“My God!” she said. “You scared me to death!”

“Sorry,” he replied, setting his ubiquitous duffel down on the nearby worktable.

Mykolos peered closely at Logan. His eyes looked a little puffy and red, as if he hadn’t been sleeping well, and his movements weren’t the usual quick, deliberate ones she’d already begun to expect from him. He seemed preoccupied, even anxious — also uncharacteristic. Perhaps he was upset about the events in the dining room that morning; she had not been there to see Dr. Wilcox, but she’d certainly heard about it. If so, it was understandable: the whole place was on edge. But in her brief acquaintance with Logan, she hadn’t pegged him as the excitable type. Quite the opposite — which was a good thing, given his line of work.

“So,” she said, “you got my message?”

He nodded. “What do you have to report?”

She turned back toward the Machine. Since they had first begun analyzing it, Logan had managed to remove several more cover plates, and it now sprouted nearly a dozen devices, large and small, mostly metal, with the occasional piece of rubber hosing or Bakelite knob, all remarkably preserved in the almost-hermetic atmosphere of the room. The process had reminded her of peeling back the layers of an onion — removing each one simply revealed something else. They had not tried turning the device on again since that first examination.

Mykolos switched off the camera and walked around to what she thought of as the business end of the device: the narrow side closest to the hanging metal suits. She pointed toward the two labels, BEAM and FIELD, and to the attendant rows of buttons, meters, and knobs arrayed above each. “Something about those terms, ‘beam’ and ‘field,’ has been bugging me from the beginning,” she said. “As if they were familiar somehow. Then, just last night, it hit me.”

“What did?” Logan asked, moving closer.

“I realized there might be an analogue in computer science.”

Logan’s eyes drifted down toward the bank of controls. “Enlighten me.”

She considered how best to explain. “In an object-oriented programming language like Java or C Sharp, you have — in the simplest of terms — two kinds of variables, local and global.”

Logan nodded for her to continue.

“Local variables have a scope limited to an individual function, embedded within a larger program. When that function is called, the local variable is created on the fly; when the function ends, the local variable ceases to exist. On the other hand, a global variable can be seen by all functions in the program.”

She paused.

“I’m waiting for the punch line,” Logan said after a moment.

“Well, I’m no electrical engineer, but think about it. Beam and field. Local and global.”

“So you’re saying…” Logan frowned, considering. “You’re saying the Machine has two modes of operation?”

“Exactly. A local mode, very specific and sharply directed: a beam. And a broader, more general mode. A field. And I believe I’ve studied these controls enough to test my theory.”

Logan did not reply. He looked from the bank of controls to her and back again.

Mykolos reached down along the side of the housing, where the primary switches were located. She flipped on the power, waited five seconds, then followed it with the load switch. Then she straightened and returned to the main set of controls.

“I’ll start with the beam mode,” she said, “since it would seem to be the more confined of the two.” She could feel the big machine trembling slightly beneath the palms of her hands. She bent over the beam controls, snapped on a toggle switch marked MOTIVATOR, then another marked ENGAGE. And then she moved her hand to the rotary dial, which was inscribed with the numbers 0 to 10. At present, it rested at the zero setting. Slowly, she turned the knob clockwise to the 1 position.

The trembling increased slightly.

She turned the knob to the 2 setting.

The VU meter came to life, its needle jiggling rightward a few degrees, straining like a dog at its leash.

She moved the switch to the 3 setting. A deep, throaty hum began to emerge from the bowels of the Machine.

All at once, two very strange things happened. To Kim, the room seemed to grow abruptly brighter — not from any one particular light source, but from all around, as if God had suddenly turned up the sun. A curious noise, halfway between the buzz of an insect and the drone of a melancholy choir, began to sound in her head…and then she was roughly pushed aside by Logan. With a quick twist of the wrist, he reset the dial to zero. Then he toggled the switches off, bent down beside the device’s flank, and turned off first the load and then the power. And then he rose again and looked at her. There was a strange gleam in his eye that almost frightened her.

“Why…why did you do that?” she asked, recovering her breath.

“I don’t know exactly what the purpose of this device is,” Logan replied, “but I know one thing — it’s dangerous. We can’t just go around messing with knobs and yanking levers without understanding it better.”

“But you brought me in here to analyze and experiment, and how can I—”

“That was before I realized certain things,” he interrupted. “Look, Kim. I have to establish two ground rules.”

She waited.

“First: no experimentation without first clearing it with me.”

“That’s a given. Why do you think I just called you in here?”

“I understand, and I appreciate it. I’m talking about going forward. And the second rule is that, whenever you’re in this room — or even near this room — you need to wear this.” And, rummaging in his duffel, he pulled out something, which he handed to Mykolos.

She took it up curiously. It was an amulet of some kind: a thin hoop made of metal, copper by the look of it, into which a web of finely spun netting had been woven. Set into the web were several items: a few strings of colored beads; a tiny fetish, apparently of bone; and, at the center, half the shell of a miniature nautilus, cut through longitudinally to reveal its spiral of ever-diminishing camerae.

“What is this?” she asked, turning it over in her hands.

“Something of my own invention. It’s a synthesis of several religions and beliefs: the healing beads used by Santería espiritistas; certain African hex wards; the dream catcher of the Lakota.” Picking it up by the leather laces tied to its left and right sides, he placed it around her neck.

“Let me guess,” she said. “A ghost catcher.”

“I wouldn’t put it quite that way,” Logan said in his normal voice. Something — perhaps handling the amulet itself — seemed to have calmed him. “I’d call it the paranormal version of a bulletproof vest. But I suppose that ‘ghost catcher’ is as good a term as any.”

She tied the laces together, tucked it beneath the fabric of her blouse. The amulet was scratchy and uncomfortable, and she looked at him closely, not bothering to keep the speculation out of her expression. “You do realize this is seriously weird.”

“Perhaps. But it’s the product of many years of research into some very arcane arts. It’s kept me safe and sane — more or less, anyway.” He loosened his tie and opened his collar enough to show her he was wearing one, as well. “Tell me something. Do you enjoy working on this little mystery of ours?”

“You know that I do.”

“In that case, consider this amulet the price of the dance.” He looked around. “I’m feeling a little beat. Can we pick this up again tomorrow?”

Mykolos shrugged. “Sure.”

“Thanks. And — thanks for that.” With a forefinger, he pointed at the now-invisible amulet. Then he smiled slightly, turned, and quietly left the room.

30

Logan approached the building — just a few steps off Thames Street — with significant doubts. It was small, almost swallowed up by the surrounding edifices, and painted a dingy green. The lone window was covered by a curtain, and above it was a weather-beaten sign that read JOE’S RESTAURANT.