got to grips with it on several occasions. The engineer who had come to fix the little black box said he was totally mystified by the way it kept breaking down. Jim didn’t have the plastic card thing any more, Jim had to ring the bell.
Jim rang the bell.
But there wasn’t any answer.
Jim inspected the bell push. It was possible, just possible, that the bell push was broken. Stone at the window? No, that wasn’t such a good idea, not after what happened last time. Jim shrugged. She was probably out somewhere. Should he hang around, or just go home? Jim leaned back against the front door. The front door swung open and Jim fell backwards into the hall.
“Ouch,” said Jim, struggling to his feet.
The door swung shut, but it didn’t lock. The keep was hanging off the wall.
“Well, that wasn’t my fault,” said Jim. “I didn’t do that.”
Jim now did those dusting downs that people do after they’ve fallen over. They do them no matter where they fall, even if there isn’t any dust. It’s probably some racial memory thing, or a primordial urge, or a basic instinct or a tradition or an old charter, or something.
Jim straightened his shoulders and marched upstairs. Suzy’s flat was number three on the second floor. Lovers of illuminati conspiracy theory could get a 23 out of that.
Jim didn’t bother with the bell push. He knocked on the door. And as his knuckle struck the black lacquered panel the door swung open to reveal
A scene of devastation.
Jim stepped inside, in haste and fear. The flat had been ransacked. And viciously so. Curtains torn down, cushions ripped to ribbons, vases broken, books shredded, pictures smashed from their frames.
“Suzy.” Jim plunged amongst the wreckage, righting the sofa, flinging aside the fallen drapes. Into the kitchen, the bathroom.
The bedroom.
The bed was made. The duvet spread. The pale silk curtains hung, untorn. An eye of calm in the centre of the evil hurricane.
Jim felt sick inside. As he stood and stared into that bedroom, the reek came to his nostrils. Jim flung himself across the room, dragged aside the duvet and the bed cover. To expose a human turd lying in the middle of the bed.
“My dear God, no.” Jim turned away.
The bedside phone began to ring. He snatched it up.
“I’ll bet you’re really pissed off, aren’t you?” said the voice of Derek.
“Who is this?”
“You remember me, or at least my nine-gauge auto-loader.”
Jim’s heart sank. His knees buckled. “Suzy,” he whispered, “You have Suzy, don’t you?”
Jim heard the noise of struggling. And then a slap. And then the awful sound of Suzy weeping.
“I’ll kill you.” Jim shook uncontrollably. “If you harm her I’ll kill you.”
“I’m sure you’ll try. But it won’t be necessary. You can have her back. Possibly even in one piece, if you do what you’re told.”
“And what is that?”
Derek spoke and Jim listened. And Jim’s face, pale and ghostly as it was, grew even paler and ghostlier still.
29
And the band played “Believe It If You Like”.
A big brass band it was, of big beer-bellied men. They had such smart uniforms, scarlet with golden sashes, the borough’s emblem of the Griffin Rampant resplendent upon them. And big black shiny boots and trumpets and cornets and big bass bassoons.
And they marched through the Butts Estate and they played “Believe It If You Like”.
And children cheered and waved their Union Jacks.
And old biddies cheered and fluttered their lace handkerchiefs.
And old men nodded their heads to the beat.
And a lady in a straw hat said, “They’re playing in the key of C.”
And a medical student named Paul said, “Oh no they’re not.”
And the weather forecast said “no rain”. And the winter sun shone brightly and today was a special day indeed.
Today was New Year’s Eve.
John Omally glanced at his gold Piaget wristwatch. (Well, he had been able to wangle one or two expenses.) “Nearly four,” said he. “Where is Jim?”
Norman Hartnell hurried up.
“Any word of him?” John asked.
“No,” said Norman. “It’s the same all over. You were the last person to see him, John. The night before last.”
“What about his girlfriend? He said he was going there.”
“She’s not home. I’ve rung loads of times, but I don’t get any answer. And I don’t have the time to keep doing this for you. Do you think the two of them have…”
“What?” Omally stiffened. “Run off together? Eloped or something?”
“It’s more than possible. He’s well smitten, that Jim.”
“No.” Omally made fierce head-shakings. “He wouldn’t have done that. Not without telling me.”
“Perhaps he was afraid you might talk him out of it.”
“Oh no.” Omally glanced once more at his wrist-watch. If he himself had been able to hive off enough expenses to purchase this, Jim might well have been salting away sufficient cash to do a runner. His need was the greater of the two.
John suddenly felt quite empty inside. Somehow the thought that he and Jim would not remain best friends for ever had never really entered his mind.
They were a team. They were the lads.
They were individuals.
“I have to get back to the brewery,” said Norman. “I’ve got crates of ale coming out of the old de-entropizer and I have to get them over to the Swan. I’ll see you later at the fireworks, eh?”
But John did not reply.
In that house in Moby Dick Terrace, where the old folk died from most unnatural causes, Dr Steven Malone paced up and down. In the sparsely furnished sitting room, with its curtains drawn and a single low-watt ceiling bulb creating gloom, the floorboards creaked beneath his feet and the two tall men sat in armchairs regarding him in silence.
“Tonight,” said Dr Steven, “we return to Kether House. I have made all the preparations. Tonight you will learn my purpose and I will learn all…”
Cain opened his mouth to speak.
“No, Cain, only listen. I brought you into being just for this. Do you know who you really are?”
“I am Cain,” said Cain. “And you are my father.”
“And you, Abel? What of you?”
“I am part of Cain,” said Abel. “He is part of me. The two of us are one.”
“This is so. And tonight you shall be joined. The two made truly one and at the moment of this
