Odds and Gods

by Tom Holt

  There was a brief pause while Lundqvist grabbed for the receiver which he had somehow contrived to drop. ‘I don’t think I heard you right,’ he said. ‘Kill a god?’

  ‘That’s what she said, Mr Lundqvist. Of course I could have got it down wrong, I know I’m still having trouble with taking the messages off the machine, but I’m pretty sure—’

  ‘Mrs Henderson, you said?’

  ‘That’s right, Mr Lundqvist. Do you want me to spell that back for you?’

  ‘I’ll be straight back. Call Haiti, cancel the zombie, make up some excuse. This is more important.’

  ‘Oh.’ The voice at the end of the line quavered slightly. ‘What excuse can I make, Mr Lundqvist?’

  ‘Tell them . . .’ Lundqvist grinned. ‘Tell them I had to go to a funeral.’

  CHAPTER SIX

  Love, according to the songwriters, is the sweetest thing; but tea as made by the great god Pan must come a pretty close second. It’s just as well that Pan is immortal, because if he were ever to die, several third world countries whose economies depend in whole or in part on the cultivation of sugar cane are likely to fall on hard times.

  ‘Have another biscuit,’ said Pan with his mouth full. Osiris shook his head.

  ‘Too full of cake,’ he explained. ‘Couldn’t eat another thing.’

  ‘To the gods,’ Pan replied, helping himself, ‘all things are possible.’

  ‘All right, then. I like these little ones with the coconut on top.’

  All living things yearn for their own kind; and it had been a long time since Pan had spent any time with a fellow god. As far as Osiris was concerned, he had several thousand years’ unhealthy eating to catch up on. So many doughnuts, so little time.

  ‘Well, then.’ Pan leaned back in his chair and nibbled the chocolate off a mini swiss roll. ‘So what have you been up to all this time?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Nothing at all?’

  Osiris nodded. ‘The first six hundred years after I retired, I just had a bloody good rest. After that, I found I’d got out of the habit of doing things. My own fault, really.’

  ‘Institutionalised.’

  Osiris let his eye wander around the room. His reactions were mixed. On the one hand, he thought, the very idea of an immortal god, one of us, being afforded so little respect by mortals that he could only afford a bed-sitting room over a chemist’s shop in a suburban high street was so infamous that it made his palms itch for a thunderbolt. On the other hand, it was a damn sight bigger than his gloomy little kennel at Sunnyvoyde (and he owned the horrible place, remember), and it was quite plain from the most cursory inspection that Pan didn’t have little chits of teenage girls in white pinnies barging in whenever they felt like it, moving his possessions about and confiscating his digestive biscuits. True, there was about a thousand years’ arrears of washing up in the sink, but the price of liberty is eternal housekeeping. He wrenched his mind back to the subject under discussion.

  ‘I suppose so, yes,’ he said wistfully. ‘To begin with you think, Hey, this is the life, five meals a day brought to your room by beautiful young girls. Then you realise that for the last thousand years you’ve noticed the food but not the girls. Then you start to wonder what’s happening to you.’

  ‘Yeah.’ Pan nodded, but in his mind’s eye he could picture his compact, thoroughly modern, utterly squalid kitchen. He had a perfectly good dishwasher, but it was a while since he’d actually seen it, because of all the dirty plates piled up on every available surface. ‘Mind you, five meals you haven’t had to cook for yourself. It’s definitely got something going for it.’

  ‘Not much, though.’ Osiris shifted slightly in his wheelchair, which seemed to have shrunk. ‘How come you never retired?’

  ‘Couldn’t afford to,’ Pan replied. ‘Purely and simply a question of money.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Really. I look back now and I say to myself, If only I’d had the good sense to take out a personal pension plan back in the third century BC, I wouldn’t still be having to get out of bed at six-thirty every morning to go to work. Mind you, it’s always the way. When you’re that age, you think you’re going to live forever. Or, more to the point, you think you aren’t going to live forever, so why bother? Were you, um, planning to stay long?’

  Osiris nodded. ‘Depends on how long it takes.’

  ‘How long what takes?’

  ‘For me to outlive my godson,’ Osiris replied. ‘The way I see it, all I’ve got to do is stay out of the way of him and his precious doctors until they kick the bucket. And in our timescale, that just gives us time for a quick game of poker before I’ve got to be getting back.’

  ‘Poker?’

  ‘It was only a suggestion. If you’d rather play snakes and ladders or . . .’

  Inside his soul, Pan grinned. The ability to cause sudden panic isn’t the world’s most useful skill; it’s not like plumbing or carpet-laying, the sort of thing that’ll always keep the wolf strictly confined to the downstairs rooms. But it surely gives you the edge when playing poker.

  ‘You’re not proposing,’ he said coyly, ‘that we play for money, are you?’

  ‘Money?’ Osiris looked at him. ‘I didn’t know you could.’

  ‘I’ve heard that it’s possible.’

  ‘Gosh. I suppose you sort of bet on who’s going to win each hand.’

  ‘I suppose so. Want to give it a try?’

  ‘Why not? Do you know how we go about it?’

  ‘I expect we’ll pick it up as we go along.’

  Three hours later, Pan came to the conclusion that maybe he’d been a trifle injudicious. Given that he was immortal, and assuming that he managed to continue doing these lucrative voice-overs he’d just broken into right up till the scheduled destruction of the Earth, he’d probably be able to pay Osiris back eventually, provided he didn’t get charged interest and went easy on the food and electricity:

  ‘You’ve played this before,’ he said.

  ‘I learned recently,’ Osiris replied. ‘About six months ago. One of the nurses at the Home has a boyfriend who’s a lorry driver. Apparently they spend a lot of time in transport cafés playing cards. We usually have a game or two every Friday evening while he’s waiting for her shift to end.’

  ‘I see. Do you think your godson’s likely to be dead yet?’

  Osiris glanced at his watch. ‘I doubt it,’ he said. ‘There’s this other game he’s taught me if you’d like to try something else. I’m not quite sure of the rules, but—’

  ‘No thanks.’

  ‘Oh.’ Osiris shrugged. ‘Well, in that case we’d better settle up. I’d rather have cash, if it’s all the same to you.’

  Pan winced. ‘To be absolutely frank with you,’ he said, ‘I’m just the teeniest bit strapped for cash at the moment. Would you mind if I, er, owed it to you. Just for a week or so, you understand . . .’

  Osiris smiled pleasantly. ‘I can do better than that,’ he said. ‘You do me a small favour and we’ll call it quits. How does that sound?’

  There was a deafening crash, and the air was suddenly full of broken glass.

  All over the building, alarms should have gone off. Haifisch & Dieb had security systems that projected into several as yet undiscovered dimensions; so sophisticated were they that bells rang and lights flashed on monitor screens if a hostile philosopher started postulating that lawyers might not exist in a perfect universe. But even the most elaborate setup won’t work if someone has been round snipping vital wires and stuffing socks in the mechanism at strategic places.

  ‘Hi,’ said Julian, not looking up. ‘Take a seat, with you directly.’

  Kurt Lundqvist let go of the rope on which he’d just abseiled in, and with an easy movement drew an enormous handgun from a huge shoulder holster. He levelled it at Julian’s heart, and cleared his throat discreetly.

  ‘Fifty-calibre Desert Eagle,’ said Julian, apparently to the seventy-page lease open on his d
esk. ‘What’s wrong with the trusty old Glock, then?’

  Lundqvist winced slightly. ‘My new assistant,’ he said. ‘Goddamn woman will insist on tidying the place up. It’ll turn up eventually.’

  ‘Tsk.’ Julian clicked his tongue sympathetically, drew a few squiggles on the page with a red felt-tip, and closed the lease. ‘Good of you,’ he said inevitably, ‘to drop in.’

  ‘I was just passing.’

  ‘Sure. Now then.’ Julian leaned back in his chair - it was the sort of chair that was designed to define its occupant, and it told you better than any words could that you were sitting on the wrong side of the desk - and steepled his fingers. ‘I got a job for you,’ he said.

  ‘So I’d heard.’

  ‘I think you’re the right man for this job.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘You come recommended.’

  ‘Glad to hear it.’

  Julian reached across the desktop and drew a file towards him. ‘Highly recommended.’ He opened the file, flicked through a couple of pages and nodded. ‘You’ve been around a fair while, I see. Like, it was you who finally killed Dracula in 1876.’

  ‘Yup.’

  ‘And 1879. And 1902. And 1913.’

  ‘You can’t keep a good man down.’

  ‘And 1927. But not since.’

  Lundqvist shrugged. ‘Actually, you can keep a good man down, just so long as you use a big enough stake. In this case, a telegraph pole.’

  ‘Cool.’

  ‘It worked.’ He smiled faintly. ‘First time, anyhow. Though I hear they get some really bizarre wrong numbers in those parts even now. What is it you want done?’

  Julian shrugged and turned a few more pages. ‘Hey,’ he said, ‘this one you did a year or so back, that really was a bit out of the ordinary.’ He tossed over a polaroid of a stunted green shape, vaguely humanoid but with a weird head and strange, long fingers. ‘I thought he made it back to his own planet eventually. There was a film about it. Lots of kids with bicycles.’

  Lundqvist said nothing, but shook his head. Julian suddenly felt ever so slightly unnerved.

  ‘But he was kinda sweet, wasn’t he?’ he said.

  ‘So what?’

  ‘How did you find him, exactly? I thought he was well hidden, after the story broke.’

  ‘I tapped his phone.’

  ‘Figures.’ Julian closed the file. ‘Well, I want you to think of this job as the culmination of your extremely impressive career. Afterwards, of course, you’ll have to retire. You’ll never be able to work again.’ He paused and smiled. ‘Mind you, you’ll never need to work again. The package I have in mind is extremely favourable.’

  ‘Look.’ Lundqvist leaned forward and stared at him across the desk. ‘The only packages I know about go tick tick. Cut to the chase, okay?’

  ‘Okay.’ Julian folded his arms. ‘I’ve got a god needs taking for a ride.’

  ‘A god. I see. Any particular one?’

  ‘Osiris. You know him?’

  ‘By repute.’ Lundqvist’s eyes glowed. ‘Any reason, or just general resentment about the Fall of Man?’

  ‘My business,’ said Julian quietly. He picked up the pen and fiddled with the cap. ‘Let’s say he’s taking up space required for other purposes. And time, too.’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  Lundqvist stood up. ‘I ought to blow your fucking head off right now,’ he said.

  In a curved and infinite universe, everything has to happen eventually, somewhere. Julian stared. For the very first time he was at a loss for words.

  ‘Now listen to me,’ Lundqvist hissed. He reached out a hand and gathered a palmful of Julian’s tie. ‘Two points. One, gods are immortal. This makes them pretty damn difficult to kill. Not,’ he added with a hint of pride, ‘impossible. But difficult, certainly.’

  ‘Not for you, surely.’

  ‘That’s beside the point.’ Lundqvist tightened his grip on the tie. ‘The second thing is, I don’t kill gods. I’m the good guy, dammit. I’m on their side. I sort out the bad guys, that’s what I do. Talking of which, the only thing standing between you and reincarnation under a flat stone is professional ethics.’ Lundqvist grinned suddenly. ‘And I wouldn’t rely on that too much.’

  ‘You’ll be sorry.’

  Lundqvist’s face was white with rage. ‘Hey, man,’ he growled, ‘I’d have thought you’d have known, threatening me is not wise. The last guy who threatened me is now an integral part of the Manhattan skyline.’

  ‘No threat intended. All I meant was, you don’t take the job, you don’t get paid a very large sum of money. I’d be really sorry if I missed out on a chance like that.’

  ‘Stuff your money,’ Lundqvist replied. ‘I got principles, okay?’

  ‘Principles?’ Julian raised an eyebrow. ‘Kurt, for god’s sake, you’re a multiple murderer. Isn’t it just a bit late . . . ?’

  Julian found himself hovering in the air about six inches away from his seat, with a square foot of his shirtfront twisted in Lundqvist’s hand. ‘I got principles,’ he repeated. ‘You touch a single hair on that god’s head and you’ll wish you’d never been born. Or rather,’ he added, with a disconcerting grin, ‘you’ll wish you had been born. In vain, it goes without saying. You copy?’

  ‘Save it for the customers, Kurt,’ replied Julian, although he could have done with the air he used in doing so for other, more urgent purposes. ‘How much? Name your own—’

  ‘Fuck you.’

  ‘Actually, I was thinking that money would be more appropriate. Still . . .’

  Julian hit the back of his chair like a squash ball, and his head slumped forwards on to the desk. A splash of blood from the cut on his forehead fell on the lease, fortuitously blotting out an unfavourable rent review clause he’d previously overlooked.

  ‘Am I to take that as a definite maybe?’ he asked.

  For a moment, Julian was convinced Lundqvist was going to kill him. The gun reappeared from under his arm - God, Julian thought, as he stared down the endless black tunnel of the muzzle, after a hard day’s work that thing must smell awful - and there was a click as the hammer came back. But there was no bang; because Lundqvist was a professional, a highclass operator, and the golden rule of top specialists is: no free samples. A moment later, there was only a space where Lundqvist had been, and the wind blowing intrusively through the smashed window.

  ‘Shit,’ Julian mused aloud. ‘Ah well, never mind.’ He swivelled his chair round to the computer terminal on his desk, tapped a couple of keys and waited while the machine bleeped at him.

  Ready.

  Julian frowned. ‘Ready what?’ he said.

  Sorry. Ready, sir.

  ‘That’s more like it. Right, do me a scan on the following wordgroup.’

  He tapped again. The machine flickered, told him a lot of things he knew already about all rights being protected, and finally produced a column of names. The heading was:

  International A-Z Compendium of Atheists

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  The visitor looked startled.

  ‘Yes,’ he replied. ‘Of philosophy. What seems to be the problem?’

  Lug elbowed the visitor tactfully in the ribs. ‘Ignore her,’ he whispered. ‘She says that to everyone.’ He started to tap his head meaningfully, caught Minerva’s eye and tried to make it look as if he was scratching his head. The visitor ignored him.

  ‘Will you take a look at my leg?’ Minerva said. ‘I keep asking to see the doctor but they never listen.’

  ‘We really ought to be getting on, because we’ve got a lot to—’

  ‘Certainly,’ said the visitor. ‘I shall be delighted to look at your leg, although it’s a pity you didn’t ask me six thousand years ago, before it got all wrinkled and yuk. Still, better late than never.’

  ‘Really, you shouldn’t encourage her, she can be a real—’

  ‘Yes,’ said the visitor, ‘that’s definitely a leg. I’d know one anyw
here. It’s the foot at the end I always look for. Mind you, who is to say that I’m not in fact an ostrich dreaming that I’m a doctor of philosophy looking at a leg? A very charming leg, it goes without saying, even now.’

  A hand in the small of the back propelled the visitor out of the television room and into a small enclosure used for the storage of cleaning equipment. Lug closed the door.

  ‘Since when have you been a doctor of philosophy?’ he demanded.

  ‘Not long,’ Pan admitted. ‘I saw one of these adverts in a magazine. You send them fifty dollars and they give you a degree. I could have been an emeritus professor, only they don’t take credit cards.’

  ‘Right. Look . . .’

  ‘Chicopee Falls.’

  Lug blinked. ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘Chicopee Falls, Iowa. University of. If you’re interested I can let you have the details.’

  ‘No thank you,’ said Lug firmly. It was, he decided, a bit like having a conversation with someone positioned twenty minutes in the future, with frequent interruptions from someone else five minutes ago in the past. ‘Look, will you stop changing the subject? You’re getting me all muddled up.’

  ‘Sorry,’ replied the god of Confusion. ‘Force of habit. What can I do for you?’

  Lug moved a dustpan and brush and sat down on the electrical floor-polisher. ‘I don’t know,’ he replied. ‘You came to see me, remember?’

  ‘So I did.’ Pan leaned on a vacuum cleaner and grinned. ‘Got a message for you.’

  ‘Oh yes?’

  ‘From Osiris.’

  Lug looked at him blankly. ‘His room’s just down the corridor from mine,’ he said. ‘Why can’t he tell me himself?’

  ‘Because,’ Pan replied, idly unwinding the flex and tying knots in it, ‘he’s done a runner. Gone into hiding. Didn’t you notice all the kerfuffle a few days ago, when those two doctors came to declare him insane?’

  ‘Declare him insane?’ Lug thought about it. ‘It’s a good point, though,’ he added. ‘I mean, if she asked them if they were doctors, they wouldn’t find it odd at all. Sorry, I’m doing it now. Why were they trying to do that?’