‘Sounds like a dream-state,’ Pollard commented.

‘Exactly! Very like the dream in which we wander, confused and unable to recognize the most ludicrous inconsistencies, accepting but not analysing. But for these luckless entities a world also coloured by despair, regret, loneliness, longing, bitterness.’ He sighed. ‘It would appear, if we can accept Dr Wickland’s theory, that at least some people survive death for a time but what survives exists obsessed with what it believed in while alive and no longer with access to the brain’s analytical engine.’

‘A pretty gloomy prospect,’ Hunt murmured.

‘Indeed it is. Anyway, Wickland found that while controlling his wife, the entity could be contacted, could be brought to recognize its situation and break free of its obsessions. You know, the overwhelming impression given by such cases is that the entity has so wrapped its own cloak of pseudoreality about it that it is oblivious to the attempts of other entities to help it. Until it recognizes its state, it is condemned to wander in its lonely twilight existence, creating its trail of havoc.’

‘What was the outcome of such cases?’ Ann asked.

‘Invariably – sometimes after a very long struggle – the entity realized its situation, seemed to perceive a happier place to go to, and departed.’

‘And you tried the Wickland technique upstairs with Mary Rolfe,’ Pollard said.

‘Yes. It seemed the reasonable thing to do. Whoever or whatever was the entity possessing Ann, whether or not it was the regression entity, it was begging for help. I hope to God we gave it.’

‘The weeping we heard,’ Paul said. ‘Will that return?’

‘Possibly not.’

‘But surely, if what you’ve said is true, we can now accept that Mary Rolfe’s shade will no longer trouble us at night.’

Meredith shook his head. ‘I can’t guarantee that. In fact I’d say we should remain as firmly on our guard as before.’

‘You mean – ?’ Paul broke off.

‘I mean I believe there’s something else here.’

Paul and Carol spoke together.

‘The man I saw – ’

‘The thing in my bed – ’

Meredith regarded them steadily.

‘Whatever destroyed Bernard Gray. That may still be here.’

‘What! After almost a century?’ Hunt was openly scoffing.

‘What is time?’ Meredith asked. ‘Karl Wickland’s entities would appear to have been active for many decades and seemingly could have gone on indefinitely. No. I hope I’m wrong but in case I’m not, take care.’

Slashing across his last words came the most appalling crash, a noise as loud as if a forty-tonner juggernaut lorry had collided with a brick wall. The room shook, dust and plaster drifting from the ceiling. Shocked, they scrambled speechless to their feet.