Heart to Heart: Ashton Ford, Psychic Detective (17 page)

"Okay."

"And he had you in mind when he created
me."

"I said that?"

"You sure did."

I said, "Must've been the other me."

She jerked on my leash and said, "Rat."

We went on then and a couple of minutes
later emerged into a large chamber much like the tidal cave but
much larger.

It looked, yeah, like the mission control
center in my dream—very much like it except without the equipment.
There were tiered levels though, and I could not see to the end of
it. Like the tidal cave it all lay beneath a tremendous domed
ceiling and was lit naturally from high above. The air in there was
good and dry and even sweetly scented.

And, well, there
was
some
equipment in there, if you want to call it that. Several long
tables—looked like stainless steel—occupied a slightly raised
level along one wall. They were clean, spotless even, and not a
thing upon them. And set into the rock wall behind the tables were
a number of vaultlike doors made out of the same stuff; I call them
doors for want of a better name: think of a circular wall safe with
a door about twenty-four inches in diameter but just set flush into
the wall with no handle or keyway or anything else to make it
open.

Or—maybe this is better as
a simile—think of the cold-storage section of a modern morgue,
where the bodies are kept in sliding drawers behind little round
doors.

Francesca seemed a bit
dazed by the whole thing. She stood exactly in the same spot where
she'd emerged from the tunnel, hands on hips and gawking at the
natural wonder. I had to call her name twice to get her attention
and show her the man-made wonder.

"What do you suppose it is?" she asked in a
hushed voice.

"Well I don't think it's a
kitchen," I replied. "What do you think?"

She said, "It's warm in here. Why do you
think it's so warm?"

I said, "Some sort of natural heating
probably. Have you ever heard of hot springs in this area?"

She shook her head, ran a finger along a
shiny table, looked at the finger, remarked, "No dust. Why is there
no dust? How did they get this stuff in here? Surely not the way we
came."

I asked, “They
who
?”

She said, "They whoever put this here. When,
do you think?"

I said, "Hell, I don't know." I was probing
with a fingernail around a steel cylinder or whatever in the wall;
could not find a crack or chink anywhere. I told Francesca, "It's
like the rock wall cooled from a molten state around this
thing."

She said, "That's ridiculous. Isn't it? This
rock must have formed millions and millions of years ago. They
didn't have stainless steel back then. Did they?"

I said, "Not unless there's a lot we don't
know about dinosaurs."

I took my lady by the hand then and led her
out of there.

I knew the way, you see.

I'd been there before.

Whether in a dream or as a contemporary of
the dinosaurs, I could not have said.

But I knew the way.

We ascended natural stairs
that had been cut into the rock by some means affording laserlike
precision, and

came onto a large shelf near the dome of the
chamber. As we turned and looked down, I saw the fire in
Francesca's eyes and knew that she too was getting a flicker from
another time.

She gasped, "Oh God, Ash. It looks so
familiar."

Familiar, yeah, that's how it looked.

And I was beginning to get a feeling about
the secret of Pointe House and a two-hundred-year-old land grant
that had to be protected at all costs.

Just a feeling, sure...but a very familiar
feeling, and maybe even contemporary—who knows?—with the
dinosaurs.

Chapter Twenty-Two: Bodies Terrestrial

We emerged via a pivoting
rock door into the pit of the elevator shaft. The cage was still
there, resting on the bottom stop just above our heads. Circular
steps in the rock took us easily around the machinery in the pit
and deposited us on the rock ledge in front of the cage. I had
noted those steps earlier and assumed them to be for maintenance
access to the elevator machinery.

Francesca seemed a bit dazed. Maybe I was
too. She was watching the surf, now well above the little wind
cave, as it crashed onto the rocky point and I knew what she was
thinking. I too was doing a bit of projection into that hillside
and trying to relate the location of the tidal chamber from this
point of view. It could have been a watery death for us in
there—that much was obvious; it was a sobering view.

She stood beside me with
an arm encircling my waist and told me, "I have felt a fascination
for this beach from the first time I saw it. I even come down
sometimes in the middle of the night and stand right where we're
standing now and watch the surf climb the rocks."

I said, "Yes, it's beautiful."

"More than that," she said. "It's more than
that."

"In what way, do you think?"

She shrugged, shivered,
clasped me more tightly, said, "It's cold out here, isn't
it."

Compared to inside the mountain, yes; there
was quite a difference in temperature. But I wanted to pursue the
more-than-that idea. I said, "You told me yesterday, Francesca—the
other you told me—when we were together on the sand that you first
came here from Vienna in the year 1872."

"I told you that?"

"The other you told me that."

"Then the other me must be crazy as a loon,
wouldn't you say?"

I said, "Maybe not. The real you told me
earlier today that your ancestry is Austrian."

"Are you suggesting that the other me is
actually my ...what?—grandmother?—great-grandmother? Let's see,
1872 would be..."

"Roughly five generations back."

"Then that would make her..."

"Three greats back, more or less."

Francesca gave me a murky look. "How did she
get here?"

I gave her one back. "Valentinius brought
her."

"Valen...the same...our Valentinius?"

I said, "It seems there's only been
one."

Francesca shivered again and said, "I want
to go up now."

So we stepped into the elevator cage and
returned to the house. She'd gone silent on me, wrapped in dark
thought and withdrawn throughout the ascent. When we emerged into
the atrium I knew that the other Francesca was back. She was cool
to me, almost rude—well okay, downright rude and more hostile than
cool.

"You were brought here to mind the store,"
she said haughtily as we crossed the entryway, "not to sample the
merchandise."

I replied, "Is that what this is?—a store?
And the merchandise is bodies terrestrial? Or is it bodies
celestial?"

"Don't be impertinent, Ashton. You know very
well what I meant."

I said, "I think you're jealous."

"Damned right I'm jealous," she replied.

She left me standing there scratching my
head and strode off toward the studio. Hell, I let her go. It had
been a long day already. I wanted a shower, a bit of rest, some
time alone to think.

I guess I knew instinctively that it was
going to be an even longer night.

It certainly was.

See, we have a
mix-and-match mystery going here. Bodies terrestrial or bodies
celestial? Or maybe both? How 'bout neither? Bodies celestial have
no need of subterranean chambers or mechanical contrivances.
Technology is the artifice of bodies terrestrial, but what manner
of those could have developed life-prolonging techniques hundreds
of years ago when the cutting edge of modern medical technology is
still frustrated in that quest?

Take a guy like St.
Germain now. Was he really a de Medici and heir to the throne of
Transylvania?—or was that just a convenient cover of mystery for a
body celestial with a terrestrial mission? If the former, then why
did the man stalk the royal halls of Europe throughout that century
of prologue to the modern age instead of claiming his own
inheritance and becoming a historical figure in his own right? Why
would he range far and wide in secret and hazardous missions for
the throne of France, dabble in technology and alchemy and
metaphysics, set up laboratories and manufacturies and turn them
over to others—and never have a real life or identity of his own?
As a real person—a terrestrial—Le Comte de St. Germain makes no
sense at all, not even if he did find a way to greatly extend his
own life span.

If, on the other hand, St. Germain was
really a celestial, at least the mystery itself makes sense. And
who is to say how much influence, within that mystery, his being
here had on the course of human history. History as narrative is
necessarily greatly abridged and is made up of final impressions,
not active details. Historians are not seers; they are merely
impressionists and convey to us their impression of the relativity
of events.

But if St. Germain is celestial—and if St.
Germain is also Valentinius and therefore Valentinius is celestial—
then why all this involvement with things terrestrial? Why Pointe
House and legal problems; and hollowed-out mountains beside the
sea? Why, indeed, the two talents and two personalities of
Francesca Amalie? And why the hell is Ashton Ford mixed into
it?

Why so much death in an atmosphere of
immortality, and why all the weird characters-in-residence in a
mansion fit for royalty?

For royalty?

Uh huh.

Call Pointe House a castle
then, and remember that all self-respecting castles have dungeons.
Recast your mystery into terms of things celestial and things
terrestrial and try to keep the two separated until both strands
come together at the true moment of crisis.

Do that, and you'll have another leg up on
me as I retire to the royal suite to rest and repair all my bodies
while I try to figure out some way to exercise my proxy.

Or was I doing that already?

I got my shower okay, but the rest of it was
not in the cards—not, that is, with Hai Tsu in the picture. She is
a very dutifully determined young woman, and I had a hell of a time
keeping her out of my bathroom. Also a locked door seems to mean
nothing whatever to her. Whether by passkey or whatever, she comes
and goes as she damn well pleases. I don't know; maybe walls mean
nothing to her either. I do know that I showed her to the door
twice—the last time rather forcefully—but still she was standing
there holding a big terry cloth towel for me when I stepped out of
the shower.

I was feeling very
exasperated but also probably a bit resigned to it as I told her,
"Damn it, Hai Tsu, this really isn't necessary. I can dry my own
damned back."

She said, "Yes, Shen," and went right on
drying it for me.

So hell, I lit a cigarette and stalked
around naked while she laid out clothes for the evening. I figured,
what the hell, let's get some mileage out of this, so I asked her,
"Who's for dinner tonight?'

Those dark eyes glinted joyfully as she
replied, "The same, Shen."

I said, "Same old same old, eh? Don't you
ever get tired of this?"

"Oh no, Shen. Hai Tsu very happy."

I asked, "How long?"

"How long? Is name?"

I had to laugh. It did sound like a Chinese
name. I explained, "No, I meant how long have you been at
this?"

"Many year, Shen."

"How many is that?"

"Hai Tsu very privileged. Hai Tsu very
happy."

Hai Tsu also cagey as hell.

I asked her, "When did you come here?"

"Come with Shen. Long ago. Hai Tsu come
China, long ago. Shen come China, long ago. Hai Tsu very privileged
serve Shen. Is Shen not happy with Hai Tsu?"

I said wearily, "Wait a minute. Ibo many
shens make it confusing. You call me Ash. Okay? I am not Shen, I am
Ash. Okay?"

"Okay, Ash Shen."

Ashen was what I was by this time. But I
thought she'd worked it out rather well.

"When did you come China with Valentinius
Shen?"

She never lost the adorational joy but
something else was mixing with it now—something maybe just a little
nervous or apprehensive. "Hai Tsu must serve Ash Shen, his every
wish. Does Ash Shen wish Hai Tsu violate honorable conduct?"

I looked at my hands and
told her, "No, Hai Tsu, I don't want you to do that."

She kissed my hand, said, "Dinner in one
hour, Ash Shen," and walked toward the door.

I went part of the way with her, asked her,
"Have you been in the caves?"

She turned back to look at
me from the closed doorway. "Caves, Shen?"

"Under the house. Within the mountain. Have
you been there?"

"Ash Shen has been there?" she countered,
surprising me with her forwardness.

I said, "Yes. Francesca and I were trapped
in the tidal chamber by the rising tide. We found our way out
through the caves. I was just wondering if you knew about
them."

I saw her then, for the
first time, without joy. The lovely face went totally blank as she
replied, "Tides very dangerous, Shen. Be very careful. Do not go
there again."

I told her, "I have to go
again, Hai Tsu. I must pierce the mystery if I am to be of help
here."

She was still a total
blank as she replied to that. "Caves come China, Ash Shen, long
ago. You must not go there again."

And then—I swear—just like
Valentinius, Hai Tsu simply winked out on me. She did not step
through that doorway; did not even open the door. She simply flat
disappeared.