The Dirty Streets of Heaven

“Because I need information, ladies, and I need it badly. Several not very nice people and some even less nice things are trying to kill me. I want to know what you can tell me about any of them.”

“Do we have to keep talking to the pitchers?” asked Clarence. “I mean, where are they now? Can you see them? ’Cause I can’t.”

“He is a strange one, in’t he?” said Doris. “Poor thing.”

“Count yourself lucky, bab,” Betty told him. “If you don’t like us in the cream pitcher, it could be worse. Sometimes we get into the sarnies. That’d make you lose weight, woont it? Your bacon bap talking back to you?”

“Sarnie?” the rookie said helplessly. “Bap?”

“Sandwiches,” I translated. “You ready to listen, ladies?”

“First let us get comfy, like,” Doris said, and suddenly they were both there. Well, not there, not in the three-dimensional sense, but present and visible in a filmy sort of way, two slightly purply-blue, mostly transparent and fairly podgy middle-aged ladies in what I’ve always assumed were outfits from the 1940s: dark dresses, heavy cloth coats, and hats. We were sitting in a four-person booth so one of them was next to each of us, Betty beside Clarence, and Doris next to me. Clarence tried to look like it didn’t bother him at all, but he also kept sliding away until he struck up against the wall of the booth.

“Mardy little bugger, isn’t he?” said Betty. Her hat was festooned with artificial flowers. “Cheer up, lad-it might never happen!”

As the waitress returned with our food, I explained the last few days to them all. I had to trim out some details I wasn’t sure I wanted to share with the kid, but I was able to lay out the most important bits. When I finished, the Sollyhull Sisters seemed to be listening carefully. The first question, though, made me wonder.

“Do you remember that boy from Erdington we were at school with?” asked Doris. “The one who had nasty crawly things in his pocket?”

“That Hamish? I was just thinking of him too,” her sister said.

“He was like that, wasn’t he? Trying to hide things from teacher, but she always sussed it out.”

“You two are not going to get even another sniff of that Yardley if you don’t start helping me,” I said sternly.

“We are, pigeon, we are,” said Betty, rippling a little with impatience. “So just shut it and listen. This Hamish used to have things in his pockets he shouldn’t-snakes, beetles, once he had a live mouse, can you believe it? — but he was his own worst enemy, wasn’t he, our Dor? He truly was, he always made a fuss whenever the teacher looked at him, squirming and looking away from her so she always knew when he was up to no good. It was as good as saying, ‘I’ve got something I shouldn’t!’”

“Am I supposed to understand this?” I asked.

“Don’t be thick, pigeon,” Doris told me. “It dunt become you. She’s saying that you can see things better when you’re face to face with someone. Most folk can’t help showing what they’re thinking if you’re ’round them long enough.”

“Right.” Betty nodded as though that had made sense.

“Meaning what? Look, ladies, I’ve almost had my skin ripped off my body several times in the last couple of days. I may not look it, but I’m scared. Can you just talk plainly for me?”

Doris sighed. “Put it about that you do have this thing. See who shows up to dicker for it. That’ll lead to conversation.”

“But I don’t care about the people who want to buy it, I want to find the missing thing-the thing itself- because if he doesn’t get his thing back, one of the major lords of Hell is going to remove all my nerves and organs. And there’s no way that can turn out well.”

“We’re just trying to help, love. You don’t even know what it is that got stolen. But if you put it out that you do have it and then see what you get offered for it you might find out. That would make it a lot easier to find the thing, now wouldn’t it? Knowing what kind of a thing it is?”

“Actually,” said Clarence, “that makes sense.”

“Yeah,” I told him, “the kind of sense that will get me killed in new ways I haven’t even imagined yet. And here I was just worrying about the old ways.” I pushed my plate away. Suddenly I didn’t feel much like finishing my Belgian waffle, although usually I can choke down anything with sugar in or on it, no matter how beat up I am. “Speaking of the old ways of me getting killed, ladies, any insights about my horned friend, the ghallu? Because I have a feeling I haven’t seen the last of it.”

Doris frowned and nodded sympathetically. “Oh, that’s a bad one, pigeon. We’ve been asking all of our friends on the other side for the last few minutes, but nobody likes to talk about such things, even those old enough to remember. Them ghallu, they’re dead yampy-completely mad. They’ll eat their way through a mountain just to break a rabbit’s neck on other side.”

“Thanks for those words of colloquial wisdom,” I said. “What can I do to stop it?”

“Not much, bab,” said Betty. “A spell of dismissal, but you’d have to get the same fella who summoned it to dismiss it as well.”

“Great. I’m pretty sure that’s not going to happen, because the fella who summoned it is probably the same Eligor, King Bad Ass of Hell Corners, who wants me so interestingly dead.” I said it a little more emphatically than I should have, perhaps, and I heard one of the delivery drivers drop a spoon.

“Sssshhhh!” Betty wiggled her stubby fingers. “Don’t say the fella’s name out loud.”

The two delivery drivers finally got up to go. They’d been watching Clarence and me talking for several minutes, and of course we had only occasionally been talking to each other, the rest of the time to empty spaces in the booth. It seemed to have disconcerted the drivers; they left a pile of money on their table and inched past us wearing unconvincing smiles.

“Ooh, I fancy that second one a bit,” Betty said. “He’s got a nice bum.”

Doris hooted with laughter. “You old slapper!”

“Focus, ladies, please.” My head was beginning to hurt. The Sollyhulls are decent enough for dead people, but trying to get anything out of them requires the patience of a saint. “Ghallu, remember? As in, how do I kill it?”

“We don’t know, love,” said Doris. “Silver works on some demons, but on these big, old ones, well…” She trailed off.

“Maybe if you popped it one right in the heart with a silver bullet,” said Betty-trying to sound like Jimmy Cagney, I guessed, but it didn’t make it any more convincing. “Or popped it four or five, more likely, and it wasn’t well…”

“Believe me, I’ll try silver, but judging by past experience it’s a bit like trying to aim a rubber band at a tiger while it’s busy trying to knock your head off.” I moved around in my seat to unkink my bruised and aching back, then took a last swallow of my coffee. “Anything else, ladies? About the ghallu or any other subject?”

“Oh, yes, one,” Doris said. “Your Grasswax fella? That prosecutor?”

“I remember him well-his outside and his insides.”

“We used to hear a bit of him,” said Betty as if she’d started the sentence. Sometimes it seemed like they were one person, the way they finished each other’s thoughts, but I guess that’s what happens when you’ve been living together (or living and dead together) for over a hundred years. “He had a gambling problem. That’s what we heard.”

I waited. “That’s all? He was from Hell, ladies-of course he had vices. I don’t think you’re allowed to live there unless you do. Not having vices would be a vice, if you get what I mean. So what of it?”

Betty frowned, a thin, nearly transparent line on her even more transparent face. “We told you, Bobby love, don’t get stroppy. People who have the gambling fever tend to owe people things. Money. Favors. We just thought we’d mention it.”

I stared at them for a moment, and they looked back at me expectantly. “Right,” I said. It wasn’t like I’d come up with anything better on my own. “Thank you, ladies. I’ll think it all over. Come on, Clarence.”

As the kid sat wondering how to get out of his seat without sliding through the ghost of Betty Sollyhull, I took the bag back out of my pocket, removed the bottle of English Lavender, and discreetly poured it on the floor. As the almost asphyxiating smell of the stuff rose around me I dropped an extra twenty on top of our bill. As we reached