"Now let me tell you, this guy has a nice life. A nice life. And I think that's what we all want, isn't it. A nice life. This guy certainly did. And he didn't know how to have it. None of these guys did. They're just kind of helpless in the modern world. It's kind of tough for them and I'm just trying to help out. Let me tell you how nave they are, and I mean naive.
"My wife, Cynthia, you've met her, and let me tell you, she is the best. I tell you, my relationship with Cynthia is so good&emdash;"
"I don't want to hear about your relationship with your wife."
"OK. That's fine. That's absolutely fine. I just think maybe it's worth you getting to know a few things. But whatever you want is fine. OK. Cynthia's in advertising. You know that. She is a senior partner in a major agency. Major. They did some big campaign, really big, a few years back in which some actor is playing a god in this commercial. And he's endorsing something, I don't know, a soft drink, you know, tooth rot for kids.
And Odin at this time is just a down and out. He's living on the streets. He simply can't get anything together, because he's just not for this world. All that power, but he doesn't know how to make it work for him here, today. Now here's the crazy part.
"Odin sees this commercial on the television and he thinks to himself, 'Hey, I could do that, I'm a god.' He thinks maybe he could get paid for being in a commercial. And you know what that would be. Pays even less than the United States of America cost, you follow me? Think about it. Odin, the chief and fount of all the power of all of the Norse gods, thinks he might be able to get paid for being in a television commercial to sell soft drinks.
"And this guy, this god, literally goes out and tries to find someone who'll let him in a TV commercial. Pathetically naive. But also greedy--let's not forget greedy.
"Anyway, he happens to come to Cynthia's attention. She's just a lowly account executive at the time, doesn't pay any attention, and thinks he's just a whacko, but then she gets kind of fascinated by how odd he is, and I get to see him. And you know what? It dawns on us he's for real. The guy is for real. A real actual god with the whole panoply of divine powers. And not only a god, but like, the main one. The one all the others depend on for their power. And he wants to be in a commercial. Let's just say the word again shall we? A commercial.
"The idea was dumbfounding. Didn't the guy know what he had? Didn't he realise what his power could get him?
"Apparently not. I have to tell you, this was the most astounding moment in our lives. A . . . stoun . . . ding. Let me tell you, Cynthia and I have always known that we were, well, special people, and that something special would happen to us, and here it was. Something special.
"But look. We're not greedy. We don't want all that power, all that wealth. And I mean, we're looking at the world here. The whole . . . fucking . . . world. We could own the world if we wanted to. But who wants to own the world? Think of the trouble. We don't even want huge wealth, all those lawyers and accountants to deal with, and let me tell you I'm a layer. OK, so you can hire people to look after your lawyers and accountants for you, but who are those people going to be? Just more lawyers and accountants. And you know, we don't even want the responsibility for it all. It's too much.
"So then I have this idea. It's like you buy a big property, and then you sell on what you don't want. That way you get what you want, and a lot of other people get what they want, only they get it through you, and they feel a little obligated to you, and they remember who they got it through because they sign a piece of paper which says how obligated they feel to you. And money flows back to pay for our Mr Odin's very, very, very expensive private medical care.
"So we don't have much, Mr Gently. One or two modestly nice houses. One or two modestly nice cars. We have a very nice life. Very, very nice indeed. We don't need much because anything we need is always made available to us, it's taken care of. All we demanded, and it was a very reasonable demand in the circumstances, was that we didn't want to know any more about it. We take our modest requirements and we bow out. We want nothing more than absolute peace and absolute quiet, and a nice life because Cynthia's sometimes a little nervous. OK.
"And then what happens this morning? Right on our own doorstep. Pow. It's disgusting. I mean it is really a disgusting little number. And you know how it happened?
"Here's how it happened. It's our friend Mr Rag again, and he's tried to be a clever tricky little voodoo lawyer. It's so pathetic. He has fun trying to waste my time with all his little tricks and games and run-arounds, and then he tries to faze me by presenting me with a bill for his time. That's nothing. It's work creation. All lawyers do it. OK. So I say, I'll take your bill. I'll take it, I don't care what it is. You give me your bill and I'll see it's taken care of. It's OK. So he gives it to me.
"It's only later I see it's got this tricky kind of subtotal thing in it. So what? He's trying to be clever. He's given me a hot potato. Listen, the record business is full of hot potatoes. You just get them taken care of. There are always people happy to take care of things for you when they want to make their way up the ladder. If they're worthy of their place on the ladder, well, they'll get it taken care of in return. You get a hot potato, you pass it on. I passed it on. Listen, there were a lot of people who are very happy to get things taken care of for me. Hey, you know? It was really funny seeing how far and how fast that particular potato got passed on. That told me a lot about who was bright and who was not. But then it lands up in my back garden, and that's a penalty clause job I'm afraid. The Woodshead stuff is a very expensive little number, and I think your clients may have blown it on that particular score. We have the whip hand here. We can just cancel this whole thing. Believe me, I have everything I could possibly want now.
"But listen, Mr Gently. I think you understand my position. We've been pretty frank with each other and I've felt good about that. There are certain sensitivities involved, of course, and I'm also in a position to be able to make a lot of things happen. So perhaps we can come to any one of a number of possible accommodations. Anything you want, Mr Gently, it can be made to happen."
"Just to see you dead, Mr Draycott," said Dirk Gently, "just to see you dead."
"Well fuck you, too."
Dirk Gently turned and left the room and went to tell his new client that he thought they might have a problem.
31
* * *
A little while later a dark-blue BMVV pulled quietly away from the otherwise deserted forecourt of St Pancras station and moved off up the quiet streets.
Somewhat dejected, Dirk Gently put on his hat and left his newly acquired and newly relinquished client who said that he wished to be alone now and maybe turn into a rat or something like some other people he could mention.
He closed the great doors behind him and walked slowly out on to the balcony overlooking the great vaulted hall of gods and heroes, Valhalla. He arrived just as the last few stragglers of the revels were fading away, presumably to emerge at the same moment in the great vaulted train shed of St Pancras station. He stayed staring for a while at the empty hall, in which the bonfires now were just fading embers.
It then took the very slightest flicker of his head for him to perform the same transition himself, and he found himself standing in a gusty and dishevelled corridor of the empty Midland Grand Hotel. Out in the great dark concourse of St Pancras station he saw again the last stragglers from Valhalla shuffling away and out into the cold streets of London to find benches that were designed not to be slept on, and to try to sleep on them.
He sighed and tried to find his way out of the derelict hotel, a task that proved more difficult than he anticipated, as immense and as dark and as labyrinthine as it was. He found at last the great winding gothic staircase which led all the way down to the huge arches of the entrance lobby, decorated with carvings of dragons and griffins and heavy ornamental ironwork. The main front entrance was locked as it had been for years, and eventually Dirk found his way down a side corridor to an exit
manned by a great sweaty splodge of a man who guarded it at night. He demanded to know how Dirk had gained entrance to the hotel and refused to be satisfied by any of his explanations. In the end he had simply to allow Dirk to leave, since there was little else he could do.
Dirk crossed from this entrance to the entrance into the station booking hall, and then into the station itself. For a while he simply stood there looking around, and then he left via the main station entrance, and descended the steps which led down on to the St Pancras Road. As he emerged on to the street he was so surprised not to be instantly swooped upon by a passing eagle that he tripped and stumbled and was run over by the first of the early morning's motorcycle couriers.
32
* * *
With a huge crash, Thor surged through the wall at the far end of the great hall of Valhalla and stood ready to proclaim to the assembled gods and heroes that he had finally managed to break through to Norway and had found a copy of the contract Odin had signed buried deep in the side of a mountain, but he couldn't because they'd all gone and there was no one there.
"There's no one here," he said to Kate, releasing her from his huge grip, "they've all gone."
He slumped in disappointment.
"Wh"--said Kate.
"We'll try the old man's chambers," said Thor and hurled his hammer up to the balcony, with themselves in tow.
He stalked through the great chambers, ignoring Kate's pleas, protests and general abuse.
He wasn't there.
"He's here somewhere," said Thor angrily, trailing his hammer behind him.
"We'll go through the world divide," he said, and took hold of Kate again. They flicked themselves through.
They were in a large bedroom suite in the hotel.
Litter and scraps of rotting carpet covered the floors, the windows were grimy with years of neglect. Pigeon droppings were everywhere, and the peeling paintwork made it look as if several small families of starfish had exploded on the walls.
There was an abandoned trolleybed in the middle of the floor in which an old man lay in beautifully laundered linen, weeping from his one remaining eye.
"I found the contract, you bastard," raged Thor, waving it at him. "I found the deal you did. You sold all our power to . . . to a lawyer and a . . . an advertiser and, and all sorts of other people. You stole our power! You couldn't steal all of mine because I'm too strong, but you kept me bewildered and confused, and made bad things happen every time I got angry. You prevented me getting back home to Norway by every method you could, because you knew I'd find this! You and that poison dwarf Toe Rag. You've been abusing and humiliating me for years, and--"
"Yes, yes, we know all that," said Odin.
"Well . . . Good!"
"Thor--" said Kate.
"Well I've shaken all that off now!" shouted Thor.
"Yes, I see--"
"I went somewhere I could get good and angry in pence, when I knew you'd be otherwise occupied and expecting me to be here, and I had a hell of a good shout and blew things up a bit, and I'm all right now! And I'm going to tear this up for a start!"
He ripped right through the contract, threw the pieces in the air and incinerated them with a look.
"Thor--" said Kate.
"And I'm going to put right all the things you made happen so I'd be afraid of getting angry. The poor girl at the airline check-in desk that got turned into a drink machine. Woof! Wham! She's back! The jet fighter that tried to shoot me down when I was flying to Norway! Woof! Wham! It's back! See, I'm back in control of myself!"
"What jet fighter?" asked Kate. "You haven't told me about a jet fighter."
"It tried to shoot me down over the North Sea. We had a scrap and in the heat of the moment I, well, I turned it into an eagle, and it's been bothering me ever since. So now that's dealt with. Don't look at me like that. I did what I could. I took care of his wife by fixing one of those lottery things. Look," he added angrily, "all this has been very difficult for me, you know. All right. What else?"
"My table lamp," said Kate quietly.
"And Kate's table lamp! It shall be a small kitten no more! Woof! Wham! Thor speaks and it is so! What was that noise?"
A ruddy glow was spreading across the London skyline.
Thor, I think there's something wrong with your father."
"I should bloody well hope so. Oh. What's wrong? Father? Are you all right?"
"I have been so very, very foolish and unwise," wept Odin, "I have been so wicked and evil, and--"
"Yes, well that's what I think, too," said Thor and sat on the end of his bed. "So what are we going to do?"
"I don't think I could live without my linen, and my Sister Bailey, and . . . It's been so, so, so long, and I'm so, so old. Toe Rag said I should kill you, but I . . . I would rather have killed myself. Oh, Thor . . . "
"Oh," said Thor. "I see. Well. I don't know what to do now. Blast. Blast everything."
"Thor -"
"Yes, yes, what is it?"
"Thor, it's very simple what you do about your father and the Woodshead," said Kate.
"Oh yes? What then?"
"I'll tell you on one condition."
"Oh really? And what's that?"
"That you tell me how many stones there are in Wales."
"What!" exclaimed Thor in outrage. "Away from me! That's years of my life you're talking about!"
Kate shrugged.
"No!" said Thor. "Anything but that! Anyway, he added sullenly, "I told you."
"No you didn't."
"Yes I did. I said I lost count somewhere in Mid-Glamorgan. Well, I was hardly going to start again, was I? Think, girl, think!
33
* * *
Beating a path through the difficult territory to the north-east of Valhalla--a network of paths that seemed to lead only to other paths and then back to the first paths again for another try--went two figures, one a big, stupid, violent creature with green eyes and a scythe which hung from its belt and often seriously impeded its progress, the other a small crazed creature who clung on to the back of the bigger one, manically urging him on white actually impeding his progress still further.
They attained at last a long, low, smelly building into which they hurried shouting for horses. The old stable master came forward, recognised them and, having heard already of their disgrace, was at first disinclined to help them on their way. 'The scythe flashed through the air and the stable master's head started upwards in surprise while his body took an affronted step backwards, swayed uncertainly, and then for lack of any further instructions to the contrary keeled over backwards in its own time. His head bounded into the hay.
His assailants hurriedly lashed up two horses to a cart and clattered away out of the stable yard and along the broader thoroughfare which led upwards to the north.
They made rapid progress up the road for a mile, Toe Rag urging the horses on frantically with a long and cruel whip. After a few minutes, however, the horses began to slow down and to look about them uneasily. Toe Rag lashed them all the harder, but they became more anxious still then suddenly lost all control and reared in terror, turning over the cart and tipping its occupants out on the ground, from which they instantly sprang up in a rage.
Toe Rag screamed at the terrified horses and then, out of the corner of his eye, caught sight of what had so disturbed them.
It wasn't so terrifying. It was just a large, white, metal box, upturned on a pile of rubbish by the roadside and rattling itself.
The horses were rearing and trying to bolt away from the big white rattling thing but they were impossibly entangled in their traces. They were only working themselves up into a thrashing lather of panic. Toe Rag quickly realised that there would be no calming them until the box was dealt with.
"Whatever it is," he screeched at the green-eyed creature, "kill it!"
Green-eye unhooked his scythe from his belt once more and clambered up the pile of rubbish to where the box was rattling. He kicked i
t and it only rattled the more. He got his foot behind it and with a heavy thrust shoved it away down the heap. The big white box slithered a foot or so then turned over and toppled to the ground. It rested there for a moment and then a door, finally freed, flew open. The horses screamed in fear.
Toe Rag and his green-eyed thug approached the thing with worried curiosity, then staggered back in horror as a great and powerful new god erupted from its innards.
34
* * *
The following afternoon, at a comfortable distance from all these events, set at a comfortable distance from a well-proportioned window through which the afternoon light was streaming, lay an elderly one-eyed man in a white bed. A newspaper sat like a half-collapsed tent on the floor, where it had been hurled two minutes before.
The man was awake but not glad to be. His exquisitely frail hands lay slightly curled on the pure white linen sheets and quivered very faintly.
His name was variously given as Mr Odwin, or Wodin, or Odin. He was--is--a god, and furthermore he was a confused and startled god.
He was confused and startled because of the report he had just been reading on the front page of the newspaper, which was that another god had been cutting loose and making a nuisance of himself. It didn't say so in so many words of course, it merely described what had happened last night when a missing jet fighter aircraft had mysteriously erupted under full power from out of a house in North London into which it could not conceivably have been thought to have fitted. It had instantly lost its wings and gone into a screaming dive and crashed and exploded in a main road. The pilot had managed to eject during the few seconds he had had in the air, and had landed, shaken, bruised, but otherwise unharmed, and babbling about strange men with hammers flying over the North Sea.