Prologue

The trick was to approach the beast without attracting its attention.

Anders Skarstind stressed this to the hired man, Ivar, when they set off from the northern city of Tromsø to the remote island in the Norwegian Sea. They would use a boat with no motor, approaching silently and scentless encased in Kevlar suits, their only weapon an unwieldy tranq gun commonly used on elephants.

But when Skarstind met Ivar on the paved walk along the bay in Tromsø that first night after Christmas, he could smell alcohol and caraway on his breath. The lights of the city glowed all around them, a patch of warmth in the desolation of the mountains and water to the north and south.

“Are you extending your Christmas celebration, Ivar? Hitting the akvavit especially hard these days?” Skarstind said, staring with blank eyes into the mottled face of the man who he would depend upon over the next three days to avoid making any mistakes that would get them both killed.

Ivar looked puzzled as he stood before Skarstind and the yellow-orange glimmering of the city behind him.

“Do you know me, sir? I don’t recognize your voice. Perhaps you’d take down that balaclava so I can see your face,” Ivar said.

Skarstind pushed the balaclava back from his hair and pulled it down away from his mouth. Ivar still did not know him, though Skarstind knew Ivar’s type very well. Skarstind had been a drunk himself before the agency found him, put him to work, paid him enough to make a life of booze and women and reveling seem like a waste of time. The busted capillaries in Ivar’s cheeks were not from the cold; they were from thirteen straight days of drinking.

But Ivar must have been the best the agency could do on a job such as this, where most respectable mercenaries and contractors would scoff with incredulity. Most did not believe in the jötnar, even in this part of the world, and the agency risked losing its reputation if it widely advertised this bounty.

Anders Skarstind, though, believed. He took the job. He was, perhaps, the only person on the planet who could fulfill the client’s demands. The agency knew this. Skarstind’s fee would reflect the dangers involved. He would never have to work again.

But look at the trash they sent to assist him.

“So when do we start, buck-o?” Ivar spoke in his best Hollywood cowboy drawl filtered through Norwegian drunkard.

Skarstind shook his head in disgust and motioned for Ivar to follow him.

#

In the dusty attic of the inn, Skarstind handed Ivar his gear.

The Kevlar boots hooked into the shin guards and the shin guards hooked into the shorts which connected to the torso and so on. The suits covered their entire bodies from the top of their scalps to the soles of their feet. It was all jointed and flexible, but perfectly sealed, not only to protect them from blows and projectiles, but also to keep their own bodily scents within, to mask their presence on the island.

The suits, provided by the agency and custom-made to Skarstind’s exacting specifications were an off-white color, textured to blending with the snow and ice covering the island and the rest of the desolate north.

“Look like fuckin dandy queers in these, Anders,” Ivar said, bumbling and tripping over himself as he tried to pull the shin guards underneath the shorts. “We’d look like ninjas if only these things were black.”

“Don’t use my name, Ivar. Call me ‘sir,’ or don’t call me anything at all. Understand?”

Ivar looked serious for a moment and then cracked a smile through his days-old stubble.

“Sure thing, sir. Respect and all, right? Boot camp style. You’re the action hero; I’m the grunt,” Ivar said.

“Shut the fuck up, Ivar. If all you’re worried about is how you look in your body armor, you’re going to get a big surprise on that island,” Skarstind said.

“So you’re happy wearing this white shit?” Ivar said.

“Let me put it to you this way, Ivar. I’d rather be unseen than seen.” Skarstind stopped and looked Ivar straight in his bloodshot eyes. “And another thing you should be worrying about is why I’m demanding that you not use my name, and I’m freely bandying yours about.”

Ivar looked stunned and slack-jawed, but he caught the big tranq gun that Skarstind threw at him.

“You know how to use that big boy, Ivar?”

The gun slipped from Ivar’s grasp, but he caught it before it hit the ground.

“Be careful, Ivar. If you hit yourself with the tranquilizer your heart will stop beating in less than thirty seconds.” Skarstind smiled as Ivar backed away, aghast. “Think about that. For the prey we’re hunting the tranquilizer will only put it down to sleep for 48 hours. For you and me, it means death. Time to recognize how out of your depth you are, Ivar.”

Skarstind finished adjusting the armor on his body and took the gun from Ivar’s sweaty grasp.

“I’m disposable.” Ivar’s voice wavered. “That’s it, isn’t it?”

“That’s what, Ivar?”

“That’s why you speak my name freely. Because it doesn’t matter to you whether I make it back here alive.”

Skarstind shrugged.

“Not quite, Ivar.” Skarstind pulled an overcoat on over the armor and put the gun and his helmet in a large suitcase. “You see. If you don’t make it back alive, the chances of me making it back alive are not good. Not good at all.”

#

At the end of the wooden dock on the east side of Tromsø, Skarstind dropped the large black suitcases in the aluminum-hulled boat. Across the street, a squat and expansive white building stood empty and dark. This part of the city was much less beautiful than the cobbled walkway where they met. The yellow lights of the central district looked sickly and alien from here instead of warm and inviting.

“Get in,” Skarstind said to Ivar. “The client wants this done quickly and quietly.”

They were innocuous enough in this little fishing trawler to pass unnoticed through the narrow sections of the bay northward where the towns were even colder and sparser and finally passed Vanna to the little uninhabited rock in the broad empty stretches of the Norwegian Sea. The ten-by-ten foot steel container sitting on the back of the boat would have raised an eyebrow if any of the shipping or fishing authorities noticed it, but these waters so infrequently saw criminal activity so that those authorities would not look so closely.

Skarstind saw Ivar taking pulls from a flask he removed from one of the black suitcases, but he refrained from scolding the drunkard. He would need the alcohol for courage where they were going.

At first Skarstind navigated by memory of the maps he studied when he first accepted this job from the agency, but when they passed into the open dark reaches of the sea, he switched on the GPS device in the cabin and steered toward the coordinates.

When he sighted the island, a huge craggy mountain peak jutting out of the water, Skarstind shut off the motor and waited as the boat drifted toward the rocky shore. He watched the depth finder until the water was shallow enough to drop anchor.

He pulled the tranq gun from one of the black suitcases and handed it to Ivar to hold while he dropped the dinghy into the choppy water. Skarstind took the gun back and jumped down into the little metal boat, catching himself from falling against the side.

“Hop down here, Ivar,” Skarstind shouted above the sea wind. “I hope your stomach isn’t roiling as much as this water.”

The water surged as Ivar climbed over the trawler’s railing and he slipped over so his head slammed against the hull and his legs wrapped around a brass stanchion. He dangled there for a moment before Skarstind reached up and grabbed around his chest and pulled him down into the dinghy.

“Where the fuck did the agency find a fool like you, Ivar?” Skarstind shouted over the growing wind.

A wave kicked up and pelted them. Salt water washed over the mask of Skarstind’s helmet. He wiped it off, but the salt left a white smudge in his eye line. Ivar slumped down on the metal crossbeam at the stern, already winded, his chest heaving under the Kevlar armor.

“Hold this,” Skarstind shouted, handing Ivar the tranq gun. “I’m going to lower my expectations. Your one duty for the rest of the time we’re together is to hold onto that gun. Keep it loaded, safety on. Just as it is now. When I say so, you hand to me. Got it?”

Ivar settled against the stern and nodded, grasping the gun against his heaving chest.

Dipping the oars in the water, Skarstind pivoted the dinghy toward the island and started to row. He laughed at the steam fogging up the mask on Ivar’s helmet. The drunk’s heart was probably about to burst. He was more of a liability than an assistant. Skarstind would put it all in his report to the agency. Maybe he’d even ask for additional compensation for these hardships.

 When the water became shallow and they had almost reached the rocky shore, Skarstind stopped rowing for a moment and slid toward Ivar so he could speak to him quietly.

“Ivar, this is the last time we can speak freely without it giving away our position. Do you have anything you want to ask?”

 Skarstind put a hand on Ivar’s shoulder and felt the man trembling under the body armor.

“Relax, Ivar. All those things I said, I was only trying to scare you. To test your resolve. You’ve made it this far. You must be a good man if the agency sent you.”

They rocked on the ocean in the little boat. Ivar’s eyes peered out through the mask and Skarstind saw the fear in them. The fear, Skarstind thought, was not irrational. Skarstind felt it himself. He was just afraid as this drunk trash clasping the tranq gun, but he knew how to contain it, to harness his fear as awareness and action, instead of letting it paralyze him. This was why the agency called him; he could take the jobs that no rational man who even consider, but he could perform much better than the men who had given up on fear, the maniacs who no longer considered the consequences of their actions. He could split the difference between dying and getting the bounty. This made him invaluable.

“Will you tell my family?” Ivar croaked through the mask.

“Tell your family what, Ivar?”

“Tell them how I died. What I was doing?”

“You’re not going to die, Ivar. Remember, if you die, I’m all the more likely to die. And one thing I’m not up for today is death.”

Ivar laughed.

Truly, though, Skarstind would not tell Ivar’s family. He would tell no one but his agency contact what happened on this island. No one would believe him anyway.

Behind Ivar loomed the island, a gray-black mountain rising directly from the ocean into the sky. Ice and snow covered its slopes almost down to the waterline. The scramble up them would not be easy, but Skarstind had faced worse in the Himalayas and in Patagonia. And this mountain was much nearer to home for him.

Finding a cove with a shallow beach of pebbles on the west side of the island, Skarstind ran the little dinghy onto shore and they scrambled out onto the pebbles. Ivar tripped on a larger rock and fumbled the tranq gun. The gun’s barrel brushed against the ground, but Skarstind pulled Ivar back to his feet and saved their only weapon, other than a few knives holstered in the Kevlar suits, from damage. The knives would not protect them from the jötnar.

The island was small, only a little more than one-hundred acres, but from this vantage in the little cove, Skarstind could not locate the cave entrance. He knew from geological survey maps it was hidden in a sheltered depression near the summit of the mountain. But it might be covered with snow or ice for all he knew.

Pointing up the nearest slope, Skarstind readied himself for an arduous ascent full of drunken Ivar’s follies. Skarstind did not bring equipment, so they would not be tied together or tethered to the mountainside. He’d let Ivar fall to his death, before risking his own life. The climb would not be difficult for anyone with experience, but he did not hold out much hope for Ivar’s skills.

So it was with surprise and relief that Skarstind saw that Ivar climbed with style and confidence. His normal off-balance drunkenness disappeared as he smoothly navigated a steep forty foot incline and then leapt over a crevasse and then delicately crossed an ice field between two of the mountain’s peaks.

With confidence, they moved quickly up toward the summit. Ivar reached it first and by the time they stood their together, looking down at the dark angry ocean, their trawler moored offshore rocking on the waves, Skarstind felt reassured about the agency’s selection of his partner. Ivar was one of these men who could drink and drink and make jokes and express worry and fear and then put on a new face when the real challenges arrived. It was a different style than his own, but who was Skarstind to judge if it worked?

Then Ivar spotted the entrance to the cave, a little downslope in a depression shielded from drifts of snow by a jagged peak that looked like the tooth of a giant ancient reptilian monster.

A warm, fiery glow twinkled from the hole. Skarstind grabbed Ivar’s arm to keep him from rushing down to the cave, cutting through the loose snow on the surface and sending a little avalanche of warning down to their target. Skarstind shook his head. They were too close to the finish to risk talking.

So Skarstind turned and sidestepped his way down toward the cave, stepping lightly on the surface. He waved for Ivar to follow.

The glowing light seemed to reach out from the cave entrance as they approached. It looked warm, almost inviting. Something in the pit of Skarstind’s stomach drew him closer. He wouldn’t have been able to turn back now even if he wanted to. He feared what the jötnar’s powers were doing to Ivar’s will.

The light kept growing warmer and warmer, as if the air and distance had been filtering its power, its heat. Now it felt like the warm afternoon sun on their cheeks, somewhere much closer to the equator than this desolate island well north of the Arctic Circle. But as they approached, with each step they took forward, the light receded further into the cave. As its strength grew it seemed to be backing away, luring them in.

Ivar stepped ahead of Skarstind, one foot over the threshold and into the cave. Skarstind forgot himself, forgot his caution, and whispered, in a voice almost inaudible, “Stop.”

Then time stopped for Skarstind as the two of them wavered there, pinned to the snow, anchored in their boots by some invisible force. He became tired, not the sore exhaustion he expected after their trek to this final meeting, but a pleasant lulling drowsiness.

Fluffy white flakes of snow started drifting down around them and they heard the voice, the last voice Ivar would ever hear.

“Men. Your blood is sweet and briny, iron-drenched like old weapons. I can smell it.”

The voice was deep and rolling, beautiful and mellow. Skarstind felt it thump in his chest. It tickled his ears and made his arms go slack at his side.

“Stupid, men. I knew you were coming the moment you entered my waters and tested their depths with your ugly machinery. Did you foolishly think I would not hear your revolting pings?”

Inside the cave, the light grew nearer and Skarstind could now see it a massive fire glowing and caressing the features of an enormous face. Hair sprung from its ears and nostrils. The lips puckered out like fat earthworms and its eyes glowed dark and black as obsidian.

“I’ve been waiting. Hungry for you…”

Skarstind blinked. The face near the fire disappeared and suddenly the voice roared at the cave entrance and Ivar flew out of his boots, ripped by some violent force, and slammed against the cave wall. His skull split along his right temple and Skarstind saw brain matter oozing from the hole.

The tranq gun lay at Skarstind’s feet. He remembered the mission and snapped out of the trance, lifted his feet from the snow and picked the gun up. The figure reared up before him, the size of a grizzly bear, but hairless and the grey-beige color of dead human flesh.

Skarstind shot it between the ribs, heard the tranq dart pierce its breast plate. He took a long, deep breath as the thing fell into the fresh snow and sent up a puff of flakes that coated his Kevlar armor.

#

The captain of the commercial ship that transported the small container with Skarstind’s quarry insisted that he must mark the container with tracking numbers. The American money Skarstind slipped him before he boarded with the container was enough for the captain to forego any of the usual questions and paperwork. He had to slip him a little more cash so he could accompany the container on its passage across the Atlantic.

But the captain was insistent. The container would need to be marked. The captain, a ruddy-faced Irishman, said any unmarked container would draw suspicion at the Port of Philadelphia where the ship would disembark.

Though he thought it unnecessary, and even fraught with risk for his venture, Skarstind was too tired to fight with the captain on this point.

After he shot the jötnar, he had to rush back to the dinghy, paddle it out to the fishing trawler and motor up to the cove. Then he brought a tangle of chains back to the cave, looked one more time at Ivar’s cracked skull and wrapped the chains around the thing’s body and dragged it down the mountain.

He had a full case of tranquilizer onboard the trawler, so he could keep it sedated and sleeping, but he had to be quick now and gentle enough not to rouse it.

Down in the cove, he pushed mounds of gravel and formed a ramp so he could drag it up onto the back of the trawler and then into the container.

Now on the container ship, Skarstind refused the captain’s many invitations onto the bridge to try some of his own special whiskey. Instead, he slept lightly with his back on the gate of the small container, sitting on top of the case of tranquilizer cartridges, listening for the thing to stir inside.

#

The rolling road felt more comfortable than the sea and Skarstind drifted off in the cushioned, springy seat as the trucker barreled his rig down the highway. He had paid the trucker extra to stop every two hours at rest stops along the way.

While the trucker pissed, or looked for a prostitute to suck him off, Skarstind would push open the gate of the container now on the back of the big truck. Careful that no one saw him, he would climb in and shoot the thing full of tranquilizer again.

It had begun to smell by the time they reached the Port of Philadelphia, but when the trucker asked what was in the container, Skarstind handed him a roll of bills and the trucker shut up.

Back in the cab, as Skarstind drifted off for one more nap before they got to their destination, a little town in the woods just across the Appalachians in Pennsylvania, he heard a voice calling him. A voice like the thing’s voice, only higher.

The beast is coming.

Make sure don’t make darkness.

He opened his eyes.

“What is this?” he asked the trucker, motioning for him to turn up the music.

With fire flames all around.

The beast is coming to your house.

The beast is coming to your town.

“This?” The trucker turned up the stereo and adjusted the brim of his hat. “This is Roky Erickson. Fuckin lunatic used to be in that Texas psychedelic group the 13th Floor Elevators. Went off his rocker in ’69. Disappeared. Then popped in the ’80s and made all this wild horror shit. Good stuff, huh?”

But Skarstind wasn’t listening to him. He was listening to the voice.

It says in the Bible,

The dark cometh and the beast will reign.

One thing about the beast, now,

He stays in his own name.

#

It was just past midnight as the trucker backed up the truck so the container stuck out over the riverbank near the bridge. Skarstind handed him more cash and told him to take a walk. He watched until the ember at the end of the trucker’s cigarette disappeared into the woods.

At the gate of the container, Skarstind slipped on a damp stone and caught himself from falling down the bank into the water. He took a deep breath and readied one last tranq cartridge.

The gate lifted as if by its own will when he undid the catch on the bottom of the container. He got a grip on the chains and started to pull.

Down in the river mud, the beast stinking and just about to stir, Skarstand stuck it with the tranquilizer.

Three hours. Counting down.

Skarstind heard the voice from the truck’s stereo again.

The beast is coming to your town.

He climbed back up to the container, pulled down the gate and latched it and shouted for the truck to come back. He looked at the man stepping down the road in the moonlight and shivered.

Skarstind heard the voice again.

It says in the Bible,

The dark cometh and the beast will reign.

And he saw Ivar’s cracked skull, oozing brain.

Ten minutes had passed since he administered the tranquilizer.

Counting down still.

Ineluctably, the beast would come awake.

Chapter One

Remnants of the previous night pounded against the inside of my skull. Exhausted, I was kept awake at my desk by a dull throb, which picked up in intensity and then died off, only to return. Images and sounds from the apartment on Newstead shredded my concentration and guaranteed a poor night’s sleep.

Marge called, she said, on the off-chance that Artie or I had made it in.

“I’m here,” I said, my voice low. “Trouble sleeping last night. This morning too.”

“I shouldn’t be surprised.”

Since I did come in, and she had me on the phone, she ran down a few items on a list of office banalities, before letting me go.

I hung up the phone and leaned back in the chair, which creaked as it swiveled. Put my hands over my eyes, rubbed them, blinked a few times, and soon found myself distracted by a bird with a red belly on a branch just outside the window. The first thing to truly divert my attention since about two o’clock this morning.

I was contemplating the bird’s species—guessing a robin, the only bird with a red belly I know—when the door to the office opened, inspiring another eruption of noise in the space between my ears. The bird flew off its branch, and I put my face in my hands. I mumbled a greeting into my palms.

“What’s that?” Artie said.

The sound of the door slamming made me twitch. Christ, I just wasn’t holding up today.

“Nothing,” I said, picking my head up, leaning back in the squeaky black vinyl chair.

Artie didn’t step around to his side of the shared desk, but clomped right up alongside my chair, a brown Burger King bag gripped in one hand. He made a show of reaching deep into the folds of the dark trench coat he wore nearly every day of the year, regardless of temperature, and retrieved a sheet of paper folded four times.

"Got somethin hot here," Artie said. "Real damn hot."

"Think I’ve had enough ’hot’ for this weekend. Thanks, though."

"This is a good one. Read it."

He set the paper down next to my elbow, then walked around the ancient mahogany desk. The desk was painted black, matching the chairs, the rug beneath the desk, both computers, and, if Artie’d had his way, the walls. To Artie, nothing was cooler than the color black.

I waited until he’d seated himself in my swivel chair’s twin, and unfolded the paper. At the top of the page was the sender’s name and e-mail address, followed by Artie’s. I asked him once why he printed out and brought these requests to me, instead of simply forwarding them electronically. Figure you’d ignore em, or wouldn’t see em right, is what he’d said. Jokes he forwarded; news articles he found interesting, the same; but possible assignments were always printed, even if we were both in the office when they arrived.

I read the page-long message below the heading. Tossed it over the three model train cars that sat on the dividing line between my desk and Artie’s. It landed in front of him, and he frowned.

"Like I said, this was kind of a busy weekend. Don’t you think, Art?" I interlaced the fingers of both my hands behind my head and relaxed into the chair.

"Did you read this?" He picked up the printed e-mail.

I nodded.

"You don’t think it’s worth investigating?"

"Nuh uh." I shook my head. The slight movement sent another howl through my cerebrum.

Artie opened the brown bag and removed the contents. Three bites into his burger he popped the top of his laptop and tapped out some keys, then squinted at the screen. I’d have told him he needed glasses, but he already knew.

"Huh," he said.

"Whaddaya got there?"

"Takin a look at this place, the town from that chick’s e-mail."

Most work done by the [name of detective agency] began with the Internet. Usually it proved fruitless, but if you get a weird request, it doesn’t hurt to do a quick Google:

Apalachin, Pennsylvania and monster under bridge.

"Let me know if you find anything," I said, and got up from my chair, the Howler howling in my brain. Artie’s lunch reminded me of my own hunger, which had gone into hiding sometime yesterday.

#

The Howler was the name Artie gave to the entity with which we’d gone head-to-head last night on Newstead Ave. Sometimes it seemed my partner’s favorite part of the job was naming the things we investigated, demons, ghosts, or otherwise. Only a handful of the many assignments we took led to actual solid encounters like last night’s. And the several definite supernatural confrontations we’d experienced previously weren’t local jobs either: the Swarmer we met in Brooklyn; the Gobbler, out in Yonkers; and the Bleeder manifested in Clinton, NJ.

But 45 Newstead Ave. Apt #3 was just fifteen minutes away, in Emmaus.

The request, from a couple teenagers, sounded like such nonsense, I almost insisted we pass it up. Artie said he’d check it out on his own, though—c’mon, Stu, it’s ten minutes away; worst happens, we get paid for an hour or two’s work—so I relented. Now, after nearly killing myself hanging out the window of that third floor apartment in Emmaus, I hoped the kids’ parents were going to cough up payment for a job (mostly) well-done.

I passed buildings climbing with ivy, some of them, like the Sun Inn, having held their places in downtown Bethlehem for more than two-hundred years. The calm, proud look of this section of town helped settle some of the stress that had built up inside me the last few days.

When we’d first set up shop, Artie and I considered a number of locations. I’d been leaning towards a town outside Jersey City, but Artie pushed for this place, where he’d been raised, and once we were all settled in, it didn’t take long for me to become acclimated. The location was good, less than two hours from Manhattan, Philadelphia, and Newark, but more than that, it felt like home, even for an out of-of-towner like myself. We had to put up with Artie’s mother dropping by occasionally for unannounced visits, but that was a mostly minor inconvenience.

Main St. Bagel sat nestled between the bookstore and a dessert café, two blocks from the agency: another good reason for our office’s location. The owner did his best to emulate the look, atmosphere, and taste of a Manhattan bagel shop. An admirable effort: here you had the excitement of a New York eatery, but without all the goddamn people.

A couple of college kids sat at one of the outdoor tables; the other three tables were empty. I nodded to the kids, then took the door from a woman walking out of the shop, a Jack Russell terrier leading her on its leash. Most dining establishments wouldn’t allow non-service animals, but the danger of a stray dog hair wasn’t enough to scare off most of the bagel shop’s clientele.

Jimmy, the guy who ran the place, nodded when I walked in, the bell above the door ringing at my entrance.

"Stu, m’man, did you see this?"

And before I’d made it five steps into the place he was turning on the TV above the counter. I knew what would be appearing on-screen before his finger had de-pressed PLAY on the remote.

A dimly lit room. Wobbly handheld video. A small crew approaching a wooden door at the end of a long hallway. Cracks along the walls, paint peeling. The floorboards squealed complaints as the investigators made their way down the hall. The man in front turned, flashing bright white teeth. He spoke into his cordless microphone: "Here we are, folks, this is it, this could be—"

The door flew open, and the screen filled with a flashing white light.

"Oh my god!"

The leader of the expedition jumped back. He covered his head with flailing arms and ducked down as a barely discernible white shape blew by him.

The camera dropped, of course. Even if you backed the scene up, played it in slow-mo, image by image, the features of what the team would surely label a ghost wouldn’t be recognizable.

Cary Wilson. Ghost hunter for the 21st century.

Jimmy paused the show and said, "You know why I like him?"

I leaned my elbows on the counter.

"The guy’s always smiling, yeah? He sees these crazy things, these crazy, crazy ghost things, and he’s still smiling."

"Because he’s not really afraid," I said. "It’s all faked, that’s why he can keep that stupid smile on his face."

"Oh no, man, I don’t think it’s fake," Jimmy said, with an almost offended look, as though we hadn’t had this same conversation last week. "How you gonna fake this stuff?"

"Flying doors? Blurry shapes? You serious?"

"You’re good," Jimmy said, pointing a finger at me. "You are good. I tell you what, I ever have trouble with, uh"—twirling his hand, searching for the right word—"monster, uh, ghost--"

"Paranormal?"

"Yes!" He pumped two fists in the air. "Paranormal. I ever have any dealings with it, I call you, not Mr. Cary."

"Thanks, Jimmy, appreciate it. I don’t understand, though, you watch this show all the time, you don’t know the word ’paranormal’?"

"Ah, I just forget it."

I laughed, but it sounded more like a sigh. I was winding down when I should have been getting started. Noon for the rest of the east coast, today, was midnight for me.

"M’man, you not feeling so good today?" Jimmy’s face twisted into an expression of concern.

I shrugged and said it’d been a tough night. Jimmy said he guessed so, me coming in after twelve o’clock. I ordered my usual bagel-egg sandwich, leaving off the jalapenos for a change; jalapenos were too intense for this kind of day.

Jimmy sliced the bagel and set the two halves in the conveyer-style toaster oven, then went to the fridge.

"Hey, m’man," he said, taking out a bottle of Budweiser, "some hair of a dog, maybe?"

I shook my head and said thanks.

Cary Wilson, on pause, stared down at me from the TV screen.

The man loved his gadgets. Seemed like every episode of his show he was showing off some device he’d picked up—or, on occasion, a device he claimed to have made. He’d take this new toy off to some investigation, a supposedly haunted house, library, coal mine, whatever location the producers picked for him, and inevitably proclaim the gadget’s effectiveness.

Some shit would fly around, maybe, or a ghostly face appear in a window, a Bigfoot would trash a campsite (Bigfoot’s always heard, never seen except in quick snatches that could be inserted close-ups of hairy dogs), and Cary would go on about what a terrifying, death-defying encounter he’d just experienced. I’d imagine his crew went through the same ghostly trials, but this went mostly unacknowledged. To Cary, it was just him out there, with his toys and enthusiasm.

I didn’t like the fact that I knew so much about Haunted House Hunters. The show, now in its sixth season, was only getting started around the time the case work Artie and I were doing began to head in the direction of the supernatural. In a matter of months our reputation as detectives who trucked with the paranormal grew, and with it came a lot of inquiries, some which led to actual encounters, and many which did not. For a while it seemed like one out of every three callers or visitors to the office brought up Cary Wilson and his show. I couldn’t pretend it didn’t get annoying after a while, but curiosity won out and Artie and I picked up a DVD set of Haunted House Hunters at the library.

We played the discs in the office one night, skipping around a bit, talking over a lot of it, laughing at the obvious bullshit, sneering at the less-than-obvious, and I returned them the next day.

You could say they didn’t leave much of an impression.

After that, a couple clients brought in copies of the show, sometimes as gifts, other times as an example of what they thought they were dealing with themselves. It got to be a bit much. I saw Cary on the news, on entertainment shows; here he made the cover of the local section in the Bethlehem paper, doing an appearance down the street at Moravian College.

It might have been OK for business, people thinking what Artie and I were doing was the same as what the "professional ghost tracker" did on their TV screens. The difference was that Cary Wilson would find no evidence of the paranormal, and claim that he did, whereas Artie and I had no qualms about telling a client their suspicions were baseless.

I used to go on the defensive with clients who learned everything they knew of the supernatural from Haunted House Hunters, try explaining to them the difference between us and them, the reality versus the stage show. But I gave up, and after four seasons Cary’s ratings took a steep plummet. Industry speculation suggested season six would be his last.

I hated that I knew that.

Jimmy brought out my sandwich, I ate it in silence, and by the time I walked out of Main St. Bagel, the Howler had quieted considerably.

I headed up Main, and turned onto New Street, taking my time, thinking over the printed e-mail Artie had insisted I take with me. I felt it in my pocket, folded eight times. A ridiculous missive, one hardly worth considering. Yet here I was, considering it.

Dear Messieurs [last name] and [last name], it began. The author of the e-mail, a Rhonda Renner, had selected a cursive font, one I imagined she thought emulated her written script. Probably hated e-mail, wishing she could write her request longhand and mail it to us.

Or maybe I was reading too much into it.

I was given the name of your agency by a trusted friend, and I

assure you it is with grave urgency that I make my request.  I

work with the Hemdale County Rehabilitation and Psychiatric

Center, located in my hometown of Apalachin, Pennsylvania.  As you

can imagine I’m sure, my work brings me into contact with many

of the less fortunate citizens of the county, a good number of

whom come from right here in Apalachin.  . . . I know by

your reputations that you are professionals and will not laugh

at what I have next to say.  I also know you have yourselves

seen a great many unusual things most would only scoff at.  So

perhaps with an open mind you will hear what I have to say.

"It’s an epidemic," Artie said, using a word Rhonda herself used twice in her e-mail, to describe the recent disappearances and deaths of rehab patients. He turned in his chair, palms out. "Town’s got a serious problem."

"I don’t doubt that," I said, pacing in front of the window. Our third floor office didn’t allow for much pacing room, but there was a nice spot, about five-by-five, that allowed me space to walk out my thoughts. Artie’s eyes followed my circular path. "What I wonder about is this woman’s diagnosis of the problem."

"It’s not all that far. Probably take us seven hours, most."

"Could always phone her and get more information before driving out there."

"I’d rather hear it in person."

"There’s no other way you’d rather spend a couple days, is there?"

"It’ll be like a vacation. And after last night—"

"Great vacation," I said, "from eastern Pennsylvania to western Pennsylvania."

"We’re fine for money," Artie said, meaning We can afford to blow off a couple days, drive across the state, and probably make nothing for the effort.

"Yeah, OK," I said, stopping in front of the window.

The bird with the red belly was back. I watched it hop from one small branch to another. It looked up at me—or that’s how it seemed. Opened its mouth. Probably it said something, but with the window closed, I couldn’t hear.

"We are gonna call first," I said, "make sure this Rhonda Renner’s a real person."

"Of course," Artie said, and picked up the phone.

Susie wouldn’t like this. We had plans for tonight. Though, truthfully, even if I didn’t cross the state with Artie, I’d probably end up canceling on her anyway. As Artie dialed the office phone, I took my cell out of my pocket and crossed to the door, to call Susie from the hallway.

I stopped and stood outside the office before closing the door all the way, listening to Artie.

"Goooood afternoon—or is it morning still? I can’t tell. I’m trying to reach a Rhonda Renner." After a brief pause: "Hello, Rhonda? This is Mr. Artie [last name] calling you from [name of agency]. Listen, I hope you’re doing well. I’ve got in my possession a request you sent over our way earlier this morning, and I’d love a minute of your time, if you’ve got one."

Artie could be an argumentative slob sometimes. He both ate and pissed more than any human I’d ever known, and he was in terrible shape; his breathing, after walking up five steps, sounded like two trains roaring past one another on a windy day. But the son of a bitch loved his job, absolutely lived for this shit. As I eavesdropped on his conversation with Rhonda Renner, my own anticipation grew. I hated calling Susie to cancel on her yet again, and the job would likely turn out to be bullshit, but by the time I stepped back into the office, I was nearly as excited as my partner to get out to Apalachin and solve their monster problem.