Next chapter, and I still don't own anything.

Chapter Six - The Queen of Cups

Once again Kolchak got out his recorder.

"After leaving The Pits I decided to find out if getting Mary Polanski's name from Maria was worth the money I'd shelled out, or if it was just another Gypsy scam. I'd already looked up the name in the phone book, and found that at least she did exist, and when I reached her residence, I found that she really was working under the name Madam Yram. So far Maria seemed to be on the up-and-up. I hoped that the rest of her information would be as sound."

The room where Madam Yram met her clients was dark, and cluttered with mystical objects and decorations. There were the typical accouterments of the fortune-teller's trade laid out on a small table in the middle of the room, a deck of tarot cards, a crystal ball, and some other objects, but there was no sign of the occupant.

A voice came from another room. "I'll be there in a minute, just hold on."

A short, pump woman with curly hair tied in a headband, and a gaudy dress draped with a shawl swept into the room. "I am Madam Yram" she announced in a dramatic manner.

"My name is Carl Kolchak..." Kolchak began, but before he'd gotten any further he stopped. A look of shock had come over the round face of the seeress, and she went pale.

You... you're the man!" Madam Yram gasped out. She sank into the large chair behind the table.

"Excuse me?" Kolchak asked quizzically.

"I saw you... in a vision," the obviously shaken woman managed.

"What, who, me?" Kolchak asked. "Naw, couldn't be..."

"Yeah, it was. Who are you, anyway?"

"Me? I'm nobody. I..." Kolchak gathered himself together and started over. "My name is Carl Kolchak and I'm a reporter with the INS. I've just been assigned here from Chicago, and I got your name from Maria Hargrove, who said you were someone I could trust in Bay City as a source of information on the paranormal."

Now it was Madam Yram's turn to look puzzled. "I don't know a Maria Hargrove."

"She said her grandmother knew your grandmother."

"Well, Grandma knew some strange people, that's for sure. I guess I'm about as good a source for information as you can get around here. But you... I saw you..." She twisted her plump fingers in distress.

"Yeah?" Kolchak asked dubiously, wondering if this were some sort of scam. He didn't think so, though. The way the woman had gone pale and sweaty was something that couldn't be faked. "What was I doing?"

"That's just it, I don't know..."

"OK, start from the beginning."

"No! There's no time!" Madam Yram seemed to have reached a decision. "I have to take you to see Detective Starsky. Right now. That's what he said, if I found who you were, I had to bring you around. Do you have a car?"

"Yes, but... What? Detective Starsky? David Starsky?" This was getting strange. Kolchak didn't like coincidences. Frequently they weren't coincidental.

"Yeah. Come on. I don't have a car, so you drive. I'll explain on the way." She pulled on his arm, tugging him towards the door.

Kolchak found himself swept up by her, and somehow leading her outside to his car.

"On the way to the police station, Madam Yram told me about the visions she had had, tying me, or someone of my description, to Detectives Starsky and Hutchinson. I was filled with a feeling of foreboding. Although this would probably lead me to a big story, I suspected it was another of the ones that would never see the light of publication."

Kolchak again put away his recorder.