Mike Carey - Thicker Than Water

‘I’ll walk,’ I said. Just bravado, of course, but I didn’t feel like taking Gary’s charity right then.

‘I’m not your enemy, Fix,’ he told me.

‘You said.’

‘And I’m still here if you need anything I’m in a position to give.’

I walked out into the night without bothering to answer.

There was no point going back to the hospital. I’d left a few bits and pieces there, but nothing I couldn’t pick up again on the move. My coat was on my back and my whistle was in my coat. The rest was just details, really. I knew where I had to go, and more or less what I’d do when I got there.

I took a cab back to Pen’s, found her still out on the town, so I borrowed an overnight bag from her wardrobe and left her a note. But while I was writing it, I thought of another piece of unfinished business that was hanging over me. And since I didn’t know how long I’d be away for, now seemed like the best — if not the only — time to do it.

I went down to the kitchen and found Pen’s car keys where she always left them, in the bowl of dusty imitation fruit on top of the Welsh dresser. Ten minutes later I was driving around the North Circular towards Wembley.

I called Juliet while I was en route to tell her where we were going, and who we’d see when we got there. She didn’t ask for any further details. ‘I’ll be ready,’ was all she said.

Juliet and Susan live in a minuscule terraced house in Royal Oak that had formerly belonged to Susan’s mother. It had been a tip in old Mrs Book’s day, but they’ve done it up really nicely now — although I suspect, without any evidence beyond the obvious, that all the nesting instincts are on Susan’s side. It’s hard to imagine Juliet with a paint roller in her hand. Someone’s still-beating heart is more her speed.

When I knocked on the door, Susan Book answered. Her face was a little troubled.

‘Jules is just coming, Felix,’ she said. ‘But are you sure you need her for this? It’s very late.’

I reflected for a moment on the implications of this: that succubi tend to prefer early bedtimes, possibly with a mug of cocoa, and might get peaky and over-tired if they stayed up past midnight. Of course, being the person who shared Juliet’s bed was bound to give you very strong opinions about how much time she spent in it.

‘It was kind of her call, Sue,’ I said. ‘I’m visiting an old acquaintance, and Juliet told me a while back that she wanted in.’

Susan still didn’t look altogether chipper about the whole deal, which made me wonder if she’d already quizzed Juliet about it and failed to get a straight answer.

‘It shouldn’t take us long,’ I promised. ‘I just want to deliver a message.’

Susan looked at me doubtfully. ‘But who to?’ she demanded.

‘Someone who isn’t going to want to sit still and listen. But there shouldn’t be any trouble. The someone in question won’t make too many waves because this will be at his own place, where he’s got to worry about keeping up appearances.’

‘I’m here,’ Juliet said, walking down the stairs at that exact moment. I was relieved, because any further questions were neatly forestalled.

Susan stood aside to let Juliet walk on by. A glance passed between them.

‘I’ll just be an hour,’ Juliet said. ‘Perhaps an hour and a half. If you’re still awake when I get back, I’ll massage your back.’

A series of mostly pornographic images flashed on my inner eye, but I strove manfully to censor them for decency and good taste.

Susan nodded and the two women kissed. It went on for long enough that I had to take an interest in the wallpaper so as not to feel like a voyeur.

‘Let’s go,’ Juliet said, when she had sole possession of her own lips again.

Susan squeezed her hand, gave her a slightly brittle smile. ‘See you later,’ she said.

On the A1081, as we breached the M25 ring and headed north towards St Albans, Juliet broke the silence that had fallen between us.

‘You’re making no progress,’ she said.

‘At the Salisbury? No, you’re right. I’m getting nowhere fast.’

‘And you blame me.’

I thought about that one. ‘I wish you’d picked another time to get strong and silent on me,’ I admitted. ‘This has turned into a fucking nightmare.’

‘But still you invited me to come with you tonight.’

‘Well, you asked. And to be honest, I might need the back-up. He’s a whimsical little sod, and he’s got it into his head that we’re playing on different teams.’

‘Is he wrong?’

‘Usually, no. But this time, I think I might be able to bring him round to my way of thinking.’

Juliet digested that statement for a moment or two, various emotions passing over her expressive face. The last time Juliet and Gwillam had crossed swords, he’d managed to get the drop on her with a Bible reading — the Good Book being to him what a tin whistle is to me. It had rankled with her for a long time afterwards, because it meant that she’d been in his power, however briefly. He might even have been able to banish her to wherever demons go after they’re exorcised, which is nowhere good: or possibly just nowhere, full stop.

‘I’m looking forward to seeing him again,’ she said at last. ‘It will be . . . interesting.’

‘But I don’t want any trouble unless he starts it,’ I clarified. ‘This is a public-information campaign, not a vendetta.’

Juliet looked at me with detached curiosity. ‘And why is that, Castor?’

‘Because he’s more use to me as an ally right now than as a corpse,’ I said bluntly.

‘And if he refuses to be an ally?’

‘Then we’ll have to see.’

Church Street turned out to be a very narrow road in the middle of a bewildering one-way system at the further end of St Albans High Street. I left Pen’s car illegally parked in front of some gates that led God knew where, and we looked for the Rosewell Ecumenical Trust. It was a modest-looking building that seemed to have been made by knocking two old workmen’s cottages into one structure. The sober, black-painted door looked fairly solid, but came equipped with both a bell and a knocker. I applied myself to both.

While we waited for an answer, Juliet examined the wards that were nailed to the doorposts and the stay-not painted on the wall. They were intended to deter the dead, and the undead, from entering this place.

‘Anything likely to slow you down?’ I asked.

She shook her head brusquely. ‘Not for a moment. They make my skin itch a little, but they won’t keep me out.’

There was a sound from inside of bolts being drawn. A very unecumenical face stared out at us: pug-ugly and brimming with surly suspicion, topped with black hair in a military-length razor cut.

‘Yes?’ it said.

‘We’re here to see Father Gwillam,’ I said, giving him a beaming smile.

He tried to shut the door in our faces, so Juliet slammed it back into his. Then she pushed him up against the wall of the narrow vestibule and I walked on in past him. He rallied, driving a punch into Juliet’s kidneys that actually made her frown slightly. She gripped his throat, slapped him across the face hard enough to make his head snap round a full ninety degrees, and then pitched him out into the street where he fetched up in a heap against a parked car. Its sidelights started to flash and it wailed on a rising pitch as its alarm went off.

Juliet closed the door on the intrusive sound. I looked around me. The ground-floor layout of the place was what an estate agent would have described as deceptively spacious: we were in a hall with a tiled floor, from which three doors opened off. The decor was High Victorian, which in the Catholic Church almost passes for contemporary. The inadequate light came from uplighters high up on the walls and from a heavy and unlovely wrought-iron chandelier suspended from three evenly spaced chains.