The manitou by Graham Masterton Page B

believe that one
person can dominate another, through their mind. And I think that somebody or
someone is dominating Karen Tandy. Somebody is transmitting a mental signal to
her, a signal that’s powerful enough to make her ill.”
    “But what about her aunt? And this old
lady client of yours – the one who fell down the stairs this morning?”
    I shook my
head. “I don’t think that this somebody really meant to harm them. But it’s
just like any powerful signal that’s sent over a considerable distance – any
receiver that happens to be in the area it’s being sent to tends to pick it up, too. Mrs. Karmann and Mrs. Herz were close to Karen Tandy, or to
places where she’d been, and they picked up the backwash from the main
transmission.”
    Dr. Hughes
rubbed his eyes, and then looked at me narrowly. “All right – supposing someone
is sending a signal to Karen Tandy, with the intention of making her ill. Who
is it, and why are they doing it?”
    “Your guess is
as good as mine. But don’t you think it might do some good if we talk to Karen
herself?”
    Dr. Hughes
spread his hands. “She’s in pretty bad shape. Her parents are flying in this
evening, in case we can’t pull her around. But I guess it wouldn’t affect her
chances if we tried.”
    He lifted the
phone and spoke to his secretary. In a few minutes, she bleeped back and said
she’d made arrangements for us to visit Karen.
    “I’m afraid
you’ll have to wear a surgical mask, Mr. Erskine,” said Dr. Hughes. “She’s
quite weak, and we don’t want any more infections getting into her system.”
    “That’s okay by
me.”
    We went down to
the tenth floor, and Dr. Hughes showed me into a dressing room. As we tied on
green surgical robes and masks, he explained that he would have to ask me to
leave if her condition worsened even slightly.
    “I’m only
letting you see her because you have a theory, Mr. Erskine, and anybody with a
theory could help us. But I warn you that this is all very unofficial, and I
don’t want to have to explain to anyone why you’re here.”
    “I get you,” I
said, and followed him down the corridor to Karen Tandy’s room.
    It was a big
corner room, with a view of the snowy night on two sides. The walls were pale
hospital green, and there were no flowers or decorations, except for a small
picture of a fall day in New Hampshire. Karen Tandy’s bed was surrounded with
surgical equipment, and there was a clear drip feed going into her right arm.
She had her eyes closed, and she looked as white and wan as the pillow she was lying on. There were dark umber circles around her eyes,
and I could hardly recognize her as the girl who had come into my apartment the
previous night.
    But it was the
tumor that was the most startling. It had swollen and grown around her neck,
pale and fat and threaded with veins. It must have been twice the size it was
the night before, and it was almost touching her shoulders at the back. I
looked across at Dr. Hughes and he simply shook his head.
    I pulled up a
chair to her bedside and laid my hand on her arm. She felt very cold. She
stirred a little, and her eyes opened slightly.
    “Karen?” I said
softly. “It’s me – Harry Erskine.”
    “Hello,” she
whispered. “Hello, Harry Erskine.”
    I leaned
closer. “Karen,” I said. “I’ve found the ship. I went to the library and looked
it up and it was there.”
    Her eyes
flickered toward me.
    “You’ve – found
it?”
    “It’s a Dutch
ship, Karen. It was built around 1650.”
    “Dutch?” she
said weakly. “I don’t know what it could be.”
    “Are you sure,
Karen? Are you sure you haven’t ever come across it before?”
    She tried to
shake her head, but the distended tumor prevented her. It bulged from the back
of her neck like an awful pallid fruit.
    Dr. Hughes laid
his hand on my shoulder. “I don’t think we’re getting very far, Mr. Erskine.
    Maybe we just
ought to leave it.”
    I grasped
Karen’s wrist more