It was Arcand.
"Well, Mr. Adams, you're awake at last. Don't try to move too much, you'll feel weak for a while. Just lie there and enjoy the hospitality. I'll try to tell you what happened. Are you okay?"
I managed a laugh. "You mean apart from feeling like shit and wishing I was dead?"
Arcand laughed again.
For the first time I was able to focus on him. He was long and lean, thin almost to the point of being skinny. A flop of jet-black hair hung across his brow. His eyes, a bright, piercing blue, looked straight at mine as we spoke.
"We haven't been formally introduced. I'm Mike."
"Derek," I replied, shaking his hand. I struggled to match his grip, then gave up. "But at the moment you can call me anything you like. I won't be able to do anything about it. How long was I out?"
"Three days," he said. "The doc knocked you out to give you a chance to heal."
"And he did a damned good job of it. But I've not gone three days without a smoke since I was at school. I don't suppose you've got one handy?"
He smiled. It looked like something his face was well used to.
"We found some battered Camels in your jacket, but they're too far gone. I've got some Sobranie Black Russians if you don't mind something exotic?"
"As long as it's got nicotine in it, bring it on."
He took a cigarette case from his pocket. I noticed it was the same shape as mine, but made of a black ceramic material rather than silver. The cigarettes were equally black, long and slim with a gold band near the base.
He handed me my Zippo.
"I guess you wouldn't want to lose this."
I flicked it open. Just that act, and the metallic clack of the lighter, made me feel better...just a little bit closer to home and health. And once I lit the cigarette and took a long draw, I started to feel almost human.
"So what happened?" I asked once the nicotine started to hit.
"What do you remember?"
"Head-butting someone with a head made of rock," I said. I touched my forehead. It felt pulpy and soft, and my fingers brought a flare of pain where they touched. "After that things get blurry."
"You took down three of them," Arcand said. "And I got the other two."
The leftmost of the figures looks as if he has jumped backwards, and the air fills with a fine red spray. There is another blast, and the head of the last man standing blows apart.
"I remember that much. Shotgun?"
"Twelve bore. It'll take down a Bull Moose, so it had no trouble with those two."
He didn't show any remorse. I wasn't about to feel too much of it myself, but the dead had only been puppets. The Elf was the real culprit. And he was still out there somewhere.
"You found the belt?" I said as he gave me another cigarette. I was starting to feel lightheaded...from the nicotine hit this time.
He nodded.
"It's still in your pocket. And we found the Journal. You got that from Collins?"
"In a way, yes."
"And you've read it?"
I nodded, then thought better of it as my head threatened to fall off in my lap. "I've read it," I said.
"When you feel better, we'll have a chat about that," he said. His eyes took on a steely look.
He might be outwardly charming, but there was a shark in there, and I'd had my first glimpse of it.
I suddenly remembered the car.
"The Cruiser?"
He laughed, and the charmer was back.
"That's a write-off. Don't worry, we'll sort it out for you. We're lawyers. That's our job. That's what we do."
He said that last bit as if it was a quote, but I didn't get the reference. It was probably in a bit of my brain that hadn't yet got the reboot.
Suddenly I felt tired again.
"Best take this cigarette off me," I said. "I don't want to set fire to the bed."
He took the butt from me and stubbed it out, leaving his case and the Zippo on the bedside table beside the ashtray.
I was asleep again before he left the room.
*****
The next time I woke I was alone. There was a small night light on beside the bed, but otherwise everything was dark and quiet. I thought briefly about getting up; indeed, I wondered how I'd been getting along on the bathroom visits front, but I nipped that in the bud quickly. Some things just didn't bear thinking about for too long.
I threw back the covers...and immediately pulled them back over me. It was more than chilly outside the warmth of the duvets. I lit one of Arcand's cigarettes and lay there smoking, listening.
A city boy like me is used to noise, even at night. Back on Byres Road, cars honk their horns, drunks sing as they stagger, and police and ambulance sirens regularly speed both ways along the main thoroughfare.
Here there was nothing...there was no patter of rain on the window, no hint of dodgy plumbing. There was just black silence.
It disconcerted me. At one point I even hummed a tune, just to hear something.
The events following the Cruiser's career downhill were still a blur to me, but more and more it was coming back. And more and more I had a problem with the execution-style killing of the two youths in the snow. Arcand had seemed just too nonchalant when I'd asked him. He'd passed it off as if it was no more than an everyday occurrence. That in itself was enough to get the spidey-senses tingling.
They might be offering me one hundred thousand dollars, but I'd want to know the price before I took the deal.
*****
I woke the next morning when a maid brought me breakfast. She came into the room, carrying a tray. All the way across the floor she refused to look me in the eyes. She put the tray down on the bed.
"Thank you," I said. She flinched as if I'd slapped her, and left the room at speed.
It was the first meal I remember eating for several days, and it looked like whoever had made it was making up for that fact. There were three plates, any one of which held more than I'd usually call breakfast. There was toast, pancakes with maple syrup, and bacon with eggs and hash browns. Plus there was also fruit juice, preserves, and a pot of black coffee.
I had a coffee and a cigarette first, just for balance's sake, then started in. It took me nearly half an hour, but I was surprised to look down and find I'd cleared all the plates.
After another cigarette, I slept again. It was getting to be a habit.
*****
Another awakening.
Someone sat beside the bed.
"Hello," he said. "I thought it was time we met."
I'd heard him before, during the fever dreams.
"Mr. McBarnette?"
"Call me Karl," he said, and showed me his perfect rows of white teeth. He was a tall, elegant black man with short-cropped hair and an easy smile that didn't quite reach his eyes.
He had a book in his lap that I recognized. He held it up.
"You've read it?" he asked.
"Yes."
"A fine story," he said. "But useless without context. What else do you know about the belt's history?"
"Not a lot. It turned up in France during the war. Lord Collins' father found it."
He nodded.
"Yes, he did. But the belt has a long history before that. Even before this," he said, holding up the book.
"Well, you've got a captive audience if you want to tell me a story," I said, reaching for the cigarettes. I offered him one.
"No. That's Mike's vice. Mine is this." He produced a bottle of rum and two glasses from the floor at his feet.
"Will you join me?"
"Do bears shit in the woods?"
"Actually, around here, they shit on your porch, but I catch your drift."
He poured me a long shot. The first sip went down like a stream of fire, but the second put that one in its place. I followed it up with some smoke, and let my head float as he talked.
"I'm a collector," he started. "I first heard about the belt at an antiques fair in Boston in '94. It fascin
ated me, and I did some research.
"It is said to have been made some time in the Fifteenth Century. The rumor is that an alchemist discovered a means of transformation, not just for himself, but for anyone in his vicinity that could be bent to his will. Certainly there are records of villages being terrorized in the Pyrenees around the time of the legend, and several farmers and shepherds were mistakenly burned alive to try to beat the contagion."
"Contagion? You mean, like the things Collins' father saw in France. Like Mark Turner?"
"He was the lad in Glasgow?"
I nodded.
"Yes. I'm sorry about that one. If we'd found you a bit earlier we might have prevented that."
"How did you find me?"
He waved the book at me. "Do you want to hear this or not?" he said. Again he smiled, and again it didn't quite reach his eyes. He had good taste in rum, though, so I contented myself with more of that as he continued.
"Let's jump forward to colonial days. France and Britain were fighting for Canada. But that's not all that came over to the big country. Someone brought the belt, someone with a pack of brutes that cut swathes through the native population."
"And that's where McNab came in? He killed the sorcerer and took the belt?"
McBarnette nodded.
"After that it passed to Fraser."
He held the book up again.
"That much you know. And you know as much as anyone about the belt's whereabouts after that. It disappears from history for more than forty years, until the Napoleonic wars. It turns up again being used by a French general at the siege of Moscow. But the Russians knew from long ago how to deal with reavers in the snow. They burned out the contagion, and sent it back to France with the little emperor.
"And, presumably, there it stayed, until the Nazis found it. I've seen an SS document detailing its use, and I've seen executive orders for experiments on prisoners. I assume they would have escalated its use...if Collins' father hadn't intervened."
"And where does the Elf come into it?"
Once more he showed me the book.
"Collins talked too much when he'd had a drink. He told someone, who told someone else. It came to Fraser's attention. He was already on an occult path, and something like this, in his own family history, just pushed him further along. He found out that Collins had the belt five years ago, and ever since, he's been trying to get it."
And now for the $64,000 question.
"And where do you come into it?
He laughed, and this time his eyes joined in.
"I offered Collins a lot of money for the belt. He turned me down, but I was hoping he'd come round eventually."
That wasn't the whole truth...his eyes told me that much, but I wasn't about to call him out on it, not while I was lying in bed, drinking his booze and smoking Arcand's cigarettes. I let it lie.
For now.
*****
McBarnette left. He wasn't quite as hospitable as Arcand...he took his rum with him. That was fine by me. I was starting to feel better, and I needed to keep a clearer head from now on. I still had a case to solve.
But first things first. The morning coffee had enough of being chased around by the rum and demanded escape.
Let's see if I can get as far as the toilet.
I threw off the covers and swung my legs out of bed. Almost immediately my head started to complain, a tight screw turning just above my left eye. I ignored it and pushed myself upright.
The room leaned at forty-five degrees for a second, but I showed it who was boss and got us onto an even keel. Walking across the floor felt like trying to navigate across the boat deck in a high sea, and it took me three tries to grab the handle of the washroom door. I fell in, pulling the door closed behind me.
I turned, and almost screamed, but it was only my own reflection that had startled me. I just wasn't used to seeing myself looking like death warmed up...at least, not when sober. My eyes had sunk far back, dark pools under the harsh overhead light. My skin looked off-white, almost gray, and a livid purple and yellow raised bruise covered the left side of my forehead above my eyebrow. I looked like I'd gone ten rounds with a heavyweight, and lost.
I held onto the washbasin with both hands for a while, until the room stopped spinning. I was happy to manage to keep things still enough to do my business, but by the time I left the washroom, the bedroom floor was under a heavy swell again. I staggered across it like a drunk along an icy pavement. I was heading diagonally away from the bed, but at least I was still upright as I reached the tall window. I hung on to the heavy draped curtains, trying to muster enough energy to make a dash for the bed.
It was only after the blood stopped pounding in my ears that I heard voices outside the window. I peeked between the center gap in the drapes.
It was a misty morning, with visibility less than ten yards. All I could see was a muddy stretch of slush stretching away to a fence that was almost lost in the fog. Two ranch hands, complete with obligatory checked shirts, blue jeans and workmen's boots, came into view, carrying a slumped, bleeding youth by the arms. The youth wore the, by now, well-recognizable black leather coat. His hair hung down over his face, but it was obvious he had taken a beating. Blood coated his torso from chin to navel.
"Where did they find this one?" one of the ranch hands said.
"Trinity. He was at the Village Inn, asking questions."
"How many is this now?"
"Seven," the other said.
"And does anyone know why they're coming? Or why we're doing this?"
"Nope. The boss says shit, and I say where do you want it, sir? It don't pay to be asking too many questions."
"I hear you, brother."
They dragged the battered youth around a corner and out of my sight.
So, the Elf was still sending troops.
But what are the lawyers doing with them?
*****
I made it back on the crest of a big swell and fell onto the bed. Blood pounded in my ears again.
I was suddenly hit with a childhood memory, of lying on a too big, too soft bed, playing with toy soldiers, using the blanket folds as cover as they fought a running battle in sand dunes. Scarlet fever, the doctor called it. Three weeks off school was what it meant to me. And at first I'd been happy at the prospect. Then my temperature rose, and the folds of the bed became ribbons of fire that encased me and sent me sweating into hellish torments where goblins vied for who was going to eat my fried brain. That was on the good days.
I felt a bit like I had during that fever, only with added dizziness, and less goblins.
The room spun. I closed my eyes, but that just made me feel like throwing up, and I wasn't ready yet for another long trip. I lay there for a while, staring at the ceiling, willing it to stop moving.
After a while it listened to me. My head settled down to only a gentle pounding. That I could deal with...it was no worse than my usual Sunday hangover.
What really bothered me was the behavior of the lawyers. I'd always known there was something dodgy...from the ease at which they could find me, to the offer of a hundred grand. I'd assumed things would become clearer once I got to the ranch, but all I had was more questions, about the Elf's troops, about the callous killing, and about the lie behind McBarnette's eyes when he talked about the belt.
And if they're so keen on getting their hands on the belt, why is it still in my trouser pocket?
It was doing me no good lying in bed thinking about it. I had to get up and get with it. I had a case to solve, and some nightmares to dispel.
But first, I had another little nap.
*****
I finally got out of bed later that afternoon. At first my legs didn't get the message. I had to lift my right leg out from under the covers. Waves of dizziness hit, and I had to lie still for a minute before trying again.
The second time was easier. I held onto the bed and pushed myself upright. I felt slightly unsteady on my feet, but the walls and floor s
tayed still to help me out.
I staggered to the washroom and let the shower wash over me. I didn't have the energy for much else, but at least I felt slightly refreshed as I walked back into the room.
Getting my trousers on proved a bit trickier. I tried it while standing up, but after falling over twice realized that the universe wasn't keen on that idea. I sat on the bed and shuffled myself into the pants, suddenly feeling like an eighty-year-old on a bad day.
I sniffed at my shirt, and it didn't sniff back, so I reckoned it was wearable for a while yet. I fumbled a bit with the buttons, but got them all done up...most of them in the right order.
I'd been right about the belt...it was still in my trouser pocket. It squirmed as I zipped up my pants, but then went quiet.
I found my other clothes in a drawer. My passport and money were also there along with my silver cigarette case. I took some of the Russian cigarettes from the black ceramic case on the bedside and transferred them to my silver case. I pulled on an extra heavy woolen sweater that I found in a wardrobe, and took both cases of cigarettes out in search of some friendly coffee.
As I turned to leave the room, I realized it had taken on a pink hue. I pulled open the drapes, and looked out onto the sunset.
The sun hung just above the horizon, an orange ball almost as big as my fist at arm's length. The sky around it was aflame in oranges, yellows and purples that ran the full breadth of the arc of the sky. The ranch sat on a hill overlooking a long, conifer-filled valley that stretched northwards as far as I could see. At the far end, the ground rose to a snow-covered hill that seemed to glow deep gold, and long glacial ponds lay scattered across the valley floor, red, like bloody teardrops.
*****
The first room I came to was a small, windowless office. I would have walked on by, but a telephone caught my eye.
I suddenly felt a need to talk to somebody...somebody that I could connect to on a personal level.
I remembered the international dialing tone for the UK at only the second attempt and ten seconds later was put through to Partick CID.
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