Petrified by Graham Masterton Page A

shadow.’
    â€˜OK . . . But what size was this shadow? What sort of shape was it? Mr Keiller here thinks it looked like a flying lizard. Mrs Lugano upstairs says it looked like one of the flying monkeys from The Wizard of Oz . How did it appear to you?’
    â€˜It frightened me.’
    â€˜It frightened you? Why? What was so scary about it?’
    Christine Takenaka raised her left hand to cover her eyes, as if she didn’t want Jenna to see how upset she was.
    â€˜It reminded me of a story that my grandmother used to tell me when I was a small girl in Osaka. She told me about the obake , the things that change.’
    â€˜The things that change? I’m not too sure I follow you.’
    â€˜Shape-shifters, that’s what they call them, isn’t it? My grandmother said that they were demons that looked like statues most of the time; but now and then they would suddenly come to life and fly out across the countryside. They would search for children who had been disobedient and disrespectful to their elders, and once they had found these children they would snatch them in their claws and fly away with them. Next day their bodies would be found in a field someplace, all torn into pieces, and their hearts missing.’
    â€˜Nice bedtime story to tell your granddaughter,’ said Jenna.
    Kenneth Keiller said, ‘You’re not kidding. Jesus. My dad used to read me Suck-a-Thumb , and that was scary enough. The long red-legged scissorman, cutting your fricking thumbs off. Jesus.’
    Christine Takenaka lowered her hand. She looked at Jenna as if she was urgently searching for reassurance. ‘My grandmother said that you could always tell if one of the obake was after you, because of its shadow. She said they had wings like dragons and long tails. If you saw a shadow like that on the ground beside you, you should never look up – never look back, she told me, never look up ! Run as fast as you can to the nearest shelter !
    â€˜Once, when I was walking home from school, I thought I saw a shadow like that crossing the path in front of me. Maybe I was mistaken and it was only a bird. A black kite, maybe. Black kites are always trying to steal food. But my heart almost stopped from fright. I ran all the way home and by the time I ran into my mother’s arms I was too scared even to scream.’
    â€˜So what are you trying to say to me?’ Jenna asked her. She was feeling deeply tired now, but she could tell that Christine Takenaka was desperate to explain what she had seen.
    â€˜The shadow I saw tonight was the same kind of shadow. You see that apartment block opposite? I saw the shadow crossing the windows. An obake . Then there was all of that screaming from the roof. You cannot persuade me that an obake did not come here tonight. I could feel it in every bone. An obake , or something very much like an obake .’
    Afterward, she and Dan went back up to the roof, where the crime scene specialists were still trying to identify which grisly lumps of flesh belonged to William Barrow and which belonged to Chet Huntley. Everything on the rooftop looked as if it had been painted red.
    Ed Freiburg came over with his bloody gloves held up in front of him. ‘This is going to take hours. I don’t think there’s any point in you guys hanging around any longer. I’ll be in touch tomorrow morning.
    He paused, and sniffed, and then he said, ‘By the way, we found Mr Huntley’s head. It was lying in the parking lot at the Carpenters’ Union on Spring Garden Street.’
    â€˜My God,’ said Jenna. ‘That’s over a block and a half away.’
    â€˜Well, that goes to show how hard that thing hit him, whatever it was. I surely don’t envy your job, having to catch it.’

ELEVEN
    Wednesday, 7:13 a.m.
    B raydon was woken up by rain pattering against the window and at first he couldn’t think where he was. He sat up, blinking his eyes into