Simon Green: Ghost of a Smile

Latimer blew a perfect smoke ring. “Why haven’t you killed us yet?”

“Because I’m having so much fun,” said Patterson.

“If we’re having a civilised little discussion before the slaughter,” said JC, “can I ask again-what is it we know that we’re not supposed to know?”

“I don’t know anything,” Happy said immediately. “I never know anything. I am famous for not knowing anything, so there is absolutely no point in killing me.”

“This is true,” said JC. “He doesn’t know anything. Or at least, not anything you can prove.”

“Your whole team was a mistake,” Patterson said flatly. “You were getting too good, too quickly. We couldn’t allow that. And if you don’t know what you know, all the better. You can die ignorant. Yes. Enough talk. I have more important things to be about. Die, little things.”

Suddenly, Patterson’s stretch limo came squealing round the corner at high speed, Melody behind the wheel. She fought to keep the speeding car under control, and aimed it right at Patterson. He barely had time to react before the limo screamed across the intervening space, tyres howling, and ploughed right into him. She hit him dead-on, the impact breaking his legs again and throwing him forward across the long bonnet. His arms flailed wildly, his hands scrabbling for a hold on the smooth metal. Melody kept her foot hard down, hauled the car around, and drove it right at Chimera House. Patterson was yelling something, but no-one could make it out over the roar of the car’s motor.

The stretch limo slammed into the building and crashed to a halt half-way into the lobby. Broken glass pelted down from the shattered windows, like jagged rain. The car’s engine cut off abruptly. The driver’s door flew open, and Melody half fell out. Happy and JC ran forward, with Kim swooping along beside them. Melody stood up, slowly and painfully. Happy got to her first, took her arm, and slipped it over his shoulders, so he could take some of her weight. It was a mark of how shaken Melody was that she let him do it. She limped away from the scene of the crash, leaning heavily on Happy, while JC and Kim hovered beside them.

Latimer approached them, smiling broadly around her cigarette holder, and surprised them all by applauding loudly.

“Nice use of improvisation!” she said. “Gold stars all round when we get back.”

“Bloody airbag smacked me in the face,” mumbled Melody. “I know I’m going to have two black eyes.”

Then they all stopped and looked back, as the limo shifted suddenly to one side. Happy handed Melody over to Latimer, and he and JC moved to stand between the women and whatever was moving underneath the car. The limo tilted onto one side and fell over, as Patterson rose out of the wreckage, pushing the car off him with almost contemptuous ease. His clothes were even more of a mess than before, and jagged slivers of glass protruded from his dead flesh, but his gaze was steady, and his awful smile was broader than ever. He stood in the wreckage of the lobby like a conquering hero, posing and preening and showing himself off so they could all get a good look at him.

“I’m thinking this would be a really good time to start running,” Happy said quietly. “I won’t point a finger if you won’t. I’m in the mood to cover a lot of ground in a really short time.”

“Do you want to leave Melody and the Boss behind?” said JC.

“Well no, not as such, but…”

“No buts. This is the job.” JC looked Patterson over carefully. “Besides, whatever’s holding that body together has got to be really powerful. I don’t think you could outrun that with your best running shoes on. And anyway, I don’t run. It’s bad for the image.”

“When all else fails, try diplomacy,” said Latimer. She handed the still-groggy Melody back to Happy and gave the dead man her full attention. “Robert, if there’s any of you left in there, please listen to me. You know me. I knew your grandfather, and your father. Both of them excellent field agents. They wanted something better for you, and I did all I could for you… I watched you grow up, watched you rise through the ranks… You believed in the Institute! I know you did.”

“I’m here, Grandmother,” said the dead man, and the voice sounded suddenly different. There was a whisper of life, of Patterson, in the voice. “I’m lost. I’m damned. I rolled the dice in the name of ambition, and they came up devil’s eyes. Don’t make my mistakes. Don’t try and fight the rider. You can’t win.”

“Stop that, Robert!” Latimer said fiercely. “I won’t have it! I taught you better than that. Fight him, boy! Fight for your body, and your soul!”

“That’s enough of that,” said the dead man, and once again the voice was dead air moving in a dead throat. “Robert isn’t here any more. I am. He betrayed you and the Institute of his own free will. His body serves me now, as he served me in life. He sold his soul to us long ago, so why should he begrudge me his body? You shouldn’t grieve so, Catherine. It really was a very small soul.”

“Who are you?” said JC. “Come on-you know you want to tell us.”

“Ah, wouldn’t you like to know?” The teasing tone sounded very out of place in a dead man’s mouth. “See if you can guess. I’m not Carnacki Institute, and I’m not Crowley Project. But you people aren’t the only players in the game. You really should have paid more attention to what was going on around you. Now playtime’s over. Time to get down to business and remove some more than usually troublesome pieces from the board.”

Melody pushed herself away from Latimer. She straightened up and glared at JC. “Come on! You’re the clever one! Think of something!”

JC looked back and forth, frowning hard, then his gaze stopped on Happy. “You know… I do have an idea…”

“Oh bugger,” said Happy. “That’s never good. I’m really not going to like this, am I?”

“I said, time for you all to die!” said the dead man.

“Oh hush,” JC said coldly. “We’re talking.

“Go ahead,” said Patterson. “Plot and plan. I do so love to watch my prey squirm.”

“Listen, Happy,” said JC urgently. “You couldn’t get inside his head before, through all the mental shields, but that was only you. What if you had help? What if you linked your mind with mine, with my extra power? And Melody, with her scientific self-control? Could you do that?”

“Well, probably,” said Happy. “These aren’t the best conditions, but stark terror motivates the mind wonderfully. And if I can tap the power within you, use that to strengthen the link… But what then?”

“Then we push the rider out,” said JC.

Happy was already shaking his head. “Even if we could do that, it would step right back in the moment we stopped pushing.”

“Not if we put someone else inside,” said Latimer. They all turned to look at her, but she was looking dispassionately at Kim. The ghost girl stared back at her with wide, frightened eyes. And now JC was shaking his head.

“No. We’re not putting Kim at risk.”

“She’s already dead,” Latimer said ruthlessly. “Nothing more can harm her in this world. She can inhabit Patterson’s body and hold it, deny the rider access. After a while, he’ll have to depart, or risk dissipation. Then she can come back out of the body and let it fall.”

“No,” said JC. “This is a bad idea. A really bad idea. Somebody else come up with another idea.”

“It will work, and you know it,” said Latimer. “And it’s the only real chance we’ve got. You haven’t any more weapons, and I’m completely out of tricks. The ghost girl is our only chance, our only hope.”

“She has a name,” JC said tightly. “Her name is Kim.”