The Doorkeepers

Twenty-Five

Nancy opened her eyes and was aware at once of the utter silence. Complete, flawless silence. She was lying on an iron-framed bed in a hospital room with cream-painted walls and a light green dado. She knew it was a hospital room because it smelled of hospitals: antiseptic and boiled vegetables. The only other furniture was an oak-veneered nightstand with a glass of water on it, an oak-veneered closet, and a green armchair. For some inexplicable reason, she felt that somebody had recently been sitting in the green armchair, watching her.

Her head felt thick, as if she had been drinking too much red wine. She tried to lift her head but she felt swimmy and nauseous, so she lay back on the pillow again. It was a big pillow, with a starched pillowcase, and it reminded her of staying in hospital when she was a child. Homesick, and alone.

She turned toward the window. Outside, she could see the upper branches of some tall elm trees, and some angular rooftops, and chimneys. Even if she had been familiar with London, she wouldn’t have been able to tell where she was. The sky was clear blue, with only a few high clouds in it, unraveling themselves in the upper atmosphere like skeins of white cotton. And it was silent. She couldn’t even hear any traffic.

She tried to think what had happened to her. The last moment she could remember was Frank Mordant hitting her. After that, all she could recall was a jumble of voices and a kaleidoscope of faces.

An hour went past. The sun moved across the window. Still there was silence. She tried to keep her eyes open but she couldn’t, and she slept. She had a dream that she was walking along a desolate seashore, with the tide gradually coming in. It was foggy, and she knew that it was getting late, and that it was time for her to turn back. But up ahead of her she could see a hooded figure, and felt that she had to catch up with it, and ask it if it could tell her where Josh was. She was deeply afraid of it, this figure, the way it walked through the fog with its robes curling and flapping, but she knew that there was no alternative. She hurried across the hard, ribbed sand, even though the water was already starting to surge across her shoes.

The figure stopped. She slowed down, and cautiously circled around it, until she was facing it.

“I know what you want,” the figure said, in a hollow whisper. “I know what you’ve always wanted.”

It reached inside its robes and drew out a yard-long poker, the tip of which was red-hot and crackling with tiny sparks. “You want the Five Holy Cauterizations, don’t you? Eyes, tongue, and ears – the greater to seal your purity.”

She wanted to turn and run, but she couldn’t. All she could do was sink slowly to her knees in the chilly seawater as the figure slowly approached her, the poker held aloft. She could actually smell the overheated iron.

“The supplicant always has a choice,” the figure whispered. “You can decide which cauterization you will enjoy first, and which last. You’d be surprised how many leave the tongue till last, so that even when they’re deaf and blind, they can still curse the Lord that made them.”

The figure was standing right over her now, its robes stirring in the breeze. The seawater swilled around her knees. She lifted her head and stared defiantly into the blackness of its hood. “You can do whatever you damn well like,” she told it.

“Well, that’s jolly generous of you,” said another voice. She opened her eyes. She wasn’t on the seashore at all, but lying in her hospital bed. Frank Mordant was standing not far away, his hands in his pockets, beaming. Two other men stood much closer, both of them dressed in starched white collars and black coats and gray pinstripe pants, like bankers. One of them had wiry gray hair and gold pince-nez that were perched on a bulbous, port-wine-colored nose. The other was young, with a neck like a heron and a dark, downy moustache.

“What am I doing here?” asked Nancy, thick-tongued. She tried to sit up but the older man gently reached out and pushed her back on to the pillow.

“You ought to rest,” he told her, with an avuncular smile. “Conserve your energy.”

“I want to get out of here, that’s all. I want to go back to where I came from.”

“You did go back to where you came from,” said Frank Mordant, still beaming. “But then you decided to return, didn’t you, and make a nuisance of yourself. Your choice, darling. You can hardly put the blame on me. We all have to cover our asses – as you Yanks put it – don’t we?”

“So what are you going to do? Are you going to murder me, the way you murdered Julia?” She turned to the two men in black coats. “Did you know that? Did you know that he was a murderer? He admitted it to me. He confessed.”

Frank Mordant stepped forward and laid one hand on each of the men’s shoulders. “Perhaps I ought to introduce you, Miss Andersen. This is Mr Brindsley Leggett, senior surgeon here at the Puritan Martyrs Hospital, and this is Mr Andrew Crane, his junior.”

“He confessed to me,” Nancy insisted. “He told me that he’s been hanging women and making goddamned videos while they die!”

“Come on, now,” said Mr Leggett. “You’ve been through a very disturbing experience. I’m not at all surprised that you’ve been suffering from misapprehensions. My goodness, if it had happened to me …!”

“You’re trying to say that I’m sick? If there’s anybody who’s sick around here, it’s Frank Mordant! He’s a killer, I tell you! I can prove it!”

“You can prove it, can you? Now, how can you do that?”

“If you let me take him back to where I come from, I have DNA evidence.”

Mr Leggett shook his head. “DNA evidence? What’s that, when it’s at home?”

“Irrefutable scientific proof that Frank Mordant killed a woman called Julia Winward.”

“And where did you say this evidence was? Do the police have it? Or the Doorkeepers?”

“It’s back in the other London. It’s back through the door.”

Mr Leggett turned to Frank Mordant and shook his head. “Poor dear. The other London.’ What a way to speak of Purgatory.”

“I didn’t come from Purgatory, you superstitious asshole!” Nancy shouted at him. “It isn’t Purgatory on the other side of those doors! It’s another London, that’s all – just like this London, only different. It has people and houses and hospitals and cars. It’s real – not some goddamned medieval never-never-land!”

Mr Crane looked quite pale. “I’ve never seen a Purgatorial so … deluded.”

“Well, she’s certainly the liveliest we’ve ever had,” said Mr Leggett. “Mr Mordant usually sends us those who are so close to meeting their Maker as makes no difference; and the Doorkeepers have usually been having a bit of a chat with the others.”

“The Doorkeepers wanted this one kept as she is,” said Frank Mordant. “They have their reasons, apparently.”

Nancy said, “If you’re not going to believe me, then I just want out of here.”

“Oh, you can’t go,” said Mr Leggett, benignly. “We have plans for you, after the Doorkeepers have done whatever they want to do. You want to make a contribution to society, don’t you, before you finally make your peace with God?”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Nancy demanded.

Mr Leggett laughed. “This is so interesting, isn’t it? I wish they could always send me Purgatorials in this condition! From the way she talks, though, I don’t know whether she’s going up …” he pointed to the ceiling, “or you know where …” and pointed to the floor.

He turned to Frank Mordant and shook his hand. “Very good to meet you again, Mr Mordant. I particularly enjoyed that brandy you brought me the other day. Where did you say you found it?”

“Oh … just on one of my business trips,” smiled Frank Mordant.

Mr Leggett and Mr Crane left the room. Nancy was left on the bed, frustrated and enraged. Frank Mordant came over and stood beside her, but he wasn’t smiling any longer.

“I’ll tell you something, darling, you made a serious error coming after me. I’ve got too many contacts in too many different realities. Too many friends in high and low places.”

“Why won’t you let me go?”

“Because you’re wanted by the Hoodies, that’s why. Do you know what the Hoodies would do to me, if I sprung you from here? I was tempted, I must admit. I think you’re a very lovely girl, and I wouldn’t like to see anything … you know, ugly happen to you. But then you had to blurt it out that you had evidence against me. So you can see that I wasn’t quite so tempted after that.”

“You bastard.”

“Sorry, darling. You should have stayed where you were, and forgotten about Julia, and that would have been the end of it. But as it is …”

“What do the Hooded Men want me for?”

“They wouldn’t say. But my guess is, they want that boyfriend of yours, and you’re the Judas goat. That’s why they wanted you alive and well; and that’s why they haven’t touched you so far – although they probably will.”

“So what are those two going to do to me? Those surgeons?”

“You’ll find that out in the morning, so I’m told. But I think you can safely assume that they’re going to be carrying out one or two operations on you. Major operations.”

“Operations for what? What the hell are you talking about?”

Frank Mordant leaned over her, so close that she could see the hairs in his nostrils. “You seem to have forgotten that you came from Purgatory. People who come back from Purgatory are dead already. They don’t have any rights to their life or property. That’s what the Lord Protector teaches us, anyway. So gentlemen surgeons like Mr Leggett and Mr Crane feel quite unconcerned about cutting them up and taking whatever organs they require.”

“You’re crazy, all of you. You’re all stone crazy.”

Frank Mordant stood up. “You know that it’s tommy-rot. I know that it’s tommy-rot. But men like Mr Leggett and Mr Crane have been brought up to believe it, as do ninety-nine point ninety-nine percent of the rest of the population. You took the chance and came back here, my darling; and now you’re going to have to pay the price.”

“You, Frank Mordant – you are the most disgusting piece of slime that ever slid across the earth.”

Frank Mordant’s left eye twitched. “It depends on your yardstick, my darling. I do have a heart, you know, whatever you think. I had a dog once. I loved that dog. I really, really loved that dog.”

Nancy had never spat at anybody in her life, but now she did, hitting Frank Mordant on the cheek. The saliva slid down to the corner of his mouth. He stared at her for a moment and she thought that he was going to hit her, but then he took a carefully-pressed handkerchief out of his pocket and dabbed at his face.

“Don’t you blame me,” he told her. “You’re the one who came back.”

Nancy had another night of appalling nightmares. She saw dark crablike shapes leaping and hopping across the ceiling. She heard her grandmother screaming her name. When she woke up, the sun was shining through the window again, and a nurse was setting out her breakfast on a tray. Toast, solidified scrambled eggs, and a grilled tomato. The nurse was young, with a long pale face and freckles, and she stared at Nancy anxiously all the time that she was serving her.

“What’s the matter?” Nancy asked her. “I don’t bite, you know.”

The nurse gave her a quick, nervous smile.

Nancy said, “Haven’t you ever seen a Purgatorial before?”

“Not one like you.”

“What’s different about me?”

“You’re awake. You talk.”

“That’s because I’m still alive. Here, you want to take my pulse?”

The young nurse shook her head.

“So what goes on here?” Nancy asked her. “What kind of a hospital is this?”

The young nurse didn’t answer, but gave her a nervous shrug.

“Come on,” Nancy urged her. “What do they do here? Heart surgery? Orthopedics? Pediatrics?”

“We look after – you know. We look after her.”

“Her? Who’s her?”

“Her, that’s all.”

“Does she have a name, this her?”

“I suppose she must have done once, but nobody ever mentions it.”

“You’re not telling me that she’s the only patient here?”

“Oh, no. She’s not a patient. She’s … well, she’s …”

The young nurse was obviously struggling for the right words. Nancy sat up and said, “Are you frightened of what goes on here?”

“Of course not. It’s a privilege.”

“Then why can’t you tell me all about it?”

“I’m not allowed to. Not to you. Not to anybody.”

“Don’t you trust me?”

“You’re a Purgatorial. You’re dead.”

“You’re a nurse and you think I’m dead? If I’m dead, why are you feeding me scrambled eggs and grilled tomatoes?”

“I don’t know. I was told to.”

“So where are you going next with your breakfast trays? Down to the mortuary? Wake up, boys, come and get it while it’s good and hot!”

“Don’t. You’re confusing me.”

“I’ll bet I am. I am absolutely and positively not dead. I never have been dead. I have never been to Purgatory. Everything that you’ve ever been told about Purgatorials is a lie. When people are dead, they stay dead, they don’t come back. But when people come from another world – when people come from another reality – now, that’s something different.”

The young nurse stared at her for a long time, and then she brushed a strand of hair away from her face.

“What’s your name?” Nancy asked her.

“Sophie.”

“Well, Sophie, thanks for the breakfast. And all I can say to you is, never believe what you read in books. Especially A Child’s Book of Simple Truth.”

Sophie, still staring at her, crossed the room, opened the door, and walked out. Nancy lay back on her pillow. She didn’t know what to think. All she knew was that she had very little time. Josh probably would have given her twenty-four hours to come back – but when she didn’t, there was no question in her mind that he would come after her. He could arrive in this reality any time today. It might take him a few hours to find her here at the Puritan Martyrs, but she knew how resourceful he was.

She closed her eyes and said a prayer to her ancestors, to protect her. But here, in this existence, she wasn’t at all sure that she could still feel their closeness.

Early in the afternoon, when she was halfway between sleeping and waking, she heard the door swing open, and the sound of boots on the polished linoleum floor. She opened her eyes and saw two Hooded Men, one on either side of her bed, with their tall Puritan hats and their black tunics and their long swords and their grotesque hessian masks. She sat up in bed and tugged the blanket up to her neck. She was too frightened to say anything.

“You believe that your friend will come looking for you?” asked one of the Hooded Men, in the softest of rasps. It was like somebody sawing a velvet cushion in half.

Nancy still couldn’t speak.

“You don’t think he’s going to abandon you, do you? Especially when he discovers what fate we have in store for you.”

“I don’t know what he’s going to do.”

“Oh, he’ll be here. In fact, we’ve given him a little guidance, so that he knows where you are, and how to find you.”

“He’s not stupid, for God’s sake. You think he’ll walk right into a trap?”

“I think he loves you,” said the Hooded Man, and it sounded as if he were smiling.

“Why can’t you just let me go? We only came here to find out who killed Josh’s sister.”

“So you keep telling us. But what mayhem you created, you and your subversive friends. And this morning we learned that your precious Josh has killed one of our number. Taken his head off. You don’t think that we can turn a blind eye to murder, do you?”

“You’re lying! Josh couldn’t murder anybody!”

“There were more than enough witnesses, I promise you.”

“Where did this happen? Was it here? Is Josh in this London?”

“It happened in another London. At this particular moment, we think we know where your partner is, but we can’t be certain. He could be hiding in any one of a million Londons, and we could never find him. That is why you are so valuable to us. When he discovers that we have you here, and what we intend to do with you, don’t worry, he’ll be here as fast as the turning world will allow him. We’ll give him three or four days. We’re not in any hurry.”

Nancy said, “You’ll be damned for this. Call yourself religious zealots? You’ll be damned for this and you’ll all burn in hell.”

The Hooded Man leaned forward. Nancy could see something moving behind the eyeholes in his hood. She was aware of a strange smell, too, that reminded her of something that had happened to her long ago, when she was a child. Something cold and unpleasant. Something that she had tried to forget.

“You, lady,” the Hooded Man rasped. “You don’t know the meaning of hell.”

Josh and Petty took a taxi from Chancery Lane to West Kensington. Petty was amazed to see London undamaged, and crowded with traffic and people.

“I can’t believe it,” she kept on saying. “Look at that girl’s dress! Look at it! There’s nothing of it, is there?”

The taxi driver’s eyes watched them in the rear-view mirror. They were both filthy and bruised, and they smelled. Their clothes were thick with dust and their hair was matted. Josh saw his reflection in the taxi window and realized that his cheeks were gray and his eyes were rimmed with red, like a zombie.

When they reached Josh’s hotel, he gave the driver a ten-pound tip. “That’s for stopping, and for cleaning up the seats, if you have to. I can tell you that we don’t normally look like this.”

“Doesn’t bother me, mate,” said the taxi driver. “At least you didn’t throw up.”

They walked into hotel reception and headed toward the elevators. Petty’s head went around and around in astonishment. “I’ve never seen nothing like this. This is incredible. And, look, what’s that? Is that a television? It’s huge! And it’s in color, just like a film!”

“Mr Winward?” called one of the receptionists, dubiously.

“That’s me.”

“There’s a message for you, sir.” She reached into one of the pigeonholes behind her and took out a folded slip of yellow paper.

Josh opened it up. It read: Mr Joshua Winward, your lady frend wos cort by the Hoodiz, I no where they are kepin her cum back to Star Yd as soon as U can excuss my riting on a/c of havn no rit han. Yor frend Simon Cutter.

“Josh, I love this place,” said Petty, taking hold of his arm. Her eyes were bright with delight. “It’s de-luxe, isn’t it? Really de-luxe.”

Josh took hold of her arm and propelled her toward the elevators. “Here, steady on,” she protested. “What’s your rush?”

“I have to leave. Something I have to do.”

“But we’ve only just got here!”

“I know. But it’s urgent. I’m going to take a shower, change, and then I’m going to have to go out. I may not be back until tomorrow.”

“So what am I going to do?”

“You can stay here. You can order meals on room service. You can watch color television. You can do whatever you like. I’ll give you some money so you can buy yourself cigarettes or candy or pantyhose or anything else you need. You’ll survive.”

He hurried her into the elevator and pressed the button for the third floor. “But I don’t know anybody here!” she protested. “How do I know that you’re going to come back? Supposing you don’t come back?”

He took hold of her hands and squeezed them. “I’ll be back, I promise you.”

When they entered the hotel room Petty dubiously sat on the bed and bounced up and down a few times. Josh went into the bathroom, stripped off and took a shower. He was exhausted, but Simon Cutter’s note had filled him immediately with fresh determination. You have to be strong, he told himself. Nancy needs you, and you have to be strong. He just hoped that he didn’t have to face up to the Hooded Men again. He stood with the water spraying at full blast directly into his face in the hope that he could wash away the image of the Hooded Man’s head. But the tighter he closed his eyes, the clearer the picture came back to him, and in the end he had to open them again, wide.

There are times in your life when you think, oh, Jesus, what have I done? And this was Josh’s moment.

He stepped out of the shower to find the bathroom door wide open and Petty standing naked in the doorway. He wrapped his towel tightly around his waist and gently maneuvered his way past her into the bedroom.

“You don’t have to go, you know,” she told him, reaching out for him. “Not straight away, anyhow.”

“I’m sorry, it’s something I have to do.”

“Couldn’t we have a rest first? You and me? This bed’s ever so comfortable.”

Josh put on a clean blue checkered shirt. “Petty … I like you. Believe me, I really like you a whole lot. But this is a matter of life and death.”

“So where are you going?”

“It’s safer for you if you don’t know. Really.”

“Those geezers in the hoods aren’t coming after you, are they?”

“I don’t know. But whatever happens, you haven’t seen me, and you don’t know where I’ve gone.”

She lay back on the bed, twisting her hair around her finger, and giving him a coquettish look that reminded Josh of a 1940s movie star. “Sure I can’t tempt you?”

It took him only ten minutes to walk to Ella’s flat. A gritty wind blew newspapers across the streets of Earl’s Court. He pressed the doorbell again and again but there was no reply. He clenched his fist and thumped the door frame in frustration. This was a time when he really needed some support. More than that, he desperately needed some insight into what the Hooded Men might be thinking of doing next.

He gave the doorbell one last, long ring, in case Ella had taken one of her own sleeping potions. He still had his thumb on the bellpush when Abraxas came hobbling around the corner.

“Abraxas! What are you doing out here, boy? Where’s your mom?”

Abraxas came up to him and Josh hunkered down on the sidewalk and took hold of his ears and stroked him. He was streaked with dirt and his eyes were dull. He had lost weight, too. Josh reckoned that he hadn’t been properly fed for three or four days.

“Where’s your mom, Abraxas? Where’s Ella? She hasn’t left you, has she? She wouldn’t do that.”

At that moment, the front door to the apartment building opened and a tall middle-aged woman came out, carrying a Harrods shopping bag.

“Oh, that poor dog!” she exclaimed. “He’s been hanging around for three days now. I’ve called the RSPCA twice, but when they arrive he’s never here. I feel so sorry for him.”

“Where’s his mistress?”

“Why, she’s dead. Didn’t you read about it in the papers?”

“Dead?” Josh felt a sensation in the pit of his stomach like dropping fifty feet in an airplane. “When was this? What happened?”

“It was quite awful. She fell out of the window of her flat and landed right on the railings. I’m so glad I wasn’t here when it happened. And a man friend of hers was stabbed right here in the hallway. I almost decided to move out. I still would, if I could find a decent flat around here for the same sort of rent.”

Josh kept on stroking Abraxas’ head and looking directly into his eyes. “You must be grieving, boy. You must be feeling your loss so bad.”

Abraxas came up closer and rested his chin on Josh’s knee and looked up at him with his sad amber eyes. “You certainly have a way with animals,” the woman remarked.

“I’ll take him and get him cleaned up,” said Josh. “He needs some emotional care, too. He’s going to be feeling very confused about Ella disappearing so suddenly.”

“I’ve got the number of the RSPCA if you want it.”

“That’s OK. Right now, the last thing he needs is a kennel, with a whole lot of other distressed dogs. He needs calm. He needs reassurance.”

He walked back toward the hotel with Abraxas gamely limping after him. The woman watched him go, slowly shaking her head.

Petty watched Abraxas wolfing down a bowl of milk and dog biscuits and shook her head. “Looks like you’re picking up all the waifs and strays, doesn’t it?”

“I couldn’t leave him wandering the streets like that.”

“So what are you going to do with him? You can’t keep him here, can you? And if you’re going away tomorrow, don’t expect me to look after him. I don’t like dogs.”

“Look, I’ll take him with me, if I have to.”

“That’s all right, then.” She lit a cigarette and blew out a long stream of smoke. “So you’re going to be staying here tonight, after all?”

“I’ll have to, won’t I, now that my friend’s been killed.” “Well, don’t expect any hanky-panky. Not with that dog in the room.”

Josh couldn’t help smiling. He was exhausted and he couldn’t think about anything else but Nancy, caught by the Hooded Men – but he was still amused by Petty’s unshakable conviction that men were only interested in one thing. Hanky-panky? he thought. You wish.

It was another gusty day, and Josh had difficulty in lighting the candles. Abraxas stood beside him, patiently panting. Josh had made a lead for him out of a suitcase strap. One or two passers-by stopped to watch him, and one old woman asked him if he was making a shrine.

He told her yes; and in a way he was. This niche in the wall was a shrine to Julia, and to Ella, and all of those who had been killed or tortured at the hands of the Hoodies.

At last the candles were burning strongly. Josh hefted Abraxas up in his arms and recited the words of the Mother Goose rhyme. There was hardly anybody around – only a girl with a basket of sandwiches walking up from Carey Street – and so he stepped over the candles and into the niche. Abraxas barked three or four times as they turned the corner out of this Star Yard and made their way through the passageway.

The other Star Yard was almost deserted. Josh peered around the corner of the niche, to make sure that there were no Hoodies or Watchers waiting for him. Then he tugged at Abraxas’ lead and said, “Come on, boy. Let’s go find Nancy.”

He had almost reached Carey Street when a hand seized his left shoulder. “’Ere! Don’t go beetling off! I’ve been waiting for you for days!”

It was Simon Cutter, although Josh could hardly recognize him. His face was swollen and scratched, both his eyes were black, and his two front teeth were missing. His right arm was wrapped in filthy bandages and held up in a sling. His long coat was covered in mud and straw and the lining dragged along the paving stones.

“God almighty, what happened to you?” Josh asked him.

“The Hoodies gave me a going-over, didn’t they? They wanted to know all about John Farbelow and the rest of his subversives. They wanted to know all about you.”

“What did you tell them?”

“I didn’t tell them nothing. What could I tell them, I didn’t know nothing. They were going to scrag me, and then they were going to transport me, but in the end the reeve said that since I’d lost my hook and feeler, that was punishment enough.”

“Where’s Nancy?”

Simon took hold of Josh’s arm and pulled him back up Star Yard. “I heard from one of my street arabs that they took her to the Puritan Martyrs Hospital in the City. That’s not a hospital for sick people, guvnor. It used to be a plague hospital, so they say, but it’s closed these days. The windows are always lit up at night, and there’s coming and going, but nobody ever says what goes on there.”

“Can we get in there, do you think?”

“Why do you think I sent you that note? It so happens that I know a lad who works in the kitchens at the Puritan Martyrs. Me and him used to do a little business together. Leather goods.” He hesitated for a second, and then he added, “Wallets, purses, that kind of thing. He can let us in through the scullery, ten o’clock sharp.”

“OK … do you know someplace we can stay until then?”

“There’s a room up over the Old Cat & Ninepence. We can use that.”

The Old Cat & Ninepence was a seventeenth-century pub wedged in the corner of Gough Square, between two glass and concrete office buildings. Outside, it was tile-hung, with a crazily tilting chimney. Inside it was all dark paneling and tobacco-stained plaster, and the ceiling beams were so low that Josh had to duck his head as they went in through the front door.

Simon led the way up a flight of narrow, sloping stairs, and then along to the back of the building, where there was a small sitting room with a chintz-covered sofa and two armchairs, a large radio set, and a magazine rack stuffed with yellowing copies of Radio Times and The People’s Friend.

“We’ll be snug enough here,” said Simon, easing himself stiffly into one of the chairs. “The Hoodies may have sensed somebody coming through the door, but they won’t think to look in a gaff like this.”

Josh went to the window. It was made up of small octagonal panes of yellowish glass, with bubbles and inclusions in them, so that when the sun shone through it on to his face he looked as if he were suffering from leprosy. Abraxas sat down at his feet and yawned.

“You’re sure you don’t have any idea why the Hoodies might have taken Nancy to the hospital?”

“Search me, guvnor.”

“You see, what worries me is that Julia was mutilated. When they found her body in the Thames it was empty, all of her internal organs taken out. And apparently it had been done by experts. Frank Mordant may have hung her, but what happened after that?”

Simon coughed, holding his right arm close to his chest.

“You sound pretty sick,” said Josh.

“It’s my stump, isn’t it? It’s infected. I kept it in a bowl of salty water but that still didn’t stop it from turning rotten.”

“Can’t you ask your doctor to prescribe you some antibiotics?” Josh asked him, but remembered almost at the same time that this was a world that was medically equivalent to the 1930s, before penicillin had been discovered.

Simon coughed again, and this time he brought up a handful of blood. “I’m bloody dying,” he said. “You don’t know what those bloody Hoodies did to me.”

Josh said nothing. He couldn’t quite understand why, but he felt uneasy. Why had the Hooded Men let Simon go so readily? After all, they had slaughtered all of John Farbelow’s people, in revenge for Master Thomas Edridge’s murder. And if they were holding Nancy prisoner, they must have guessed that he would come looking for her. So why hadn’t they been keeping a constant watch on the doors?

Unless they wanted to be absolutely sure that they had him trapped, where he didn’t have any chance of escape whatsoever. Josh remembered Ella’s tarot card with the man snaring songbirds. “You’re not setting me up, are you?”

Simon looked up at him, the whites of his eyes still stained with blood, like a broken vampire. “You can trust me, guvnor. You know that.”

Josh sat down next to him and pointed a finger directly at his nose. “If this is a trap, I swear to God that I will kill you first.”