by Emby Press
“You’ll have heard of the Campbell Expedition to Labrador?” he asked, and I nodded. Every Scottish schoolboy knew of it, if only for the rumours of madness and cannibalism that had tainted any glory the Victorian adventurer had sought.
“What you probably have not heard is the depravations that expedition inflicted on the native people,” he said. The smile was still in place, but now it looked fixed, and his eyes had a far away stare. “They took all the food the tribe had, leaving them to starve slowly over the winter to come. But my people have survived harsh winters before now. What they could not abide was the loss of their connection to their god. They had no Angekoh to stop the thieves. The Telling Bone was taken. Since that time the tribe has withered. It was only with my birth that hope was reborn. And now that Tomga has led me to you, that hope is a fire in the hearth that can be kindled to a great flame.”
I understood less than half of what he’d said. Part of that was the distraction of having so much money on the table, and the rest was due to the fact that he was clearly as mad as a bag of badgers.
“Will you help me?” he said.
I laughed.
“I would if I had any clue what you’re talking about,” I said.
“I thought I made myself clear,” he replied, puffing another perfect smoke ring. “Tomga has sent me to fetch the Telling Bone. It is somewhere in this city, and I need you to find it.”
Things were clearing, slowly.
“And this bone…it is valuable?”
“Priceless,” he replied. “To my people. It was stolen, and brought here by Campbell. That is all that Tomga has seen. As Angekoh it is my task to retrieve it.”
“This Angekoh thing? It makes you a big cheese?”
“A full round of Stilton,” he said laughing. “And damned near as smelly.”
I still only had part of the tale straight in my head, but I had enough. I just needed one more thing.
“What does this Telling Bone look like?”
Half an hour later I was out on the streets of Glasgow a happy man. I had cash in my pocket, and a case to work.
*
Toolemak didn’t leave me any instructions for contacting him.
“I’ll find you when you need me,” he said.
This case already had all the signs of high strangeness I was becoming used to. I’d long since given in to the fact that I was a magnet for Twilight Zone cases and went with the flow. It had led me down some dark alleys, but, still, it was preferable to taking divorce pictures or chasing lost cats.
Besides, I knew where to start this time, so I was already ahead of the game. I made my way up University Avenue to the main building and climbed the steps to the Hunterian Museum.
Doug was back in his old lab. Not long ago he’d left academia to help me out on cases, but he found he didn’t have the heart for fieldwork of that type. Doug worked best in rooms filled with old books, artefacts and computers. The museum had all three. I found him hunched over a table of bones.
“If those are Inuit artefacts from the Campbell expedition, I’ll just have made the fastest grand in history,” I said.
He looked up, puzzled. Despite spending all his time in a dark room with dusty tomes, he still looked better than he had when working cases with me.
“Are we going for a beer or are you working?” he said.
“Maybe both,” I replied. “If this place has what I want.”
I gave him the story, as much as I understood of it. He got excited at the mention of the Angekoh.
“You met a real wizard?” he said.
I laughed.
“Aye, sure thing. He’s a mad wee man… and if he’s a wizard then I’m a millionaire.”
Doug got even more excited at the mention of the Telling Bone.
“I’ve heard of it,” he said. “But we don’t have it here. It went missing decades ago. But there might be something in the archives that will help. Take a pew. If you’re going to smoke, open the window. I’ll be back soon.”
His version of soon differed from mine. I got through three cigarettes and gave myself a case of the heebie-jeebees in the stacks of bones in the shelves. I was considering making my escape to the nearest bar when Doug returned, flushed and excited like a manic puppy. I resisted the urge to slap him down and let him talk, knowing that, although it might take a while, I would eventually get the story out of him.
“I was right,” he said. “The bone you’re after did live here, once upon a time. We have a whole shelf of artefacts from Labrador. There are sealskin suits, bone harpoons and even a long sled that was pulled by huskies. But there is no Telling Bone.”
He saw the disappointment on my face.
“But there’s more,” he said. “Back in the Thirties our archivist was a wee man called McAllister. He’s a legend in here. He kept records of everything that came in and out, from the Mammoth skeletons down to the smallest chips of rock in the Geology stacks.”
“And the Inuit bone?”
Doug’s smile grew broader.
“How many beers is it worth?”
I smiled back… mainly because I knew his capacity.
“As much as you can get down your neck before you keel over.”
“I tracked down who took it from the shelves back in ’37,” he said. “But you’re not going to like it. It was signed out to George Briggs.”
“The George Briggs?”
Doug nodded.
Things had suddenly got complicated. Briggs had run Glasgow through the war years… booze and prostitution being only two of the many pies in which he had fingers. It had since become a family dynasty. His grandson Jim now carried the mantle, holding a large sector of the city in a tight grip. Thus far I’d managed to pursue my cases without stepping on his toes.
I didn’t look forward to starting now.
I thanked Doug and was about to turn away, but he wasn’t quite finished with me.
“You know the Briggs clan has a reputation for finding things when they need them?”
That was true. Nothing seemed to pass their scrutiny if they turned their attention to it.
Doug looked serious.
“I’m just saying… it might not be coincidence that they are the family with the so-called magic bone?”
*
I was still mulling that over as I headed for the City Vaults. In most cities there is the bar – the place everyone knows and nobody talks about, the place where things get traded and information gets shared… for a price. The Vaults is Glasgow’s version, a spit and sawdust pub where even hard men tread softly. Normally I can get what I need on the street, but this time I needed something bigger. I knew it was going to cost me, but I had no choice.
I sat on the empty seat at the end of the bar and waited. It didn’t take long. A small man, thin to the point of emaciation, walked over and sat beside me. We made small talk for five minutes, during which time I discovered that Rangers had beaten Celtic in the afternoon and that the 2:30 at Ayr the next day would be won by Mr. Pastry. He learned I had a hundred pounds for him in my wallet, and that I wanted a meet with Mr. Briggs.
I got another beer and moved away to a seat in the corner. Someone took my place almost immediately and another conversation began. I merely sat and waited. I was halfway down my second beer when the thin man returned. He didn’t speak, just handed me a slip of paper.
5:00pm.
That’s all it said. It didn’t have to say any more… everybody in town knew where to find Jim Briggs.
I passed my contact his payment and sat there for another beer just so I wouldn’t seem too eager. I walked back to the office, trying to compose a set of questions for Briggs that wouldn’t offend him. I was none the wiser by the time it came round to time to leave. I decided to wing it and hope for the best… not a great plan, but it was the one I felt most comfortable with.
Half an hour later I was headed for the Briggs’ townhouse, armed with two packs of cigarettes.
The house
was huge, a red sandstone, Gothic Pile sitting beside the River Kelvin to the north of Glasgow University. It was an elaborately carved baroque extravaganza, the Victorian equivalent of saying Look at how big and important I am. Nobody had told me where the house was… they didn’t have to. Everyone in town knew where the most expensive house in Scotland could be found.
Briggs himself opened the high glass door to let me in, and led me into the vast entrance area. High overhead the ceiling curved in a vaulted roof of gravity defying stone and glass. I was still marveling at the wide, spacious emptiness of it as he closed the main door behind us. The short stocky man turned back towards me. He had a pronounced limp, and walked with a waddle and sway. He looked like a small, friendly bear.
“You’ll be the big dick then?” he said to me, and smiled.
“And you’ll be the wee arsehole?” I replied, smiling back.
He took a second to think about being affronted, then broke into a wide grin.
“Come on through and tell me what I can do for you,” he said.
*
We sat in a room filled with mahogany bookcases and leather sofas and over two large malt whiskies I gave him the spiel. He seemed amused to be told that the Inuit had come looking for the Telling Bone.
“And how much are they offering?” he said, puffing on a cigar that cost more than I made in the last month.
I shrugged.
“There’s been no mention of payment. I think they’re hoping for a charitable donation?” I said hopefully.
He laughed in my face.
“Do you know what that bone does?” he asked.
I shrugged again.
“Does it matter? It’s a cultural artifact and belongs to them.”
This time his laugh was harsh and for the first time I saw the criminal beneath the façade.
“Cultural? Oh, it’s a lot more than that. My gGrandfather knew it as soon as he heard about it. Some drunk in Easterhouse was talking about his father’s trip to Labrador. He mentioned that the Bone was in the Hunterian. The auld man could put two and two together faster than anyone else. He paid off somebody in the museum… we got the bone… and we’ve been on the up ever since. There’s no way I’m giving it back.”
And that was that. Oh, he was urbane, cultured even, but beneath that there was a shark, and I wasn’t about to let him taste blood in the water. I made idle chit chat for ten minutes as I finished some more of his expensive whisky, then I was firmly showed out onto the street. The big door shut behind me with a clang that sounded like finality.
I took myself to the nearest bar and wondered what I was going to tell my client.
*
It turned out I didn’t have to tell him anything. He sat on a high stool at the bar as if he was waiting for me… which was a good trick, as I only decided on a whim which bar to enter. He pushed a beer at me.
“Nice job,” he said. “I knew you’d find it.”
“Find, yes. Get, no.”
“Get is the easy part,” he said.
“Not from where I’m sitting.”
“That is because you haven’t met Tomga. It is time we rectified that.”
Without warning he took my right hand in his left. I was about to object – I had a reputation to consider after all – but before I could speak the bar seemed to melt and flow around me.
Bubbles rushed in my ears and I went cold, plunged from a height into icy water. I gulped for breath but none came. There was only darkness, thickening, as the water grew even colder. Somewhere beneath a vast shape moved, disturbing the waters. The tide surged, throwing me away into the void. My chest ached with the need for air.
Cold fingers gripped tight at my hand and squeezed. The pressure lifted, as quickly as it had come. Water sloughed away and the pressure eased on my lungs. I gasped in air in huge heaving gulps. The small hand let go.
I was finally able to stand upright. I patted at my clothes. They were dry as a bone, although my skin felt cold and clammy.
“Tomga knows you now,” Toolemak said at my side.
I looked at him… and realized where we were. We stood in the library in Briggs’ townhouse. Two empty whisky glasses sat by the armchairs, and the stub of a cigar smoked in an ashtray.
He dropped my hand and headed out of a door to our left.
“This way,” he said. “I can smell it.”
He led me through to a smaller room. It was empty save for a single glass case. Inside the case a long white bone lay on a bed of dark velvet.
I saw the Inuit’s intent and didn’t have time to stop him. He strode forward, lifted the case, and smashed it to the floor with a crash that echoed loudly around us. If no one knew we were there before, they certainly did now.
The little man did not seem to care. He had a look of reverence as he lifted the bone from the shattered shards.
“Do you know how long we have been looking for this?”
He showed no signs of urgency, despite the sounds of someone approaching at a run. I grabbed his arm.
“I’m sure it’s very nice,” I said. “But we can bask in the glory of it later. For now we need to get out of here.”
I was looking for an exit, even as I felt his hand in mine once more.
“Hold tight,” he said.
Bubbles rushed in my ears and I went cold again. The room went dim around us. The last thing I saw before the water surged around us and we dived was Briggs’ astonished gape from the doorway.
Once again I was buffeted and thrown in a cold dark tide. We went deep, to a place where Tomga waited for us. I had a brief impression of a long gray shape; a feeling of great age and wisdom before Toolemak gripped my hand tighter. We rose, fast, towards a far-off shimmering light.
I blinked… and looked out over the familiar scene of my office.
*
I made another dive – straight for the whisky bottle. A long slug from the open neck started to warm me from the inside but a chill had settled in my spine and it would take more than strong liquor to remove it.
Toolemak stood in the center of the floor, cradling the bone.
“You have done my people a great service,” he said.
I laughed bitterly.
“Aye. And I’ve pissed off Jim Briggs. The equation doesn’t actually balance in my favor.”
“Do not worry,” the Inuit said. “Tomga knows you now. She will not allow you to come to any harm.”
“She? What kind of gal is she anyway?”
He was still staring at the bone, as if unsure it was really in his arms.
“She is our protector. She is wise and old, and provides us with all we need.”
He held up the bone.
“This is our compact with her, and through this, I will once more bring strength to my tribe.”
“I wish you well,” I said. “But maybe we shouldn’t have annoyed Jim Briggs quite so much.”
“You’re right there,” a voice said from the doorway. Today was obviously the day for people sneaking up on me. John Briggs and two of his heavies stood there. All three carried sawn-off shotguns.
“Nobody steals from me and gets away with it,” Briggs said.
The Inuit did not seem concerned.
“I merely took back what was stolen from my people.”
Briggs did not look in the mood for chat. He raised the gun.
Simultaneously, Toolemak raised the bone.
It got cold again, a dry cold this time, biting hard at my fingers and cheeks. Briggs’ finger tightened on the trigger but never completed the action. A layer of ice ran across the floor of the office and crept up the bodies of the men in the door. Toolemak made a series of gulping noises and stamped, hard on the floor, a series of out-of-rhythm thuds that were answered from somewhere far below.
Briggs’ mouth open in a scream and I saw ice form in his throat as he and his cohorts faded. Toolemak made one last motion with the bone and all that was left was a damp patch in the doorway. Any chill in the air was
dispelled as I threw another shot of whisky down my throat.
“What just happened? Where is Briggs?”
The Inuit waved the bone and he too started to fade. The last thing to go was his smile.
“Tomga is old and wise,” he said from a great distance. “And sometimes, she gets hungry.”
VINNIE DE SOTH AND THE VAMPIRE DEFINITION
I.A. Watson
Investigative journalist Annette Anson glared across the counter at Alto Tumour. “Don’t you care about being offensive to women?” she asked.
The proprietor of the occult bookshop looked down his paunch at his grubby T-shirt that said Honk if you want to be honked. “What’s wrong with that?” he asked.
Annette’s stare was icy. “I didn’t mean the T-shirt,” she said. “I was referring to you generally.”
While Alto was dealing with this, the reporter picked up a dog-eared flyer for Vedric Chakra Debugging. She wondered again what she was really doing in a seedy backstreet bookshop in London’s narrow-alleyed Soho area. She remembered that she was a reporter who never gave up on a story, even in the face of grubby overweight shopkeepers of cluttered damp-smelling new age second-hand stores.
“Where is he?” she demanded.
By now the proprietor of Alto Tumour’s Occult Books was used to a succession of intimidating visitors calling upon his lodger. “Vinnie’s through there,” he said, pointing to a shabby bead curtain.
Annette marched into the backroom. She found a flustered-looking young man trying to coax the lid off a jar of coffee using a sacred Maori dagger. When he saw he had a guest he accidentally cut his finger, stifled a yelp, and quickly dropped jar and weapon into a drawer and tried to look professional.
“Mr. De Soth,” Annette began.
Vinnie flinched. “Are you another process server?” he asked. “If so you could just leave it on the pile there.”
The reporter noted a thick stack of legal documents threatening to fall out of Vinnie’s in-tray. “That’s a lot of summonses,” she noted. “What did you do?”
“Ah,” winced Vinnie. “It turns out that when you shut down a website that puts you in e-mail correspondence with spirits claiming to be your dead loved ones, you should really check whether the domain is registered to a prominent dead lawyer first. Otherwise you tend to get some really serious post-mortem litigation.”
