The door behind the curtain led to a gloomy corridor running out to the back of the building. There was a small staff kitchen, and a set of steel swing doors opening off the corridor to the left. Alice approached them, but Adriel placed a hand on her arm. “You don’t need to go back there,” was all he said, and she hoped the relief didn’t show on her face – although it would have vanished when he continued, “but I do need to show you the barn.” He opened another door.
Alice’s hand flew to her mouth before she could stop it. The ‘barn’ was at least three times the size of the other rooms combined, and full of coffins. Coffins: leaning on their ends against the wall, or stacked on shelves, all neatly labelled according to height. Or length, depending on how you looked at it. A rack of shelves on one side of the space held what looked like rolls of fabric, and plastic-wrapped pieces of brass in baskets. Adriel brushed past her and beckoned her to follow, lifting something from a basket and handing it to her. It was a handle. A coffin handle.
Alice swallowed hard.
Adriel didn’t seem to notice, and was instead pointing out the different items on the shelves. “Satin, for lining. And the staple-gun, for fixing it, as well as the staples. It jams sometimes: the screwdriver is kept over there.” He pointed to a lower shelf and she nodded, wondering how she’d ended up here and whether she hadn’t made a terrible mistake.
And then the door creaked open, and everything changed.
“ANDREW? IT’S MRS Jackson, I... Oh.” The man who had stuck his head into the room stopped short when he saw Alice. There was a moment of silence, and Adriel looked from one to the other before clearing his throat.
“Alice, this is Toby: one of my assistants. Toby? Alice. She’ll be joining us from today.”
“Alice. It’s nice to meet you,” said Toby with a broad smile. A scar curved around the edge of his cheek, making his grin slightly uneven. “I’d shake your hand, but...” He waved a rubber-gloved hand at her. Much to Alice’s surprise, she realised she couldn’t reply. In fact, it was all she could do not to blush.
“Well,” said Adriel. “Toby, I’ll be with you momentarily.”
Toby nodded, and with another glance at Alice, withdrew his head from the doorway. The door swung closed behind him.
Adriel turned to Alice. “They can’t know, Alice. None of them.” He held the door for her and ushered her through, back out into the hallway. “You’ll meet the others later. If you’ll excuse me, I have some business to attend to in the... with Toby.” He nodded back towards the waiting area. “Perhaps you would like to familiarise yourself with the desk?”
“But what do I do? If someone comes...?”
“You’ll know what to do, Alice. It’s why you’re here.” And with a smile, he turned on his heel and walked towards the steel doors of the mortuary.
ALICE CONSIDERED THE sofas in the waiting room for a moment, then thought better of it and sank into the chair behind the desk. It wasn’t nearly as uncomfortable as it looked – which was more than she could say for her shoes. Bearing in mind Adriel’s comment to wear something ‘appropriate,’ she had forced herself to go and buy a pair of shoes Which Were Not Trainers, and as a result, she now felt as though a whole tribe of rats were gnawing at her toes – not to mention slightly resentful at having to chip into the last of her cash reserves. She told herself it was an investment. A back-aching, toe-killing investment. Groaning, she kicked them off under the desk and curled her sore toes into the thick carpet. A fly was making lazy circles over one of the flower arrangements – and although she couldn’t hear it, there was something about it that annoyed her. A fly in a funeral parlour just seemed... wrong, somehow. She watched the fly for a moment as it spiralled around the flowers, then nodded in satisfaction as it burst into flames and disappeared in a little cloud of ash.
“Alice, was it?” The voice came from behind her, and made her jump out of the chair.
“What? Yes. Alice. Me. Right.” She sounded flustered. She knew she sounded flustered. She tried not to.
“I just wanted to come and say hello properly,” Toby said, stepping away from the wall where he’d been leaning. Had he seen the fly, she wondered? If he had, he didn’t say anything. That would be a good start, wouldn’t it: not even been in the place five minutes and giving the game away? Alice made a mental note to be more careful. The ‘secret identity’ side of this was clearly going to be harder than she’d expected. Alice thought she should probably be grateful that Adriel hadn’t wanted her to be a spy.
Toby was holding out his hand to her – minus the glove, this time. He watched her staring at it. “I did wash them, if that’s what you’re thinking.” He was grinning again, teasing her. She smiled, and took his hand. It was warm and soft, and his grip felt strong.
“Nice to meet you. Sorry. It’s just that you startled me a bit. I was miles away.”
“Wondering how the hell you ended up here, right?”
“Something like that, yes.”
“Don’t worry about it. It takes a bit of getting used to, you know? We’re just like any other office, really, when you get down to it.”
“Mmm. The difference being that here you’ve got dead people in the filing cabinets.”
“I never thought about it like that,” he laughed. Alice shrugged, and he continued. “We take care of people. That’s all it is. The dead, the living; we take care of them. I... are you alright?” he tailed off, a look of concern on his face.
“What? Oh, yes. Fine.” She wrinkled her nose and gestured to the floor beneath the desk. “My shoes. Now, those are going to take some getting used to.”
“At least you don’t have to wear the hat,” he said, and Alice had to remind herself that Toby was entirely himself – and entirely what he seemed to be. Toby was human. Toby was normal. A normal person who knew nothing about angels, nothing about the Fallen. Just a person; a person who spent his time with other Just People. And Alice needed to be around people; to get on with her life. Or start having one, at least.
And in the meantime, she’d just try to overlook the fact the Angel of Death was her boss.
THE MORNING HAD not gone well. So far, Alice had knocked over a vase of lilies, spilled tea on the appointment book (and, while trying to mop it up, managed to smear the ink across today’s page – which meant she would later have to tell Adriel that his three o’clock appointment was with a Mrs Hrrrdddddgz) and had set off the smoke alarm in the kitchen. With the kettle.
No. The morning had not gone well. And it was only eleven o’clock.
SHE WAS STILL frantically trying to yank the battery out of the smoke alarm when Toby strolled into the kitchen, took one look at her and shook his head. Without a word, he opened one of the drawers and pulled out a wooden spoon, then reached up and whacked the side of the alarm casing with the spoon. Hard. The siren faltered... then picked up again, even louder. Toby pulled a face, and hit it again. It let out a final strangled squawk and stopped. The silence made Alice’s ears ring.
“Thanks,” she said weakly.
He grinned at her. “No problem. It’s a bit touchy – next time, just give it a smack on the head.”
“Is that how you solve all your problems?”
“Only the ones that don’t shut up...”
Alice wasn’t quite sure how to answer that, and Toby seemed to realise he’d said something off. “It was a joke, Alice.”
“Whatever.”
“Hey... did I say something wrong?”
“No, nothing. It’s fine.” She rubbed her forehead. “It’s just... headache. Loud, you know?” He was watching her carefully, and he looked so serious that Alice felt suddenly awkward. He must have felt it too; he stepped back and started fiddling with the box of teabags on the counter.