The Good, the Bad, and the Uncanny

SEVEN Not Just Another Walk on the Nightside

Come, John. Walk with me.

And so we went walking together, up and down the Nightside and back and forth, up the Grand Parade and down the Old Main Drag, in and out of endless rain-slick streets and shadowed alleyways. Taking in the wildest clubs and the lowest dives, walking under hot neon and flashing signs, past the open doors of very inviting private clubs and terribly discreet dens, where the barkers promised every pleasure you’d ever heard of or dreamed about. Where the patrons called for madder music and wilder women and danced till they dropped. One great kaleidoscope of sin, with temptation on display in every window, at marked-down prices. Love for sale on every street-corner, only slightly shop-soiled. The twilight daughters out in force, with their painted-on smiles and switch-blades tucked into their stocking tops. You can find anything you want in the Nightside if you’re prepared to pay the price.

We walked and walked, and all the time Walker never said a word to me. He just stepped it out at a brisk pace, swinging his furled umbrella like a walking-stick, letting the streets speak for themselves. The pavements were packed with people, wide-eyed and eager, in hot pursuit of whatever drove them. But they all made way for Walker and me, so that we seemed to walk in our own little pool of calm, like the eye of the hurricane.

Up and down we went, in and out of every private domain and sphere of influence, and no-one challenged us. Hard men stepped back into doorways, and foot-soldiers for a dozen different crime lords quickly changed direction or disappeared down handy alleyways. Walker led the way and I followed, and no-one wanted anything to do with us. After a while, my legs grew weary, and my feet hurt, but Walker never slowed his pace. I grew so tired I lost all track of time, which might have been the point.

I’d reached the point where I was prepared to swallow my pride and call a halt when Walker beat me to it. He came to an abrupt stop before a shabby storefront in a decidedly grubby area and gestured grandly at the run-down establishment before us. I looked it over and wasn’t impressed. The starkly lettered sign on the blank window said Welcome to the Nightside Tourist Information Centre! I couldn’t help thinking that the exclamation mark at the end was entirely unjustified. A sort of resigned shrug would have been more appropriate.

“All right,” I said to Walker. “This is new, I’ll grant you. I didn’t even know we had such a thing. Does it get much business? I would have thought most people who come here already know what they’re looking for.”

“That’s the point,” said Walker. “Shall we go in?”

He pushed open the door, and crumbling bits of paint fell off it. A small bell tinkled sadly as we entered a stuffy little office. A dark figure sat hunched behind a rough desk, half-concealed behind piles of folders, pamphlets, and assorted paper-work. Curling posters had been roughly tacked to the walls, offering picture-postcard views of places I happened to know looked nothing like that, and tall spinners held cheap pamphlets that looked as though no-one had disturbed them in years, There was dust, and cobwebs, and a general smell of futility and despair.

“Carter!” snapped Walker. “Why are you naked again?”

The figure at the desk crouched down even further behind his stacks of paper. “It helps me relax! I’ve got a lot on my mind!”

I turned away and interested myself very firmly in the contents of one of the spinners. Mostly pamphlets and flyers concerning places of interest for the discerning tourist in the Nightside. All written in that false, cheerful tone so beloved of Chamber of Commerce types, which fools no-one.

Visit the colourful Street of the Gods! (Travel insurance advised, especially against Acts of Gods.) Visit the amazing Mammon Emporium; all the merchandise from all the worlds! Try a bucket of Moose McNuggets, or a Cocaine Cola! Have you seen the Really Old Ones in the World Beneath? (Parental discretion advised. Some parts of the tour may not be suitable for those of a nervous disposition.)

That was about as much as I could stand. I looked back, to see Carter emerge sullenly from behind his desk, now wearing a grubby undershirt and jeans. He looked as run-down and untrustworthy as the place he worked in, which took some doing. Carter was neurotically thin, defiantly unhealthy, and basically disgusting on a genetic level. You got the feeling he’d still be sleazy even if you soaked him in bleach for a week. He did his best to look put-upon and hard done by, but I still felt an instinctive need to slap him, on general principles. He cringed away from Walker and glared at me.

“Don’t bother; I already know who you are. I’m Basil Carter, and you’re not at all pleased to see me. No-one ever is. See if I care. And yes, this place is a dump. Why not? No-one ever comes here. The last person to stick his head through that door really wanted the karma repair shop next door. What do you want, Taylor? We’re closed. Or out for lunch. Or renovating; that’s always a good one. There’s been a fire, or an outbreak of plague, or the rabid weasels are loose again. Come back later. Or not at all; see if I care. Those are my official responses to any and all inquiries. I’m only talking to you now because Walker will hit me if I don’t.”

“And quite right, too,” said Walker. “I never knew anyone who deserved being beaten repeatedly about the head and shoulders more than you do, Carter. And don’t you dare complain. If the people around here knew who you really were, they’d drag you out of this shop and feed you into a wood-chipper, toes first.”

Carter sniffed loudly, in a defiantly moist and unpleasant way. “When you offered me this job as an alternative to lifetime incarceration in Shadow Deep, I should have known there’d be a catch. Working in this hell-hole should count as cruel and unusual punishment. At least I don’t have to deal with people much. I’ve never been a people person.”

“Then you shouldn’t have buried so many of them under your floor-boards,” Walker said briskly. “I needed someone for this position whose very existence would discourage people from coming in, and you fit the job perfectly.”

“Walker,” I said. “Why are we here? You didn’t march me all the way across the Nightside just to meet this ... person, did you?”

“Perish the thought,” said Walker. “Walk this way.”

“If I could walk that way, I wouldn’t need the acupuncture,” sniggered Carter.

Walker hit him.

A concealed door at the back of the office opened up onto a much larger room. I followed Walker in, while Carter resumed his post behind his desk again; and just like that, I was in a whole other world. The new room was huge, stretching away in all directions, its walls covered from floor to high ceiling in hundreds and hundreds of viewscreens. Images came and went faster than I could follow them, constantly changing and updating. There were computers everywhere, backed up by unfamiliar machinery working furiously at unknowable tasks. And miles and miles of hanging cables, twisting and turning in great loops, criss-crossing like the web of a spider strung out on acid. Sitting in the middle of all this was a silent figure in a simple white robe, held upright in his chair by a series of tight leather straps. He was utterly still, his face blank, staring at nothing, with dull, unblinking eyes. A dozen thick cables sprouted from his shaven head, where holes had been drilled to allow them to burrow on through into the brain. He didn’t react to me, or to Walker. He didn’t even know we were there. Walker shut the door firmly and locked it, then strolled over to the silent figure and checked a few of the skull contacts to make sure the cables were secure. He clapped the unmoving figure on the shoulder and smiled happily, like a proud father.

“Welcome to my Secret Headquarters, John. My special place, from where I see and hear everything, hidden behind the perfect off-putting disguise. This is Argus. He makes what I do possible; don’t you, dear boy? Argus isn’t his real name, of course; it’s more of a job description. No-one remembers who he is; in fact, I doubt if even he remembers any more. It doesn’t matter. There have been hundreds like him, and no doubt there will be hundreds more. Computers and scrying balls can’t do everything; you need human input to pick out the things that matter from all the oceans of information that come pouring in at any moment.

“So, Argus. The god with a thousand eyes. Sees all, knows all, and no personality to get in the way. Though they do tend to burn out fairly quickly ... Still, not to worry; there’s never any shortage of replacements. Don’t worry, John; he can’t hear us. All his senses are focused exclusively on the Nightside. His higher functions have been surgically removed, so they can’t interfere with his observations. His mind has been surgically adjusted, so it can interface perfectly with the computers and watch thousands of situations at once, throughout the Nightside, and never once grow bored or distracted. Nothing happens that Argus doesn’t know about, and report on, and draw attention to, if it is red-flagged in his programming. Names and faces like yours, John. He always has an eye out for you.

“What do you think of my Secret Headquarters, John? Admit it; you always thought I had some great underground lair, watching over an army of secret informers and secret police, reporting back on everything they see. Well, in a way you’re right, but we’ll get to that later. Why are you scowling, John?”

I gestured at Argus. “He’s not a volunteer, is he?”

“Well, hardly. That would be cruel. Only the really nasty bastards get to undergo the Argus procedure. People who deserve it. Like Basil Carter out there; why waste time and money locking them up? There’s Shadow Deep, of course, but that’s for the out-and-out monsters like Shock-Headed Peter, who deserve to suffer. Everyone else gets to do useful things for the Nightside, in recompense for their crimes. This particular Argus ran an utterly foul con scheme, ripping babies from living wombs to sell on. Now he performs a useful function and is well provided for. He gets fed and watered and changed on a regular basis, and he’ll spend what’s left of his time helping to protect the Nightside from people like him. What could be more fitting?”

“You said something about secret police,” I said.

“So I did. Well spotted, John. Glad to see you’re paying attention. There are hundreds of other criminals, their heads as empty as Argus, walking up and down the Nightside, their minds linked to him through the computers. They’ve been programmed to look and talk like everyone else, even though there’s no-one at home in their heads. They go everywhere and see everything, and no-one ever notices them.”

“And these are more pressed men? More criminals being punished?”

“Of course!” said Walker. “Take your poachers and turn them into gamekeepers. A grand old tradition...”

He looked at me for some response, some reaction to what he was saying, but I wasn’t ready yet. I gestured at the hundreds of screens covering the walls.

“Ah, yes, those,” said Walker. “From here I can talk to everyone in the world.” He didn’t say it at all grandly, to boast or to preen. It was all just part of the job, to him. “From here I can call on any backup I need, to help me enforce my decisions. I can get armed men from the Church, the Armed Services, the Carnacki Institute, and any number of more specialised organisations. I can talk to the Authorities, the British Government, and places of power all across the world; and there isn’t a place on Earth where they won’t take my call. Because everyone knows how important the Nightside is, and how dangerous. Of course, only specially trained troops are ever allowed into the Nightside. You couldn’t expect ordinary soldiers to cope. I’d say that about the only people I don’t talk to are the Droods. They’re banned from the Nightside by long agreement. They don’t play nice.”

He broke off abruptly, as Argus began to rock back and forth in his chair. When he spoke, his voice was rough and harsh, as though he didn’t get to use it very often.

“Out of the dark, it’s coming. From out of the place that nothing comes from, it’s coming. And, oh, it’s so bright, so bright! ”

Walker moved quickly forward and put his mouth right next to Argus’s ear. “What is it? What’s coming?”

“So old, so ancient; far older than people think. But it never was what people thought it was. It is mighty and terrible, too ... and it shines so brightly it hurts to look at it. The only survivor from a Golden Age; because we were not worthy of it. Now it’s back. And God help us all.”

He stopped speaking, and nothing Walker could do could make him say anything else. Walker didn’t know what Argus was talking about, but I thought I did.

“You said he had no personality left,” I said. “But he sounded really scared.”

“They can always surprise you,” Walker said finally. “I wouldn’t worry about it. His condition makes him supersensitive to certain disturbances in the aether. He’s only repeating what someone else is saying ... I doubt it’s anything important. Bad things are always coming to the Nightside. It’s what we’re here for.” He turned his back on Argus, and spread his arms out wide, taking in the whole set-up. “So, John, what do you think of my Secret Headquarters?”

“Typical of you,” I said. “That all your influence and power should be derived from the suffering of others.”

“They suffer because they deserve to,” said Walker. “And through their penance they serve and protect the people they preyed on.” He smiled briefly. “One day, all of this could be yours. Or would you shut the system down and become blind to what threatens us? Let the bad guys go unpunished and let everyone else suffer? What would you replace this with? See? Not as simple as you thought, is it, John? I only do what is necessary for the common good. And so could you, John. All this could be yours to command. All the secret lines of influence, control, and power ... Tell me you’re not tempted.”

“Get thee behind me, Walker,” I said.

He laughed.

Next he took me to the Londinium Club, that most private and select of clubs, where the elite of the Nightside come together to dine and do business, and discuss the destruction of their enemies. You aren’t anyone in the Nightside unless you’ve been invited to become a member of the oldest club in the world. I am not a member. They wouldn’t accept the likes of me on a bet. Though I have been known to barge, trick, and intimidate my way in when I need answers I can’t find anywhere else. This has not made me popular with members of the club, but I’ve learned to live with that. The current Doorman saw me approaching and looked like he wanted to pull up the drawbridge and set fire to the moat; but I was with Walker, and no-one says no to Walker. The Doorman bowed stiffly as we passed, his face utterly impassive; but his body language suggested terrible things were happening inside him.

“You see what it is to have power?” said Walker, as we strolled into the elegant embrace of the club lobby. “You can go anywhere, and they have to smile and bow and let you in. No door is ever closed, and no-one is ever unreachable.”

“And you do so enjoy having the world by the throat, don’t you, Walker?” I said, and he surprised me by considering the question seriously.

“I try not to,” he said finally. “It gets in the way of getting the job done.”

Various liveried servants appeared to take Walker’s coat. They tried to take mine, but I just looked at them, and they gave up on the idea. The servants concentrated on Walker, smiling and bowing and asking if there was anything at all they could do for him; and as I watched them fawn over him, with their fake smiles and subservient gestures, I had to wonder if this was anything I wanted. Most people refrained from upsetting me because they were afraid of my reputation. They did what I told them because they were afraid of what I might do if they didn’t. Was that really any different?

Walker and I moved on into the dining room, where the great and the good, the movers and shakers and Major Players of the Nightside all sat down together, like so many predators sharing the same watering hole. A general truce prevailed because the place was so useful. Walker moved easily amongst the various members, greeting them all by name, charming and intimidating and persuading all the right people. All in the same calm, quiet, and utterly assured manner, never once raising his voice. Everywhere he went, good men and bad smiled just a bit nervously and agreed with whatever he said. They took it on the chin as the price of doing business.

Eventually, Walker and I ended up standing before a table set far too near the kitchens, an indication that the people sitting there might be members in good standing but were still very much at the bottom of the Londinium Club’s pecking order. Surprisingly, the old man and his wife not only didn’t look pleased to see us but made no effort to hide it. Walker tipped his bowler hat to both of them.

“John Taylor, allow me to introduce Dash Oblivion, the Confidential Op, and his wife, Shirley den Adel, once the costumed adventurer known as the Lady Phantasm.”

“Oh please,” said the grey-haired lady in the pearls and twin set. “Do call me Shirley.”

Dash just grunted something, concentrating on his meal. It was a curry, steaming hot, and the smell of it made my stomach rumble. Dash was a whip-thin figure in a smart blue blazer and white slacks. Bald-headed, his face was dominated by an eagle nose and bushy white eyebrows. He had to be in his eighties, but his cold blue eyes were still sharp and piercing. He sat bolt upright in his chair, and his blue-veined, liver-spotted hands didn’t tremble once as he shovelled food into his mouth.

Shirley gave her husband a look that was half-exasperated and half-amused. “Don’t mind him, Mr. Taylor. He hates being interrupted at his dinner. He’s always believed conversation should follow food, not interrupt it. Won’t change your ways for anyone, will you, darling?”

Dash grunted again, and she laughed quietly. Shirley den Adel was a well-preserved woman in her seventies, with a faint European accent I couldn’t quite place. Her gaze and her voice were both quite firm, and her easy manner did nothing to hide a sense of accustomed power and authority.

“Good to meet you at last, Mr. Taylor,” she said, with what sounded very like genuine warmth. “Tommy always spoke very well of you.”

“Tommy didn’t know his ass from his elbow,” said Dash, his voice still dominated by a sharp Chicago twang. He pushed back his empty plate and fixed me with a hard stare. “He should never have been a private eye. It’s not for everyone.” He glared at Walker. “And stay clear of that one. He’s bad news.”

“You wound me, Dash,” murmured Walker. “After all, it was your son Hadleigh who taught me everything I know. Before he ... stepped down.”

“Before he went crazy and ran off to the Deep School,” growled Dash. “The job broke him like it breaks everyone.”

“He left to save his soul,” Shirley said firmly.

“Or what was left of it,” said Dash.

“The job’s not for everyone,” said Walker. “It’s always suited me just fine.”

He looked at them both challengingly, and they looked away rather than meet his gaze. Walker glanced at me, to make sure I’d seen them defer to his authority.

“So,” Walker said easily. “What are you doing these days, Dash?”

Dash growled at him, apparently deeply immersed in the dessert menu, so Shirley answered for him. I got the feeling that happened a lot.

“Dash is retired now. We both are. He gardens, and I work on our memoirs. Oh, the stories we have to tell! Not to be published until we’re both safely dead, of course. It’s not everyone who were legendary heroes back in the thirties and forties, then made an even more successful comeback in the seventies and eighties! We could have gone on ... but we both felt we’d done our best. So now we just consult, on occasion, and let younger bodies do all the hard lifting. Isn’t that right, Dash?”

“Even done some work for you, Walker, on the quiet,” said Dash, grinning nastily. “I can still show these youngsters how it’s done.”

“But not too often,” said Shirley. “We’ve earned our retirement.”

“Don’t you ever miss the old days?” I said.

“Sometimes,” said Shirley, a bit wistfully. “We had a good war, really, chasing saboteurs and fifth columnists all over America ... And the villains were all so colourful in those days. They had style. The Vril Power Gang, the Nazi Skull...”

“And Wu Fang,” said Dash. “Put him away a dozen times, but he always got out. We should never have let him drink that Dragon’s Blood, back in ‘forty-one.”

“Oh, hush, dear,” said Shirley. “He was dying. And he wasn’t a bad sort. For a Chinaman.”

“Things were different when the Timeslip kicked us out here, back in the seventies,” said Dash. “Appalling place, then and now. So we rolled up our sleeves and got to work. There was a lot to do.”

“Never much cared for the seventies,” said Shirley. “Terribly cynical times. Though the eighties turned out to be even worse ... I was glad to retire. We stayed involved, though, helping train our successors. I worked with Ms. Fate, you know, when she started out. She’s done very well for herself.”

“What do you want with us, Walker?” said Dash. “You never show up unless you want something.”

“I’m looking into Tommy’s disappearance,” I said carefully. “Working with his brother Larry, not Walker. And it would appear that your eldest, Hadleigh, is also involved in some way. I was hoping you could tell me something about him.”

Dash and Shirley looked at each other, and they suddenly seemed older and more frail. Dash’s hands closed together on the table before him, and Shirley put her hand over them.

“Can’t say I approve of what Hadleigh’s made of himself,” Dash said finally. “Detective Inspectre for God’s sake ... We should never have left him alone, all those years. Not our fault, of course, but...”

“He fell in with bad company,” said Shirley, glaring at Walker. “We’d hardly been back a year, before he disappeared. And when he came back ... We don’t talk any more. We never see him. He does write us the occasional letter, now and again. But it’s not the same.”

“He was our first-born,” said Dash. “He meant so much to us. We had such hopes for him ...”

“Larry and Tommy came later,” said Shirley. “Good boys, both of them. Nothing like their elder brother. We had hopes for them, too ... but Larry was murdered by his own partner, and we lost Tommy to the Lilith War.”

“Never did like Larry’s partner,” said Dash. “That Mag gie Boniface ... stuck-up little piece. Just because her family was big in voodoo ...”

“I never knew what he saw in her,” said Shirley.

Dash grinned suddenly. “I could make a good guess. She had a balcony you could do Shakespeare from ...”

“Oh, hush, you nasty old man,” said Shirley. And they smiled at each other.

“Larry hasn’t been the same, since he came back from the dead,” said Shirley. “We try to look after him, as best we can, but he keeps us at a distance. As though we might be bothered because he’s dead. The very idea. He’s our son.”

“Seen a lot worse than the walking dead,” said Dash, nodding. “Lot worse.”

“We spent a lot of time and money looking for Tommy,” said Shirley. “After the War was over. But it was chaos everywhere, everything in such a mess ... and there were so many people missing. No-one knew anything. Dash wore himself out, walking up and down the streets, looking for something, some sign ... until finally I made him stop. We did think about hiring you, Mr. Taylor; but we heard you’d already tried your gift, to no effect, so what was the point? So we got used to the idea that our poor Tommy was gone, another victim of that damned War.”

“Larry never gave up on his brother,” said Dash. “Always was stubborn as a mule, that boy.”

“They were both good boys,” said Shirley.

“Good boys,” said Dash.

They sat close together, holding hands, their heads bowed.

“We didn’t do so well with our children,” said Shirley. “Larry’s dead, Tommy’s gone, and Hadleigh ... God alone knows what Hadleigh is. Three sons, but no grandchildren, and never likely to have any now. Was all that we did for nothing? We saved the world, on at least three occasions. President gave us medals. In private. And all for what? To grow old and see our children lost to us. Don’t we deserve something for all we did?”

“We didn’t do it for the rewards,” said Dash, squeezing her hand. “We did it because it needed doing.”

“Duty and responsibility,” said Walker, nodding. “The only things that matter.”

“Oh, fuck off, Walker,” said Shirley.

I felt like applauding.

After the Londinium Club, Walker and I paid a visit to the Uptown Board of Unnatural Commerce. A big stately building right in the heart of the Nightside business sector. All very solemn, very dignified and businesslike; you could practically smell fresh bank-notes on the rarefied lobby air. Walker took me in and out of various offices, where no expense had been spared, and comfort and ostentatious luxury came as standard. He made a point of introducing me to a whole series of powerful and influential people, who all pretended to be glad to see me. Because if I was with Walker, then I must be a personage worth knowing. They offered me thick, murky sherry, which I declined, and listened to my every casual remark as though each contained the secrets of the world. I smiled and nodded and avoided answering any of their subtly probing questions as to what I was doing with Walker. Let them wonder and worry.

It didn’t take me long to work out why Walker wanted me to meet these high city types. These were the people who supplied Walker with private and confidential business information, from the inside. Such as who was on the way up, who was on the way down, and who could be pressured or blackmailed ... All so Walker could keep on top of things and apply corrections when necessary. More than one top business man with a pale and sweaty face eased me to one side to whisper how Walker had destroyed this person or that, or even made them disappear ... because they put their personal financial interests ahead of the Nightside’s.

No-one was allowed to threaten the status quo, not while Walker was on the job. No matter how rich and powerful they might think they were.

The Street of the Gods came next. Walker’s portable Timeslip was working overtime now, slamming us from one place to another. Walker and I strode down the Street, side by side, and a whole bunch of Beings, Powers, and Other-Dimensional Deities decided to retire to their various churches, lock the doors, and hide under their altars until we were gone. Other Beings and their congregations made a point of coming out into the Street, just to be seen conversing amiably with Walker and me and demonstrate to everyone else that they were on good terms with us. And not in any way afraid of either of us. Walker was very polite, as always, and even allowed a few of the gods to bless him.

“Doesn’t any of this ever go to your head?” I asked him, as we left our admirers behind.

“It’s pleasant enough, in its way,” said Walker. “One of the perks of the job. But it’s not real. There isn’t one of them that really likes or even respects me. It’s the position, and the power that comes with it. They’d bow down to you as quickly if you were in my position.”

“There was a time when people did that,” I said. “Back when some quarters saw me as a potential King in waiting. Can’t say I ever liked it much. They weren’t talking to me, just who they thought I might be.”

“You’ve made people respect you,” said Walker. “You’ve put a lot of effort into building your reputation. And unlike many in the Nightside, you really have done most of the awful things you’re supposed to have done.”

“A reputation helps keep the flies off,” I said. “But it’s there to protect me, not feed my ego.”

“And it is a useful tool, to make people do what you want them to do.”

“Yes,” I said. “But...”

And then I stopped, because I didn’t know what came next. Walker just smiled. And so we carried on quietly together, for a while.

“Normally, I’d take you to the Exiles Club next,” said Walker. “Introduce you to all the otherworldly and other-dimensional royalty in exile; thrown up here on the Nightside’s shores through Timeslips or dimensional doors, or some other unfortunate celestial accident. All the lost Kings and Queens, Emperors and Divinities ... If only to show you that royalty can be a real pain in the arse, just like everyone else. Still, nothing like having a King or Queen bow their head to you to cheer up a dull day. Unfortunately, the Exiles are currently a bit mad at me, ever since I found it necessary to have some of them killed to maintain public order. You remember, John.”

I nodded. I remembered their severed heads set on iron spikes outside the Londinium Club. Queen Helena, Monarch of the Evening in a future twilight Earth. Uptown Taffy Lewis, crime boss, and the scumbag’s scumbag. And General Condor, a great leader of men from some future Spacefleet; who made some unfortunate alliances in his quest to do the right thing. Walker never hesitated to deal firmly with anyone who might challenge his authority.

Was he trying to tell me something in his own subtle way? Did he have an iron spike ready for my head if I turned him down?

That was Walker’s main strength; he always kept you guessing.

Somewhat to my surprise, our next stop turned out to be Rats’ Alley; where the homeless scrabble for thrown-out food or a place to lay their heads. Rats’ Alley is a wide, cobbled square and a few narrow tributaries, set behind some of the finest and most upscale restaurants in the Nightside. Here, out of sight of the fine clientele who swan in through the front door, exists a small community of those who have fallen off the edge and can’t find their way back. The homeless, the beggars, the lost and the ragged, the damaged and the damned, living in cardboard boxes, lean-to shelters, plastic sheeting, or only layers of clothing and the occasional blanket. Refugees from the world the rest of us take for granted.

I spent some time here, once.

Rats’ Alley was a rougher, more dangerous place these days, with the loss of their saint and guardian angel, Sister Morphine. Razor Eddie still slept there as often as not, keeping the vultures at bay, and, of course, they still had Jacqueline Hyde. She came lurching out of the shadows to block our way, wrapped in the grimy tatters of what had once been an expensive coat. Walker and I stopped, to show respect for her territory. Everyone knew Jacqueline’s story. This grim, bedraggled figure had once been a debutante and a high flyer, until she made the mistake of experimenting with her grandfather’s formula. Now she’s one of the Nightside’s sadder love stories. Jacqueline is in love with Hyde, and he with her, but they can only ever meet briefly, in the moment of the change.

She snarled at Walker and me, and her body exploded suddenly into muscle and bulk. Hyde stood swaying and growling before us, his huge hands clutching at the air, eager to rend and tear, break bones, and feast on their marrow. He towered over us, his brute face flushed with the hatred he felt for all Mankind. Jacqueline Hyde: two souls in one body, together and separated at the same time.

“Easy,” said Walker. “Slow and easy, that’s the way. You don’t want to hurt us, Hyde. It’s Walker. You remember Walker.”

If anyone else had tried the calm and reasonable routine, Hyde would have turned him into roadkill. But Walker was using the Voice, in a calm and soothing way, rather than his usual abrupt commands. Hyde’s great head swayed slowly back and forth, deep-set eyes blinking confusedly under heavy eye-brow ridges, then he turned away suddenly and was gone, back into the shadows.

“I didn’t know you could use your Voice like that,” I said.

“Lot you don’t know about me, John,” Walker said cheerfully. “I could write a book. If I only had the time.”

He moved easily among the soggy cardboard boxes and the piles of blankets, stepping carefully past and over the filth that covered the cobbled square. He greeted many of the homeless by name, as one by one they emerged from their shelters and hiding-places to crouch uneasily before him, like a pack of suspicious wild dogs. Most didn’t want to get too close, but others fawned openly, begging for food or spare change, or a kind word—some sign that they had not been entirely forgotten by the real world. Walker murmured soft words and let them sniff his hands, and they quickly lost interest and retreated back to their own private little worlds. Walker smiled easily about him, in the last place you can fall to before the grave claims you for its own.

“This used to be Peter Pendrake,” said Walker, gesturing at a bundled-up figure pressed up against the rear of its mould-covered box. “You used to work for me, didn’t you, Peter? Until I caught you with your hand in the till.”

“Long time ago, Henry,” said a dry, ghostly voice from the shadows at the back of the box. “I’m a different person now. You could take me back. I could still do the job.”

“That wasn’t all I caught you doing, was it, Peter? You really were a very bad boy. But I’ll tell you what; keep your eyes open and keep reporting in, and I’ll think about it.”

A painfully thin man, stained and filthy, in the ragged remains of a futuristic pressure suit, huddled against the cold under a very basic lean-to. He clutched possessively at his bottle and hugged it to his chest, glaring at Walker with sullen defiance.

“This was the famous Jet Ace Brannigan,” said Walker. “Air hero from some alternate time-line. Flew a supersonic jet of his own design, fighting crime in the skies. Then he flew through a Timeslip and ended up here. You used to work for me, too, didn’t you, Ace? Hunting dragons in the night sky? Until the drink got to you, and you crashed your jet on a main street, killing one hundred and twenty-seven people. You walked away with hardly a scratch; but I couldn’t let you fly again, after that.”

“I never used to drink,” said Ace. “Until I met you.”

The last person Walker wanted me to see was a shivering wreck of a man, trying to keep out the cold and the damp with a single thin blanket. He looked a hundred years old, his face the colour of bleached bone, his features hidden behind heavy wrinkles. He turned his head away, not wanting to be seen. Walker considered him for a long moment.

“This pathetic wreck used to be Somerset Smith, Gentleman Adventurer,” he said finally. “Worked for Hadleigh, then for me, taking care of all those important, necessary, but very unpleasant situations that sometimes have to be dealt with quietly, by expendable people like yourself, John. Quite a name in his time, was Somerset; had a hell of a reputation. But then he tried to bring me down, and I broke him. A lot of my enemies end up in places like this. So much more satisfying than simply killing them.”

“Are you warning me?” I said. “Or threatening me?”

“What do you think, John?” said Walker.

Everywhere we went, people noticed Walker. They smiled and bowed, glared and turned their faces away ... but no-one ever ignored him. Walker was the Man. Everyone knew who he was, and what he did. But the one thing they all had in common, when you looked past the smiles and pleasant words, was that no-one was ever genuinely pleased to see Walker. A lot of them faked it remarkably well, so well that perhaps only a trained and experienced eye like mine might have spotted the falseness; but I knew. And I was pretty sure Walker did, too. I had to wonder if Walker had any real friends any more, or if he’d only see that as a weakness others would exploit. He kept his wife and his sons outside the Nightside, in an entirely separate life.

I knew, though, that he used to have friends. Good friends. There were three of them, tight as brothers and thick as thieves, three young men determined to get on in the world and change it for the better. Henry, who became Walker. Mark, who became the Collector. And Charles, my father.

I said as much to Walker, but he just shrugged.

“I don’t have time for my family, let alone friends. The job is everything: my life, my wife, my mistress ... It’s very demanding. The thing about duty and responsibility is that they’re like the Old Man of the Sea. Once you pick them up, you can’t put them down again. Ever. You carry the weight of them until you drop in your tracks, and the best you can hope for is that there’ll be someone to take up the burden for you. I thought I knew what I was taking on, when I started; but I didn’t. You can’t know, you can’t understand, how big the job is until you’re carrying the whole weight of it on your shoulders. You think this is the life I wanted, John? The life I would have chosen for myself? I don’t run the Nightside; it runs me.”

“You’re not exactly selling me on taking over,” I said. “What about Hadleigh? He was in charge before you. How did he cope?”

“Arguably, he didn‘t,” said Walker. “He gave it all up and ran away to the Deep School, and now he’s the Detective Inspectre. Whatever the hell that is. No-one gets to retire from this job, John. We go crazy, or get killed, or drop in our tracks. But ... it’s the only job worth doing. There’s nothing else like it.”

We were walking through Uptown now, where the very best and the very worst came to wine and dine, to see and be seen. Walker moved easily amongst the celebrities and the Major Players, greeting them all by name and putting them in their places if they got too familiar. All he had to do was murmur his wishes, and people jumped to obey. I never got that, for all my hard-won reputation.

“You see, John?” Walker said finally. “My job isn’t to punish the guilty or strike down the wicked. Or even to rescue and preserve the good. It’s all about maintaining the status quo. Dealing with all the stresses as they arise, playing one faction against another, encouraging this individual or slapping down that one. I keep the lid on, maintain a steady balance, so that the wheels of business can turn smoothly, and everyone who comes here can get everything they think they want. The Nightside exists to cater to and contain all the darker elements in the world; and it’s my responsibility to prevent any of it from spilling over into the unsuspecting everyday world.

“If it were up to me, I’d nuke the whole sick freak show and be done with it. But since the Powers That Be won’t let me, I walk the night and do my best to keep the freaks in their cages.”

I stopped, and Walker stopped with me. I gave him my best hard look.

“Enough. Enough, Walker. I don’t need to hear any more. And I’ve seen everything I need to see.”

He smiled briefly. “You haven’t seen anything yet. The Nightside is bigger than you know, bigger than you ever suspected, and so are my duties and responsibilities. I can’t hand this over to just anyone.”

“How many times do I have to say it, Walker? I don’t want your job! I don’t want it, don’t need it, and I wouldn’t be any good at it if I did. Let the new Authorities choose your successor.”

“You’d trust them to do that?”

“More than I trust you,” I said.

He smiled again. “Very good, John. You’re learning.”

“I’m not going any further. I have a case, remember? And you know something about Tommy Oblivion. Tell me what it is.”

“All right,” said Walker. “It was Mark. The Collector has finally lost it. He’s moved on from collecting things to collecting people. Famous, important, or interesting people; they’re all trophies to him now. Find his current lair, wherever it is, and there you’ll find Tommy Oblivion; and all the other missing people. But be careful, John. I can’t speak for Mark’s state of mind any more. Best of luck. Talk to you again later.”

He walked away, not at all tired or troubled, swinging his furled umbrella in a cheerful but dignified way. I watched him go, considering all the things he’d said and all the things he hadn’t. First, and most obvious, he didn’t know where the Collector was hiding himself these days, or he would have told me. Which was ... unusual. Where could the Collector have buried himself and his extensive collection that even Walker’s people couldn’t locate him? And second, why had Walker felt the need to bargain with me, trading his private knowledge for a walk in the Nightside? All right, the man was dying, and time was running out; but I’d never known Walker to deal from anything save a position of strength.

But that would have to wait. I had a case. I’d given my word. I had to find the Collector. I winced as an image of Tommy filled my head, pinned to a giant display card, like a captured butterfly.

Walker and the Collector had worked together, along with my father, during the Lilith War. The Collector had seemed to be improving then; less obviously crazy. What had happened since, to drive him over the edge? And why would Walker want me to lower the boom on the Collector, after tolerating his old friend’s nefarious exploits for so many years? Unless ... Could this be connected to the new time-travel apparatus the Collector had stolen? The one that could transfer his consciousness into another body ... Such a device would make the perfect escape route, so that the Collector could never be captured or punished, no matter what he did ... Walker couldn’t allow that.

So maybe he wanted me to take down the Collector because, while it had to be done, he couldn’t do it himself. Not to the one man who might be his only remaining friend.

That was the trouble with hanging around with Walker. You ended up thinking like him.