Unschlicht leaned back in his chair, fingers steepled, and looked into the distance with his clear bird-of-prey eyes. They sat in his rooms in one of Trinity’s towers. There was a table, two folding chairs and virtually nothing else, no curtains, and no books. On the desk rested a foolscap-sized journal, bound like a ledger, and a fountain pen.
Unschlicht was quiet and still for so long that Peter began to suspect he had been forgotten. He looked dishevelled. A leaf clung to his shirt, and the knees of his trousers had grass stains. Then the philosopher looked up and cocked his head to one side, like Peter had seen falcons do.
‘You are a very lucky boy, Mr Bloom, that my friend and I spotted you from the green. What are we going to do with you?’
‘I won’t try it again, sir,’ Peter said. ‘It was just a silly thing. A whim. A dare. I will sit my finals on Monday, like I am supposed to, I promise—’
Unschlicht made a chopping movement with one hand.
‘That is not my meaning. You appear to have taken my philosophical commentaries very seriously. That is good. That is very good. But I fear it has made you too much possessed by death.’
Peter said nothing.
‘That is foolish. We can never experience death. Death is not an event in life. If we take eternity to mean not infinite temporal duration but timelessness, then eternal life belongs to those who live in the present.’
‘But Summerland—’
‘Summerland makes no difference. It is merely another construct, with no true eternity. It is the board for yet another linguistic game. But tell me, Mr Bloom, who makes the rules? Who stands besides the board, watching and judging?’
‘I don’t know.’ Peter felt uncomfortable under his unblinking stare. Unschlicht smelled faintly of grass and sex, and suddenly Peter realised what he had been doing in the grounds that had stained his trousers.
‘Well, let me show you,’ Unschlicht said. ‘I am only the stepladder, boy. You must climb on your own, and then throw the stepladder away.’
He got up and pulled out a heavy-looking leather suitcase from under his bed. He lifted it with some effort and placed it on the table in front of Peter.
Then he opened it.
Inside it was God.
The Blue Dog Pub was on Cottage Place, off Brompton Road, away from the bright cafés and shops of Knightsbridge and the grandeur of the Victoria and Albert Museum. A high wind blew down the alley and made the bare trees in the private garden on the other side of the road wave their branches and whisper. In the November dark, the pub’s windows were bright and welcoming.
When Rachel entered, the stifling heat of a gas fire and the smell of beer washed over her. The place was small and quiet, just a handful of tables and a large wireless set playing a German song, dog-themed paintings and posters on blue walls, a scuffed bar with brass taps. The landlord, an old man with a thick white moustache, looked up at her and then went back to polishing a pint glass.
She ordered half a pint of cider for herself and a pint of lager, peeled off her winter coat and sat down near the fireplace to wait. She had started to feel like she was fighting a cold and the warmth felt good. Fifteen minutes later, the bell above the door tinkled and Bloom walked in.
‘Peter. It is good to see you again. I bought you a drink.’
This was the first time Rachel had seen Bloom in the flesh since the Harrises’ soirée. As far as she could tell, he was wearing the same body as the last time, although he looked bearlike in his thick duffel coat and hat.
The barman frowned at Bloom and went on polishing his glassware. The New Dead were not welcome everywhere, especially not amongst German immigrants. The crushing defeat of Germany in the Great War and the role ectotechnology had played in it had left deep scars.
‘This weather makes me appreciate your fortitude during our first meeting,’ Peter said. ‘Thank you for coming at short notice.’
In the last two weeks, Rachel had taken several more steps towards treason. At Bloom’s request, she had jotted down notes on her co-workers. She found it cathartic, especially describing Miss Scaplehorn as a beak-nosed harpy. She chronicled rivalries between Section heads and affairs between junior agents and secretaries. She made most of them up, with enough half-truths to appear plausible.
She delivered her reports to Bloom via ectomail drops, which seemingly by accident established a reasonably secure covert communications protocol. They spoke briefly on the ectophone and went for a walk in Serpentine Park one Saturday, Rachel with the ectophone buds in her ears, Peter in spirit. There was little need to mask her emotions that time—she genuinely enjoyed his company. Like Joe, Bloom lacked the snobbishness that characterised many Court agents. He kept the conversation light, asking Rachel about India and relating a few amusing anecdotes about C.
This meeting, however, felt much more serious.
‘I did not expect to see you in the flesh again,’ Rachel said.
‘I was needed in Blenheim. Spain went pear-shaped so quickly it’s all hands on deck. The Army might end up having to fight British volunteers, would you believe it? It’s a mess. How we ended up in it is a textbook example of the problem we are trying to solve here, really—the lack of Winter and Summer collaboration. Your reports have been very helpful in gauging the temperature up here.’
He took off his mask but kept his hat on, and quickly donned a pair of tinted glasses that hid the medium’s blank eyes. His charter-body’s face was pale and rounded. He looked a little like a chubby boy wearing his father’s hat.
Not for the first time, Rachel wondered about Bloom. In her experience, a double agent was motivated by ideology, sex, money or ambition. Peter did not quite fit any of them. Maybe he was simply a better actor than most.
‘I’m glad to hear it. The Finance Section continues to be as exciting as always,’ she said. ‘Over time, I could even get used to it.’
‘I doubt that, Rachel. I really doubt it.’ Bloom sipped his beer and grimaced. ‘I’m afraid I don’t really like beer. Although this body appears to.’
She raised her cider glass. ‘One more sip, for good luck?’
They clinked glasses.
‘It is nice to meet like this,’ Rachel said. ‘The other times … well, I always felt sort of naked.’
‘Really?’
‘That came out wrong. But I knew you could see my thoughts.’
‘Not your thoughts. Just a glimpse of your emotions. Your aetheric shadow. It is unfair, I know.’
‘So, what did you see, Mr Bloom?’
Bloom sipped his pint and then stared at it. ‘You are very unhappy. Not just angry. Something happened to you. Did you lose someone? Not that it is any of my business.’
‘Yes. Yes, I did.’
‘It is hard, isn’t it?’ Bloom said. ‘Younger people do not even understand what death is anymore. We have all become like children that way. That is probably why people are happy to send soldiers into harm’s way in Spain. It’s not real to them.’
‘You lost someone, too,’ Rachel said.
‘My father. He never got a Ticket. He was too stubborn. I am not sure what happened to him. I expect he Faded quickly.’
‘I’m so sorry.’
Peter emptied half his pint with one gulp. ‘You know, this stuff is starting to grow on me. That happens a lot: the medium likes something and you start to like it, too. I now have a surprising fondness for orange marmalade, for example.’ He looked at Rachel, his medium’s blank eyes just visible behind the glasses. ‘I’m sorry. I am rambling.’