panicked, knowing this news would break her husband’s heart, not to mention the large hole it would leave in their bank account. ‘What are the problems?’ Rhea urged Max to tell her, although he seemed doubtful that she really would want to know. ‘ Please. ’
‘Well, for a start, the originator of the thought form is no longer living and as time on the inner planes functions differently to here, it’s going to be a little difficult to return the thought form to it’s rightful sphere of activity. Its source has transcended elsewhere.’
‘Oh.’ Rhea understood about half of what he’d said.
‘Secondly, since the way in which the curse was first banished from the house was crude and inappropriate —’
‘An exorcism,’ Chuck interjected for her information and Max grinned in gratitude. He had been trying to not offend the guest.
‘The thought form withdrew from the house as requested by the priest, only to spread out on to the property. You see, thought forms have no spirit, no inner knowing or connection to mass consciousness. Therefore, they do not understand human concepts of good and evil, of God or light. So it’s no good telling a thought form to return to God or hell, or to enter the light, if the originator did not believe in these things. Thought forms know only that which they were designed to do, that for which they were spawned. They cannot be reasoned with, as a ghost or a spirit can be. The priest did manage to make the thought form dormant, but it did not leave. You opened a doorway for the entity back to physical world expression when you extended your house.’
‘I wish someone had told us that before we renovated.’ Rhea was feeling really depressed now. ‘What was this thought form designed to do?’
‘Well, thought forms can be empowered by certain elements.’ Max considered her case. ‘Thanks to Chuck’s experience we know this thought form has a strong influence over liquids. It also had a sea water smell, you said?’ Max looked to the priest and he nodded. ‘Natalie drowned at sea so that smell seems to support our suspicions that she was the instigator of the thought form. It also suggests that she actually cast this particular thought form as she was dying, rather than it belonging to the curse that was cast on the house before Natalie left here for America.’
‘According to the tale, nothing weird did happen until after she drowned,’ Chuck informed them.
‘Tell us of your experiences, Rhea,’ Max invited. ‘They might give us a few more clues as to the nature of the beast, wherein we might find a weakness.’
Rhea was more than happy to spill her guts on the whole affair and when she cited every instance of strange phenomena that she was aware of, it sounded rather a lot. She left out the fact that Phillip and she were having sex when the door slammed in the kitchen; she merely said they were having a smooch.
‘Sounds like this female thought form might have a bit of a crush on your husband,’ Max suggested, and the priest nodded and agreed that most of the behaviour sounded as if it was jealousy-motivated.
Rhea gasped, covering her mouth with both hands and shaking her head, not wanting to accept this new explanation.
‘Or perhaps it thinks Phillip Garrett is Phillip McLevy,’ the priest suggested. ‘If the exorcism put it to sleep, wouldn’t the present just feel like the next day to the entity?’
‘Quite possibly.’ Chuck’s reasoning impressed Max, but he wanted to get back to the subject of elements. ‘The entity has a strong earth presence if it can move objects — like the bedclothes — and that would explain how it opens and closes doors with no accompanying wind.’
‘Because there was no wind felt when doors opened and closed, there can be no air element connected to the curse,’ Chuck explained for Rhea’s benefit.
‘Well, that makes perfect sense,’ Rhea reasoned. ‘If Natalie drowned at sea, then the one element she