Read Online Vision by Dean Koontz - Free Book Online

before.”
    “It did this time.”
    “Have you ever heard of another clairvoyant having the same experience? Hurkos? Croiset? Dykshoorn?”
    “No.” She turned from the window. “What’s it mean? What’s going to happen to me?”
    “Nothing will happen to you.” Convinced that she wasn’t ill, he began the gentle interrogation that could guide her through a vision in progress or through the memory of a vision that had passed. “Has this thing you just saw happened yet?”
    “No.”
    “This woman who will be stabbed ... was she one of those you saw in the nightmare last evening?”
    “No. A new one.”
    “Did you see her face clearly?”
    “I did. But only briefly.”
    Mary sat in a wing-back chair by the window. Her hands, against the brown crushed-velvet upholstery, were pale, almost translucent. She felt lighter than air, as if her existence were tenuous, as if she were fading away.
    “What did this woman look like?” Max asked.
    “Pretty.”
    He paced before her. “Color of hair?”
    “Brunette.”
    “Eyes?”
    “Green or blue.”
    “Young?”
    “Yes. About my age.”
    “Did you sense her name?”
    “No. But I think I’ve seen her before.”
    “You thought the same of one of them last night.”
    She nodded.
    “What gives you the idea you know her?”
    “I can’t say. It’s just an impression.”
    “Was the scene of this crime the same as in last night’s vision?”
    “No. This woman will be murdered ... in a beauty parlor.”
    “At a hairdresser’s?”
    “Yes. The beautician is a man.”
    “What will happen to him?”
    “He’ll be killed, too.”
    “Any other victims?”
    “A third. Another woman.”
    She had sensed a great deal in the few seconds that the psychic images had coruscated through her mind. However, with each datum came the brutal recollection of that knife she had shared mystically with the dying woman.
    “What’s the name of the beauty shop?” Max asked.
    “I don’t know.”
    “Where’s it located?”
    “Not far from here.”
    “In Orange County again?”
    “Yes.”
    “Which town?”
    “I don’t know.”
    He sighed, sat down in the armchair opposite hers. “Is the killer the same as the one you saw last night?”
    “No doubt about it.”
    “So he’s a repeater, a psychopath, a mass murderer. He’s going to kill four or five people in one place and three in another.”
    “That may only be the start,” she said softly.
    “What does he look like?”
    “I still don’t know.”
    “Is he a big man or small?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “What’s his name?”
    “I wish I knew.”
    “Is he young or old?”
    “I don’t even know that.”
    The room was stuffy. The air was stale, almost rank. She got up and opened the window.
    “If you can’t get an image of him,” Max said, “how can you tell it’s the same killer in both visions?”
    “I just can, that’s all.”
    She sat down, face to the window.
    She felt hollow, light. She could imagine being carried off by the breeze, slight as it was. The unbidden visions had sucked a lot of energy from her. She wouldn’t be able to endure many more of them. Certainly not a life full of them.
    Pretty soon, she thought, I won’t need a tornado like Dorothy did. just a puff of air will carry me off to Oz.
    “What can we do to keep him from killing?” Max asked.
    “Nothing.”
    “Then let’s put him out of our minds for now.”
    She scowled. “Know when I feel worst? You know when I feel so awful I hardly want to live?”
    He waited.
    Her hands were in her lap, her fingers at war with one another. “It’s when I know something horrible will happen—but I don’t know enough to stop it from happening. If I must have this power, why wasn’t I given it without strings attached? Why can’t I turn it on and off like a television set? Why does it sometimes get all cloudy for me when I need it the most? Am I supposed to be tormented? Is it a nasty joke? A lot of people are going to die because I