but...”
    “No, please,” I
interrupted. “Just listen for one minute. Yesterday I had a visit from a
patient of yours, a girl named Karen Tandy.”
    “Oh, really?”
    “Dr. Hughes,
Miss Tandy told me that ever since she had first felt that tumor of hers, she’d
been having recurrent nightmares.”
    “That’s not
uncommon,” said Dr. Hughes impatiently. “Many of my patients are subconsciously
disturbed by their conditions.”
    “But there’s
more to it than that, Dr. Hughes. The nightmare was very detailed and very
specific, and she dreamed about a ship. It wasn’t just any old ship, either.
She made me a drawing of it, and it turned out to be a very particular ship. A
Dutch man of war, dated about 1650.”
    “Mr. Erskine,”
said Dr. Hughes. “I’m a very busy man, and I don’t know whether I can...”
    “Please, Dr.
Hughes, just listen,” I asked him. “This morning another client of mine came to
visit me, and she started talking in Dutch about a ship. She was the kind of
woman who wouldn’t have known a Dutchman if he’d come up wearing dogs and given
her a bunch of tulips. She got very upset and hysterical, and then she had an
accident.”
    “What kind of
accident?”
    “Well, she fell
downstairs. She was seventy-five years old, and it killed her.”
    There was a
silence.
    “Dr. Hughes?” I
said. “Are you still there?”
    “Yes, I’m still
here. Listen, Mr. Erskine, why are you telling me all this?”
    “Because I
think it’s relevant to Karen Tandy, Dr. Hughes. I was told this morning that
she had some kind of complications. This dream has already killed one of my
clients. I’m worried in case the same thing happens again.”
    Another silence, longer this time.
    Finally, Dr.
Hughes said: “Mr. Erskine, this is very irregular. I’m not saying for one
moment that I understand what you’re trying to get at, but you seem to have
some kind of idea about my patient’s condition. Do you think I could persuade
you to come up to the hospital and talk to me about it? There may be nothing in
it, but to tell you the truth we’re at a complete impasse with Karen Tandy, and
anything, no matter how small, could help us understand what’s wrong with her.”
    “Now you’re
talking,” I told him. “Give me fifteen minutes, and I’ll be right there. Should
I just ask for you?”
    “That’s right,”
said Dr. Hughes tiredly. “Just ask for me.”
    By the time I
arrived, the slush was freezing up again, and the streets were slidey and
treacherous.
    I parked in the
basement of the hospital, and took the elevator up to the reception desk. The
girl with the Colgate smile said: “Well hello – it’s