Whispers Under Ground (Rivers of London 3)

by Ben Aaronovitch

  ‘We might as well lower the stairs then,’ I said.

  ‘If they are stairs,’ said Lesley.

  I lay down on the floor-boards and put my head through the hatch, looking for the brass handle to operate the folding staircase. From below a light shone in my face.

  ‘You might want to stand back a bit,’ I shouted down and the light retreated. I was just reaching for the handle when Lesley spoke in my ear.

  ‘Are you sure that’s safe?’ she asked.

  I looked to find that she’d lain down beside me and had hung her head out the hatch as well.

  ‘Meaning what?’ I asked.

  ‘We don’t know what it does,’ said Lesley, looking at the handle. ‘It might swing round and snick your arm right off.’

  When me and Lesley were doing our probation at Charing Cross nick I’d learnt to listen to her suggestions – especially after the thing with the dwarf, the show girl and the fur coat.

  ‘Okay,’ I said. ‘I’ll use a line.’ And scrambled up to find one.

  Nightingale waved me aside and muttered something quietly. I felt the forma lining up, a fourth-order spell I thought, with that economy of style and that abrupt twist of strength that I was beginning to recognise as his signare. I heard a creak and a clank which I guessed was the lever pulling itself and then a surprisingly quiet but prolonged rattle of metal as the stairs unfolded and dropped.

  ‘Or we could do that,’ I said.

  ‘Was that magic?’ asked Kumar.

  ‘Can we please get on,’ said Nightingale.

  I cautiously put my weight onto the steps, which bounced gently under foot. When it didn’t collapse I walked all the way down. The last step hovered a third of a metre above the rails. A safety measure, I assumed, against electrocution when the track was live. Once they’d seen that I’d made it safely, the others followed me down. Kumar introduced us to a cheerful Welsh geezer called David Lambert – the patrolman. It was his job to walk the line each night checking for faults.

  ‘I’ve been doing this stretch for six years,’ he said. ‘I always wondered what all that ironwork was for.’

  ‘You never thought to ask?’ I asked.

  ‘Well, no,’ he said. ‘It’s not TfL equipment, see, and it’s not like I don’t have enough to worry about down here already.’

  Even once we’d stepped out from under the fake houses the bottom of the cut was pitch-black. Fifty-odd metres to the east were the lights of Bayswater Station where gangs of men in high-viz jackets were manhandling heavy equipment onto the tracks.

  We knew there had to be a secret door. Even if whoever it was had delivered the pottery overnight, they’d still taken the fresh produce away in the middle of the day while the trains were running. You couldn’t count on more than five minutes without a train on the track, and the window was smaller because you didn’t want to be seen by the drivers. Since there wasn’t an obvious entrance within fifty metres in either direction we had to be talking about a concealed entry.

  ‘There’s always a secret door,’ I said. ‘That’s why you always need a thief in your party.’

  ‘You never said you used to play Dungeon and Dragons,’ Lesley had said when I explained my reasoning. I’d been tempted to tell her that I’d been thirteen at the time and anyway it was Call of Cthulhu but I’ve learnt from bitter experience that such remarks generally only makes things worse.

  ‘Don’t you have to make a perception roll?’ she asked as I walked slowly along the dusty brick wall that lined the cut.

  ‘You know a suspicious amount about gaming,’ I said.

  ‘’Yeah well,’ said Lesley. ‘Brightlingsea’s not exactly the entertainment capital of the Essex coast.’

  I felt something and paused to trace my fingers along the course of bricks. The surface was gritty beneath my fingers and suddenly there it was – the hot sand smell of the furnace and a whispered muttering sound on the cusp of hearing. Even as vestigium went, it was faint and I doubted I would have spotted it as recently as this summer but I was improving with practice.

  ‘Got it,’ I said.

  I checked the position. On the north side of the cut, underneath the road on which the false houses fronted – in the shadows and hidden from any of the nearby buildings that overlooked the tracks. Less than five metres from the base of the extendable staircase.

  I extended my baton and gave the wall a rap. It wasn’t hollow but it was definitely a different pitch from the adjacent section. For extra strength, the walls of the cut had been built with a line of arched alcoves that looked for all the world like bricked-up windows. The easiest way to hide a door, I figured, would be to give it the same dimensions as an alcove. In a film you would be able to open the door by pushing in a false brick. I picked a brick at a convenient waist height and pushed it, just to get that stupid notion out of the way.

  The brick slid smoothly in, there was a click, and the door cracked open.

  ‘Shit,’ said Lesley. ‘A secret door.’

  The door was well balanced and definitely oiled and maintained because, despite being really heavy, it opened easily enough when I pulled on it. The back was made out of steel, which explained the weight, with a thick ceramic veneer fused, I have no idea how, onto the front as camouflage.

  ‘Speak friend and enter,’ said Kumar.

  I stepped inside and looked around. It was a brick-lined passageway wide enough for two people with an arched ceiling sufficiently high that I had to stretch to touch it. It ran parallel to the cut in both directions, right towards Bayswater and left towards Notting Hill, in which direction I found a crushed bean sprout on the floor.

  ‘They went that-a-way,’ I said. The air was still and tasted flat, like water that had been boiled more than once.

  ‘You follow the breadcrumbs,’ said Nightingale. ‘And I’ll take David here for a quick recce in the opposite direction. See how far the tunnel runs that way.’

  ‘Do you think it runs as far as Baker Street?’ asked Lesley.

  ‘That would certainly explain how James Gallagher got where he did,’ said Nightingale.

  David the Patroller looked dubious. ‘That would involve passing through Paddington and that’s a big station with open platforms,’ he said.

  ‘It’s worth a look anyway,’ said Nightingale. ‘Perhaps the tunnel ducks under Paddington.’

  ‘And what about me?’ asked Lesley.

  ‘You can guard this secret door and act as communications relay,’ said Nightingale. ‘And in the event that you hear us screaming, you can come rescue us.’

  ‘Great,’ said Lesley without enthusiasm.

  So me and Kumar headed off down the passageway with Lesley glaring at my back. As we went I couldn’t help thinking our little party was short a rogue and a cleric.

  Friday

  18

  Notting Hill Gate

  My first thought was, how many people could be supported by five to six boxes of vegetables a day? My second thought, after we’d been walking in a straight line for five hundred metres or so, was this was a hell of a long way to go to the shops. Which was followed by my third thought which was – where would these hypothetical vegetable eaters be getting their protein from? Mushrooms, rats, the occasional commuter? Cannibal navvies – thank you so much Inspector Nightingale.

  ‘When do you think this was built?’ asked Kumar.

  ‘The same time as the cut was dug,’ I said. ‘See the way the bricks are laid? That style’s called an English Bond. It matches the work on the tracks and it’s the same kind of London brick. Probably made locally.’

  ‘They teach you this stuff at Hendon?’ asked Kumar.

  ‘I had an education before Hendon,’ I said. ‘I was thinking of training to be an architect.’

  ‘But you were lured away by the glamour of police work,’ said Kumar. ‘Not to mention the high pay and the respect of your peers.’

  ‘Architecture didn’t work out,’ I said.

  ‘How come?’
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  ‘I found out I can’t draw,’ I said.

  ‘Oh,’ said Kumar. ‘I didn’t know that was still a requirement. What with computers and everything.’

  ‘You still need draughtsmanship,’ I said. ‘Is that a turn ahead?’

  Ahead, the passageway curved to the left. Kumar checked his map.

  ‘We must be following the curve of the trackway. I think you’re right about this being contemporaneous,’ he said. ‘It must have been built by the contractor.’

  It made sense. If you’re cutting a nine-metre wide trench through the heart of London you might as well throw in a side tunnel. It could have all sorts of uses, a safety route, a utility conduit. But in that case, why not just make the cut wider? Or if you wanted it covered, why not a colonnade?

  ‘We should have checked the original plans,’ I said.

  ‘I did,’ said Kumar. ‘Definitely no secret passages.’

  We stopped when we were far enough around the curve to start losing sight of the passage behind us. I flashed my light back towards where Lesley was hopefully standing guard and called her on my airwave.

  ‘Still here,’ she said, and I saw a flash as she waved her torch at us.

  I told her that we might be out of communication soon. Airwave works in the Underground but only when it’s in range of a relay and the tunnels predated digital radio by a good century and a half.

  Lesley told us that Nightingale had popped up on the other side of Bayswater Station, which meant that it was growing more likely that James Gallagher could have used the passageway to reach Baker Street. She suggested we look for any evidence that he’d been in our section.

  ‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘Never would have thought of that.’

  ‘Stay safe,’ she said and hung up.

  I was just wondering if we were going to end up walking all the way to Notting Hill when Kumar found the stairs. It was a spiral staircase wrapped around a thin cast-iron hub, unmistakably late Victorian – who else would expend that much effort on something no one was ever going to see? It was impossible to tell how far down it went, although I caught a strong whiff of excrement and bleach wafting up from below.

  ‘That’s the sewers,’ said Kumar. ‘No mistaking that.’

  Beyond the entrance to the staircase the passageway continued in its curve to the left.

  ‘Down the stairs or keep going?’ I asked.

  ‘We could split up,’ said Kumar with more enthusiasm than I liked.

  The floor of the passageway beyond the stairs seemed a paler colour under my head light than the section we’d just walked. I squatted down and had a closer look. There was definitely more dust on the far side and it seemed less disturbed. I admit it wasn’t much, but it was all we had and there was no way I was splitting up.

  I explained my reasoning to Kumar, who cracked a glow tube to mark the spot and made a note on his map.

  ‘Down it is,’ he said.

  We went down slowly counting revolutions as we went. Three turns down we encountered a landing with a doorway – the stairs continued downwards. When I had a look through the doorway the shit and bleach smell was strong enough to make me gag. The room beyond was barely larger than a broom cupboard and most of the floor was taken up with an open hatchway. Holding my nose and breathing through my mouth I peered down. Below I recognised one of Bazalgette’s famous sewers, complete with egg-shaped cross-section and sturdy English bond brick lining. It was over a metre across at its widest point and a quarter filled with surprisingly watery-looking water considering what it smelt like.

  ‘Tell me they didn’t take their food through that,’ I said.

  ‘Definitely an FSA violation,’ said Kumar. ‘We don’t want to go down there. I’m not qualified for the sewers.’

  ‘I thought you went caving in wild out-of-the-way places,’ I said. ‘Caves that no man had caved before.’

  ‘And none of them were as dangerous as the London sewer system,’ he said. ‘Or as smelly.’

  I examined the hatch. It looked cast-iron and late Victorian. It also had the same ceramic camouflage as the door in the cut fused into its underside.

  ‘This is obviously designed to be closed.’ I swung the hatch back and forth a couple of times to demonstrate that it wasn’t rusted open or anything. ‘Somebody left it open, probably because they were in a hurry, and I think we’ve got to check it out.’

  ‘You know I’ve heard rumours about you,’ said Kumar.

  ‘Are any of them true?’

  ‘Understatements,’ said Kumar. But I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of asking what the rumours were.

  ‘We drop down and have a quick look and if we don’t find anything we come back.’

  ‘Smelling of roses,’ said Kumar.

  My dad says that the Russians have a saying: a man can get used to hanging if he hangs long enough. Unfortunately, what is true of hanging is not true of the smell of the London sewers, which are truly indescribable. Let’s just say that it’s the sort of smell that follows you home, hangs around outside your door and tries to hack your voicemail. Kumar and I ended up stuffing tissue paper up our nostrils, but agreed that if we had to come down again more drastic action would be justified – like amputation.

  Since it was my idea I got to go first. The, let’s call it water, was freezing and knee-deep so that it cascaded over the top of my wellies. Later I learnt from a flusher, them that make their living maintaining the sewers, that only an idiot climbs into the sewers wearing anything other than waist-high waders. In my defence there were plenty of other idiots underground that night.

  The ceiling was just high enough that I could wade upright, although the top of my helmet scraped the brickwork. I pushed upstream against the surprisingly strong current and Kumar splashed down behind me.

  ‘Oh god,’ he said.

  ‘Yeah I know,’ I said. ‘Water’s cold.’

  ‘That’s because it’s snowmelt,’ said Kumar. ‘That’s why we’re wearing wetsuits.’

  I heard a splash from up ahead and pointed my helmet light in that direction.

  ‘There’s somebody ahead,’ I said.

  ‘Kill your lights,’ said Kumar. So I did and he followed suit.

  It went completely black. I became aware of the sullen wash of the filthy water against my knees, of random sloshing sounds and a really disgusting slurping sound from somewhere behind us.

  ‘I think they heard us,’ I whispered.

  ‘Or there’s nobody there,’ Kumar whispered back.

  We waited while the cold seeped into our legs. I’m not claustrophobic. It’s just that my imagination won’t let me forget how much the stuff above my head weighs. And if I start thinking about my breathing I start thinking about how it doesn’t seem to be bringing in enough oxygen.

  There was a splash up ahead. The distance was difficult to judge, but I thought less than ten metres. I surged forward as fast as I could against the current and fumbled to turn my helmet light back on. When it came on I was rewarded with a flash of green and tan ahead of me. Despite the up and down of the light, I realised that I was looking at somebody’s back and shoulders as they tried to wade ahead of us. They were wearing woodland camouflage pattern, what looked like a skateboarding helmet and, unlike me. they were short enough to be submerged above their thighs.

  ‘Stop,’ I yelled. ‘Police.’ I hoped they would, because I was getting knackered.

  Our fugitive tried to pick up their pace, but my height gave me the advantage.

  ‘Stop,’ I yelled. ‘Or I’ll do something unpleasant.’ I thought about where we were for a moment. ‘Even more unpleasant than what we’re doing now.’

  The figure stopped, the shoulders slumped and then started to shake with laughter and I suddenly knew who it was.

  Agent Reynolds turned to face us, her pale face caught in the bobbing circles of our helmet lights.

  ‘Hi, Peter,’ she said. ‘What are you doing down here?’

  19

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  ‘We’ve got to go now,’ said Agent Reynolds. ‘I’m right behind them.’

  There are some questions you have to ask even when you don’t want to. ‘Right behind who?’

  ‘There’s somebody down here,’ she said. ‘And it isn’t you, me or some guy from water and power.’

  ‘How do you know?’ asked Kumar. ‘And who are you?’

  ‘Because they’re moving about without using a flashlight,’ she said. ‘And I’m Special Agent Kimberly Reynolds, FBI.’

  Kumar extended a hand over my shoulder which Reynolds shook.

  ‘I’ve never met an FBI agent before,’ he said. ‘Who are you chasing?’

  ‘She doesn’t know,’ I said.

  ‘If we don’t follow now we’re going to lose him,’ said Reynolds. ‘Whoever it is.’

  So we chased because they were, allegedly, running away and that’s just the way the police roll – even when they’re special agents. I made it clear that post-chase there were going to be some explanations.

  ‘Like what brought you down here in the first place,’ I said.

  ‘Later,’ said Reynolds through gritted teeth as she splashed ahead.

  I say chase, but there’s a limit to how fast you can go when you’re knee-deep in icy water, not to mention how bloody knackering it is. After watching Reynolds flounder in front we persuaded her to follow behind and grab hold of my belt so that I could half pull her along. We were too breathless to talk and by the time we reached a dog-leg a couple of hundred metres further up I had to call a breather.

  ‘Fuck it,’ I said. ‘We’re not going to catch them.’

  Reynolds screwed up her face, but she was too winded to argue.

  Where the sewer turned through a dog-leg its builders had briefly doubled its width. Halfway up the walls a number of moist brick apertures periodically gushed fluid around our feet. Underneath, one in particular was a heap of vile yellowish white stuff.

  ‘Please tell me that’s not what I think it is,’ said Reynolds weakly.