“I don’t believe this,” Michael said, turning away.
“It’ll hardly hurt him now,” Streak pointed out. “Look, our terms have just picked it up. No one saw. Much the fastest way. Thumper sent the signal.”
“How?” Michael was astounded. The dwarf had said nothing.
“Cybercom,” Thumper said. “Thought-to-sound unit. Wired to radio. Paired with the rigger.” Clearly, he didn’t want to waste any time on superfluities like connecting principles or verbs here. “Told him, special delivery. In the van now. That’s three hundred thou, mate.”
“I’m not carrying that much,” Geraint said, perfectly reasonably. “Come back to my apartment. You’ll have the cred in five minutes.”
“Fine by me,” Steak said. “But it will be going to his family.” The elf looked deadly serious for a moment. Behind the joking and facetiousness, and the seemingly awful fact that he barely seemed to care that a comrade had been killed in this place and his body treated like refuse, the elf had some honor remaining. He would see the man’s family right, at any rate.
They were just about to leave when Michael spotted the slightly out-of-place cushion and told them to Wait. Underneath the red wine-stained cover he found a small padded envelope stashed there, and pocketed it. He wondered whether to search the whole place, and then realized that apart from the wardrobe there was precious little to search. A quick check eliminated the wardrobe as an object of suspicion. Streak was beginning to get jumpy; the coast was clear and he wanted to get out now. Michael obliged and went down in the elevator.
“What did you get?” Geraint asked him.
“UPS package,” Michael said. “Non-standard packaging, but, they delivered it. The sticker with the ID is gone, but we could trace it easily enough.”
“So, come on, what’s in it?”
Michael fumbled with the packaging. It was, as courier deliveries usually are, rendered impossible to open without recourse to a sharp object of some kind. His nail-file didn’t quite come up to scratch. By the time Thumper had offered him a combat knife, the elevator doors were about to open.
Standing before them was a large clutch of Metropolitan policemen. They even had riot shields and were obviously expecting some serious trouble. The electric stun batons they carried were further evidence of that, if any were needed. The two at the front of the wedge were orks, and they looked as if the police had recently taken to recruiting from hospitals for the criminally insane. Or perhaps doing so more openly and with less pickiness than usual. Michael’s heart almost stopped dead and it was all he could do not to gasp aloud.
After twice catching Michael and company at the scene of a murder in a single night, the police weren’t going to look at them any too kindly. They wouldn’t get out of this again.
Michael and the others stared at the police, who stared back at them.
There was something horribly wrong.
“Rather fine gentlemen to be in a place like this,” one of the orks said in an obviously assumed semiposh accent. He was staring at Geraint and Michael.
“Well, officer,” Streak chimed in before either of the men could open their mouths, “that’s because they were kidnapped and brought here. I’m glad to say we’ve just now persuaded their ‘hosts’ to release them, without any due trouble. Ransom job. Quietly and efficiently dealt with. No harm done, nothing to frighten the horses.”
Geraint was amazed at his quick-wittedness. He was even more amazed at the response of the ork.
“I see, sir,” he said, continuing with his brave attempt to Sound like a BBC newscaster. “Well, then, we need not detain you any further.”
“I assume you have other business here, officer,” Streak said mischievously. The ork looked very uncomfortable. “Well, we won’t get in your way. These places,” be said, shaking his head, “such hot-beds of depravity and crime. Good to know London can rely on you brave fellows.” He led them out, past the shifty-looking uniformed squad, and into the safe anonymity of the night. When they were a safe distance away, and the police safely inside the building, the elf almost doubled up laughing.
“I don’t know how you got away with that,” Michael said, shaking his bead.
“Got away with it?” the elf hooted. “Police, my arse. They were local slints. Disguised as coppers. Gets them in the door and that’s half the battle when they’re out on a job, steaming a flat or thrashing some poor tosser senseless. There’s been a rash of it lately. Good outfits though. Not bad gear. Probably bought it as knock-off from some sub-station somewhere.”
Geraint shook his head ruefully. The ork’s attempt at posh English had been so absurd, but he simply hadn’t thought of the possibility. Understandable, really. Few people, exiting from the scene of a murder, would have thought of it.
“Funny thing is, one look at a real toff and they go all slobbery and weak at the knees. The old hand starts tugging at the forelock before they know it,” Streak said, still chuckling. They knew you were class, Your Lordship. Tangling with you would be trouble. Get the real cops in, right? Not what they wanted at all.”
“Makes two of us,” Geraint said.
“Come on, let’s get to the van, get those pictures for you,’ Streak said to Michael, “and then our cash. It’s been a long night.”
“It certainly has” Michael said in fervent agreement. Too long by half.
By five AM., back in Mayfair and with their unexpected guests long gone back into the anonymous dawn. Geraint and Michael sat down to a brandy and waited for their over-stimulated systems to calm down to where sleep might be a possibility. Michael was painfully stiff across the shoulders and of course there was the permanent weakness in the small of his back. Whenever he exerted himself too much, he felt as if he’d spend a day on a rack. An image flitted across his tired mind of being tortured by devilish hooded figures from some historical Inquisition. Maybe it was coincidence, maybe it was psychic, but he dismissed it at the time.
Then he remembered the package he’d picked up in the apartment. lie took a dagger-shaped paper knife from Geraint’s desk and slit it open. Inside was a slim, leather-bound volume whose contents was written in Latin. He took in the long-winded title and shook his head slowly.
“Don’t tell me, it’s a book of fairy tales.” Geraint said.
“Actually, you’re not so far off. It’s a treatise on undines.”
Geraint looked thoughtful. “Go on. Refresh my memory.”
“I’m not sure myself,” Michael admitted. “Some kind of water spirit or something. Let me check.”
A few quick recourses to dictionaries and a database had the answer before too long. Michael summarized the spew of words. “Yes, nature spirits in watery form. Often female. The Rhine maidens, that sort of thing. Want me to go press some macros and call up more detail?”
“I think it can wait,” Geraint said, yawning at last. Finally, his body was telling him that it might be able to sleep after all. “But what does a-”
“…cultural attache want with a book on undines?” Michael finished his sentence for him. “Indeed. What does it mean?”
“Maybe it was intended for Serrault?” Geraint suggested. “His mage frend? The one absent from public records?”
“Could be,” Michael said. “Only one thing to do. Find out who sent it.” His rubbed his hands together with the smug grin that prefaced any decking activity he expected to be very straightforward. “I think we’ve got to go trawling through the databases again.”
“You do that, old man,” Geraint said as he got up, rubbing his eyes. “I need some sleep like the Conservationist party chairman needs a punch in the face. Let me know what you find.” He knew the expression in Michael’s eyes from old, and guessed his friend would be busy for some time yet. Whenever they gambled with cards, or just played some game for the fun of it, Michael would always want one more. One more hand, one more twist, one more puzzle or riddle to crack. Because you couldn’t have too much of a good thing. Geraint was just a couple of years older, and much less prone to riding waves.