Something
From the Nightside
Nightside 1
Simon R. Green
I went to a house that was not a house.
I opened a door that was not a door.
And what I saw, I saw.
Contents
Money Comes Walking In
Private eyes come in all shapes and sizes, and none of them look like television stars. Some do insurance work, some hang around cheap hotels with camcorders hoping to get evidence for divorce cases, and damn few ever get to investigate complicated murder mysteries. Some chase things that don’t exist, or shouldn’t. Me, I find things. Sometimes I’d rather not find them, but that comes with the territory.
The flaking sign on the door in those days said Taylor Investigations. I’m Taylor. Tall, dark and not particularly handsome. I bear the scars of old cases proudly, and I never let down a client. Provided they’ve paid at least some cash up front.
My office back then was cosy, if you were feeling charitable, cramped if you weren’t. I spent a lot of time there. It beat having a life. It was a low-rent office in a low-rent area. All the businesses with any sense were moving out, making more room for those of us who operated in the greyer areas of the legal and illegal. Even the rats were just passing through, on their way to somewhere more civilised. My neighbours were a dentist and an accountant, both of them struck off, both of whom made more money than I did.
It was raining hard the night Joanna Barrett came to see me. The kind of cold, driving, pitiless rain that makes you glad to be safe and dry indoors. I should have taken that as an omen, but I’ve never been very good at picking up on hints. It was late, well past the point where the day starts edging into evening, and everyone else in the building had gone home. I was still sitting behind my desk, half-watching the portable television with its sound turned down, while the man on the phone yelled in my ear. He wanted money, the fool. I made sympathetic noises in all the right places, waiting for him to get tired and go away, and then my ears pricked up as I heard footsteps in the hall outside, heading for my door. Steady, unhurried … and a woman. Interesting. Women always make the best clients. They say they want information, but mostly what they really want is revenge; and they aren’t mean when it comes to paying for what they want. What they need. Hell hath no fury; and I should know.
The footsteps stopped outside my door, and a tall shadow studied the bullet hole in the frosted-glass window. I really should have got that seen to, but it made such a great conversation piece. Clients like a touch of romance and danger when they’re hiring a private detective, even if they only want some papers served. The door opened, and she walked in. A tall good-looking blonde who reeked of money and class, looking immediately out of place amid the battered furniture and cracked-plaster walls of my office.
Her clothes had the quiet elegance and style that shrieks of serious money, and when she spoke my name her voice had an aristocratic edge that could cut glass. Either she’d been to all the very best boarding and finishing schools, or she’d spent a hell of a lot on elocution lessons. She was perhaps a little too slender, with a raw-boned face and minimal make-up that meant she would always be handsome rather than pretty. From the way she stood, the way she held herself, it was obvious she was a control freak, and the set of her perfectly made-up mouth showed she was used to being obeyed. I notice things like that. It’s my job. I gave her my best unimpressed nod and gestured for her to take a seat on the only other chair, on the opposite side of my desk. She sat down without taking out a handkerchief to clean the seat first, and I gave her extra points for bravery. I watched her look around my office, while the voice in the phone at my ear grew ever more hysterical, demanding money with menaces. Very specific menaces. Her face was studiously calm, even blank, but as I glanced around my office, it was only too easy to see it as she saw it.
A battered desk, with only a few token papers in the in and out trays, a fourth-hand filing cabinet, and a rickety couch pushed back against the wall. Rumpled blankets and a dented pillow on the couch showed someone had been sleeping on it regularly. The single window behind my desk had bars on the outside, and the glass rattled loosely in its frame as the wind goosed it. The scuffed carpet had holes, the portable television on my desk was black and white, and the only note of colour on my walls was a giveaway girlie calendar. Old delivery pizza boxes stood stacked in one corner. It didn’t take a genius to work out this wasn’t just an office. Someone lived here. It was also patently obvious that this wasn’t the office of someone on his way up.
I’d chosen to live in the real world, for what seemed like good reasons at the time, but it had never been easy.
I suddenly decided I’d had enough of the voice on the telephone. “Look,” I said, in that calm reasonable tone that if done properly can drive people absolutely batshit, “if I had the money I’d pay you, but I don’t have the money. So you’ll just have to take a number and get in line. You are of course welcome to try sue-ing, in which case I can recommend a neighbour of mine who’s a lawyer. He needs the work, so he won’t laugh in your face when you tell him who you’re trying to get money out of. However, if you’d care to be patient just a little longer, it’s possible a whole lot of money just walked in… You know, hysteria like that can’t be good for your blood pressure. I recommend deep breathing and visits to the seaside. I always find the sea very soothing. I’ll get back to you. Eventually.”
I put the phone down firmly and smiled politely at my visitor. She didn’t smile back. I just knew we were going to get along. She looked pointedly at the murmuring television on my desk, and I turned it off.
“It’s company,” I said calmly. “Much like a dog, but with the added advantage that you don’t have to take it for walks.”
“Don’t you ever go home?” Her tone made it clear she was asking for information, not because she cared.
“I am currently in between homes. Big, empty, expensive things. Besides, I like it here. Everything’s within reach, and nobody bothers me when the day’s over. Usually.”
“I know it’s late. I didn’t want to be seen coming here.”
“I can understand that.”
She sniffed briefly. “You have a hole in your office door, Mr. Taylor.”
I nodded. “Moths.”
The corners of her dark red mouth turned down, and for a moment I thought she was going to get up and leave. I have that effect on people. But she controlled herself and gave me her best intimidating glare.
“I’m Joanna Barrett.”
I nodded, non-commitally. “You say that like it should mean something to me.”
“To anyone else, it would,” she said, just a little acidly. “But then, I don’t suppose you read the business pages, do you?”
“Not unless someone pays me to. Am I to take it you’re rich?”
“Extremely.”
I grinned. “The very best kind of client. What can I do for you?”
She shifted slightly in her chair, clutching her oversized white leather handbag protectively to her. She didn’t want to be here, talking to the likes of me. No doubt usually she had people to take care of such unpleasant tasks for her. But something was eating at her. Something personal. Something she couldn’t trust to anyone else. She needed me. I could tell. Hell, I was already counting the money.
“I have need of a private investigator,” she said abruptly. “You were … recommended to me.”
I nodded, understandingly. “Then you’ve already tried the police, and all the big private agencies, and none of them were able to help you. Which means your problem isn’t one of the usual ones.”
She nodded stiffly. “They let me down. All of them. Took my money and
gave me nothing but excuses. Bastards. So I called in every favour I was owed, pulled every string I had, and eventually someone gave me your name. I understand you find people.”
“I can find anyone or anything, if the price is right. It’s a gift. I’m dogged and determined and a whole bunch of other things that begin with d, and I never give up as long as the cheques keep coming. But, I don’t do insurance work, I don’t do divorces, and I don’t solve crimes. Hell, I wouldn’t know a clue if I fell over it. I just find things. Whether they want to be found or not.”
Joanna Barrett gave me her best icy disapproving look. “I don’t like being lectured.”
I smiled easily. “All part of the service.”
“And I don’t care for your attitude.”
“Not many do.”
She seriously considered leaving again. I watched her struggle with herself, my face calm and relaxed. Someone like her wouldn’t have come this far unless she was really desperate.
“My daughter is … missing,” she said finally, reluctantly. “I want you to find her for me.”
She produced an eight-by-ten glossy photo from her oversized bag, and skimmed it across the table towards me with an angry flick of her hand. I studied the photo without touching it. A head and shoulders shot of a scowling teenager stared sullenly back at me, narrowed eyes peering past a rat’s nest of long blonde hair. She would have been pretty if she hadn’t been frowning so hard. She looked like she had a mad on for the whole damned world, and it would have been a sucker who bet on the world. In other words, every inch her mother’s daughter.
“Her name is Catherine, Mr. Taylor.” Joanna Barrett’s voice was suddenly quieter, more subdued. “Only answers to Cathy, when she answers at all. She’s fifteen, going on sixteen, and I want her found.”
I nodded. We were on familiar territory so far. “How long has she been gone?”
“Just over a month.” She paused, and then added reluctantly, “This time.”
I nodded again. It helps me look thoughtful. “Anything happen recently to upset your daughter?”
“There was an argument. Nothing we haven’t said before, God knows. I don’t know why she runs away. She’s had everything she ever wanted. Everything.”
She dug in her bag again and came out with cigarettes and lighter. The cigarettes were French, the lighter was gold with a monogram. I raised my rates accordingly. She lit a cigarette with a steady hand, and then scattered nervous little puffs of smoke across my office. People shouldn’t smoke in situations like this. It’s far too revealing. I pushed across my single ash-tray, the one shaped like a lung, and studied the photo again. I wasn’t immediately worried about Cathy Barrett. She looked like she could take care of herself, and anybody else stupid enough to bother her. I decided it was time to start asking some obvious questions.
“How about Catherine’s father? How does your daughter get on with him?”
“She doesn’t. He walked out on us when she was two. Only decent thing the selfish bastard ever did for us. His lawyers got him access, but he hardly ever takes advantage of it. I still have to chase him for maintenance money. Not that we need it, of course, but it’s the principle of the thing. And before you ask, no; there’s never been any problems with drugs, alcohol, money, or unsuitable boyfriends. I’ve seen to that. I’ve always protected her, and I’ve never once raised a hand to her. She’s just a sullen, ungrateful little bitch.”
For a moment something glistened in her eyes that might have been tears, but the moment passed. I leaned back in my chair, as though considering what I’d been told, but it all looked pretty straight forward to me. Tracking a runaway wasn’t much of a case, but as it happened I was short on cases and cash, and there were bills that need paying. Urgently. It hadn’t been a good year—not for a long time. I leaned forward, resting my elbows in my desk, putting on my serious, committed face.
“So, Mrs. Barrett, essentially what we have here is a poor little rich girl who thinks she has everything but love. Probably begging for spare change down in the Underground, eating left-overs and stale bread, sleeping on park benches; hanging out with all the wrong sorts and kidding herself it’s all one big adventure. Living life in the raw, with the real people. Secure in the knowledge that once again she’s managed to secure her mother’s full attention. I wouldn’t worry about her too much. She’ll come home, once it starts getting cold at nights.”
Joanna Barrett was already shaking her expensively coiffured head. “Not this time. I’ve had experienced people looking for her for weeks now, and no-one’s been able to find a trace of her. None of her previous … associates have seen anything of her, even with the more than generous rewards I’ve been offering. It’s as though she’s vanished off the face of the earth. I’ve always been able to locate her before. My people have contacts everywhere. But this time, all I have for my efforts is a name I don’t recognise. A name, given to me by the same person who supplied me with your name. He said I’d find my daughter… in the Nightside.”
A cold hand clutched at my heart as I sat up straight. I should have known. I should have known the past never leaves you alone, no matter how far you run from it. I looked her straight in the eye. “What do you know about the Nightside?”
She didn’t flinch, but she looked like she wanted to. I can sound dangerous when I have to. She covered her lapse by grinding out her half-finished cigarette in my ashtray, concentrating on doing the job properly so she wouldn’t have to look at me for a while.
“Nothing,” she said finally. “Not a damned thing. I’d never heard the name before, and the few of my people who recognised it… wouldn’t talk to me about it. When I pressed them, they quit, just walked out on me. Walked away from more money than they’d ever made in their life before, rather than discuss the Nightside. They looked at me as though I was … sick, just for wanting to discuss it.”
“I’m not surprised.” My voice was calm again, though still serious, and she looked at me again. I chose my words carefully. “The Nightside is the secret, hidden, dark heart of the city. London’s evil twin. It’s where the really wild things are. If your daughter’s found her way there, she’s in real trouble.”
“That’s why I’ve come to you,” said Joanna. “I understand you operate in the Nightside.”
“No. Not for a long time. I ran away, and I vowed I’d never go back. It’s a bad place.”
She smiled, back on familiar ground again. “I’m prepared to be very generous, Mr. Taylor. How much do you want?”
I considered the matter. How much, to go back into the Nightside? How much is your soul worth? Your sanity? Your self-respect? But work had been hard to come by for some time now, and I needed the money. There were bad people in this part of London too, and I owed some of them a lot more than was healthy. I considered the matter. Shouldn’t be that difficult, finding a teenage runaway. A quick in-and-out job. Probably in and gone before anyone even knew I was there. If I was lucky. I looked at Joanna Barrett and doubled what I had been going to ask her.
“I charge a grand a day, plus expenses.”
“That’s a lot of money,” she said, automatically.
“How much is your daughter worth?”
She nodded briskly, acknowledging the point. She didn’t really care what I charged. People like me would always be chump change to people like her.
“Find my daughter, Mr. Taylor. Whatever it takes.”
“No problem.”
“And bring her back to me.”
“If that’s what she wants. I won’t drag her home against her will. I’m not in the kidnapping business.”
It was her turn to lean forward now. Her turn to try and look dangerous. Her gaze was flat and hard, and her words could have been chipped out of ice.
“When you take my money, you do as I say. You find that spoilt little cow, you drag her out of whatever mess she’s got herself into this time, and you bring her home to me. Then, and only then, will you get paid. Is that clear?”
I just sat there and smiled at her, entirely unimpressed. I’d seen a lot scarier than her, in my time. And compared to what was waiting for me back in the Nightside, her anger and implied threats were nothing. Besides, I was her last chance, and both of us knew it. No-one ever comes to me first, and it had nothing to do with what I charge. I have an earned reputation for doing things my own way, for tracking down the truth whatever it takes, and to hell with whoever gets hurt in the process. Including, sometimes, my clients. They always say they want the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, but few of them really mean it. Not when a little white lie can be so much more comforting. But I don’t deal in lies. Which is why I’ve never made the kind of money that would allow me to move in Mrs. Barrett’s circles. People only come to me when they’ve tried absolutely everything else, including prayer and fortune-tellers. There was no-one else left for Joanna Barrett to turn to. She tried to stare me down for a while, and couldn’t. She seemed to find that reassuring. She rummaged in her bag again, took out a completed cheque, and tossed it onto my desk. Apparently it was time for plan B.
“Fifty thousand pounds, Mr. Taylor. There will be another cheque just like it, when this is all over.”
I kept a straight face, but inside I was grinning broadly. For a hundred grand, I’d find the crew of the Marie Celeste. It almost made going back into the Nightside worthwhile. Almost.
“There is … a condition.”
I smiled. “I thought there might be.”
“I’m going with you.”
I sat up straight again. “No. No way. No way in Hell.”
“Mr. Taylor…”
“You don’t know what you’re asking…”
“She’s been gone over a month! She’s never been gone this long before. Anything could have happened to her by now. I have to be there … when you find her.”
I shook my head, but I already knew I was going to lose this one. I’ve always been a soft touch where family is concerned. It’s what comes of never having known one. Joanna still wouldn’t cry, but her eyes were bright and shining, and for the first time her voice was unsteady.