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She did, and she had to agree. She’d hopped the express train to Crazyville. Where they loaded their guns with silver bullets and went hunting for serial-killing shape-shifters.
Was that redundant? Kris shut the drawer.
“Start with the village,” Mandenauer said. “A monster could not exist undetected this long without someone, or several someones, protecting it.”
“You think Nessie is the killer?” Kris couldn?
??t believe those words had actually left her mouth.
“So far we have two deaths by drowning in a loch where the most famous lake monster in the world lives. What is it that you youngsters like to say?” He put a finger to his temple, then flicked it away. “Ah, yes. You do the math.”
“I don’t believe Nessie exists. Which really screws up your equation.”
“Here is the truth: Either Nessie is killing people or someone wants us to think that she is and then kill her.”
“Why?”
“Discover that and you will discover all you need to know.”
Mandenaeur was probably right. Just because Kris didn’t think the culprit in this case was an ancient waterlogged dinosaur didn’t mean there wasn’t something—someone—else out there behaving like a monster and laying the blame on the shores of Loch Ness. If she discovered who was behind the new hoax, she’d have either the perpetrator of the whole hoax or someone who could possibly lead Kris to him.
“Why would Nessie suddenly start to kill people?” Kris asked.
Mandenauer’s lips twitched. “I thought you did not believe in Nessie.”
“I don’t. But won’t those who do believe, like you, wonder what the hell?”
“My dear,” he murmured, “I always wonder ‘what the hell?’”
“It just makes no sense for a lake monster that has, up until now, never hurt anyone—”
“That is not true.”
Kris tensed. “What do you mean?”
“The first sighting of the Loch Ness Monster was by Saint Columba, who came along the river Ness and spied a funeral. He was told that the man being buried had been mauled by the water beast. The good Irish priest then sent one of his underlings into the water, where he was promptly attacked by said beast.”
“Nice guy.”
“He proved his point.”
“Which was?”
“God is great. Columba called upon God to banish the beast, and the beast was banished.”
“You believe a mere man could call off a monster?”
“He was not a mere man but a saint.”
“Not then.”
“Men, and women, become saints because of what they do when they are not saints.”
“Is there a point in this?” Kris asked.
“The point is that Nessie has attacked before.”
“Fifteen hundred years ago!”
