Then it was afternoon, and Harry said: 'Penny, I think you can go home now.'

He had told her what she must say: how it couldn't have been her body the police found but someone who looked a lot like her. How she had suffered amnesia or something and didn't know where she'd been until she found herself in her own street in her own North Yorkshire village. That was all, no elaboration. And no mention, not even a whisper, of Harry Keogh, Necroscope.

He made a note of her sizes, Möbius-tripped into Edinburgh and bought her clothes, waited while she frantically dressed herself. He had forgotten shoes: no matter, she'd go barefoot. She would go naked, if that were the only way!

He took her home - almost all the way, only breaking the jump for a final word of warning on the rolling moors - via the Möbius Continuum, which was something else for her not to believe in. And he cautioned her: 'Penny, from now on things will be normal for you, and eventually you may even come to believe this story we've concocted for you. Better for you, me, everyone, if you do believe it. Most certainly better for me.'

'But... I'll see you again?' (The realization of what she had found, and what she must lose. And for the first time the question: did she have the better of the bargain?)

He shook his head. 'People will come and go, Penny, through all your life. It's the way it is.'

'And through death?'

'You've promised me you'll forget that. It isn't part of our story, right?'

And then the rest of the jump, to a street corner she'd known all her life. 'Goodbye, Penny.'

And when she looked around...

As a small child she'd followed the rerun adventures of the Lone Ranger. Who was that invisible man...?

Back at the house near Bonnyrig, Jordan was waiting. He was calmer now but still radiated awe and wonder, which made him look beautiful, fresh-scrubbed, newly returned from a holiday in the sun or a swim in a mountain stream. All of these things. 'Harry, I'm ready any time you are. Just tell me what I must do.'

'You, nothing. Just don't shut me out, that's all. I want to get into your mind, and learn from it.'

'Like Janos did?'

Harry shook his head. 'Unlike Janos. I didn't bring you back to hurt you. I didn't even bring you back for me. It's still up to you. If you don't like the idea of me going in there just say so. This has to be of your own free will.' Very significant words.

Jordan looked at him. 'You didn't just save my life,' he said, 'but returned it to me! Anything you want, Harry.'

The Necroscope sent his developing Wamphyri thoughts directly into Jordan's head, and the other cleared the way for him, drew him in. Harry found what he wanted: it was so like deadspeak that he knew it at once. The mechanism was easy, a part of the human psyche. Mental in action, it was purely physical in operation, a part of the mind people - most people - haven't learned how to use. Identical twins sometimes have it, because they come from the same egg. But discovering it wasn't the same as making it work.

Harry withdrew, said: 'Your turn.'

For Jordan it was easy. He already was a telepath. He looked inside Harry's mind and found the trigger which the Necroscope had pictured for him. It only required releasing. After that, like a switch, Harry could throw it any time it was required.

And: Try it,' Jordan said, when he'd withdrawn.

Harry pictured Zek Föener, a powerful telepath in her own right, and reached out with his new talent.

He (no, she) was swimming in the blue warm waters of the Mediterranean, spear-fishing off Zakinthos where she lived with her husband Jazz Simmons. She was twenty feet down and had lined up a fish in her sights, a fine red mullet where it finned on the sandy bottom and ogled her.

Testing... testing... testing,' said Harry, with more than a hint of dry humour.

She sucked in salt water down the tube of her snorkel, triggered off her spear and missed, dropped her gun and kicked frantically for the surface. And she trod water there, coughing and spluttering, staring wildly all about. Until suddenly it came to her that the words could only have been in her head. But the mental voice had been unmistakable.

Finally she had her breath back, and got her thoughts together. Ha - Ha - Harry?

And from his house in Bonnyrig, fifteen hundred miles away: The one and only,' he answered.

Harry, you... you... a telepath? Her confusion was total.

'I didn't mean to startle you, Zek. Just wanted to find out how good I am.'

Well, you're good! I might have... I might have drowned! A swimmer like Zek? There was no way she might have drowned. But suddenly she backed off, and the Necroscope knew that she'd sensed the other thing that was Harry Keogh. She tried to shut it out of her thoughts but he cut right through her confusion with:

'It's OK, Zek. I know that you know about me. I just think you should also know that it won't be like that with me. I'm not staying here. Not for long, anyway. I have a job to do, and then I'll be on my way.'

Back there? She'd read it in his mind.

To begin with. But there may be other places. You of all people know I can't stay here.'

Harry, she was quick, anxious to return, you know I won't go up against you.

'I know that, Zek.'

She was silent for a long time; then Harry had a thought. 'Zek, if you'll swim back to the beach, there's someone here would like a word with you. But better if you have your feet firmly on the beach, because you won't believe who it is and what he has to say. And this time you really might drown!'

And he was right, she didn't believe it. Not for quite some time...

About the middle of the afternoon, when Jordan had finally accepted everything and the glow had gone off him a little, he said: 'What about me, Harry. Can I just go home?'

'I may have made a mistake,' the Necroscope told him then. 'Darcy Clarke knows I had that girl's ashes. He might figure it out. If he does he'll know I have a couple more talents now. Which will be confirmed - and how - if you show up! And anyway I have this feeling that everything is going to blow up, soon. You can go any time you like, Trevor, but I'd appreciate it if you'd stay here and out of sight a while longer.'

'How long?'

Harry shrugged. 'I have a job to do. That long. Not much more than four or five days, I should think.'

That's OK, Harry,' Jordan nodded. 'I can stand that. Or four or five weeks if I have to!'

'What will you do, anyway? Back to the Branch?'

'It was a good living. It paid the bills. We got things done.'

Then it's best that you leave it until I've gone. You have to know that they'll be coming after me?'

'After all you've done for us. For everybody?'

Again Harry's shrug. 'When an old, faithful dog savages your child, you have him put down. His services in the past don't cut it. What's more, if you knew for certain he was going to savage the child, you'd put him down first, right? And afterwards you might even feel sorry for the old guy and cry a little. But hell, if you also knew he had rabies, why, you wouldn't even think twice! You'd do it for him as much as for anyone else.'

Jordan played it straight, face to face. 'Does it really worry you that much? I mean, let's face it, Harry: it won't be an easy job, taking you out. Janos Ferenczy had a lot going for him, but he wasn't in the same league as you are now!'

'That's why I have to go. If I don't I'll be forced to defend myself, which can only hasten things. And then there'd be a chance for this curse to go on for ever. I didn't spend all that time doing all of that - Dragosani, Thibor, Janos, Faéthor, Yulian Bodescu - just to end up the same way they did.'

'In that case... maybe I should go. I mean now.'