The Devil You Know (39 page)

Gabe jumped ship at last just before Sands End, paid off the cab, and continued on foot. I did the same.

“That good enough for you?” my cabbie asked, deservedly smug.

“You could write the book, mate,” I said, tipping him a fiver. Then I was off after Gabe before he could get too much of a lead on me.

He didn’t go far, though. He stopped at the next street corner—Lots Road—under a pub sign that showed a horse leaping a brook, took out his mobile, and had an intense conversation with someone. He glanced up at the sign, said something into the phone, nodded. Then he put the phone away and walked on into the pub—the Runagate.

I debated with myself whether I should give this up as a bad job. It would be useful to see who Gabe was meeting up with—more useful still to be able to eavesdrop, but that was probably asking too much. In any case, having come this far, it seemed a bit ridiculous just to jump into another cab and go back into the City.

Cautiously, I followed Gabe inside. The place was reassuringly crowded, and I was able to pause on the threshold and get my bearings. I couldn’t see Gabe at first, but that was because his highly visible hair was momentarily eclipsed behind a row of tankards hanging up on the far side of the bar. A few seconds later, he turned away from me with a pint in his hand to walk over toward the side door—and out through it. As the door opened and then closed, I had a glimpse of a beer garden beyond, with small wooden picnic tables and bright green parasols.

That made life a bit more problematic. If I followed him through that door, I might be walking right into his line of sight, and there’d be no crowd to hide behind. It would probably be better to go around the outside of the building and at least see the lay of the land before I moved in.

I stepped back out onto the street. Barely ten feet away, Scrub was squeezing his huge bulk out of a minicab, making it rock wildly on its suspension.

I ducked back inside before he could see me and looked around for somewhere to hide. No upstairs. No saloon. The gents. I crossed the bar in three strides, threw the door open, and ducked inside.

The only other occupant, who was waving his hands under a hot-air drier, glanced around at me and then gawped in disbelief. Fortunately, I already knew that the deck of fate was stacked against me, so the fact that the other man was Weasel-Face Arnold didn’t faze me in the slightest. I hauled off and kicked him as hard as I could where a kick was likely to have the most immediate and dramatic effect. Then, as he doubled over, I got a good, solid grip on his neck and rammed his head sideways into the unyielding white ceramic of a sink. He folded without a sound.

Damn! Taken on its own merits, the violence had been quite cathartic, but I had nothing to tie him up with, and as soon as he was found, the whole place would be up in arms. Whatever was going on here, it was probably a bad idea to try getting any closer to it right then.

On an impulse, I went through Arnold’s pockets. Nothing particularly exciting there, but I took his wallet and his mobile phone just in case either of them might prove to be useful later on.

I opened the door a crack, checked out as much of the bar as I could see, and then stepped out. No sign of Scrub, for which I was devoutly grateful. Most likely he was already out in the beer garden with McClennan.

I went back out onto the street again, which immediately made me feel a little bit safer. At least I was away from the epicenter of whatever alarums and excursions would follow on when Arnold was found—so there was probably nothing to lose by taking a look around the side, so long as I kept my head down.

I rounded the building. The approach looked good, because there was a fence around the beer garden that came up almost to head height. Peering around the corner of the building, I caught sight of Scrub’s unmistakable back on a bench in the far corner, his enormous frame almost completely hiding McClennan from view. They were talking earnestly, but I was too far away to hear a word.

By bending over like an old man, I was able to shuffle my way around the outside of the fence without being seen. I knew when I was in the right place, because I could hear McClennan’s voice, raised in complaint.

“. . . never told us what the hell was going on. That’s all I object to. If I’m told up front what the risks are, I’ll take them. But this—this just isn’t what I signed up for, and I—”

Scrub’s basso-profundo rumble cut through McClennan’s feeble-sounding litany of grievances with three terse words.

“You’re on retainer.”

“Yes. Yes, thank you for reminding me of that fact. I’m on retainer. As an exorcist. Nobody mentioned raising hell-kin. Nobody mentioned performing necromantic surgery on a ghost with too much mouth to it. Why didn’t he just let me toast the fucking thing? Then we wouldn’t be having any of these problems.”

“Castor?” Scrub growled. “Castor isn’t a problem. First of all, he couldn’t find his arse with a map. Secondly, there’s no evidence anywhere that he can get his hands on. And thirdly, I’m going to kill him as soon as Mr. D gets tired of using your fuck-pig demon.”

“I half killed myself raising that thing.” Gabe spat the words out, bitterly angry. “Just the effort of bringing it up from Hell—you don’t have any fucking idea! And then I had to do the binding while I was still weak and sick from calling her, and if I hadn’t got every last detail down right, she would’ve torn me apart.”

“Mr. D assumes you’re competent to do your job.”

“Oh, thanks.” Gabe’s laugh sounded like it must have left welts coming out. “Thanks so fucking much. Am I supposed to be flattered?”

“You’re supposed to do what you’re told.”

“Right, right. And if Castor gets his hands on the other little trollop?”

“He won’t.”

“Why doesn’t Damjohn just kill her and be done with it?”

“Why don’t you ask him?”

Gabe didn’t seem to have any answer to that. The silence lengthened and was followed by a change of subject.

“What’s keeping that fucking moron?” Scrub’s voice, rumbling like a train passing under your feet.

“He said he had to piss.”

“Well, go and get him.”

Which was my cue to leave.

Rosa. Rosa was the key. But I didn’t have any idea how to find her or even where to start looking.

Actually, that wasn’t strictly true. It was just that nosing around the only starting point I had—the strip club—felt uncomfortably like sticking my head into the muzzle of a cannon and striking a match to see what was in there.

I was honestly amazed at my own stupidity.

The blonde on the upstairs bar shot me a look that conveyed a lot of dislike and mistrust with great economy. But my opening words were calculated to disarm her suspicions and make her love me like a long-lost brother.

“You know,” I said, smiling cheerfully, “I don’t think I’ve ever stood a round in here.”

The blonde’s lower jaw went through a cataclysmic plunge. She did her best to reel it back in.

“The drinks are on me,” I clarified helpfully. “Let’s have champagne all ’round, shall we?” I took out my wallet and slapped my credit card down on the bar. Well, okay, it was Arnold’s wallet and Arnold’s credit card, but I know he would have been happy at the thought of giving pleasure to so many people.

The barmaid recovered from her surprise and hurriedly went diving for bottles, in case I unexpectedly recovered my sanity. I took the first one from her, ripped off the foil, and popped the cork as she was setting up the glasses. The girls at the end of the bar had gotten wind of what was going on by now, and they all crowded around. I knew that the markup on the drinks was colossal and that they were probably on a percentage of bar takings as well as what they took in the bedrooms; persuading a punter to buy them a glass of champagne was an easy earner compared to the regular daily grind, if that’s the right expression.

I handed each glass out as soon as I’d poured it, pressing it into an outstretched hand happily and clumsily—and with the maximum of skin-to-skin contact. My psychic antenna was fully alert, but it only works by touch. I knew what I was looking for, but I also knew I’d have to take whatever I could get.

I struck gold around about number eight or nine. She was a pouty, slightly emaciated brunette dressed in a fire-engine red bra and panties (the panties bearing a sequined love heart at front and center), a gauzy see-through top, and a pair of black stockings adorned with fleur-de-lys.

“We’ve never met,” I said to her, taking her hand in both of mine and getting a stronger psychic fix on her. “What’s your name?”

“It’s Jasmine,” she said, giving me what she probably thought was a sultry look. “What’s yours?”

“I’m John,” I said, because it was the first thing that came to mind.

“And would you like to go upstairs with me, John?”

“Yeah,” I said. “That’d be great.”

She smiled warmly. “What sort of thing do you like?”

“I’d like a full body-to-body massage,” I hazarded. And then, to forestall more detailed questioning, “Do you do Glaswegian?”

Jasmine bluffed like a trouper. “Of course I do, you naughty boy,” she purred. She took a key that the blonde woman handed to her, glanced perfunctorily at the number, and led me away with her arm crooked proprietorially in mine. After all, I was the only John in the place.

I couldn’t tell if I’d actually been into the room she took me to, but it was identical to all the ones I’d seen—a bleak, clean little box, and in its way as perfect a triumph of function over form as a battery cell on a chicken farm.

“So you tell me exactly how you’d like me to do it,” Jasmine coaxed, sitting me down on the bed, “and I’ll tell you how much it’s going to be.”

I put on a crestfallen face. “Actually, Jasmine,” I admitted, “I was hoping we could just talk—since it’s my first time with you, and all. So what’s the price for missionary with no trimmings?”

I was expecting ructions, but she took it in her stride; it must be more common than I’d imagined for punters to get this far and then lose their nerve.

“It’s sixty, John. Let’s get that sorted now, and then we’ve got all the time in the world just to get to know each other.”

Docilely, I counted three twenties into Jasmine’s hand. She slipped out of the room, presumably to hand it over to the duty madam, and then came back in again a few seconds later and closed the door behind her.

“Do you want me to take my clothes off?” she asked, standing over me and smiling down at me with her hands cupping her breasts.

It seemed a token gesture, given how skimpy her outfit was to start with—and it wouldn’t do anything to establish the necessary mood of calm consultation. “No, thanks,” I assured her. “What you’re wearing now is fine. Absolutely fine.”

She sat down next to me, put a hand on my knee, and snuggled in close. She had a floral smell that was sweet and delicate, but it reminded me—unfairly—of Juliet, a.k.a. Ajulutsikael. I fought the urge to pull away.

“So what would you like to talk about, John?” she cooed little-girlishly.

I went for broke. “You’ve got a colleague named Rosa,” I said. “And I guess you work some of the same nights, so I was hoping you might know her.”

It wasn’t what she expected or wanted to hear, but she rolled with it.

“Is Rosa your favorite?” she asked in the same Shirley Temple tone.

I thought about the steak knife. “Rosa leaves a very powerful impression,” I acknowledged, genuflecting at the secret altar of my conscience in penance for such a cheesy line. “And ever since I saw her, I’ve been wanting to meet up with her again. But she’s not in today.”

“That’s right. She’s not.” Jasmine was still playing the game by the house rules, but there was a guarded edge to her voice. “Do you want me to pretend to
be
her? You can call me Rosa, if that makes it better for you.”

I shook my head brusquely. “I want to make sure she’s all right. And I want to talk to her again.”

Jasmine didn’t answer. Either I’d struck a nerve, or she was just wondering if my obsession might spill over into actual violence. I was hoping for the former, because when I’d touched her hand, I’d got a fleeting glimpse of Rosa’s face on the surface of her mind. At the very least, she knew the girl; and, perhaps, if my luck was in, she was concerned about her already.

But her first reaction wasn’t promising. “Rosa’s fine,” she said. Her voice had changed now, closed down to a flat monotone. She took her hand off my knee.

“How do you know that?”

A pause. “Because I saw her yesterday. She’s fine.”

“When yesterday?”

Anger flared in her eyes. “Look, if you’re social services or someone, you can kiss my sodding arse!”

“I only paid for missionary, remember? I’m not social services. And I’m not a cop, either, but then you probably have pretty good radar for cops. I really do just need to talk to her. And I really am worried about her. If you tell me she’s okay, then that’s great. But when did you see her?”

Bowing to the inevitable, I took out my dwindling roll of cash and held out another twenty for her to take. She didn’t make a move for it. She just scowled at me, but not in aggression. It was more like her flexing her facial muscles as she came back out of role and took off the mask. My luck was holding. It looked as though I’d guessed right, and Jasmine was worried about Rosa on her own account. At least, that was the only reason I could think of for her not either whistling for the bouncer or helping herself to the extra twenty.

She still had to decide how far to trust me, though, and I could see it was going to be someway short of the full distance. “In the afternoon,” she said. “About two. She came in late, and Patty had words with her. Then Scrub”—she stumbled slightly on the name; I could see there was no love lost there—”Scrub came in and took her to see Mr. Damjohn.”

The pause lengthened.

“And?” I prompted.

Jasmine looked unhappy. “And she never came back in again after that.”

“Do you know where Scrub took her?”

Jasmine rolled her eyes, then shook her head once, tersely. How would she know? Why would she want to find out? This clearly wasn’t the kind of place where you asked too many questions. But that was still what I had to do.