Necroscope: The Plague-Bearer Read Online Free Page A

been a little too well-fleshed for the Necroscope’s tastes, and he had worked hard to rid himself of the excess weight. This hadn’t mattered much to Alec Kyle himself with his height, whose work in E-Branch had more usually been sedentary; but it mattered to Harry. Bad enough carrying those extra years around without all that extra weight! And:
    “Damn!” Harry muttered under his breath, and shook his head where he stood staring at himself. And then to himself: “Do you know something, chum? I think I’m actually getting used to you!” There was no answer, just a wry grin which gradually faded…
    Now then, why was he back here in this room? Mainly because he wasn’t quite ready yet to return to Edinburgh. It would have been just as easy to base himself at home; with the Möbius Continuum at his command he could have based himself anywhere! But if he was back in Edinburgh, the Necroscope knew where he would be spending his time—or his nights, anyway: with Bonnie Jean, if she wasn’t too busy with her girls at B.J.’s wine bar in the city. But while she had become the love of his life, and albeit that it was a very odd love affair, still the absence of Brenda—her disappearance—was very upsetting, galling; and still he felt he must track his wife and baby son down if only to ensure that they were okay, fit and well and not suffering any kind of hardship.
    As for his feelings for Brenda: Harry knew they were fading now if not already gone entirely. He had found that contrary to the old adage absence—at least in his case—had not made the heart grow stronger. Three years and more, much of it spent in fruitless, soul-destroying search, had only served to blunt his affections, especially since he had found B.J. or she had found him.
    And that was why he was back in his hotel room: because he had promised to stay in touch, calling B.J. every day. Truth to tell, Bonnie Jean had told him to call her every day. She knew what he was about—his ongoing search and all—which apparently made little or no difference to her affections. But B.J. wasn’t the sort to admit to jealousy; and anyway, she was aware that Harry’s search was a matter of duty, an acceptance of personal responsibility as he saw it. No matter that his wife had fled him, he still must satisfy himself that she and the child were secure, whatever their location and situation.
    B.J. never rose until late, rarely went abroad during daylight hours. She revelled in darkness, loved the night and the moon, especially at its full. It was now past midday; she would probably be abed still in her rooms above the wine bar. But the Necroscope knew there was a telephone on her bedside table.
    When he dialled her number there was a pause of one or two seconds before a growling, softly Scots accented voice queried, “Aye? It’s B.J. here—who’s callin’ the noo?”
    “It’s Harry,” he told her, already feeling her spell flooding over him. And immediately:
    “Ah! Mah wee man!” she said: words that Harry could never resist, carrying a post-hypnotic command unbreakable as carbon steel chains. “Where are ye, Harry?”
    “In Scarborough, Yorkshire,” he told her. “But I think I’m done here now.”
    “Good!” she said, at which he believed he detected a degree of relief in her distant, telephone-metallic voice. “So, you’ll be coming home soon then?”
    Truly amazing, he thought, half-smiling to himself and just a little irreverently, how B.J.’s Scottish dialect can come and go like that! An eccentricity or idiosyncrasy…Oh really?
    But anyway: “Yes, I’ll be back tonight.” (As the Necroscope he could be there instantly, of course, but how to explain that to her? He couldn’t, so instead he would spend the afternoon at his house near Bonnyrig.) “Should I come to the bar later?”
    “Oh, but you’d better!” she answered. “It’s been only a few days—what, a week?—since your wanderlust, your search, took you away from me