Sefton let his body react. With a straight arm, he pushed beardy back. This was between her and him.
She opened her eyes, and now her gaze was dancing over his face, taking him in as she spoke quickly under her breath. ‘Cockney rhyming slang: Berkshire Hunt, cunt. It should be “bark” for “Berkshire”, but the meaning is only conveyed if you change the pronunciation.’ It was as if she was reciting something to herself, a mantra or a prayer, while expecting to be beaten. If you didn’t count the words, everything in her body language was pleading with him not to hurt her. What sort of character was he playing, who couldn’t rise above it?
‘You’re a fucking berk,’ he said. Which was slight. Not enough.
She let out a long, relieved breath.
‘I think she’s dedicated her speech to breaking off her every social relationship,’ said beardy waistcoat. ‘It’s a sort of sacrifice. I’ve read about-’
‘Fuck you,’ said the woman, mildly, and then nodded to Sefton. ‘And you and all, you fucking flid fucking nigger fucking twat.’
He let himself make understanding eye contact with her. ‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘How nice for you.’ He hoped she knew that was what the Queen was supposed to say when she didn’t like someone.
She gave him a relieved smile and a nod of appreciation. Then she turned on her heel and was gone into the crowd.
* * *
Quill had never paid much attention to what he wore. Now he was feeling awkward, walking down the steps into a boozer in what felt to him like something his old man would have worn on a night out after nicking the Shantry gang in 1983. He’d stuffed those rather too well-upholstered abs of his into a waistcoat that was a bit too tight. He’d found some natty striped trousers of which he was rather proud, and a jacket that swung under its own weight, all poured into a pair of brothel creepers. ‘Fancy dress party?’ Sarah had asked, and so he’d told her. ‘Just because you’re going as Gene Hunt,’ she’d said, ‘don’t act like him.’
It was sound advice. That Seventies TV copper was the part of his dad he sort of was but tried not to be. The place was rocking. He immediately clocked where his officers were, got a pint of something filthy and went to look at the paintings that lined the walls. Supernatural subjects: watercolours of graveyards; wood-cut prints of dancing skeletons; occult modernist pieces that were all clashing shades and angles. He checked out the juke box. It was the modern sort, millions of choices, probably downloaded from somewhere. The list of suggested tracks demonstrated an interest in the spooky, from mockery like ‘The Monster Mash’ to Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin. He hit a button, and found … two pounds a play — bloody hell. It had been a while since he’d used one of these. The introduction to ‘Don’t Fear the Reaper’ rang out under the noise of the crowd.
* * *
Costain had noted the arrival of the rest of his unit. It was getting too crowded in here to be doing what he was doing. Already all the other chairs had been taken from his table, on two occasions without asking, with just an annoyed glance in his direction. He put his book back in his pocket and stood. That bearded bloke across the way who was now obviously watching the stairs hadn’t been disturbed similarly. He was still reading, a discreet space kept around him even now the bar was packed. He had been, for some minutes now, making eye contact with Costain every now and then. Now the undercover watched as a young woman approached the man directly and he looked up. He … oh, there we go, he’d done that checking thing Sefton had mentioned: there had been just a little hand gesture, a curl of the fingers in a sort of well-practised spiral, and then he’d nodded. The woman walked down the stairs and out of Costain’s line of sight.
He turned to look at a noise from the bar. A group of lads, well dressed but very modern, in jackets and jeans, were suddenly laughing and whooping as if a goal had been scored. They were pointing in the direction of where the woman had just gone. ‘Vanished!’ he heard them yelling to each other. ‘Right through the floor!’
Okay. Those were guys without the Sight, and the stairway downwards was something of the Sight, invisible to those without the ability. He looked back. The bearded man, who was obviously some sort of gatekeeper of that stairwell, was looking pained at the celebrations by the bar. Very gauche. They were letting the wrong sort of people in here nowadays. The man visibly sighed, then slowly and purposefully closed his book and looked expectantly at the crowd, making eye contact once more with all those Costain had noticed earlier. They were the ones, Costain was sure now, who could see what he was sitting beside.
Costain stood. At the same moment, many others moved too. The people separating themselves from the throng formed not so much a queue, but an awkward spread, waiting for their turn. The ones who had wandered over … yeah, he could feel the sudden shift in gravity … you couldn’t tell if an individual had the Sight, but when they all moved together … They were, largely, the ones who looked poor or wore older clothing. He looked back to the rest. There was a real anger in the room about what was happening now. A couple of the better-dressed people had marched over to insert themselves into this rough queue, and there was mocking laughter, rolling of eyes, people turning away in annoyance. Costain could feel the social forces in conflict here, a frustration that, if it had been later in the evening, might have led to something kicking off. Hence the bouncer — he’d woken up a bit and was looking around.
Costain wished he knew more about the nature of the defences in this place, in case he had to make a sudden exit.
* * *
‘See you later, then,’ said Ross to the bloke at the bar, and she made to get up. She’d started a conversation about safety on the streets, in light of the riots, and had hoped the man might say something about the Ripper murders. But he hadn’t.
He stopped her now. ‘I didn’t realize you were … one of them.’
She tried to look non-committal.
‘We were told we were going to get to go down there too, sometime soon. You know, under the new proprietors.’
‘Oh.’
‘Obviously that message hasn’t got through. I mean, I don’t even know how we’d do that now, since it turns out to be true that we’re not even able to see the bally stairs, but … could you remind those in charge? When you get down there?’
‘Of course,’ she said, and headed over. So, there was a whole other level to this place, and only people with the Sight were allowed down there. That was where juice for the operation might be found. Maybe juice that would help with her own plans too. She had to find some sources of information about occult objects, about one object in particular. She had to get down there. She wanted just to march over, but down there — given that it didn’t exist as far as a lot of these people knew — surely counted, in the terms Quill had set out for the evening, as a private space. So to go down there would be to go against orders. She noted Quill nearby and walked past him, raising her eyebrows in a question.
Quill seemed to consider for a moment, then, just before he was gone out of her eyeline he nodded, which was a relief.
She headed for the stairs, and the man beside them met her gaze. He made a gesture so quick she couldn’t follow it, a grab of nothing, and she felt the air flatten against her face … as she mentally recited the couple of lines of nonsense syllables that Sefton had taught them from the scroll he’d found in the Docklands ruins. She’d been repeating them to herself ever since so it was second nature.
He nodded her through.
Without looking back, she was aware of Quill doing the same and being allowed to follow.
She walked quickly down the stairs. At the bottom was another set of doors exactly like the ones that led into the bar on the floor above. Ross marched right in as if she belonged.