All of it is completely foreign to her. She is fascinated when I mention suffering from allergies, something with which no one here has problems. She asks me what I study in school. She understands being an artist, but when I tell her about creating 3-D models and animating characters on computers, about vertex lighting, rigging, what I know about light maps and texture maps, I can tell it all sounds like gibberish to her. Even so, she smiles and nods in polite interest.
She asks about my family. That takes all of about twenty seconds, so then I start to talk about Amber, but she quickly steers the conversation another way. She pays rapt attention to everything I say whether she understood what I was talking about or not, and I have to say that’s never happened to me before. I also can’t help but notice that she hasn’t moved her hand off my forearm. Which is nice. But it would be nicer if her hand had warmth, if it didn’t feel so stiff and cold. It’s just a constant reminder of how different she is than what I’m used to.
“What about you?” I ask her. I don’t want to be a total bore, and I’m genuinely curious about her. No one talks about how they got here, who they were before or what they used to be. To them, it’s another life.
Jessica shrugs, glancing away, giving me the opportunity to surreptitiously examine her. Her skin is pale, like the last time I saw her, but again I can see the edges where the cover-up doesn’t completely hide. She is still doing her fake breathing. I wonder if she does it all day or if she’s merely doing it for my benefit. Even covered with flowery perfume, the smell of decay still tickles my nose.
“What do you want to know?” she asks.
I pause. What do I want to know?
Guardedly, I say, “I’m not sure what questions might be impolite here.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that. I’m curious what questions you would ask me.”
Here goes nothing. “How long have you lived here? In this place, I mean? Is that a rude question, like asking how old you are?”
She laughs. “No, it’s fine. I’ve been here nearly one hundred years.”
The mug pauses partway to my lips.
“Ah.” Well, that blew any follow-up questions out of my mind. “Hmm, what do you do?”
“I sing. I run a theater troupe. I observe.”
I nod, and I try to manage a genuine smile. An actress—that I can understand. She continues. “My group and I, we try and emulate the living. We call ourselves Those That Came Before to sound all mysterious. You should come and see some of our performances.”
“I’d like that,” I reply. It’s true; I would like to experience something normal, and I’d like to see her perform. “Performances of the living. What’s that like?”
She shrugs nonchalantly. “We do things that living people do. Eat, sleep, dream. One of our most popular bits is portraying how you mortals get ready in the morning. Bathing, grooming, dressing. We have to keep security on hand; sometimes we do such a good job the hungrier ones in the audience try and grab a snack.”
“Heh,” I chuckle and take another sip from my mug.
“Could you tell I was not a living girl when you met me?” she asks, turning serious. I pause, keeping the cup in front of my mouth. I don’t want my expression to betray me. Of course, I knew she was dead. The skin, the fake breathing, the slight smell of rot, the eyes. Maybe from a distance, maybe I’d be fooled. Up close, even though she’s the closest I’ve seen to living, she’s still a long way off. No point crushing her though as she clearly goes to a great deal of effort to appear to be alive.
“I had a hard time at first, of course,” I say, cautiously. She beams back at me, pleased.
I open my mouth to ask another question, and I completely freeze. A thunderbolt of an idea has just hit me.
“Jake? What is it?”
I set my mug carefully down on the table. I think about it a little. Am I crazy? Yes, but maybe—hmm . . .
“How would you like to help me do some undercover work?” I ask, the words out before I can worry about the wisdom of this action.
“Oh, yes, please!” she gushes, grabbing my forearm with both hands, leaning close. “How can I help?”
An hour later, we’re walking into my apartment. Jessica is the first corporeal girl I’ve brought home here. Weird. All the times Greystone has been here, I’ve never felt that I was in my place with a girl. The two of us, a ghost and I, are we friends? No, not friends. Coworkers.
With Jessica, though, it’s definitely different. It seems more intimate.
I don’t have enough belongings for things to get messy in my apartment, so it’s passably clean. No stray clothes laying around, no trash piled up. It’s easy to keep the place tidy when you don’t own anything.
“You live here?” she asks, the smile on her face a little forced.
“What? Is there something wrong?”
She hesitates, setting down two boxes full of makeup, a garment bag with some clothes, and other materials I haven’t been able to identify. “Well, it’s just . . .”
“Yes?”
“It’s just that I expected you to be somewhere a bit nicer,” she says. “Not that there’s anything wrong with your place!” she adds quickly. Her eyes linger on the cot, canvas stretched across a splintered wooden frame, torn stained sheets and a blanket bunched on top.
I frown, looking around again. She can tell I’m not understanding.
“Have you been to any of the other detectives’ homes?”
“No. Why?”
“You should. They live in places nicer than this. A lot nicer actually. Estates, penthouse suites, that kind of thing. I’m surprised you’re in this area; it’s mostly criminals and such.”
“Sonnuva . . . Marsh!” I grumble quietly. I’ll have to bring this up with him soon.
Jessica pushes me back into my lone chair. A stray spring digs into my spine. I start to lean forward and stop myself just in time. Jessica is bending down to reach one of her boxes behind me on a table, and I just about plunged my face into her chest. By her smile, I don’t think she would have minded. Still, she’s uncomfortably close as she reaches past me. Finally, she gets what she needs and leans back.
“OK. I think I have everything we need here. I brought some of my stage makeup, a change of clothes for you, and I have my materials for a glamour.”
“Wait, a what?” I ask.
She looks at me quizzically.
“What do you mean, a glamour?” I reply. This may be the first time I have an actual opportunity to get an answer on this.
She thinks I’m kidding at first, but her smile fades as she realizes I’m serious. “Oh, I see. People don’t use glamours in the mortal world.” She looks vexed at having to explain, reluctant.
“It’s magic,” she says finally. “It makes people see what you want them to see. They rely on a combination of words, materials, gestures, and artistry. Not everyone can do them, and most of us only specialize in a very limited number. My glamours alter one’s appearance, and I generally alter them in a specific way. Others make glamours to hide and conceal things or create illusions. Basically, anything that alters a way you perceive people and the environment around you.”
I smile like I understand what she’s saying. “What makes someone good at them? Could I do them?”
“Possibly,” she says with a forced smile, which I read to mean: not at all likely. “One of the biggest factors in one’s ability to create glamours is one’s willpower. Most mortals who have the willpower to do it are also the ones who have enough willpower to persist past death and make their way here. Then for those who can create them, imagination is also important. It makes them more believable. Magic isn’t merely logic or learning; it involves those and many other factors.”
“Magic. Glamours. This glamour you’re putting on me—this will make people think I’m dead?”
She nods.
“Yes. I have a passable ability in this. Usually, I’m trying to do it the other way around, trying to make someone who’s dead pass as living. But I shouldn’t have too much trouble. With the makeup and the glamour, you’ll look like a regular resident here unless you’re observed with anything other than casual scrutiny. Don’t do anything out of the ordinary, and even your detectives shouldn’t notice you.
“Now, lean forward, let’s get started.”
She leans over me, our knees touching, her eyes gazing into mine and about my face. It takes about another half hour. And then I look dead. Or so Jessica tells me. I study myself in the mirror, and it just looks like I’ve got green foundation smeared on my face. I think it’s ridiculous.
“I really pass for dead looking like this?” I ask her. I don’t understand how this magic works, I’ll just have to take her word for it.
“Of course. Can’t you tell? The glamour is working. Some of my best work, if I do say so myself.”
I shrug. OK, then. Now to step two.
Ms. Greystone, can you hear me?
I’m “thinking” as loud as I can, directing it towards where I sense the ghost in my mind.
“. . . Det..tive . . . Gr . . . n?” I hear the words in my head. Fuzzy, faint, garbled, but I can make them out. I hope this isn’t the best it will ever get.
I’m going to follow up some leads on my own, I think at her.
“Are . . . you sure? You should . . . someone . . . with you . . .”
I nod, then realize how stupid that is. I hope she doesn’t know I did that, or she won’t let me hear the end of it.
Yes. I’ve got someone with me. Tell Marsh, I’ll check in later. I’ll need your help in a little bit. But until then . . . Um . . . Green, out.
I can’t tell if I hear the sigh of exasperation in my head, or if I just imagined it. I open my eyes and turn to Jessica.
“OK, let’s go.” She grabs my hand and pulls me out the door. She’s much more excited about this than I am.
Jessica and I loiter around the bridge leading to the police precinct. There is a lot of foot traffic going in and out. Since this is the only way to enter or leave the precinct, this is probably the best place to try and start following him without being obvious about it. It’s not like I’ve ever done this before. I lean against the wall of a nearby building, something I would expect to see in some European town, giving me a clear view of the front gate.
After about an hour I see Armstrong walk across the bridge and start marching into town, the collar of his coat upturned against the wind. About time. I’m freezing my ass off. It was plenty warm outside my apartment, but here, it’s at least forty degrees colder. Jessica doesn’t seem fazed by the temperature. When I asked her about the change in weather, she admits she doesn’t understand it either. That’s just how it works here. I’ll never figure it out.
I let Armstrong get about a block ahead of us and then start out after him. To better blend in with the crowd, Jessica insists on holding onto my arm and walking with our hips almost touching.
We follow him for the next several hours. He wanders all over town. He doesn’t seem to be doing any police work, per se. He walks along the main river that bisects the downtown area—the River Styx, appropriately, though Jessica assures me no one really thinks it’s the actual river from legend. It runs through a deep canal, the current strong and churning, the water dark. Buildings butt up right to the edge of the path lining the canal. The walls and buildings provide a nice buffer to the wind, and the temperature is considerably warmer. The river is loud, and it meanders through the town, under several bridges. This path is very popular; we pass numerous people, helping us blend in. At one point, I think I see something under the surface of the water and lean out over the side of the path. Jessica quickly yanks me back away from the edge and shakes her head. I’m confused, but later see a large shadow under the water pull away from the shore, and I shiver at what might be down there.
We see Armstrong speak to several people along his walk: shopkeepers, people walking on the street, the occasional person hanging out at a corner. I’m not close enough to ever hear what he says, but he never speaks to anyone for long. Most of the time he merely nods or waves as he passes by.
Eventually, we follow Armstrong over near the docks. He spends an hour on a bench by the pier, a clipboard in his lap with paper clipped on it to repel the occasional gusts of wind, sketching pictures of birds and the waves. Later, back in a business area in the middle of a pedestrian district, he gets lunch at a cart on an alley corner. I have no idea what kind of meat is slapped between the slabs of bread he gets, and I don’t really want to know. Some sort of condiment squirts out from the sandwich when he takes a bite; I hope to God it’s mustard, but it’s not any color of anything I’ve ever seen before on a sandwich. It doesn’t escape my notice that he slipped the cart vendor a thick envelope, but they don’t appear to talk about it any.
A few times he glances over his shoulder, and my heart stops, but he doesn’t seem to take any interest in us. Finally, he ducks into some bar called Giuseppe’s Place. By going in, we significantly increase the chance he’ll see us, but I want to know what he’s doing. We wander in shortly after and see Armstrong sitting down with a trio of unsavory types. I don’t recognize any of them, but their hatchet faces and massive arms probably don’t come from soft living. We manage to find a booth nearby but out of line of sight. Jessica orders a couple drinks for us while I concentrate on listening to what Armstrong is saying.
“Antonio, you know how it is,” Armstrong whispers as we get our drinks. “If I give you too much, suspicion will come right down on me. You may not know Radu, but believe me, you don’t want to catch his attention.”
“That’s not our deal, and you know it,” one of the men responds. Maybe this is Antonio? “We’re paying you good money.”
Armstrong interrupts. “All I’m saying is, I’ll give you what I can. I haven’t steered you wrong yet, have I?”
“We’ve got a big shipment coming in tomorrow. Our guys have a lot riding on this one.”
“And I’m telling you,” Armstrong says, “that if you bring it in at Pier 14, I’ll make sure the Port Authorities are busy somewhere else.”
I whisper to Jessica, “Are you hearing any of this?” She shakes her head, shrugging helplessly. “I’ll tell you when we leave.”
I don’t know what to make of this. Armstrong doesn’t say anything related to the murders, but he talks to Antonio and his friends for several minutes about a shipment of something coming in and how he’ll help them get it past the authorities.
The conversation turns to talk about some kind of sport I can’t identify; then they finish up and part. We get up and follow soon after.
He travels to a park—at least, what passes for a park here. A battered gazebo sits in the center of weeds clustered on bare dirt. A few paths crisscross in between pockets of dead trees. Some shrubs nearby have actual greenery on them, though it barely covers the wicked barbed thorns that poke out everywhere. Here the detective meets with a corpse so old it looks like it will collapse into dust at any moment. We hear only snatches of conversation from the bench we’re sitting on. To get any closer would be too obvious. Again, he discusses details about helping him smuggle some stuff into the city. I’m relatively sure he’s not talking about the murders.
We have found a park bench tucked near the entrance, and we’re trying to look as uninteresting as we can. Jessica is holding my hand, sitting close to me, leaning into me so we can both hear what is being said. She’s a little closer than I’m comfortable with, but when I try and scoot away, she just moves right back up to me.
Armstrong nods to the fossil he’s talking to, and then turns around and starts heading right for us. There’s nowhere to go without obviously avoiding him, and the path is going to take him right next to us. I panic, not sure what to do.
Jessica grabs my chin in her hand, turns my head towards her, and she plants one on me, nearly climbing into my lap. She kisses me hard, her other hand sliding behind my head so I can’t back away. Her head blocks Armstrong’s view of my face, so I close my eyes and pray he’s too busy staring at Jessica’s curves to notice the lucky stiff she’s latched on to.
Any other time, having a beautiful woman throwing herself at me is something I dream about but never really expect to happen. But this . . .
Her lips are locked onto mine; her tongue darts into my mouth. I feel her breasts pressed firmly up against me, and it’s all I can do to suppress a shudder of revulsion. The lips are dry, leathery. I can taste a wave of rot and decay breathing out of her mouth. A trickle of fluid leaks from her mouth into mine, and it’s not saliva. Her tongue is as dry as a stick, with a rough sandpaper texture. Instead of sliding up against my tongue it snags on it. I can’t hear her breathing, which is wildly disconcerting. With my eyes closed, all I can picture is a corpse wrestling with my lips and biting my face. I feel panic building, and it’s all I can do not to scream.
“Jake?” It takes me a second to realize Jessica is speaking to me. I open my eyes, and she’s looking at me with concern. Her nose is pressed against mine, her eyes filling my vision. “Are you OK?”
I look around before looking back to her. Armstrong is gone. Even if I could pick up his trail, I’m not sure I want to right now. I lick my lips nervously, still tasting a tinge of decay, and I suppress a shudder. “Hmm? Yes, sure, of course.”
She slides away from me but retains a grip on my arm. “Did I do something wrong?” I look at her, and I see the distress on her face, the fear. A wave of emotion crosses her stiff face. She’s teetering on an edge, worried I am genuinely repulsed, and if she thinks that, it will mean she’s not as living as she is attempting to be. Maybe she doesn’t care what the rest of the dead in this town think of her but, me, a living person, my opinion matters.
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