“What made the camera unusual?” Elaine asked.
“The Tarasov camera was supposed to be able to photograph human auras.”
“Nonsense.” Elaine gave a disdainful sniff. “Human auras have never been successfully photographed, not even by the experts in the Society’s labs. Something to do with the location of aura energy on the spectrum, I think. Auras can be measured and analyzed in oblique ways and some people can see them naturally, but you can’t take pictures of them. The technology just isn’t available yet.”
“It gets better,” Zack said. “According to the notes of the agent who brought the camera out from behind the Iron Curtain, the Russian researchers believed that a unique type of psychic photographer could not only take pictures of auras, he could use the camera to disrupt them in ways that would cause severe psychic trauma or death.”
Elaine frowned. “In other words, it was meant to be some sort of psychic weapon?”
“Yes.”
“But the experts say that no modern technology can interface successfully with human psychic energy. That’s why no one has ever been able to build a machine or a weapon that can be activated by paranormal powers or one that can produce that kind of energy.”
“True.”
“In other words, the camera really is a fraud?” She sighed. “That’s a relief. The world is already armed to the teeth. The last thing we want to do is introduce a new psychic technology designed to kill people.”
“Uh-huh.”
She beetled her brows at him. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“I was able to determine that the Tarasov camera had been used to kill at least once, possibly twice. The vibes from the first murder were murky, though.”
Elaine’s eyes widened a little. “In other words, the Russians had at least one sensitive who could operate the camera?”
“Looks like it.”
She moved one hand in a small arc. “How is that possible?”
“The J&J agent speculated in his private notes that the Russian operator was probably a one-of-a-kind exotic. Some type of unusual level-ten talent that has never been classified by the Society.”
Exotic was the Society’s slang for those endowed with rare, extremely high-level psychic talents. It was not, generally speaking, a complimentary term. The truth was, people with exceptionally strong paranormal abilities often made other members of the Society uneasy. In fact, it was not uncommon for folks outside the Society—people who scoffed at the very idea of the paranormal—to find themselves unaccountably nervous or wary when they were in the presence of an individual endowed with powerful parasensitive abilities.
Power of any kind, including psychic power, was a form of energy. Most people, whether they were aware of it or not—whether they even wanted to acknowledge it or not—were capable of sensing it when there was a lot of it in the room.
“Wonder what happened to the exotic who could operate the camera,” Elaine mused.
“She’s dead.”
Elaine gave him a quick, startled look. “Killed by the Jones & Jones agent who appropriated the camera?”
“Yes. It was close. She almost took him out first with the damned thing.”
“Fascinating. Which one of the Society’s museums got the device?”
“It’s not in any of the museums. It’s in the Jones family vault.”
Elaine glowered. “I should have known. No offense, Zack, but your family’s penchant for keeping secrets is extremely annoying to those of us who are in the business of encouraging research. That camera, if it has any historical significance at all, should be in the collection of one of the Society’s museums.”
“Hey, give me some credit here. I persuaded my grandfather to let me study the camera and write up the results for the Journal, didn’t I? That was a major accomplishment. You know how he is when it comes to the family’s and the Society’s secrets.”
“Bancroft Jones spent far too much time in the intelligence world before he accepted the Master’s Chair, if you ask me,” Elaine said, grimly disapproving. “If he had his way, he’d probably classify the guest list for the annual Spring Ball as Top Secret, Council Eyes Only.”
Zack smiled slightly.
Elaine stopped in mid-stride, rounding on him. “Good lord. Don’t tell me he actually tried to do it?”
“Grandmother told me he mentioned the idea over breakfast one morning a few months ago. Don’t worry, she talked him out of it.”
Elaine made a tut-tutting sound. “Talk about old school. Just another example of why we need new blood at the top. In fact, if you ask me, the entire internal organizational structure of the Society requires serious reform and modernization.”
“It’s not that bad. The changes that Gabriel Jones made in the late 1800s served the Society very well throughout the twentieth century.”
“This happens to be the twenty-first century, although I sometimes think that certain members on the Council haven’t noticed.”
“Uh-huh.” He resigned himself to the lecture. He’d heard it often enough.
“I predict that within the next twenty or thirty years, research and study of the paranormal will come out of the closet,” Elaine continued forcefully. “It will move into the realm of mainstream science. When that happens, it’s quite possible there will be some risks for those who possess any sort of psychic sensitivity. We need to start preparing now.”
“Uh-huh.”
“In the long term, it is the Society’s fundamental duty to help move the study of the paranormal into the mainstream, to make the scientific establishment take it seriously. The last thing we want is another round of witch burning if and when that happens.”
“Doubt if there’s much chance of that,” he said. Agreeing to have coffee had definitely been a mistake. He glanced covertly at his watch. Maybe he could get an earlier flight. “Today, people who claim to possess psychic powers don’t go to the stake. They go on talk shows.”
“Being treated as a carnival act or an exhibit in a sideshow is hardly an example of mainstreaming, and that’s exactly what those silly talk shows are, if you ask me, modern carnival acts and sideshows.”
“Right.”
“To say nothing of all those poor people who end up in psychiatric institutions or on the streets because they’ve been driven mad by the psychic side of their nature or because someone decided they were crazy.”