Simon Green - Spirits from Beyond

“Apparently she doesn’t trust you, or the Institute,” JC said flatly. “And she really didn’t feel like being interrogated.”

“She’s been gone some time,” said the Boss, avoiding the pointed comment. “What did your ghost girl have to say for herself? Where has she been? What’s she been doing? What did she learn?”

“She can’t remember,” said JC, calmly.

“What?” said Catherine Latimer. She actually leaned forward in her chair, glaring right into JC’s sunglasses. He met her gaze unflinchingly.

“Some form of traumatic amnesia, apparently,” said JC. “I’m sure her memory will return, in time. As long as she’s not. . pressed. But for now, she can’t tell us anything. Such a pity.”

Catherine Latimer switched her gaze to Melody, then to Happy. They both presented the Boss with their best poker faces though everyone present knew they weren’t fooling anyone. The Boss looked back at JC.

“Did anything happen at Chimera House?”

“Like what?” said JC, not giving an inch.

“Don’t play games with me, Chance.”

“I wouldn’t dare,” said JC. “I did happen to notice that Chimera House hasn’t been pulled down and bulldozed, even though everyone was promised it would be. And it wasn’t in any way whatsoever under armed guard.”

“I know,” said the Boss. “I took the guards away. Chimera House is being left intact, as a trap. To see who or what tries to move back in.”

“You didn’t tell us that,” said Melody.

“I don’t have to tell you everything.”

“And you don’t,” said JC. “What can you tell us about what’s really going on, Boss? How far have your investigations progressed, into the infiltration of the Carnacki Institute? Any names, or facts? Anything you’d care to share with us?”

“I have learned nothing useful, as yet,” said Catherine Latimer. “I have to be careful with what I ask and who I talk to, and even more careful not to reveal how much I know and, more importantly, how little I know, for certain. .”

“Would you tell us?” said Happy. “If you did know something?”

“He’s being very brave, all of a sudden,” said the Boss, still looking at JC. “Back on the pills again, is he?”

“It’s no thanks to you if he is!” said Melody, bristling immediately.

“Happy goes his own way,” said JC. “He always has.”

“Why is everyone talking about me as if I weren’t here?” said Happy, loudly. “Oh hell; I haven’t gone invisible again, have I? I hate it when that happens. .”

“You are entirely visible, every appalling inch of you,” JC reassured him. “Now hush, while the grown-ups talk.” He gave Catherine Latimer his best hard look. “You have been working us very hard, Boss. Working us into the ground, in fact. It’s no wonder some of us are feeling the pressure. It’s been one case after another, often without the mandatory downtime between cases that the rules call for, to help us get our heads back together again.”

“That’s what being an A team means,” said the Boss, sitting back in her chair, entirely unmoved. “You get the most important, and the most dangerous, missions, as and when they arise. Whether you’re rested or not. Now stop changing the subject. I haven’t finished haranguing you yet. I want to know what you were all doing down in the Secret Libraries?”

“You gave me the password,” said JC.

“Yes!” said the Boss. “I gave it to you! I thought with the understanding that you had enough sense to keep it to yourself. At the very least, I expected you to avoid exposing your team members to toxic spiritual material. I’m surprised those two came back out with their souls still attached. . Well, what’s done is done. Hopefully. Did you at least turn up something useful?”

“Not. . useful,” said JC. “Not as such. . But we did uncover a few interesting things. For example, I was looking for information about past strange happenings down in the London Underground; and imagine my surprise when I discovered that all relevant materials had been removed from the Secret Libraries. On your orders.”

Catherine Latimer removed the dark cigarette from her ivory holder and stubbed it out in an ash-tray shaped like a lung. She made no move to light another. She sat in her chair, thinking. She didn’t look particularly surprised or even shocked; but she was quite definitely thinking.

“I gave no such order,” she said finally. “The fact that someone was able to use my name and falsify my authority, in such a way that no-one even questioned it. . is interesting. I shall have to look into that. Makes me wonder what else might have been done in my name that I don’t know about. .”

“Did you know about the piece of The Flesh Undying that had been gifted to the Acquisitions Section?” said JC.

“Of course I know!” said the Boss. “I arranged for it to be put there, in a safe location, as far as possible from the Institute itself. Tell me you haven’t damaged it!”

“More like. . muzzled it,” said Happy, smiling unpleasantly.

Catherine Latimer shook her head slowly. “He worries me; he really does. .”

“You’re doing it again!”

“This is what I’m talking about!” said Catherine Latimer. “Disobeying orders, blundering around, interfering in things you don’t understand!”

“Only because you won’t explain them to us!” said JC.

“You’ve all been making too much noise,” said the Boss. “Drawing too much attention to yourselves. And that. . is getting in the way of my investigations. So I’m sending you away for a while. To deal with a haunted inn, down in the south-west.”

JC, Melody, and Happy all sat up straight in their chairs. They looked at each other, then back at Catherine Latimer.

“What?” said Happy.

“You’re. . sending us away?” said JC. “With everything that’s going on here, after all we’ve uncovered. .”

“That’s why you’re going,” Latimer said firmly.

“What if we don’t want to go?” said Melody. “We’re getting close to some real answers! I can feel it!”

“You’re making waves,” said Latimer. “And that’s not what I need right now. So off to the West Country with you. It’s standard stuff, practically a text-book haunting, nothing too difficult. Not really worthy of an A team, but it’ll do to keep you occupied, and out of the spotlight, until the interest in you dies down.”

“Interest?” said Happy. “What interest? Who’s interested in us?”

“You don’t need to know,” said Catherine Latimer.

“Story of my life,” muttered Happy.

“Treated like mushrooms,” Melody said harshly. “Kept in the dark and fed shit.”

“Go sort out the haunted inn,” Latimer said flatly. “Do a good job. Don’t talk to strangers. Don’t get killed. And take your time coming back.”

Happy was up and out of his chair and heading for the slowly opening door the moment it was clear to him the meeting was over. Melody took her own sweet time getting up, to make a point, and still managed to catch up with Happy before he was out the door. JC stood up, checked that his incredible white suit was hanging properly, and only then looked at the Boss.

“So what did happen to the Empty Librarian?”

“Nothing, as far as I know,” said Catherine Latimer.

Later that evening, following a series of railway journeys that went on that little bit longer than body and soul could easily bear, JC and Happy and Melody arrived at that old country inn, the King’s Arms, outside the small country town of Bishop’s Fording. An old farming community, of old houses in an old setting.