The Doorkeepers

Sixteen

It was the smell that hit them first, and all three of them cried out in a chorus of disgust. Josh couldn’t imagine how it hadn’t permeated the whole house; and then he realized that he had been smelling it, all the way upstairs, and that he hadn’t really registered what it was. And then there was the noise: the furious zizzing of hundreds of glittering bluebottles as he disturbed them in the middle of their feasting and their egg-laying.

The smell was ripe and sweet and almost visibly green. All of the bathroom windows were closed and an electric wall-heater had been left on, which had increased the temperature inside the bathroom to well over eighty degrees. Above the bath hung a wooden drying-frame, intended for drip-dry shirts and pantyhose. But spreadeagled on this frame was what appeared at first sight to be a half-gutted animal.

It was only when Josh stepped closer, keeping his hand clamped over his nose and mouth, that he understood what he was actually looking at. The animal was a woman – a naked, gray-haired woman, her body split wide open from her chin to her pubic hair. It was impossible to see who she was, or who she might have been, because her face was crawling with bluebottles, as if she were wearing a living Mardi Gras mask.

On the green-tiled wall, a large cross had been marked in blood and excrement.

Josh pulled the door shut. Nancy was already halfway down the stairs, with Simon close behind her. Simon didn’t bother to go back through the kitchen: he snatched open the front door and took three stiff-legged steps outside, gasping for air. Nancy leaned up against the porch, both hands clasped over her stomach, saying, “God … oh my God. That was appalling.”

Josh said, “We’d better get out of here. Whoever did that to Mrs Marmion, they won’t hesitate to do it to us, too.”

“The Hoodies,” said Simon. “Didn’t you see the cross? They always do that.”

They climbed back into the Austin. Simon swung the starting-handle and the motor chugged into life. Then he executed a fifteen-point turn, with a gladiatorial clashing of gears, and managed to point the car back the way they had come.

“They must have guessed that we were coming to see her,” said Nancy.

“I doubt if it was a guess,” put in Simon. “The Hoodies have people in the telephone exchange, they listen to everything. You can’t even phone up your fishmonger without them knowing about it.”

“Isn’t that illegal?”

“Course not. It’s all allowed under the God’s Word Act. They can’t allow people to talk a lot of popery, even in private.”

They drove down St John’s Hill toward Wandsworth. Josh glanced out of the rear window from time to time to make sure that they weren’t being followed, but there was a convoy of three buses behind them which would have made it very difficult for anybody to keep them in sight.

Nancy said, “We can’t stay here, Josh. It’s much too dangerous. We have to go back.”

“Not bad advice, guvnor,” said Simon. “Even if it was Frank Mordant that topped your sister, how are you going to prove it? So far as this world’s concerned, she never existed, so she couldn’t have been topped; and so far as your world’s concerned, Frank Mordant is gone without a trace, ain’t he, and you try convincing your constabulary to come here and collar him.”

“You’re not suggesting I let him get away with it?”

“I don’t see that you’ve got very much choice. You’ve got a body in one world and a murderer in another, and never the twain shall meet. You might find proof enough to get him arrested, even without a body. But then there’s the question of the Hoodies. It looks like he’s come to some sort of arrangement with them; and if that’s the case, you won’t have a dog’s chance of getting him convicted. One wink to the reeve and that’ll be it, no case to answer, your worship. You saw that woman back there. They’re a law unto themselves, the Hoodies. Do what they like, say what they like, kill who they like; and all in the name of God.”

“Josh, we have to go back,” Nancy insisted.

“The world’s taken a turn around since you first arrived,” put in Simon. “You can go back as soon as you like.”

“I’m not sure,” said Josh. “What if I can never find my way back here again? How can I spend the rest of my life knowing that the man who strangled Julia is going unpunished? And if he murdered John Farbelow’s girlfriend, too, how many times has he done it before, and how many times is he going to do it again?”

“There are times in this vale of tears, guvnor, when we just have to admit that we’re up against a brick wall.”

“That’s exactly right. We are up against a brick wall. But you and I know that if you have enough faith, you can jump right through that brick wall.”

“Can’t see your constabulary swallowing that. Even if they did, they wouldn’t have any jurisdiction over here, now would they?”

“I wasn’t talking about the cops. There are other ways of settling scores than calling the cops.”

“Like what?” Nancy demanded. “Killing Frank Mordant yourself?”

“Of course not. But if he did do it, I can think of a whole lot of ways to make his life a misery. Mind you, if I did kill him, I wouldn’t be caught for it, would I? Any more than he’s ever going to be caught for killing Julia. But it would be justice.”

“Justice? If you killed him, then you’d be just as evil as he is. Besides, I can’t imagine you having the nerve to kill anybody. You killed that dog and you can’t stop blaming yourself.”

“The dog was innocent.”

“The dog was going to kill a man. You had to make a choice. Now you have to make another choice.”

“You ought to think about going back, guvnor,” said Simon, his eyes floating in the rear-view mirror. “You don’t want to underestimate the Hoodies, believe you me; and if Frank Mordant really is their man they won’t let you get away with giving him grief. You’ll be looking over your shoulder for the rest of your natural. I’ll tell you something else: don’t trust that John Farbelow further than you can throw him. He’s the kind of cove who gets everybody else to do his dirty work for him. For all you know, he’s got a grudge against Frank Mordant for something quite different, and there never was no girl what he met on the number fifteen bus. What could suit him better than for you to do his topping for him?”

Nancy reached across and sandwiched Josh’s hand between hers. She was looking tired and stressed, and he could see that the sight of Mrs Marmion had been just too much for her. He suddenly realized how tired he was, and how dirty he felt. They needed to get back to “real” London for a rest and a shower, if nothing else.

“OK, then,” he said. “Take us to Star Yard. Do you know anyplace where we can buy some candles?”

“Ironmongers on the corner here, guvnor.”

Simon parked the car and left them sitting in the back seat while he went to buy some candles. Nancy said, “You shouldn’t come back here again, Josh. You’ve got an idea of what might have happened to Julia … you don’t need to follow it up any further.”

“I’m sorry, Nance, that’s where you’re wrong. There’s no way that I can leave this unfinished.”

“But what about the Hooded Men? Look what they did to that woman!”

“That’s exactly my point. There have been Hooded Men all through history, of one kind or another. The day we let them intimidate us, that’s the day we might as well get our dogs to dig us some graves, and scoop the earth back on top of us.”

“Of everybody in the world, Josh, you’re the only person I know who could persuade a dog to do that.”

They drove through crawling traffic along the Embankment until they reached Charing Cross. The rain was even heavier now, and as they turned up Villiers Street the sidewalks were crowded with bobbing black umbrellas. Villiers Street was a steep gradient, and the Austin whinnied up it like a protesting old horse. On the corner of the Strand, a drummer was silhouetted, his triangular black hat dripping with rainwater.

“Keep your heads down,” Simon advised them. “He’s a Watcher. He probably won’t recognize you, but you never know your bloody rotten luck.”

It took them nearly twenty minutes to drive from Santa Cruz Square to the Aldwych. The road was clogged with buses and horse-drawn wagons, and two enormous horse-drawn drays were drawn up outside a half-timbered pub called The Battle of Winceby. The rain trickled down the Austin’s windows and Simon kept tapping the thermometer gauge because the engine was overheating.

At last they turned into Chancery Lane, and then left into Carey Street. The torrential rain had forced a pieman to cover up his “Eric the Pie” stall with wet tarpaulins and wheel it away, and Simon was able to park in the space that he had just vacated. There was still a smell of hot coke and beef pies in the rain as Josh and Nancy and Simon climbed out of the Austin. They made their way up Star Yard, their collars pulled up, their heads ducked down.

They reached the niche, which was still clogged up with wet rubbish. Simon took the brown-paper package of candles out of his pocket, and set three of them down on the ground. He produced a cigarette lighter and flicked it, and managed to light two of the candles, but every time he tried to light the third it was instantly extinguished by the rain.

“Come on, you bastard,” he snarled at it, and tried to light it again. It managed to flicker for a moment, but then the rain put it out again, and then another candle went out.

“Here,” said Josh, and leaned over him, holding his coat out like an umbrella. Simon managed to light all three candles for a few triumphant seconds, but as soon as Josh stepped away, two of them went out again.

“How about finding someplace to wait this rain out?” Josh suggested. “A pub, maybe. I don’t know about you, but I could sure use a serious drink.”

Simon flicked his cigarette lighter yet again. “No good hanging around, guvnor. The forecast is, bucketing down till next Wednesday fortnight. Hold your coat up again.”

Josh leaned over the niche once more, and Simon managed to light all three candles. This time, Josh stayed where he was, to give the wicks time to burn more strongly. But as he waited, he thought he heard a faint sound like a train approaching, over a jointed track.

He shook his wet hair. It was difficult to distinguish anything over the clatter of the rain and the roaring of buses and the sizzle of tires on the tarmac-covered cobbles. “Do you hear that?” he asked Nancy. “Kind of like a train.”

Nancy lifted her head. Her forehead was decorated with beads of rain, and her eyelashes sparkled. She listened for a moment, and then she nodded. “Drums” she said.

Simon stood up, too. “They’re coming nearer. They’re definitely coming nearer.”

“They don’t know that we’re here, do they? How do they know that we’re here?”

“Perhaps that Watcher spotted us. Don’t ask me, I’m not a per-sychic.”

“Maybe they’re not coming this way,” said Nancy. But the trat-a-trat-trat was growing louder and louder; and it wasn’t long before they could hear it quite distinctly over the grinding of the traffic.

“We’re going to have to go,” said Josh. “Simon … you’d better get the hell out of here. Tell me where to find you when I come back.”

“Josh …” said Nancy. She wasn’t only warning him to hurry, she was telling him that she didn’t want him to come back, ever.

“Go to the British Museum. John Farbelow will know where to find me.”

“OK,” said Josh, and grasped his hand. “And, look, if I don’t make it back …”

The drums were battering off the sides of the nearby buildings, and people were hurrying past them as fast as they could. Even if you hadn’t lied or stolen or committed a blasphemy, even if you didn’t have a Book of Common Prayer secreted under your mattress, it was better to keep well out of the way of the drums and the dogs and the Hooded Men.

“Nancy, you first,” said Josh. Nancy took three steps back and said, “Jack be nimble, Jack be quick, Jack jump over the candlestick.”

As she ran forward, however, a rain-filled gust swept across the sidewalk, and all of the candles blew out. She struck the brick wall with her shoulder and almost fell over.

“There’s no time to do this now,” said Josh. “Let’s get out of here and try it again later, when we can rig up something to keep the candles alight.”

At that moment, however, dog-handlers came round the corner of Star Yard and Carey Street, and drummers appeared behind them, from the direction of Chancery Lane. The drumming was totally deafening now. It seemed to make the rain rattle and the paving slabs shake. And behind the drummers, Josh could see the silhouettes of Puritan hats and buckles, and heads that were covered in hessian hoods, and the shine of long sharp swords.

Simon was down on his knees, frantically trying to relight the candles. He lit one, then another, and then another. Josh put his arm around Nancy and held her tight, and she covered her ears to blot out the drumming. The first candle blew out, but Simon persisted and lit it again, just as the first of the dogs came barking and slathering up to him.

“Jump!” Josh shouted at Nancy. He seized hold of her fringed buckskin sleeves and almost threw her over the candles, toward the solid brick wall. She landed on the other side of the candles, and turned.

“Josh, you too!” she cried out, in a distorted, watery voice.

Josh took a step back, ready to jump, but as he did so one of the dogs seized the cuff of his pants. He swung his leg, trying to shake it loose. Simon, right next to him, gave it a kick in the ribs. But Josh knew that you could set one of these dogs on fire before they would open their jaws.

“Josh!” screamed Nancy. “You have to jump!”

Josh swung his leg again, hitting the dog against the sidewalk with a crunch that must have broken one of its legs, but it still clung on. Simon reached down to seize its collar, but as he did so Josh caught the shine of steel out of the corner of his eye. At the instant that Simon’s fingers closed around the studded leather choker, a straight-bladed sword came down with a chappp! sound and cut right through his wrist. Simon didn’t scream. He didn’t utter a sound. But he fell backward on to the candles with blood jetting out of his severed wrist like water out of a garden hose.

Josh felt a powerful hand seize his hair and wrench his head back. He felt hessian scratch against the side of his head. A sword was held across his throat, and a harsh voice said, “You won’t move a single muscle, sir, or else I’ll have your head off.”

In the niche, Nancy stared back at him in desperation. He wanted to yell, “Go!” but the sword was just touching his Adam’s apple and he was afraid that his captor would cut his throat if he tried to shout out. All he could do was stare at her and will her to carry on.

One of the dog-handlers came forward and snapped, “Spit it out, Rancour,” and the dog that had been gripping Josh’s pants released its grip. It trotted back to stand by its master with Simon’s hand still clutching its collar and Simon’s blood still matting the fur on its back.

Down on the sidewalk, Simon had gone into shock. He was trembling like a run-over stag and his eyes had rolled up into his head. One of the drummers knelt beside him and looped a lanyard around his arm, just below his elbow, and knotted it tight. The blood stopped spurting across the yard, but it was still leaking all over the paving stones, and so the drummer wrapped a grimy-looking cloth around it and told Simon to press it against his stump as hard as he could.

“Jesus save me,” Simon quivered, through whitened lips.

“Oh, Jesus will save you, mate,” said the drummer. “Jesus saved Barabbas, didn’t he?”

Nancy was still hesitating. None of the Hooded Men made any attempt to follow her, and of course they couldn’t, unless they relit the candles. She was already through to the “real” London – a different existence altogether. With an expression of bewilderment and anguish, she lifted both hands, with the palms flat, as if she were pressing them against a window. Josh knew what it meant: I love you, and I’m not going to abandon you. She stood like that for three or four helpless seconds, before she turned and walked away. She turned right and then she was gone.

“Pity your poor lady,” said the Hooded Man. “She’s going to miss all the amusements.”

“Call an ambulance!” Josh demanded. “If this man doesn’t receive medical attention right now he’s going to go into deep shock.”

“He’ll have his ambulance. Meanwhile, you can come with us.”

“What am I supposed to have done?”

“Did I say that you’d done anything? We’d like to engage you in a little conversation, that’s all.”

“And supposing I don’t want to?”

“Oh, you will, sir. Believe me, you will.”

Josh was turned around and pushed firmly against the opposite wall. There was a broken guttering high above his head and the rainwater splattered against his shoulder. He tried to edge sideways but one of the Hooded Men prodded him with his sword. “Stay where you have been told to stay.”

“I’m an American citizen. You don’t have any right to hold me like this.”

“Yes, I do.”

“At least let me talk to the US Embassy.”

“You’re making no sense, sir.”

The Hooded Man quickly searched through his pockets and discovered his billfold in the back pocket of his jeans. He sorted through his credit cards and his driver’s license and his photographs of Julia and Nancy.

“Joshua B. Winward, is that your name?”

“You can read, can’t you? How about calling that ambulance?”

“If I were you, Mr Joshua B. Winward, I would concern myself more with my own welfare.”

“But you’re not me. You’re just a goddamned sadist with a sack over his head.”

The Hooded Man, unexpectedly, laughed. “You have a great deal to learn about life in this London, sir. A very great deal. Now, let’s get you off and ask you some questions.”

“I’m not saying anything.”

“Wiser if you do, sir. We don’t want to have to open you up, do we, and read what we want to know from the disposition of your vitals?”

“I see … you’re going to cut me open, just like you cut open that woman in Lavender Hill.”

“Keep your peace, sir.”

They heard an ambulance bell approaching from Chancery Lane. Simon, without warning, began to wave the stump of his arm in the air and scream. He screamed so loudly that one of the dog-handlers slapped his face with his dog leash, but it didn’t stop him. Two or three of the dogs began to join in his screaming with a mournful howling of their own.

What with that, and the rain, and the fact that he was now alone with the Hooded Men, Josh began to feel that – even if he hadn’t really returned from Purgatory – he had certainly been sent to hell.