The Left-Handed Booksellers of London

by Garth Nix

  “About time you got here,” she grumbled, making a beckoning gesture. “Come on, then. Let’s be having you.”

  “Can’t we talk tomorrow?” asked Susan. “I am totally knackered.”

  “No, because I need to know what the hell is going on,” replied Greene, standing back to let them into the room. “As does my colleague from Organized Crime, who has graced us with his presence. Susan Arkshaw, Merlin St. Jacques, allow me to introduce Chief Superintendent Holly.”

  “Reg Holly!” cried the older, heavily built, once-handsome ex-boxer type in a charcoal three-piece double-breasted suit, bright white shirt, club tie, and chunky silver-braceleted watch peeking out from under his French cuff, with gold yacht club links that made him look more like a banker than a police officer. “Call me Reg.”

  Merlin looked from Holly to Greene.

  “This is bookseller business,” he said. “No one outside of your unit is cleared, Greene. None of the regular police. You know that.”

  “Don’t fret, lad,” said Reg. “I was in Greene’s job once upon a time, until I moved on to greener—ha ha—pastures, career-wise I mean, something I’ve suggested to young Mira here, because it’s a dead end working with you booksellers. And look at me now, chief super and in charge of what I like to call incompetently organized crime.”

  “The chief superintendent has a historical clearance that has not been revoked,” said Greene evenly.

  “And I called up Merrihew to make sure it was kosher for me to stick my head in,” said Reg. “Fine, she said. So here I am.”

  Susan flopped down into an armchair. Merlin remained standing, looking at Holly suspiciously.

  “So you must be Susan . . . Arkshaw,” said Holly, looking intently at Susan. He had small, cruel eyes, she thought, and looked away. “A newcomer to all the sort of things the booksellers get into.”

  “Ms. Arkshaw has nothing to do with anything in your area of responsibility,” said Greene. “Sir.”

  “What I’d like to know,” said Reg, ignoring Greene, “is what your arrival and the . . . uh . . . departure of our dear and unlamented friend Frank Thringley has to do with a bunch of Brummagen boys trying to take you off the doorstep here?”

  “Sir, I will be advising the deputy commissioner—” Greene tried to interrupt, but Holly pressed on.

  “Birmingham mob, organized crime, that’s my bailiwick,” he said, almost snarling at Greene, though when he looked back at Susan his face was placid again. “So I have to ask what the arrival of one Susan Arkshaw has got to do with the demise of Frank Thringley, North London mobster and Sipper, and then those gits turning up here for you and the sudden outbreak of violence between and within a number of usually quite-well-behaved gangs in London, Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds, and Newcastle. Or in other words, the whole of bloody Britain that matters, since the Scots and the Welsh—or ninety-nine percent of them—are apparently sailing on oblivious.”

  “What?” asked Susan. “It’s nothing to do with me.”

  “Now, as there’s nothing written, no statements as is par for the course with you lot, I only got to know this morning from informal sources that you even existed and you were present when Frank Thringley was knocked off by Mr. Merlin St. Jacques here—”

  “You have no operational involvement in this and you should not have been informed of either—”

  “Shut it, Greene. I told you, I talked to Merrihew and she said I can talk to whoever I want.”

  Again, the attack dog disappeared as he turned back to Susan. She frowned, wondering why on earth he bothered, as if she wouldn’t notice how rude he was to Greene. He could be as nice as pie to her and she’d still know he was a total arsehole.

  “Now that was a week ago, so maybe I might think this outbreak of argy-bargy isn’t all connected. But this morning, two of the Milk Bottle Gang show up here, try a snatch and get their comeuppance, not counting on your Mr. Merlin being at the front door with a damned hand cannon. Why were they here? What’s the connection?”

  “Why don’t you ask them, Reg?” suggested Merlin, though he already knew the answer.

  “I did ask them, after Greene’s lot had a go, and their minds were like a plate of mushy peas. They didn’t know where they were, what they were doing, or who they were doing it for. They’d been interfered with, I reckon, by someone you booksellers are supposed to make sure can’t do that sort of thing, or maybe by your lot themselves. Who’s out there messing with the gray stuff of my ordinary mobsters, that’s what I’d like to know?”

  “We’d like to know, too,” said Susan. “Me particularly, since I don’t fancy any more attempted kidnappings.”

  “And you don’t know anything you can tell me?” continued Reg. He put on what he obviously thought was a kind, pleading face, but his cauliflower ears and broken nose made him look like a slightly demented pug.

  “I don’t know anything about gangs in London or anywhere else,” said Susan. She looked away from Holly, not wanting to meet his eyes. She’d caught something there, a momentary flash. For a second he’d looked at her the way a particularly cruel cat might look at an injured bird.

  “What about you and yours?” Reg asked Merlin, his expression once again all police officer, bland and impersonal. “Anything you can tell me?”

  “No,” said Merlin, very shortly.

  “You must have something!” protested Holly. “Look, I’ve been in this job eighteen years, everything peaceable as you like. Sure, there’s crime, the gangs do what they do, but orderly like and to each other, or if it’s not, it’s to do with lowlifes anyway. Hardly a murder or even a beating involving honest members of the public. Nothing to make the papers or the TV. I retire in six months. My record was perfect and then today everything gets flushed down the crapper. You must know something. Miss Arkshaw, you’re Thringley’s adopted daughter or something, aren’t you? Come on, I need help.”

  “I am not Frank Thringley’s daughter, adopted or otherwise!” said Susan. “He was an old friend of my mum.”

  “Oh, I must have got that wrong,” said Holly. “Who’s your dad, then? I’ve only got your mum’s name. She lives down near Bath, doesn’t she? Lovely town, beautiful countryside.”

  Susan wondered if he meant that as a threat of some kind. There was nothing in his tone of voice, and the words were innocent enough. But she felt it was somehow. In any case, she’d had enough of Chief Superintendent Holly.

  “I can’t help you,” said Susan firmly. “I’m really tired and I’m going to have a bath and go to bed.”

  “All right, all right,” said Reg, throwing up his hands. “Throw an old copper on the rubbish heap. But if you’re really worried about more kidnapping attempts, you’d best help me out. I can help you. In fact, how about I lend Mira Greene a couple of officers to keep an extra eye on this place? I’m not saying anything against Unit M, but if a bunch of your real London thugs come all tooled up to have a go . . . well, I don’t like your chances.”

  “We’ve got it managed, thank you, sir,” said Greene. “And it would be strictly against direct orders from the commissioner for any of your junior officers to be aware of the booksellers and matters concerning the Old World.”

  “I reckon it’s the criminals of this world you should be worried about, Miss Arkshaw,” said Reg to Susan, ignoring Greene. “But you dig your own grave. If you change your mind, here’s my card.”

  Neither Susan nor Merlin reached out to take it, so he dropped it on the coffee table and stalked out. Greene turned on her heel and followed him, and they heard the two police officers talking on the way to the front door.

  “I didn’t know you were retiring, sir. Costa del Sol?”

  “Fuck off, Greene. Have your laugh. You know I’d stay if I could; they’re forcing me out. And it’ll be the Costa del Cumbria most likely, on my pension. And I don’t appreciate you suggesting I’m bent. Costa del Sol indeed!”

  “Good luck, sir.”

  The slamming
door cut off most of Holly’s strident “Get f—!”

  Greene came back into the room a few seconds later.

  “Sorry about that. Holly’s a zombie, hardly going through the motions. The reason the gangs have been so quiet for so long is because he lets them get away with so much! He’s a lazy sod who’s always away on courses or sick leave or whatever. And I reckon he is bent as well; no one could be as ineffectual as he is accidentally. The only surprise is it’s taken so long to give him the boot. Now tell me what the hell is going on.”

  “It’s bookseller business,” said Merlin.

  “And where that crosses over with police matters, it’s my business, too,” said Greene. “I wish there was someone else to talk to with your lot other than Thurston. Or Merrihew, who’s never in either shop, and when I call her in the country it takes half an hour to get her to the phone and costs a fortune. I had to call Thurston three times today and kept getting told he was too busy to answer my questions.”

  “He is very busy,” said Merlin. “Unpacking the personal library of Sir Anthony Blunt. Former sir, I guess, since they took away his knighthood.”

  “The traitor? Are the Soviets connected—”

  “No, of course not,” snapped Merlin. “Sorry. Thurston . . . irritates me as well. There’s no connection. It’s simply that Blunt had an amazing library, full of first editions and collectibles. They’re all going gaga over it at the New Bookshop and Thurston can’t spare a brain cell for anything else. I wish he’d retire.”

  “Uh, will he ever?” asked Greene. “I only have very limited records and what I’ve been able to find out myself, on the job, but Thurston and Merrihew seem to have been running the St. Jacques operations since 1887.”

  Susan started in surprise. “Eighteen eighty-seven?”

  “Yeah, that’s about right,” said Merlin wearily. “For Thurston. Merrihew’s been in charge of the left-handed for even longer. Since 1815, a few months after Waterloo. Some of us live a long time. If we don’t get killed, that is. Look, it really is better if you don’t know what might be going on. I mean, despite the job and all, you’re still a mortal, and generally the more you know the more you are at risk.”

  “That’s my line,” said Greene. “Is Ms. Arkshaw at risk?”

  Merlin hesitated, then said, “I think so, though the Greats don’t. I’m going to bodyguard her for a while—I’ll stay here tonight—and the taxis are going to drive by regularly.”

  “Mrs. London told me something tried the wards last night,” said Greene. “You apparently called it a Kexa. Unsurprisingly, my predecessor never mentioned one to me in what I laughably refer to as my training, and I couldn’t find any other reference. What is a Kexa?”

  “Mrs. L has got very superior hearing,” complained Merlin. “A Kexa is a hemlock cat. And you could look it up in The Golden Bough . . . no, wait . . . you’re right, it’s not in the version that made it to print. Anyway, a Kexa is a summoned servant called from the sacred burial urn of a pharaonic cat; a few were brought here from Egypt by the Romans, but we’ve collected most of them over the years. Not all, clearly. A very dangerous creature, but it couldn’t get in, and it can only prowl at night, when it’s clear, and the moon is neither new nor full.”

  “Like tonight,” said Greene. “Can a Kexa be shot? I mean, will bullets kill one?”

  “Theoretically yes,” said Merlin. “But they’re very hard to hit, because they move between this world and somewhere else that isn’t . . . er . . . here. Though I suppose it might be easier than fighting urchins. . . .”

  “Why?” asked Susan.

  “You need something old to strike goblins. Cold iron or steel—and preindustrial steel at that—more than three hundred years old. Or stone or ancient wood. Like Audrey’s bog oak stick.”

  “Are any members of the public likely to be at risk because of whatever or whoever is after Susan? Speaking of goblins, I understand there was some sort of unusual event in Mayfair this morning?”

  “No members of the public were at risk,” said Merlin. “The urchins only wanted us; they took us out of time and clouded the minds of those nearby for the few seconds it took to do that.”

  “Except for that one American tourist,” said Susan, with a yawn. “But I think she thought it was a kind of jet lag illusion or something.”

  “Is the situation with Ms. Arkshaw—”

  “Call me Susan. You did before.”

  “Is the situation with Susan, whatever it is, likely to be resolved in the near future? The very near future?”

  “I don’t know,” said Merlin. “But, as your lot like to say, inquiries are proceeding.”

  “Maybe everything will settle down,” said Susan hopefully. “And I can look for my dad. . . . Anyway, I have to get upstairs. I can’t stay awake.”

  “I’ll check in on you later,” said Merlin. “Uh, don’t forget your cricket bag.”

  “Oh, right,” said Susan. She picked up the cricket bag with the swords and her clothes, ignoring Greene’s inquiring and somewhat disbelieving gaze, and left the room. She narrowly missed Mrs. London wielding a pink feather duster, where she was pretending to spruce up the hallway. Mister Nimbus was on the stairs, a very distinguished black cat with white socks. He looked at Susan with narrowed eyes. Not suspicious exactly, but wary, as if the cat thought she needed both eyes kept upon her, not one.

  “Good night, Mrs. London,” said Susan. “I’m turning in early.”

  “Very wise,” said Mrs. London. “Do you want me to bring you a cup of tea?”

  “No, but thank you. I’ll have a quick bath and then go straight to bed. I reckon I’ll be asleep before my head hits the pillow.”

  “Come sleep, O sleep, the certain knot of peace,” recited Mrs. London, surprising Susan.

  Susan was in bed when Merlin knocked on the door.

  “Susan? It’s me, Merlin. Can I come in?”

  “Um, yes,” said Susan, a little flustered, and annoyed with herself for being flustered. “I’m in bed.”

  Merlin opened the door and ran his hand along the edge, found the bolt, and slid it back and forth a few times. Not suggestively.

  “Don’t lock your door unless I tell you to,” he said. “And keep your clothes and boots handy. In case we need to leave in a hurry.”

  Susan, who’d been feeling nicely relaxed after her bath and perfectly safe in bed, struggled upright. She felt a brief pang at thus revealing she wasn’t sleeping in one of her cool band T-shirts but in a massively oversized one featuring a photo of the Wombles, furry suits and all, but told herself she wanted to put Merlin off anyway. Or did she? A small voice inside told her to take a chance; what was the worst that could happen? Her mother’s experiences with very handsome men did not have to be her own.

  “What! You mean . . . you think more is going to happen? Here?”

  “No, I want to be prepared,” said Merlin. “Baden-Powell and all that. And . . . and . . . uh . . . Vivien called. One of the wards at Northumberland House was compromised. Not a pipe or a sewer. A ward meant to stop evildoers entering a service door to the plant room for the air-conditioning. Someone poured fresh blood mixed with quicksilver—that’s mercury to you—under the door, which will dull a lesser ward—”

  “Fresh blood!”

  “Um, yes. Someone must have been killed minutes before and very close by, though we haven’t found a body yet. Anyway, the ward was breached, so someone with malevolent intent could get in. Which at first didn’t seem to be a problem because the plans showed no connection from the plant room into the hotel proper, but Viv found a crawl space inside that allowed access to the laundry, so . . .”

  “There could have been a Cauldron-Born.”

  Susan was out of bed in a flash, opening the cricket bag to get out the sword she already thought of as hers.

  “Yes. That’s probably a good idea,” said Merlin, and took up his own sword.

  Susan leaned the saber against the bed, the hilt close to hand, an
d got back under the covers. Her boots and discarded boiler suit, and embarrassingly the day’s underwear, were already in an untidy pile at the foot of the bed, easy enough to put on in a hurry if circumstances so required.

  “The boundaries of this house have superior wards and are also alarmed against more usual intruders,” said Merlin. “Vivien’s coming over to check the wards. Inspector Greene has decided to stay as well, and there will be extra police patrols in the square. I’d prefer her not to stay if there is going to be anything I need to deal with, but then again if there is some sort of attack by gangsters she’s apparently pretty handy. I’m in the next room, by the way, and Mira will be across the hall—”

  “So she’s Mira now?” asked Susan. Surely the inspector was too old to fall for Merlin’s charms? She had to be thirty, maybe even mid-thirties.

  “We are on first-name terms, upon occasion,” said Merlin gravely. “But it’s a professional relationship, you understand. Anyway, that’s it in the house, apart from Mrs. L. The Russians and the CND turncoat have been relocated for the time being.”

  “What, too risky for them?”

  “Yes,” replied Merlin. “And they weren’t supposed to be here anyway, according to our agreement with the police. Special Branch trying a sneaky little budget saving at our expense. It’ll be fine. Get some sleep. What time do you start work, by the way? And . . . uh . . . where exactly?”

  “Eleven,” replied Susan. “The Twice-Crowned Swan. Cloudesley Street.”

  “Well, I’ll see you at breakfast at, say, a civilized eight thirty,” replied Merlin. “Would you like a good-night kiss, by the way?”

  “I don’t think so,” said Susan, after a moment’s hesitation. Caution still had the upper hand, though it took considerable exercise of willpower and common sense. “I have a feeling your good-night kisses might lead to a distinct lack of sleep.”