The Tomb (Repairman Jack)

rakoshi were banished to the Realm of Death.'

'Not all.'

'No, not all. My ancestors penned the last nest in a series of caves in northern Bengal and built their temple above. They learned ways to bend the rakoshi to their will and they passed on those ways, generation after generation. When our parents died, our grandmother passed on the egg and the necklaces to Kusum and me.'

'I knew the necklaces came in somewhere.'

Kolabati's voice was sharp as her hand flew to her throat. 'What do you know of the necklace?'

'I know those two stones up front there look an awful lot like rakoshi eyes. I figured it was some sort of membership badge.”

'It's more than that,' she said in a calmer voice. 'For want of a better term, I'll say it's magic.'

As Jack walked back to the living room, he laughed softly.

'You find this amusing?' Kolabati said from behind him.

'No.' He dropped into a chair and laughed again, briefly. The laughter disturbed him—he seemed to have no control over it. 'It's just that I've been listening to what you've been telling me and accepting every word without question. That's what's funny—I believe you. As a kid I saw some weird stuff in the Barrens, but this! It's the most ridiculous, fantastic, far-fetched, implausible, impossible story I've ever heard, and I believe every word of it!'

'You should. It's true.”

'Even the part about the magic necklace?' Jack held up his hand as she opened her mouth to elaborate. 'Never mind. I've swallowed too much already. I might choke on a magic necklace.'

'It's true!'

'I'm far more interested in your part in all this. You must have known.'

She sat down opposite him. 'Friday night in your room I knew there was a rakosh outside the window. Saturday night, too.'

Jack had figured that out by now. But he had other questions: 'Why me?'

'It came to your apartment because you tasted the durba grass elixir that draws a hunting rakosh to a particular victim.'

Grace's so-called laxative…a rakosh must have carried her off between Monday night and Tuesday morning. And Nellie last night. But Nellie—those pieces of flesh held on high in the flickering light...he swallowed the bile that surged into his throat—Nellie was dead. Jack was alive.

'Then how come I'm still around?'

'My necklace protected you.'

'Back to that again? All right—tell me.'

She lifted the front of the necklace as she spoke, holding it on either side of the pair of eyelike gems. 'This has been handed down through my family for ages. The secret of making it is long gone. It has...powers. It is made of a special iron, which traditionally has power over rakoshi, and renders its wearer invisible to a rakosh.'

'Come on, Kolabati—' This was too much to believe.

'It's true! The only reason you are able to sit here and doubt is because I covered you with my body on both occasions when the rakosh came in to find you! I made you disappear! As far as a rakosh was concerned, your apartment was empty: If I hadn't, you would be dead like the others!'

The others...Grace and Nellie. Two harmless old ladies.

'But why the others? Why—?'

'To feed the nest! Rakoshi must have human flesh on a regular basis. In a city like this it must have been easy to feed a nest of fifty. You have your own caste of untouchables here—winos, derelicts, runaways, homeless people no one would miss or bother to look for even if their absence was noticed.'

That explained all those missing homeless the newspapers had been blabbering about.

Jack jumped to his feet. 'I'm not talking about them! I'm talking about two well-to-do ladies who have been made victims of these things!'

'You must be mistaken.'

'I'm not.'

'Then it must have been an accident. A missing-persons search is the last thing Kusum would want. He would pick faceless people. Perhaps those women came into the possession of some of the elixir by mistake.'

'Possible.' Jack was far from satisfied, but it was possible. He wandered around the room.

'Who were they?'

'Two sisters: Nellie Paton last night and Grace Westphalen last week.'

Jack thought he heard a sharp intake of breath, but when he turned to Kolabati her face was composed.

'I see,' was all she said.

'He's got to be stopped.'

'I know.' Kolabati clasped her hands in front of her. 'But you can't call the police.'

The thought hadn't entered Jack's mind. Police weren't on his list of possible solutions for anything. But he didn't tell Kolabati that. He wanted to know her reasons for avoiding them. Was she