by Paul Cornell
‘It sounds like he put you in a tiny “outer borough” of his own making,’ said Sefton.
‘Could you . . . tell me what he has done?’ asked Watson.
They were all silent for a moment. Then Ross began to tell him. Watson closed his eyes, his face a picture of horror. ‘This is . . . not my old friend,’ he said, when he’d heard it all. ‘He always thought he was above the law, yes. But he is a good man. I have seen him, in the last few weeks, become so . . . changed. As if he was dragged this way and that, and, caring little for himself, did not see it, and could not cope.’
‘I got that bit right while I was doolally,’ said Quill. ‘What Londoners believe can change the nature of a ghost.’
‘Yeah,’ said Costain. ‘With those three very different Sherlocks in the public imagination, with all of them over the years . . . our boy is definitely a little confused.’
‘He was always one to understand how circumstance could make a man a criminal. Please, if you care about my wishes, I implore you, offer him the same courtesy.’ Watson looked suddenly around, as if aware of some change in his situation. ‘I feel the pull failing. Can you not free me?’
‘Sorry . . .’ Sefton was leaning against a table, on the verge of collapse. ‘I’m guessing Holmes will have sorted things so you get out if his plan fails, but I can’t . . .’
‘Then no matter. I trust it to your hands. I have told you all I know. Save Sherlock Holmes.’ With that he vanished. Sefton fell.
They all went to him. Costain made him some strong, sweet tea, and he took some iron tablets with it. He actually kept a supply in his holdall. ‘I’ll be OK in a couple of days,’ he said, falling into a chair, exhausted.
They all turned at the sound of the door opening. There stood Lofthouse, on crutches, bruised and battered. ‘Would one of you,’ she said, ‘please answer your bloody phone?’
THIRTY-TWO
Sherlock Holmes sat in an upstairs meeting room of a property just off Brook Street. He was in disguise as an eighteen-year-old woman, a temporary secretary. The fact he now had to exercise no skill at all to make such transformations still disturbed him.
Those chasing him would almost certainly have been able by now to contact dear Watson. What would he tell them, that his friend had gone mad? Well, yes, he had. His thought processes, every time he tried to examine them, were a cacophony of voices that came from the wild variety of impulses inside him. In his past, dreamlike existence, when he had been merely a literary character, he had enjoyed utter clarity.
Now he was so many different people, all at once. As Watson would no doubt by now have told Inspector Quill, Holmes wanted himself and his friend to be entirely real and whole. He wanted this in order to bring order to this chaotic world, the outward appearance of which matched his inner turmoil. He also wanted to see if being a true, living native of this world would bring an end to the inner voices, an end to the many different selves who fought to be in charge of him. He hoped that to be real here allowed one to attempt to be in charge of one’s own character.
Here he was, committing murders, being the opposite of himself, in order to be more fully himself. The irony wasn’t lost on him. Why did these new fictions about him have to be so dark, so extreme? They, especially, had pulled him in all directions. When he had been created, interpretations of a part were just that. Now there seemed to be multiple worlds, the possibility of an individual being so many different things, each version too soon after the last, and sometimes all at once. How could the public believe in them all, and with such passion?
He was now aware, of course, that the victims of murderers went to Hell. That weighed on him, also. Still, what he was doing would benefit more people, in the long run.
He had, as part of him, his creator. That was the worst voice of all to contain. His creator hated him. His creator wanted him dead. He contained a sudden wince at the thought, a sudden doubling-up as if around a physical pain. His disguise aided that containment. To think such thoughts was out of character for young Alanna.
He wanted nothing more than to bring down the entity with whom he had made this bargain. That would be his first aim when he was made real. It had become obvious the Smiling Man was not, as he had initially thought, a traditional Satan. Indeed, he was a suspect, if what he had heard at that conference could be trusted, in the murder of said Lucifer. That would be a case worthy of Sherlock Holmes.
Worse still, however, was what that actor who had played him had turned out to be, one of the Gods of London, devoted to chaos. He stood against everything Holmes believed in. He had not quite managed to break Holmes, and next time the boot would be on the other foot. He was fortunate indeed that an actor in this era could make little difference to the character he was playing at such short notice, or who knew what extremities Flamstead could have added to his inner turmoil. Still, Holmes felt Flamstead’s version inside him, felt the twist of the personality of a god inside that. He wanted, once again, to groan in pain.
Once he had finished and had Watson by his side again, once they were whole, then he would make all this right. Watson would upbraid him, would rail against him. He would welcome it.
He realized that the door was opening. Into the room, for what he thought was an assignation, suggested by Alanna by text message, stepped young Ben Gildas, a very junior employee here. Gildas was a habitual user of narcotics. Holmes had once had the same habits, but, curiously, a great many of his inner selves thought those habits, even carefully monitored, to be a great evil. Gildas was, by any modern measure, a criminal. Holmes reached under his chair and picked up the rope he’d adjusted to a specific length. He approached Gildas, swinging it playfully. None of the people he was liked the thought of what he was about to do.
Quill and his team had looked to their pockets, found that all of them did indeed have messages left in the last half-hour and had made their apologies. Lofthouse, who had a uniform with her whose job seemed to be to open doors and pick things up, ignored their questions and led them across the road, back to her office on the Hill. With painful slowness she sat down in her chair behind her desk. ‘Look up Richard Chartres,’ she said. ‘Or any of the Continuing Projects Team.’
Ross did. She was amazed to see public records appear on her phone. ‘We wouldn’t have known,’ she said, ‘because we didn’t have any memories of them in the first place. How did—?’
‘I went and found my memories. Brought you back some presents.’ She put onto the desk a large, ancient book, some folded papers and an ornate shotgun.
‘You’ve been busy,’ said Costain, as Sefton, who had asked for a chair himself, immediately started to leaf through the book.
Lofthouse told them her story, and they filled her in on theirs. Ross urgently wrote down all the details in her special notebook, with Sefton interjecting at points about which he wanted more clarity. Ross noted that none of them volunteered their new knowledge about that sign over Hell.
‘Well,’ said Lofthouse finally, ‘we’ve all been in the wars. Now, though, I have the Sight. Which I suppose I was always meant to have. Richard chose me to send the key to, a sort of supernatural USB drive, containing everything I needed to know about his team, and how to create a new one in their image. It might have worked too, apart from everyone being made to forget that team. The key feels like it’s done its bit.’ She held it up, limp on her charm bracelet. ‘Now it’s just a key.’
‘Thank you,’ said Quill, ‘for telling us. I understand why you couldn’t. Is Peter . . . ?’
‘He’s fine. He has no memory of the times he was possessed. He seems to have done some excellent work at the office during that time. I’m telling him it’s a medical condition. Is that wrong? No, sorry, shouldn’t have asked that. I’m in charge, and it isn’t wrong.’
‘Five is better than four,’ said Sefton, ‘like that fortune teller once said to Ross. When I was in that longbarrow I was told that five was the knot, the knot that catches things. What you just told us a
bout that Halloween where the CPT got erased from memory, there were so many data points . . .’ He took Ross’s notebook and flicked back through the pages. ‘Like what Chartres called the Lud Vanes. I reckon those are what Jimmy took off that bloke who had a go at him at the New Age Fair, the same ones that led us to the Docklands ruin in the first place.’
‘I immediately thought there must be such objects everywhere. The first thing I did was to search my house, but there’s nothing Sighted there. I suppose that’s not surprising. I think this might be why I like to touch the buildings I’m in. I’ve hung around too much with spooky architects.’ She sighed. ‘They thought it was all about buildings, and not at all about people. They’d lost so much good practice over so many years. I felt they were vulnerable, even back then. I wish I’d known enough at the time to say so. I’ve been watching the reaction, in official circles, to the return of the memory of them as individuals. It’s muted, as you might expect. A file here and there is no longer blank. There’ll be a whole constituency who’ll now be wondering if, a few years ago, they had a stroke. Friends and relatives will start talking. It’ll be fascinating to see that pattern, all those impossible memories, come to the surface, whether or not anyone will realize that something extraordinary happened to anybody but themselves. What the CPT really did was a secret, so I don’t know if the people in your world . . . I should say our world now—’
‘They’ll know,’ said Sefton. ‘Those who encountered the old law, or even researched them, will remember what they found out.’
‘They might see it,’ said Ross, ‘as an indication we’re getting the job done.’
‘And now the CPT are back in human memory,’ said Lofthouse, ‘we stand a chance of finding anything else they hid away, any records or objects that weren’t plundered from the ruins in Docklands.’
Sefton seemed to have a sudden thought. ‘Did the Continuing Projects Team often use the word “protocol”?’
‘All the time. One of their euphemisms, for what anyone else would call a spell.’
‘A spiel.’ Sefton corrected her.
‘Don’t you start. Why do you ask?’
‘When we first saw her, Mora Losley told us there was a protocol “on” us. You say you had strong feelings about which of us to pick for this team. I think the key had already picked us as its chosen successors to the CPT, placed on us something like whatever spiel was said in the ceremony for new recruits in that Docklands HQ of theirs, preparing them for immersion in the lake. The lake was meant to be the power source, but we didn’t have one.’
‘Until we touched Losley’s soil,’ said Quill. They all remembered that moment when they had gained the Sight, by touching a pile of earth in the home of that terrifying witch.
‘I bet we’d have seen the protocol as tiny golden strings of information,’ said Sefton, ‘and what was in Losley’s soil as the silver fluid, if we could have seen it with the Sight before we, you know, we actually had the Sight.’
‘And I must have had that protocol on me too,’ said Lofthouse, ‘also given to me by the key. Because I got the Sight when I went into the lake. God, we have to go back there. We have to see what that poison did.’
‘Later for that, ma’am?’ said Ross. Lofthouse calmed herself and nodded.
‘I think, ma’am,’ said Sefton, ‘that you didn’t get the Sight when we did because you were out of range.’
‘I was in Birmingham for most of that day.’ She sat back in her chair, astonished all over again. ‘I don’t know whether to be grateful or angry. The things I saw on the way here . . . how do you live with this?’
‘It gets easier,’ said Quill. ‘Mostly.’
‘I hope—’ Lofthouse suddenly yelled.
They all spun, to find that Moriarty had appeared, reacted to that reaction and scampered into a corner. They explained. Lofthouse tried to stand, winced, thought better of it. ‘You know, when I first got you together, we had a round table. I must have had a feeling in my head for where the Continuing Projects Team had sat at theirs, because I even got you to sit at particular places. Well, now I hope I qualify for a seat at that table. If I’m meant to be one of you, at least now I can help directly, share what you experience and try to find some way for you all to get the bloody Police Medal.’
‘I would not turn that down,’ said Costain.
‘The next thing I should do is try to use my authority to shut down the Sherlock Holmes filming.’
Ross was pleased at the speed of Lofthouse’s deductions. That was actually top of their list of actions to be taken immediately. Lofthouse made the calls as they sat there, Sefton being kept supplied by her secretary with cups of strong, sweet tea. ‘Damn,’ she said finally, ‘none of them are willing to stop production when they’re nearly at the end of their schedule, not without solid evidence of some sort of practical connection between what they’re doing and the murders, which we can’t provide.’
‘I’m sure your Gilbert would be up for staging a walkout,’ said Costain to Ross. She searched his expression for any sign of bitterness, but found none.
‘Yeah,’ she said, ‘but that’s just one of three. I doubt he could convince the others, and anyway, it’s not like Holmesmania would stop overnight. If anything, the news of a walkout would make it increase. As things stand, Holmes has at least a week or two to complete his mission.’
Lofthouse answered her phone. She listened for a moment, looking grim, then put it down. ‘One Ben Gildas has been found hanged in an upstairs meeting room at a property off Brook Street.’
‘Fuck it,’ whispered Costain.
‘If I go along with you,’ said Lofthouse, ‘I’m going to see all sorts of horrors, aren’t I?’
‘It sounds like you already have,’ said Ross.
‘I’m not complaining. I just want to be ready.’
Quill looked like he couldn’t keep it from her any longer. ‘You’re one of us now. As we drive over to Brook Street . . . there’s something we should share with you.’
THIRTY-THREE
The crime scene yielded only the sickening things that Quill expected it to. A startled-looking young man in a business suit, struck down.
He saw that Lofthouse felt it so much more than they did. The distance she had had as a police officer had been taken from her by the Sight. Plus, she now had the burden of the knowledge of Hell. She put a hand on the wall to steady herself and nodded along, staying in command, as the main investigation, led by DI Clarke, came through, with their crime scene examiners.
They found nothing of note over the course of the night, and Quill sent his people home, himself included.
He found Sarah asleep, which was probably just as well, given the long conversations that remained to be had between them. He still wasn’t right in the head, despite Sefton’s mantra. All it was doing was dealing with the symptoms, holding things off. His thoughts still kept wandering to terrible places, and that made it hard to express himself. The anger was still there. With it would come the crushing anxiety. At least now he was home, and back at work. He got out of his clothes, slipped in beside Sarah and repeated to himself that he was Jimmy Quill, that London should know that, that here was a whole list of what he was. He tried hard to believe it. Thank God, Moriarty stayed downstairs. Finally, Quill slept.
He got in bright and early the next morning to find Lofthouse had joined them once more. Sefton was there, looking pale, but keeping himself fortified with biscuits. Ross was already at the ops board, Costain working beside her. ‘Given that we know how specific his targets have to be,’ said Ross, ‘if Holmes didn’t have such an incredible intellect and resources, we’d have had him by now. Ben Gildas was on work placement with a medical insurance company, which only touches on the subject matter of “The Resident Patient”. Still, we’re now sure about our limiting factors. So for the next story, “The Greek Interpreter”, Holmes will be looking for a location in Beckenham that he can seal up to burn charcoal to kill his victim, who should a
t the very least be Greek and/or an interpreter with a dodgy background. If he’s going for authenticity, he’ll be capturing him or her ahead of time and starving them first.’
‘Sealing a room isn’t that hard,’ said Costain, ‘not these days. You could do it with any modern building, though I’d pick a small room.’
‘All I’ve got about Greeks in Beckenham,’ said Sefton, looking up from his phone, ‘is that there’s a restaurant called the Taste of Cyprus that has a really good rating on Trip Advisor, so a vague estimate of number of possible targets is “some”. Wait a sec . . . finding a census page. OK, more sensibly, it’s less than a thousand.’
‘But there are going to be a ton of interpreters,’ said Lofthouse. She looked like she hadn’t slept. ‘You get language schools all over London.’
Moriarty flashed into the room and swept darkly into a chair. Quill suddenly realized that his presence had given him a very troubling idea. ‘What if we could find him before all that?’
‘How?’ Ross sounded wary.
‘When I was . . . very ill, I saw some stuff. I think it was real stuff. I was letting it in, attracting it, being made to see it, whatever. Listen . . .’ Haltingly, he outlined what he was thinking.
He watched as their expressions got very worried. Then he looked to Lofthouse.
She considered for a moment. ‘I’m new at this,’ she said. ‘James, are you sure?’
Quill nodded.
Lofthouse looked up as the team approached the Heron Building in Moorgate on foot, startled all over again by the extra detail and meaning the Sight gave her. The way the architecture toyed with the history of this place seemed . . . insulting, askew. That meant bad things could happen here. Given that, and the ongoing situation with Peter, who had insisted on going to work as always, but was going at some point to start asking some really awkward questions, and what James had told her about where they were all going when they died . . .
She felt like she had given her all in pursuit of saving something and lost everything as a result. Was it sheer duty keeping her going? No, it was that here were four people who were in the same boat.
