VALUES
Part Four
09.00
He'd always been an insomniac, never managing a decent night's sleep. Always kept up thinking about this or that, to the point where he and his wife now slept in separate beds.
But I don't need this, Terry Pitt thought, as he swam into consciousness, and felt the huge pounding throb at the back of his head. The pain seemed to explode through his head and flashed ice cold bolts of agony into his temples.
He was sat on a damp stone floor, deep underground. His wrists were bound to an old iron pipe with tight rope. From somewhere water dripped endlessly, a steady stream in the darkness. And there were roses. Hundreds of roses.
Pitt began to struggle with his bounds, getting a hold of his position, attempting to understand his surroundings. Shafts of light pierced down through small holes in the roof, often illuminating the jagged criss-crosses of rusty black pipes along the way up, and casting pale white light on the sea of roses before him.
Come on, old man, he thought. You've been through worse than this.
From somewhere to the side he could hear footsteps. Fear froze up in a lump in his throat. He attempted to talk, but his words were lost somewhere in his throat and all that came out was a dry click.
"I didn't wake you, squire, did I?" an elderly voice said from the darkness.
An ancient man, all scruffy white hair and stubble, wearing an old coat, stumbled out into Pitt's vision, stepping carefully around the roses.
"No, no," Pitt managed to reply, fighting the urge to laugh at the ridiculousness of his situation. He'd been afraid of this? Just another derelict? "Come on, now, untie me, you bloody fool."
"Can't do that, squire," the man said solemnly. "You're with the party, aren't you?"
"Yes," Pitt said through clenched teeth, feeling the rage sear through him, getting hotter. "And if you don't untie me, you'll be in serious trouble."
"But if I does untie you, won't I be in serious trouble anyway, squire?" the old man chuckled.
Pitt snapped. "Stop playing silly buggers and untie these knots!" he screamed into the darkness. His voice echoed back forlornly. Pitt's head sank into his chest. Trapped alone, underground, with a nutter. No amount of screaming will get you out of this, Terry. Best to just sit and wait it out. Come on. Deep breaths.
The old man, still smiling and appearing almost to be in a daze, bent down and began to untie the knots that bound Pitt. As the ropes fell to the damp floor and Pitt had the chance to stretch his aching arms, trying to ignore the fire-slashes the ropes had worn into his wrists, he fought the urge to break his neck.
Instead, he pushed himself up and stretched out in the cavernous depths of the tube station. Yes, the tube station. Of course. That's where he was.
"Who are you with, then?" the old man asked, almost oblivious to Pitt's danger. "The Finger?"
"The Nose," Pitt replied, condescendingly. He rubbed the dirt off his jacket sleeves.
"Ah-ha!" the old man laughed. "Does Eric Finch still work up there?"
"Yes, of course he does." Pitt was growing increasingly tired of this chirpy old fool. He doubted very much if he could have masterminded anything on the scale of the scheme he was currently investigating. Unless, of course, this was all a part of it.
Oh, don't be daft, he thought. Him?
"Ah, Finch," the old man was saying. "A bit of a stiff by all accounts, but a nice fellow. Remember him from my days in the Nose."
"You were in the Nose?" Finch asked, suddenly cheering up.
"Aye," the man said, with a wry smile. "Gave it all up a few years back."
"What for?"
The man's gaze misted over, and he finally whispered, "I had an encounter. An encounter with a fellow in a mask."
Pitt's head throbbed angrily. What had he been thinking? This man, in the Nose? Had he been with them, he'd inevitably now lost his mind completely. He was certainly away with the fairies at the moment. By the state of his dress, he'd gone AWOL with them. "A man in a mask," he said cynically.
"Aye," the old man said. "Big smiley fellow, he was. Killed, ooh, I don't know how many people. Plenty. Me and another chap, Andy Thatcher, had his case, we did."
"And where is this Thatcher chap these days?"
"Oh, he was still with the Nose, when I left. Might still be there."
Pitt began to walk out of the shadows and to the staircase, wrapping his coat around him. "And the man with the mask?" he asked.
The old man winked, and in a split-second his face turned into an awful snarling leer. "Oh, he's still around. Told me about this place, he did. But he won't be back again. Not him. He's got other things on his mind."
Pitt frowned. "You sure you're happy to stay down here?" he said, but the old man had vanished into the shadows.
He sighed, shook his head, muttered "Silly get," and wandered back up to the world of light.
10.00
Jean Irons was leaving the house with young Ted, their six-year-old son. Visconti had escorted the pair to the door, even putting on their coats for them.
"Are you sure you two will be alright?" he asked, as they stood on the doorstep. Outside the air was cold and arid, the sky a crisp pale blue, the sun a watery smear across the east.
Jean smiled. "Fine, thanks," she said. She rubbed a hand through Ted's hair, who gave her a playfully upset scowl. "To be honest, I'm a little more concerned about you," she said to the Fingerman.
"Oh, don't you worry," Visconti replied. "I've had plenty of training, and…"
"No," she said. "No, it's Richard. He's not himself. And that gun. God, I don't know where he got it, but I don't like it." She stared into Visconti's dark eyes deep enough to see the white spark at the centre of each pupil. "Try and get it off him. Please." She lowered her voice a little more. "Do it for Ted."
Visconti nodded. "I'll do it for both of you," he smiled, and scratched the back of his head. "Are you sure you don't want a lift into town?"
"Yes, the bus will do fine," Jean said. "We're going to the British Museum, aren't we, Ted?"
"Yeah!" Ted cried. "Going to see all the old war stuff!"
Visconti almost seemed tempted to ruffle the boy's hair, but thankfully for Ted, thought better of it. Instead, he and Jean stared at each other for a little longer than was comfortable, giggled and then he finished with, "Have a good time. We'll try and help your husband."
Jean somehow felt tempted to throw her arms around him, this tall, handsome young man, this protection from her own damn husband, for god's sake, and kept it down only with the greatest willpower. Push it away, she thought. Think of Ted.
She walked to the bus stop.
10.30
Pitt's Ford Escort was parked outside the Nose Headquarters in Islington, a tall and soulless white concrete block on a busy high street. He stepped out on to the pavement as cars rushed past and shoppers made the most of the morning rush. As he almost staggered up the steps, tired, dishevelled, dirty and damp, occasionally getting glances from the perfectly attired women with pushchairs and gentlemen in basic Marks and Spencer suits, he reflected on his status.
A creature of the night, he thought bitterly. This world of daylight, of nine to five, of taking the kids out to pick up some food from Sainsbury's, wasn't for him. He was a hunter. He was a man of darkness, of sleazy bars, of moonlit back-alleys. He'd never asked for it, he thought as he nodded to the door guards. He'd been fated to it.
It was his calling.
He took the lift up to Finch's office with a small group of morning people – a couple of office workers in immaculate shirts, a pretty girl in a neat grey skirt and shirt. They granted him a few derogatory glances before ignoring him and glancing at their watches or at the lift walls.
The lift opened upstairs and he passed by more office workers, talking on phones, typing, writing up letters. More daylight people. More of those who's calling was to lead a stable life and clean up the mess that his people left in their wake. He bet that they didn't go home and argue with their wives and sleep in separate beds because of the damned insomnia. He bet they slept just fine at night. Because it was what they were meant to do.
He gently pushed open Finch's door.
"Ah," the Nose agent said, amiably. "Terry. You're looking a little rough this morning."
"Aye," Pitt responded, collapsing into a leather seat. "Been up all night working on this Irons case."
"Irons?"
"Richard Irons, over at the Finger. Some joker left a rose on his desk last night and he's completely flipped out. Reckon someone's out to kill him by midnight tonight or some nonsense."
Finch chuckled, a rare occurrence for him, and poked down his chipped, old pipe. "And that's been keeping you out of a warm bed? How's it coming along?"
"I followed up a lead that happened to take me right back here," Pitt said. "Do you know a guy called Thatcher? Andrew Thatcher?"
Pitt sat back in his seat, staring up at the ceiling. "The name does ring a few bells, yes," he said, sucking hard on his pipe. The cloying scent of pipe smoke filled the small office and drifted out into the chilly air drifting in through the open window.
Finch always kept the window open, regardless of the weather. Pitt never quite knew why. "Why don't you try seeing if you can dig up one of his files?"
"I was wondering if you couldn't maybe get me access to Fate," Pitt asked. "Might save a little time, you know."
Finch frowned. "Could be tough," he said. "But you are in luck. I've got a meeting with the leader in an hour. I'll give you a bell."
Pitt nodded. "Thanks Eric," he said.
He left Finch's office, wandered out into the lobby and collapsed on the seats outside. His eyes felt weighted down with black bags. The headache continued to pound unabated.
Some sleep, he thought. Just a little sleep.
11.00
"I'm not sure what's going on with him," Julian Brown said into the Iron's telephone. "He's calmed down a little now – just sat up in his room, mostly. But when we came in, he was brandishing a gun and going on about some man in the flames or something. Completely off his box."
From the kitchen Bill Visconti calmly stirred a cup of sour coffee. Brown was making the hourly report. As usual, they'd seen nothing.
When he'd started this whole ridiculous mission, he'd been counting down the minutes until the inevitable midnight no-show. But then he'd started talking to Mrs Irons, and although she was a little older than him, and married, he felt he'd begun to uncover something that had been buried deep down there. And that they'd really begun to hit it off.
Since she left, he'd found his mind drifting back to her at every opportunity. She wasn't bad looking, he'd thought. She was an old-looking mid-thirties – that was the stress, he'd guessed. But she was blessed with a face that aged well, and he got the feeling she looked best now.
She'd been pouring Ted's cornflakes when he noticed the red bruises running the width of her arm. He'd quizzed her about it, and she'd been a little hesitant at first, but something had clicked between them.
And it wasn't until Ted left that she had been on the brink of opening up. He was sure on that.
"Don't think too badly of him," she'd said, her eyes looking everywhere but at him. "He gets angry sometimes, is all. He had a hard childhood and he leads a stressful life. Don't get too mad at him."
And she'd reached over, and stroked his hand.
"Look, we'll stick with him till midnight, then we're gone, understand?" Brown ranted into the phone. "I'm not being paid to bloody baby sit the terminally bewildered… Yeah, goodbye."
He hung up and drifted moodily back into the kitchen.
Visconti didn't notice.
11.30
He looked at the house with eager eyes.
And leapt into action.
11.50
Julian Brown was having a bad day. He'd had a bad experience with a girl at the Kitty-Kat Keller last night (well, that morning, to be accurate), he'd been late for work, and now this. Now he'd spent the whole day hanging around this grotty little house in Camberwell.
He wanted to be out on the streets, dealing with young punks and nancy boys and the rest of them. He wanted a little bloody action, if that wasn't too much to ask for.
He poured another cup of tea, just to stay awake.
Behind him the back door opened. He didn't hear.
In fact, he didn't hear anything until it was too late.
11.55
Visconti wandered out of the bathroom and gently placed the Party Chronicle in the rack outside.
And noticed the horror in the eyes of Julian Brown.
He reached for his revolver, heard the rush of air behind him, turned…
12.00
Richard Irons sat on his bed, massaging his temples.
Maybe it had been a joke, he thought. God knew there had to be a way to get a rose these days, it wasn't that hard. Probably one of the other chaps playing silly buggers or something.
Yes, he was overacting.
He stared at his gaunt figure in the mirror, at his tussled hair, at his dishevelled clothes. You're a mess, Richard, he thought. A disgrace. Letting the night terrors get the better of you.
He turned to the window, and froze up.
There was a man crouched there. A man with a grinning face.
"Oh, bloody hell," he choked, stumbling back onto his bed. "Oh, god, no. Who the hell are you?"
"I have no name," the mask said, and smiled that all-knowing smile, freezing Iron's blood solid. "You can call me V."
To be continued…
