by Tom Becker
Carter’s voice dropped to a low hiss. “The SIU cracks cases exactly because we don’t work like that. We think, we wait, we anticipate. It’s a complex process that a beat copper might find a little beneath him, but we’ve found it gets results. You understand?”
“Yes, of course, sir. Sorry, sir.”
Then, all of a sudden, the malice was gone, and the amusement had returned to Roberts’s face. “Anyway, we’re meeting someone this afternoon who I think will be able to help us with the case. He may well have some valuable information. And if you’re still bored after that, I’ll try and do something to liven things up. Shoot someone or something like that. OK? Ah good, here’s the food.”
After the meal, he lingered over a coffee, before the two men headed back out into the late afternoon. Their vehicle – a gun-metal grey Mercedes with blacked-out windows – was parked across the road from the restaurant. Shaw had never seen such an expensive car used for police work, but he was getting the feeling that Roberts tended to work to different rules from other coppers.
Shaw climbed into the front seat and rubbed his hands together. “Where are we heading then, sir?”
“Go straight across Waterloo Bridge. I’ll direct you from there.”
As usual in central London, the traffic was backed up for miles, and the Mercedes inched its way down busy streets. Roberts seemed unconcerned that he might be late for his meeting, and spent the time jotting notes down in a black leather notebook he carried in his inside jacket pocket. Every so often, he would emit a soft chuckle.
Eventually the Mercedes crossed Waterloo Bridge. The sky was now tinged with pink and purple streaks, and although it was still light, the moon was clearly visible. On the south side of the Thames, the London Eye rotated slowly, like an exhausted fan. Shaw turned the radio on for company, but a level glare from Roberts made him turn it off again. Could he do anything right with this man?
The Mercedes moved on past Waterloo Station, beyond the grim facades of the buildings on the South Bank. The roads began to change in character, becoming narrower and more winding. Roberts directed Shaw through the maze of backstreets without looking up from his notebook. Eventually they found themselves on a desolate road strewn with rubbish and plastic bags. On one side a row of lock-up garages huddled underneath a bridge, their brickwork black with grime.
“Pull up here,” ordered Roberts, his head still buried in the book. He finished his sentence, then slipped the notebook back into his pocket and got out through the passenger door. Shaw made to follow, but the head of the SIU looked around and shook his head. “You stay here and keep an eye on the car. Unattended Mercs don’t tend to stay that way very long round here. I’ll be back soon.”
And with that he slammed the car door shut and strode towards the nearest lock-up garage. As Shaw looked on he unlocked the shutters and lifted them up, before disappearing inside. The PC was fuming. He wanted to be at the meeting, not sat around here like some kind of night-watchman! Not the first time, he wished that he had never been selected for the SIU.
He had just started to doze off when the roaring sound of an engine made him sit up with surprise. A flaming-red motorbike was careering down the street towards him. At the very last second, it swerved wildly right and into the garage that Roberts had just opened up. The bike had disappeared as quickly as it had arrived, leaving only a dark drip of oil and a set of tyre-marks on the surface of the road. Behind it, a carrier bag fluttered forlornly across the pavement.
Shaw hurriedly got out of the car. There was no way he was going to miss this, no matter what Carter said. He turned on the Mercedes’ alarm with a beeper and crept to the edge of the garage. Glancing furtively up and down the street, he checked to make sure that no one was watching him. It was empty. He pressed his back to the brickwork and placed his ear as close as he could to the opening. Immediately Shaw recognized the imperious tone of voice that Carter used when he was telling people off.
“. . .and if the Starling boy dies she will regret it. I am very unhappy, Silas. When you speak to her, make sure she understands that, won’t you?”
“I try. . .”
Shaw shuddered. The man Roberts was speaking to had a cold, reptilian voice with slithering vowels.
“. . .I try, but you know Marianne. She doesn’t listen to many people.”
“She will listen to me. Everyone listens to me.” It was said starkly, without a trace of arrogance, and in that moment Shaw could well believe it.
“She is a natural hunter . . . maybe she not stop. The boy has made the crossing to Darkside, after all. Maybe he has an accident. Maybe he’s dead already. What are you going to do then?”
There was a hint of mockery in the man’s voice that only made the sound worse. Goosepimples broke out on Shaw’s skin. Where in God’s name was that accent from? Shaw couldn’t think of any language that hissed like that. Wherever he was from, he didn’t sound like the sort of person that Roberts should be dealing with. Shaw remembered the Super saying that there was “something fishy” about the Biloxi case. If he was referring to this person, he was dead right.
“Let’s hope that Marianne can recognize a warning when she hears it, and takes all the necessary precautions. She will bring the boy to me, or you know what I will do.”
The reptilian man hissed with pleasure. “I like to see that fight one day. It might be closer than you think.”
There was a loud thud from inside the garage, and Shaw winced. Was Roberts all right in there? With great caution he poked his head round the side of the open shutters and surveyed the scene. The low-ceilinged garage was poky and cluttered with an array of oily and rusty machine parts. The red motorbike was gleaming on its stand towards the back. By the near wall, Roberts was standing with his back to Shaw. He was holding a spanner in his left hand. His companion was lying on the floor, but Shaw couldn’t make out any of his features because Roberts was obscuring his view.
When the head of the SIU spoke again, his voice was icy with anger. “Do you really think that it would be that close?” He leant down and grabbed the other man by the collar. “You’re nothing but a go-between, Silas, a penny-scrabbling messenger boy. How close do you think it would be between me and you?”
There was no reply, only a soft hissing noise.
“I agree. Now get out of here and go give Marianne the good news.”
The other man picked himself up off the floor. Shaw suddenly realized that, if Roberts found out that he had been eavesdropping, he was in dead trouble. As he pulled his head back away from the doorway he caught a glimpse of the reptilian man’s face. It was dark and pockmarked, and covered with peeling flaps of flesh. The man must have had some sort of horrible skin disease, because he didn’t look human. Shaw stood breathing against the side of the wall for a moment as a wave of nausea swept over him. Then there was a scream of an engine from inside the garage, and the red bike flew out into the street. Regaining his composure, Shaw ran back to the Mercedes, his raincoat flapping in the wind. He pressed the beeper frantically, unlocking the car, before collapsing in the front seat. A second later, Roberts appeared and closed the garage door. He walked in a businesslike manner back to the car and got in.
With a Herculean effort, Shaw managed to prevent himself from panting as he spoke. “How did the meeting go, sir?”
Roberts granted him a broad grin. “Surprisingly smoothly, Shaw. I haven’t lost my powers of persuasion. Hopefully that will have a large impact on the case. Right then. I could murder a curry. What about you?”
16
Carnegie and Jonathan walked down Savage Row in silence, the rain slanting down through the leafy treetops. The sky was an unforgiving black, and the wind nipped at the tips of ears and fingers like a small angry dog. Inside the huge mansions there would be lamps and roaring fires to ward off the darkness and the cold, but outside there was no escape. In the distance Jonathan could see
bolts of lightning crackling over the chimneys and roofs that clustered together around the Grand.
Raindrops dripped down from the brim of Carnegie’s hat on to his face. He loped along the road, his hands deep in his pockets. Once he made as if to say something to Jonathan, but bit his lip and turned away again. Feeling thoroughly miserable, Jonathan trailed behind and wished that he was inside. He would have given anything to have been back in his bedroom in London, watching TV in bed, but that seemed like another world. At that moment in time, he would have settled for the sparse comfort of Carnegie’s lodgings.
He caught up with the wereman and tapped him on the shoulder. “Look, I’m sorry I’ve caused you so much trouble. . .”
Carnegie grimaced. “That’s all right, kid. I’m used to trouble. Though even by my standards, this is a lot of trouble.”
“It’s all my fault. I should never have come here,” Jonathan said bitterly.
“Your dad knows what he’s doing. If he thought you weren’t safe in Lightside, he wouldn’t have sent you over here.”
“I don’t exactly feel safe here either.”
“No,” he conceded. “You may have a point there. But don’t worry about it. We’ll sort out Marianne, and then we’ll sort out Vendetta, and then we’ll get you back to Alain. Everything will be fine.”
Jonathan gave him a dubious look. “You really think so?”
“No. But you’ve got to be positive about these things. I mean, I was this close to eating you. But you’re still here, aren’t you?”
“If you get me out of this,” Jonathan said mournfully, “you can eat my hand if you want. Vendetta’s going to chop it off anyway, so I won’t be needing it.”
Carnegie barked with laughter and ruffled Jonathan’s hair. He reflected that maybe things could be worse, after all.
They continued their slow progress back towards the centre of Darkside, and gradually the expensive houses and the trees became obscured behind vast factories and the columns of black smoke churning out from their chimneys. Carnegie led the way through a warren of side streets and alleyways, never faltering or taking a wrong turning. The factory walls were so high and unforgiving that they made Jonathan feel like a rodent in some sort of laboratory experiment. For all the loud clanking of machinery, the explosions of steam and the ceaseless billowing of smoke, he couldn’t see the people who actually worked in the factories. There were no windows in any of the walls, hiding the ranks of Darksiders who toiled away inside.
In one alleyway a pair of young men were leaning idly against the wall. Their muddy, worn clothes barely covered their skeletal limbs. On spotting Jonathan and Carnegie, they stepped out into their path. One of them produced a dirty knife from his pocket and waved it under Carnegie’s nose.
“Give us your money,” he spat, through broken teeth.
The wereman shook his head. “Can’t do that, boys.”
“Give us your money, or I’ll cut you open!”
“Have we not met before? I’m Carnegie.”
At the mention of his name, one of the robbers blanched. He tugged his companion’s sleeve urgently, and motioned with his eyes to move away. Carnegie watched them back away with benign interest.
“That’s right, boys. You’ve made a very grave error. Shouldn’t you be running?”
He bent his head back and unleashed a high-pitched howl that reverberated off the factory walls. As he watched the two robbers flee, Jonathan was reminded of Raquella’s words on the Grand: Everyone knows Carnegie.
Two streets later, he concluded that thinking about Vendetta’s maid only made him even more confused. She had clearly recognized him in the glasshouse. But he had told her that his name was Jonathan. Why hadn’t she said anything when he was introduced as someone else? If Vendetta found out that she knew who he was. . . Jonathan thought back to the corpse in the glasshouse and shuddered.
They had been walking for some time now, and the wound in his side was beginning to throb again. He stopped walking and bent over, holding his side. Carnegie looked on with concern.
“You all right, boy?”
“Yeah. Just a bit tired.”
“That wound giving you pain?”
“Little bit. Be all right.”
Carnegie’s eyes narrowed to slits. “That’s very brave of you, son, but we’ll get a hansom cab anyway. We’re coming out on Princeville Street. We’ll be able to get one there.”
They came out on to a wider road packed with terraced housing. Carnegie shooed away a couple of small children from a front doorstep and made Jonathan sit down on it. The rain was coming down harder now, and bouncing off the cobblestones. The road was clear of carriages, and Jonathan wondered how long they were going to have to wait for a cab to pass. It wasn’t as if they could phone for one.
As it turned out, it didn’t take that long at all. After a couple of minutes a hansom cab drew smoothly up to the pavement.
“Fitzwilliam Street, driver,” barked Carnegie.
The driver, immersed in a thick brown cloak and hat against the elements, nodded and gestured at the door. Carnegie helped Jonathan up the steps and into the cab, as the horses stamped their hooves impatiently.
The interior of the carriage was cramped and dark, but it seemed like paradise to Jonathan. It even smelt familiar somehow. Carnegie followed behind him, hunching over to fit through the door. A woman had already occupied one of the seats. She was dressed for mourning, in all black, and a veil was drawn over her face.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” began Jonathan. “I didn’t realize. . .”
“It’s fine,” replied the widow. She spoke in a whisper they could barely hear. “I am happy to share the carriage. It is not an evening to be standing waiting in the cold.” She paused. “And it is nice to have the company.”
Carnegie removed his hat and shook himself vigorously, sending a spray of water droplets flying across the carriage. “Excuse me,” he said, looking entirely unrepentant.
“Good evening, sir. Are you travelling far?”
“Fitzwilliam Street.”
“What a pleasant coincidence. So am I.”
The widow settled back into her seat, seemingly satisfied. Jonathan rested his head on the door of the carriage, taking comfort from the sound of the raindrops throwing themselves against the window. They were travelling nearer to the heart of the storm, and thunder rumbled continuously above their heads, as if the black sky was tearing apart at the seams. Every now and again, a flash of lightning would sear his vision, bathing the carriage in a brilliant white light.
Despite the loud frenzy of the weather, the combination of his painful wound and the long walk had made Jonathan feel very tired. He was just about to drift off to sleep when the widow opposite adjusted her bonnet. A single shining white hair dropped into her lap, stark against the black folds of her dress. As the thunderclouds unleashed another monumental roar, a wave of fear swept over Jonathan.
“Carnegie!” he screamed. “It’s Marianne!”
Beside him, the wereman had slumped into a daze, overcome by the effects of her sleeping scent. Marianne chuckled and lifted her veil up, revealing her pale skin.
“Hello, Jonathan. You didn’t think we’d forget about you, did you?” She drew a slender dagger from her boot. Carnegie slapped himself around the face, trying to clear his head. Marianne laughed again. “You both look tired. Why don’t you go back to sleep?”
Carnegie lunged towards her, but his energy had been sapped. The raging beast that had attacked Jonathan was nowhere to be seen, and in his place was a large, tired man. His lumbering movements contrasted with Marianne’s speed and sharpness. She flashed her dagger at him, slicing him across the arm. The wereman yelled with pain. He aimed a blow with his other fist, but missed Marianne completely. Instead his fist shattered the near window, and rain and cold air flooded into the carriage.
&nb
sp; Jonathan felt the cobwebs begin to clear from his head, and realized that had been Carnegie’s plan. The wereman was down on the floor of the carriage, blood pouring from his arms. Marianne swore and made to stab him in the back, but Jonathan snaked out a leg and kicked the dagger from her hand.
Up on the roof of the cab, the driver began to lash his horses mercilessly, urging them to go faster and faster. The carriage hurtled onwards into the night, rocking from side to side like a boat in a storm. Inside, it was nearly impossible for anyone to stand up. As Marianne scrabbled about for her dagger the driver took a sudden right turn, sending all three occupants crashing into the door. For a second Jonathan could feel Carnegie’s bulk slumped against him, and hear Marianne’s breath close by his ear, before the carriage righted itself and the three of them fell back to the floor.
Carnegie groaned and tried to push himself up, only to receive a swift knee in the ribs from Marianne. He collapsed again. Clearly, the wereman was having trouble shaking off the effects of the bounty hunter’s scent. Jonathan dived for the dagger, curling his fingers around the hilt. Marianne went after him, trying to prise the weapon free with her nails. As they tumbled about Jonathan became aware of a loud scratching noise coming from the roof of the carriage. He glanced up, and with a sinking heart saw Skeet’s sharp, bald head poking down from the top of the window. Unaffected by the breakneck speed of the carriage, the creature swung down from the luggage rail and rested his feet on the ledge by the door so that he was pressed flat against the side of the vehicle.
“Carnegie! Wake up! Skeet’s coming!”
There was an angry snarl in response, and suddenly Jonathan felt Marianne being hoisted off him. The wereman tossed her into a heap on top of the seat and turned back to face the other threat. He was just in time. Having yanked open the door, Skeet was already inside the carriage. He went straight for Carnegie, fingers aiming for his eyes. The detective wrapped his arms around him and wrestled him to the floor. In the melee Marianne caught a stray boot to the chin, sending her sprawling across the carriage. Behind her head, the door banged excitedly open and shut.
