Free Death Mask by Graham Masterton Page B

hasn't stopped killing yet, not by a long way, according to these cards. In fact he's going to kill more and more people every time. I'm also going to tell him that he and his men need to be very careful when they go looking for him. You see this Cache-cache card? This means that the hunters are going to become the hunted. They're going to suffer a whole lot of casualties before they find Red Mask. That's if they find him at all."
    "Well, you can try," said Molly. "But like I say, Mike Kunzel is one of these people who won't believe that a stove is red-hot until he's sat on it to make sure."
    Sissy said, "There's so much detail in these cards…times, dates. There's a sundial in this picture pointing to quarter after ten o'clock. And there are five magpies sitting on that signpost. That means the fifth month, May."
    "Sissy-I believe that you can predict what's going to happen. But what I'm trying to tell you is, it's going to take so much more to convince Mike."
    "I'll write down everything that I can, and then maybe you could take me to police headquarters."
    "Sissy-"
    "People are going to be killed, Molly! People are going to die! And I'm the only person who can stop it from happening! I have to try, goddammit!"
    "Okay," Molly agreed. "But take my advice, and try to make your predictions sound very straightforward. Don't tell Mike that five magpies means May. And don't mention any kind of magic."
    It took Sissy over an hour to study the cards in detail, noting every single nuance, such as distant castles with flocks of rooks around them, and two-headed cats, and peasants sleeping under hayricks. She couldn't interpret all of them, though, and she began to feel that the cards were deliberately trying to frustrate her.
    She sat on the tapestry window seat overlooking the yard. The cicada nymphs were beginning to molt, breaking out of their skins and stickily emerging with red eyes and black bodies and wings. Their discarded remains floated to the ground, so that the soil around the maple tree was littered with hundreds of papery shells.
    Molly brought her a glass of wine. "How's it going?"
    Sissy held up her legal pad. On it, she had written, "Red Mask: Predicted Behavior Patterns," and underlined it seven times.
    "Is that all?"
    "I can't do it, Molly. Not logically. I know what the cards are telling me because I know what they're telling me. But I can't explain it to anybody else. Why do five magpies mean May? Because they do, that's all. I can't tell you why."
    Molly sat down beside her. "All right. But even if you can't explain how you know what Red Mask is going to do next-what do you think he's going to do?"
    "He wants to kill dozens more people, I'm sure of it. He has the taste for it now. You see this card? You see this man in the background, stuffing himself with tripes? From what the cards are telling me, I'm kind of surprised that Red Mask only killed one person today. He enjoys stabbing people. He relishes the blood and the close physical contact and the power that it gives him over his victims. And for some reason he's very vengeful, very self-righteous. He believes that he's totally justified in committing all of these murders.
    "The cards are telling me something else, too. Red Mask wants to be recognized. He wants to be notorious. He wants everybody in the city to be frightened of him. I think he's going to contact the police or the media before too long and start making threats. Look here-this man shouting from the top of a tower."
    "And the roses? These roses are really gruesome, aren't they?-these ones like bloodstained hands."
    Sissy took out a cigarette and lit it. "I'm not sure about the roses yet. But they show up in practically every card, don't they? So they must be significant. I get the feeling that the cards are trying to tell me that I'm missing something really obvious, but I can't for the life of me work out what it is."
    The phone warbled. Molly picked it up and said, "Sawyer residence."
    "Molly?