Rupert Thomson - The Five Gates of Hell

‘We pick them up,’ the Skull was saying, ‘they’re guys with no links, like on the pier or down in the meat streets, they’re always suckers for a few lines and a limousine. We pick them up, we take them somewhere, then we turn them blue. There’s a guy we know, works in the morgue, he gets the delivery. Few hours later he calls, we’re the funeral parlour, right? he’s recommended us, we do the honours, bury them,’ and his mouth opened like a grave, you could fall into that mouth for ever and ever, amen, and all those crooked grey teeth of his, no names that you could see, no names or dates, just blank, so nobody could find you, nobody could visit, nobody could leave flowers. ‘I mean, if you’re going to die you want a decent burial, stands to reason, doesn’t it, and who better to give you a decent burial,’ he said, ‘than the Paradise Corporation. You, me,’ and he levelled a hand at Creed, ‘and the chairman.’

Creed put his glass of water down. ‘Skull,’ he said, ‘just shut up, will you?’

That vial again. Some amyl too, which blew Jed’s head up like a mushroom cloud. In the distance, in a big gilt cage, he could see nude bodies gluing and ungluing, the sticky rhythmic contact of flesh. Male or female, he couldn’t tell. Did it matter? Flesh of some kind. Tourists, maybe. Kill them later. His vision shrank. Their table again. McGowan was running on about his gun collection.

It was after four when they reached the Palace. McGowan vanished with a couple they’d brought home in the car. A buzzing started up. Some kind of aid. That psychopath. Jed looked across at Creed and saw that Creed was already staring at him. Jed didn’t flinch. He remembered what Sharon had said about him, remembered the chill in his eyes. Eyes that’ve killed. He never blinks. It’s like those lizards.

‘You remember what you said about loyalty?’

Jed snapped back at the sound of Creed’s voice. ‘About it being silence?’

Creed nodded.

‘I remember.’

‘It’s kind of passive, silence,’ Creed said, ‘isn’t it?’

‘Well,’ Jed said, ‘you don’t do anything.’

‘That’s what I mean. So would you go further? Do something?’

There could be no hesitation here. ‘Yes.’

‘Make yourself comfortable, Jed. Take your jacket off.’

Jed’s stomach lurched. Had Creed suspected? ‘No, it’s all right. I think I’ll keep it on.’

‘What’s wrong? You cold?’

Sharon’s words. In Creed’s mouth. Did he have another virginity to lose? ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Just a bit.’

Imagine if he had to take his jacket off. All his insurance would be gone. But Creed had turned away and Jed breathed easier.

‘Do you know who talked to the papers?’ Creed said.

Jed shook his head. ‘I’ve no idea.’

‘It was your friend,’ Creed said. ‘Your old buddy.’

Jed felt a trap closing. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘Vasco Gorelli,’ Creed said. ‘It was Vasco Gorelli talked to the papers.’

‘How do you know?’

Creed traced the outline of his drink with one finger. ‘I put a couple of new vultures on it. You know what those new vultures are like. Keen isn’t the word. They get right down to the bones of things. They tear out the truth. Blood, guts, organs, the lot.’ He paused. ‘Gorelli said he was loyal,’ and he looked across at Jed and his eyes glittered.

Curiously it was Vasco’s advice that Jed remembered now. Be single-pointed. No grey areas. ‘He sold you out.’

‘He lost his nerve,’ Creed said. ‘But you,’ again that glitter in his eyes, ‘you’d do anything for me.’

‘That’s what I said.’

‘You’d lie.’

Jed thought of that night at Mitch’s and what he’d said to Sharon. ‘I already have.’

‘You’d steal.’

‘No problem.’ He knew what was coming now. It was like counting down to an explosion. He waited for the blast. He braced himself.

Creed’s hand reached carelessly for his glass of water. ‘You’d kill someone.’

This had to sound right. First a chuckle, then the words, ‘Why? You got someone in mind?’

Creed didn’t lift his eyes from his drink. He was watching that pure water the way you’d watch a fire.

The dread rose through Jed’s body. He had to speak before he drowned in it. But he remembered to use names. He was taping this. He needed names. ‘It’s Vasco,’ he said, ‘isn’t it?’

Still Creed watched his drink. ‘Too obvious.’

Jed tried to think. His mind kept curving away, the way a golf ball curves when it’s sliced or hooked. That beautiful, lazy parabola into somewhere you don’t want to be.

‘Think sideways,’ Creed said. ‘I don’t want to kill Vasco, I just want him,’ and finally he raised his eyes and smiled, and the smile was almost benign. ‘I just want him to pay.’

Jed got it. ‘Vasco’s brother.’

Creed lifted his glass. ‘Congratulations.’

But Jed had to make sure. ‘You want me to kill Vasco’s brother?’

‘That’s right.’

‘How?’

‘Don’t you worry about that. It’s taken care of. It’s nice. Yes,’ and Creed leaned back in his chair, ‘we’re going to send Gorilla a little Christmas present.’

‘You’re going to send him his brother,’ Jed said, ‘dead.’

Creed smirked. ‘Something like that.’

Jed left the apartment at ten to six, the wheels still turning next to his heart. He couldn’t sleep now. He took the service elevator down to the parking-lot and got into his car. As he drove across Moon River Bridge, the day rose over the estuary, the colours you find in the skin of fish: brown and pink and palest blue. He stopped the car at the Baker Park end. Leaving the engine running, he went and leaned on the railings. The metal cool against his palms, his heart still pummelling, he drew the fresh dawn air into his lungs. The wind had blown the surface of the river into streaky lines, stretchmarks on the water’s tired skin. Gulls picked at the mudbanks where once he’d searched for jewellery. He heard a voice call Vasco’s name. It was Vasco’s brother, Francis. The boy behind the door. He turned to face the ocean.

Just before he left, Creed had given him the date. Next Wednesday. Exactly a week from now. And as he leaned against the railings he suddenly tasted it, the moment Creed had planned for him, the moment he’d always longed for, dreaded now, still longed for, and it was burnt sugar, sweet and caustic, on his tongue, it was like the flight of a bird across a window, it was there and it was gone, he couldn’t dwell on it, he couldn’t let the terror in, all he knew was what it would do for him, he knew that it would give him membership, he’d be past the sliding sheet of glass, he’d finally belong.

During the next week he concentrated on his job to the exclusion of all else. He was silent, deferential, precise — the perfect chauffeur. He didn’t need to wire himself. There was nothing being said, nothing to record. This was empty time. He felt close to Creed. Superimposed on him, somehow. Bound. He thought he recognised in Creed qualities that he had himself: the ability to wait and to charge the act of waiting with the current of anticipation, to check and double-check, so that when the waiting was over everything would go like clockwork. He knew that, if he ever told Creed the story of the radios, Creed would understand. It might even be something that Creed already understood, that he’d divined on their first meeting in the Mortlake office. It was something they recognised in each other and shared. It made them, Jed thought with satisfaction, extremely dangerous enemies.

Wednesday came around. When Creed called, Jed was watching a news report about a vulture who’d just been arrested on a murder charge. Apparently he’d brought the corpse in and then tried to claim commission on it.