End Time by Keith Korman

candles—séance tricks. But he couldn’t see what the Senora saw. The earring leapt into her mind: the sound of screaming, a girl screaming, the girl’s head was restrained; long black pony-tail grabbed and then came the knife, bad men were going to cut her, men laughing—
    Senora Malvedos started to babble, some sort of song or poem she’d never heard before: “ A rag, a bone, a hank of hair!” She paused and more came, “Love! It’s an iron hand in a woman’s glove, it’s a hawk disguised as a dove, it’s a rag, a bone, a hank of hair, it’s not fair, it’s a nightmare that poets call a beautiful dream.”
    She stopped babbling.
    Then sat up straight; she knew the fate of that young woman.
    â€œThe young lady who wore a trinket like this was kidnapped.”
    She reached over the table to the little metallic hematite earring and clasped it tightly in her fingers to keep it from jumping away. The Senora quietly reassured herself the thing was real and not some parlor trick brought into her sanctum by a very clever man. Clever people tried to trick the medium. No, no parlor trick.
    â€œThis one. Lila . Still lives. You may see her yet.” She watched the sad man’s face darken then lighten, as if with a shard of hope. “Show me the note.” He reached for it, touched it with his fingers. To him, nothing happened—to her, to Senora Malvedos, she saw the scrap ignite like flash paper and sail to the ceiling on a sliver of rising ash.
    They’ve been real good. Thanks for everything.
    A thread of smoke hung for long seconds in the air; frozen smoke dangling in front of her eyes like the ghost of a lost soul. When she looked back down toward the sad man, he was still holding the unburned scrap in damp, meaty fingers. In that short flash of light and its smoky trail, she’d seen a wall of steel lockers. A coroner or mortuary. An orderly slid a stainless steel slab into the wall, naked feet vanishing into the cold dark. The toe tag read Jane Doe, and a date written in bold red flair; they’d scheduled the body for an autopsy. And Senora Malvedos spoke clearly:
    â€œEleven-oh-four North Mission Road. Los Angeles, California. Zip code 90033. Telephone 323-343-0512. Business Hours: 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday. Autopsy day after tomorrow. They call her Sweet Jane because she’s so innocent. They tried to be gentle; they tried to be kind.”
    The sad man sat back in his chair, all the blood draining from his face. He began to breathe heavily, almost like a stroke was coming. With all his self-control, knowing he’d gotten the worst news possible, he held out Lila Chen’s earring again. Senora Malvedos’ finger reached to the hematite dangler, but this time the silvery thing hung like a dead weight. Lifeless. The attraction gone.
    â€œAnd this one?” he asked. “I might still see this one?”
    But the hand had left Senora Malvedos; she sighed, exhausted. Alas, there was no more left to tell him, nothing left to learn. The sad man dropped the earring and it fell to the table with a tiny clink. He’d heard her correctly, all right. Yes, he might still see the other girl. He put the trinket away. Found his wallet and fished a wad of bills from it, counting out the Franklins, one-two-three-four …
    But the woman across the table merely shook her head.
    â€œI don’t want your money. Look after your Frozen Smoke.”
    Bhakti started at the use of those two words, frozen and smoke. Very odd. “That’s a special material we make where I work,” he managed to tell her. Senora Malvedos shrugged. To her, frozen smoke simply meant a ghost. A lost soul.
    â€œI only saw your daughter. She’s waiting for you.”
    *   *   *
    A thousand miles away in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, a few people, people that mattered, were beginning to notice Bhakti’s