“Yes,” I said. “I can always trust you, Molly.”
We were right outside the front door. I raised a hand to knock, and the door swung suddenly open before me. And there, standing in the doorway and very obviously blocking our path, was Ammonia Vom Acht herself. She didn’t look pleased to see us.
The greatest telepath mankind has ever produced was under medium height, stocky, with a broad and almost mannish face under a frizzy shock of unrestrained auburn hair. She had piercing green eyes, a hook of a nose and a thin, flat mouth not really helped by a brief slash of dark red lipstick. There was a lot of character in her face, but no one was ever going to call her pretty. Or even handsome, unless the light was really bad. Someone once said she had a face like a bulldog licking piss off a thistle, and I could see why. She wore dull, characterless clothes with more than a touch of the masculine about them: a battered tweed jacket with leather patches on the elbows, over baggy trousers with earth stains still on the knees from working in the garden. Her shoes were stout brogues, with trailing laces.
I didn’t run. I knew my duty.
When she finally spoke, her voice was harsh and clipped and almost emotionless.
“So. Edwin Drood and Molly Metcalf. I’ve been expecting you. I was busy gardening when I sensed you were coming, so this had better be worth it.”
“Hold everything,” I said, caught off guard despite myself. “We arrived instantaneously through the Merlin Glass.”
“I sensed the Glass was about to open here,” said Ammonia. “You have no idea what an impact that thing makes on the world when you use it. But then, you don’t even know what it is, really, do you?”
“Do you?” Molly said bluntly.
Ammonia ignored her, which isn’t easy. She looked us both over, eyes narrowed, and then nodded abruptly. “You’re both shielded. Good. Nothing worse than a noisy mind. That’s why I have to live out here, so far away from everyone else. Being the most powerful telepathic mind in the world isn’t always all it’s cracked up to be. I have trouble keeping everyone else out of my head. The world will keep pressing in. People will intrude . . . and all the shouting makes me tired.”
She stepped back. “Come in. Brush your feet on the mat. Properly! And don’t mutter.”
She beckoned us into a wide, brightly lit hallway with bare wooden floors and faded prints of rare flowers on the walls. Molly and I slipped in, and the door closed itself behind us. Ammonia turned her back on us and headed for the door at the far end, gesturing brusquely for Molly and me to follow her. We did so. She didn’t look back, but she did keep talking to us over her shoulder.
“You were wondering why there are only insects in my garden, and no beasts or birds. I scare them off. Have to. Can’t stand to have anything with a mind around me. All that red-in-tooth-and-claw stuff; they can’t turn it off, you know. The endless fear and appetite make me bad tempered.”
I felt a chill run up the back of my neck. “Were you reading our minds just then?”
“No,” said Ammonia. “I heard you talking about it in the garden. It’s quiet in the garden. That’s why I like it. Come through into the parlour. Meet my husband, Peter.”
That last bit almost stopped me dead. There was nothing in any of my family’s files about the infamous Ammonia Vom Acht being married. Molly shot me a quick look and mouthed the word
The parlour was small and cosy, filled with modern, brutally styleless furniture that clashed loudly with the rest of the cottage. Bright sunlight streamed in through the great bay window. There were vases of fresh flowers on every flat surface, pleasantly scenting the air. A large and very modern electric clock dominated one wall, working silently away, while the other walls presented paintings by several masters. Ammonia, it seemed, was very fond of the Pre-Raphaelites. Payment for past services, presumably. Two large and very comfortable-looking armchairs stood facing each other across the real fireplace. Sunk deeply in one of the chairs was Ammonia Vom Acht’s husband, Peter.
He rose languidly from the depths of his chair to greet us. He smiled vaguely in our direction, but didn’t offer a hand to shake. He was a tall, diffident sort in an expensive three-piece suit with recent dinner stains on the waistcoat, a pale, bland face under thinning blond hair, and a calm, uncommitted smile. He had a large drink in his hand, though it was barely midday.
“This is Peter,” said Ammonia. She might have been speaking about her accountant. “I married him because he’s a psychic null. Born shielded from every form of telepathic contact. His thoughts stay inside his head. I can’t hear him. I can relax around him.”
“And I married her because she needed me,” Peter said blithely. “And I do so love to be needed. Don’t I, old thing?”
His voice was well educated, even aristocratic: that affected, bored drawl that gets on everyone’s nerves.
“I can’t hear his thoughts or sense his feelings,” said Ammonia. “Everything he says and does is a surprise to me. You have no idea what a relief that is.”
“So many compliments,” said Peter. “You’ll make me blush, dear.”
Ammonia nodded slowly. “I’m not easy to live with. I know that.”
“Some marriages are made in heaven,” said Peter. “The rest of us do the best we can.” He spoke vaguely, his voice trailing away. When he looked up from his glass to take Molly and me in, his eyes were frankly disinterested. “You mustn’t mind Ammonia. She’s only being herself. Her problem is, she’s always had difficulty deciding where she stops and other people begin. The edges are never properly nailed down, for a telepath. Things sneak in: thoughts, emotions, intentions. . . . She has no people skills. None at all. I’m not even sure she is people, really.”
“Peter . . .” said Ammonia.
“Yes, dear, I know. We have guests. Party manners! Can I get you people a little something? I’m having a little something. I always have a little something about now.”
Molly and I declined. Peter nodded understandingly, knocked back what was left in his glass, and drifted over to the very modern sideboard to refill his glass from a functional but quite ugly crystal decanter that was already half-empty.
“Ammonia doesn’t drink,” he announced, turning lazily back to face his visitors. “She daren’t. Whereas I . . . am rarely sober. I daren’t . . . I drink like a fish, you know, like a spiny denizen of the deep. So would you, if you were married to the most powerful telepath in the world. It’s not the person, you understand; it’s the lifestyle. Oh, do sit down, both of you. You make the room look untidy. No use waiting for Ammonia to ask you. Such things simply don’t occur to her. No people skills, remember? Not her fault, of course.”
Peter slumped bonelessly back into his armchair, and Ammonia sank down into the chair opposite him. Not a single recognisable emotion had crossed her face so far. Molly and I pulled up two stiff-backed wooden chairs and sat down facing them.
“Given everything the poor girl’s been through, it’s a wonder she’s as sane as she is,” Peter said affably. It was off-putting, the way he talked about his wife as if sometimes she was there, and sometimes she wasn’t. He smiled vaguely at Molly and me. “Do you know the story? It’s not one of the better-known ones, but it is jolly interesting. Ammonia spent the first ten years of her life in a coma, you see. Self-inflicted, to protect her developing mind from the thoughts of all the world crashing in on her at once. She had to learn how to make a shield that would keep everyone else out, before she could decide on who she was. Think of the poor child knowing all there was to know about human nature at such a young and defenceless age. The good and the bad, the sane and the insane, the saints and the devils . . . Only an iron will kept her together. . . . That’s what makes her such a marvellous curative telepath. She knows all there is to know about the demons of the mind, because she’s been there. You’re very good at what you do, aren’t you, dear? Yes, you are.”
“Peter . . .” said Ammonia.
“I’m telling them what they need to know, old thing.” Peter smiled conspiratorially at Molly and me. “I see you’ve noticed all the fittings and furnishings are terribly up-to-date. Have to be. Ammonia can pick up traces, echoes, from all the people who used to own old things. People imprint on everything, you see. She had to run a full-scale telepathic exorcism on the cottage before we could move in, wiping the stone tape recording clean, as it were. And all the furniture has to be replaced regularly, every twelve months, because they soak up memories. We hold a nice little bonfire for the old stuff, out back. Because you can never tell what another telepath might pick up
