by S Williams
‘Detectives Loss and Stone?’
The police officers nod. ‘How did you spot us?’
‘Well, you don’t have massive cameras strung round your necks for a start,’ he addresses his response to Loss, indicating the tourists receding down the platform in front of them. ‘And you just insulted my tour guide in language which I believe is standard police patois,’ he tells Stone. ‘Please, step into my office.’
As the three of them walk away from the tour party, the man in front of them looks over his shoulder and says, almost apologetically, ‘Plus. I can see your daughter in you.’ For a moment, Loss thinks he is going to fall over, but he recovers, and makes it through the door into the young man’s office and onto a seat. There’s a blade fan gently spinning in the ceiling, and the room is occupied – that’s the only word Loss can think to use – by a massive mahogany desk with a green leather top, upon which sits a monitor relaying the activity on the station platform. There is a standard lamp in the corner of the room, and an umbrella stand, Stone is pleased to note, containing an umbrella. She thinks of making a comment about the amount of rain falling underground, but doesn’t.
‘Colin Stevens,’ he says, holding out his hand. Stone shakes it.
‘How did you know my daughter?’ Loss grips the proffered hand a little more than perhaps he needs to. The young man’s smile fades.
‘I used to work with her at the hospital. Please let me say how sorry I am, Inspector. It was a sad loss. She was very much liked and admired, you know.’
Loss feels tears pricking his eyes, so he bites the inside of his cheek. ‘What was your role at the hospital?’
‘I was a therapist, Inspector. Part of the patient outreach team. I specialized in alienation problems and depression.’
‘How come you’re here? This is a long way from being a counsellor.’
‘Therapist,’ Stevens corrects him. ‘Oh, I don’t know. Half the tourists who come down here only seem to be able to view the world through a camera lens.’
‘Except it isn’t a lens, is it?’ Stone asks.
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘Well it’s all digital these days, isn’t it? No lens involved.’
‘Quite.’
‘So how come you’re here?’ Stone repeats the question. Stevens has a look of someone unsure if he’s been reprimanded. Stone is unmoved.
‘I’ve always loved the Underground. Ever since I was a kid and we first moved to London I’ve been fascinated by the stations and the trains. Did you know that originally each line had its own look, its own individual architecture? Right down to the colour of the bricks.’ He sits back in his chair. ‘Plus, I discovered that I wasn’t a very good therapist.’ He pauses, and considers the detectives for a second. ‘Sorry. It’s difficult to explain. All the work I did before becoming attached to Charing Cross, well, it just didn’t prepare me.’ He fixes his attention on Loss. ‘Before I took the post at the hospital where your daughter worked, I was stationed in the suburbs. At the other end of the equation, you might say. I never expected to …’
Loss sighs. ‘Ok, sir. Tell us about the Secret Underground.’
Stevens seems to lighten with the new direction of their questioning. ‘Oh, it’s not just the Underground. I mean the Underground is fascinating. All the lines that are still there, a whole forgotten transport network …’
Stone breaks in, ‘And are they connected to the present one? I mean, could you get from one to the other?’
‘Oh, yes. Many of the stations we use now were built to replace the old ones, because as new lines, new outposts, were added it was cheaper, and less structurally problematic, to create new stations above the deep Victorian ones, than to demolish and replace. But yes, the old stations are still there. Sometimes only a door away, in the side of a walkway, or sometimes just a few metres below, connected by a staircase similar to the one you came down today.’ The flickering flames of a true fanatic are dancing in his eyes. ‘And those stations have the old lines, no longer used, but perfectly navigable! Miles and miles of them down here.’
‘You said not just the Underground,’ prompts Stone.
‘No indeed. There’s the Royal Mail mini railway, for a start.’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘Royal Mail has its own underground train network. It was used to move all the mail around central London, allowing it to cope with the twice-daily delivery service they used to offer.’
‘What, its own mail trains under London?’ says Stone. Loss turns and looks at her.
‘Even I knew that. They had to have it for the second delivery.’
‘The second delivery?’
‘Yes. Amazing, isn’t it?’ Stevens interjects. ‘Then there are all the bunkers, and all the tunnels from private houses and department stores …’
‘And museums,’ adds Loss.
‘And museums, yes. And then, during the War, many of these tunnels were connected up in case of bombing or invasion. Did you know it was possible for the Prime Minister to walk from the War Office to Oxford Street without once coming to the surface?’
‘Amazing,’ says Stone dryly.
‘Indeed. In fact, many people living in London houses aren’t even aware that there are cellars beneath them, and tunnels leading from the cellars. After the Blitz, when much of London was rebuilt, these things were just, well, sealed off and forgotten. Plans were lost. People were lost. Things were forgotten or hidden for another time.’ Stevens pauses for a moment, contemplating the past, and then continues with renewed enthusiasm. ‘And then there’s the sewer system, and the old river sluices, and the smugglers’ pubs, and so on and so on.’
He reaches under his desk and starts rummaging in drawers. ‘I’ve been writing a book all about it.’
As he brandishes a detailed hand-drawn map at them Stone tries to keep him on track. ‘So are you saying it’s possible for our girl to have got off the train at Embankment, say, and then walk through the network of disused tunnels to wherever she wants to be without ever coming to the surface?’
‘Oh easily. There are tunnels everywhere. To the stations, yes. But also to the big shops in Oxford Street. To all the old hotels. Government buildings. Hospitals. Churches. If you wanted to, and were determined enough, you could set yourself up and live underground for years.’
And then all the lights snap on in DI Loss’s head. His mind palace lights up like Christmas.
‘So food, bedding …?’
‘The old department stores all have tunnels connecting to the network. Had to, so goods could be safely moved around during the War.’
‘Internet? Wi-Fi?’
Stevens thinks for a moment. ‘A lot of the stations are Wi-Fi-enabled. You’d have to ask someone technical, but I shouldn’t think it’s too difficult to set up some sort of relay system, if you could source the power.’
Loss murmurs to himself: ‘Christ. She’s been living underneath us. Not just using it to get around. It’s her world.’
The two detectives look at each other, the implications of what they have just learnt fizzing between them
‘We need to go.’ They get up, thanking Stevens.
As he leads them to the stairs, he says, ‘You know, Inspector, I was genuinely sorry to hear of Suzanne’s murder. She was very much loved around the hospital.’
Loss isn’t sure what to do with the man’s sympathy. ‘Thank you. We’d grown apart a little, and I wasn’t fully aware of her friends. It’s nice to know she was so well liked.’
Stevens smiles at him. ‘Well it wasn’t just me, it was everyone really. And not just at the hospital. All the kids at the refuge loved her too.’
‘What refuge?’
‘The one off Charing Cross Road, do you know it? That’s what I meant by the other end. I was used to seeing where they’d run from. Not to. The refuge for teenage runaways. It was because of what happened there that I left my job.’
64
I never think of my body as becomi
ng something; only staying the same. Only not becoming something else.
Too big.
Too weak.
Fertile.
I turn on my laptop and set up a program to search for any new reference to me. Actually what I’m searching for is any old reference to me that’s been newly uncovered, but all that’s out there is what’s happening now. I shut it off and fire up the World Service, lie back down and let myself drift away to the shipping forecast. I may have no fucking idea what they are talking about, but it makes me feel safe and warm. I reckon when I die this is what I’ll hear; a beautiful voice telling me which way to go.
Or maybe just screams.
Sleepy time now. Shut down. Night night.
***
When I resurface, the radio is talking about penguins. I listen for a while, taking in the ticks of the station. I can hear the scuttle of rats, and just below hearing, I can feel the slight changes of pressure that indicate the tubes are running. I get off my cot and power up my laptop, opening the window that monitors all the mobile activity of the drones.
Oh dear.
I click to a London news channel and there it is. The Roof Gardens, formally Kensington Roof Gardens. The reporter is standing outside the ground floor entrance, underneath the big brass 99s that sit above the doorway. There is a pop-up box in the corner of the screen showing people running about in confusion. The resolution is terrible. It is obviously footage from somebody’s mobile phone. Really, there’s no excuse these days. Every mobile phone should have a hi-resolution camera. Ones that don’t, the phone companies are just dicking you about. The camera is shaking so much it wouldn’t surprise me if one of the flamingos has filmed it. But bad as the pictures are, as stuttered as the images in the corner of the screen come to us, we can clearly see Mr Man being dragged away by some of his drones.
Honestly, between the shuddering camera, the top-notch dub music, and the video wanksta waving his gun about in confusion, I feel the urge to pull up a director’s chair and change my name to Quentin Tarentea-time. What a bunch of posturing pricks. I turn off the news and go back to hearing about the penguins. I take off my beach shoes and put on my hiking boots. I wear something on my feet when I’m asleep in case I have to wake up running, and the DMs are just too big. The beach shoes are lightweight but with a solid sole, so they do the job perfectly. I’d wear crocs, but I haven’t quite given up on life yet.
I go to my workbench. On top of it are a portable stove and a saucepan I borrowed from the department store. I switch on the stove and there is a satisfying whoosh as the gas ignites when I flip the Zippo I took off the Z-boy outside the nightclub. I close the lid of the lighter and put it in a box on the floor with all the other lighters.
They’ll be really gunning for me now. I’ve embarrassed them. They had their little meeting, like they’re James Bond or the mafia or something, and I walked right in and slapped them in the face.
Right through his little army. Right up to him and his assassin and gave them a hug.
He must really hate me now. I bet he’s got his drones searching all over London for me, tearing it apart. I bet he’s got every low-life drug fuck-up and street tally girl scanning the lanes trying to eyeball me. I bet he’s tearing his hair out, trying to get information about where I am.
Except he hasn’t got any hair.
I tap out a message on my tablet, and send it to one of the drone’s phones. I do it in text-speak so they can understand it. If I wrote it in proper English they wouldn’t have a clue what it said. I send it via a free text app rather than SMS, and beg them to let me in to their gang.
Or at least let me have some free coke or some smack.
I tell them that I’ve seen this girl, the one they’re looking for. I tell them that she’s just sitting there, like she’s waiting for someone, and if they want her, come and get her, but remember that it was me who told them where she was and I want paying.
I make up a name and sign off. I do a couple more on the same theme then store them ready to send. I weigh out an amount of potassium nitrate and sugar, mix them together, and throw them in the pan. Potassium nitrate used to be given to prisoners in their tea to reduce their sex drive. It also used to be a main ingredient in gunpowder. Now you can buy it in most garden centres as fertilizer.
Or you can steal it from a large department store.
Once the mixture has turned brown, the sugar caramelizing and the whole thing becoming syrupy, I take it off the heat and let it cool. From under the desk I bring out a few cardboard tubes I’ve saved from the centre of toilet paper rolls and use black Gaffa tape to seal up one end. I love Gaffa tape. I love the sound it makes when you pull a length off. A kind of ripping sound. On the radio the penguins have been replaced by a programme about plants growing round an active volcano. Apparently these plants have such a high level of silicates in them they should not exist.
I fill the tubes with the gloopy substance and use a palette knife to level it off. Then I seal the ends with some more Gaffa tape, and stick a fuse in. I took the fuses from some fireworks.
Actually I took the fireworks as well, then just cut the fuses in half.
I never could resist a pretty firework.
After everything’s cooled down I pack all the stuff I need in my rucksack, set up all my alarms, and head out, a ghost girl in an underground city made for ghosts.
***
To get into Seething Lane Gardens you have to go down four stone steps, worn concave by the feet of the dead. It’s a medieval street next to a medieval church in a medieval town. St Olave’s has three skulls above its entrance, just so you know it’s not fucking about. It also has the tomb of the original Mother Goose.
I love this city. It’s a thousand years old with more blood in its mortar, more history in its stone, and more stories in its streets than anywhere else I can think of.
It’s been half an hour since I sent the texts so I imagine the gang boys should be here any time now. I’m sitting in a cherry tree, hidden by white, genetically modified forever-blossom. I’ve got my rucksack strung over a broken branch just above me and I’m looking down through the petals at the street below. I’m loving the view.
Seething Lane attracts a lot of tourists. It’s one of the few remaining streets that survived from the Great Fire of London, and people enjoy coming here and feeling all olde-worlde, as if they’re living in a film or something. People of all nationalities are walking backwards and forwards taking pictures and videos of themselves and the street. Really, the amount of ambience and culture they’re soaking up, they could just take one photo of themselves against a white background and Photoshop in the scenery. Still, you never know, there might be something interesting to film a little later on.
I spot a few city boys and girls having a quiet toke on their crack pipes. They’re not too difficult to pick out; expensive suits on ghosts waiting to hatch. Since the introduction of e-cigarettes some clever entrepreneur has made an adaptation for our little drug addicts. You put your rock in and suck away and no one can really tell the difference.
At least, not until you fall over dead.
I stare at the entrance to the street. It’s not a real street anymore. More like a mock-up. It’s like a street island: it leads nowhere and comes from nowhere. A street shipwreck, with me in its mast. A boy walks into the street. He’s got on Diesel jeans, £300 sneakers and a Weird Fish hoodie. He’s talking into an android phone, and he’s scanning the street as though he’s the fucking Terminator. I nearly fall out of the tree with fear. He sits on a bench. The woman who’s sitting there takes one look at him, gets up and leaves. Smart girl.
He’s looking for the informant, or for me, or for trouble, and he’s looking hard. The tourists are moving around him like he’s a disease. I bet he’s loving it. Actually, maybe I’m being hasty. Maybe he’s a nice boy. Maybe he’s looking for Wally. I see he hasn’t bent his right leg when he sits down and guess he’s probably got an iron bar down his trousers
.
Maybe not a nice boy, then. Maybe a fuck up merchant.
Five more come in and start working their way up the street. The assassin’s not with them. He’ll be doing something cool and assassiny somewhere else. I haven’t set up any cameras because every tourist is a filmographer these days, ready to upload straight to the inter-grid and on into a million brains.
I don’t have to wait for them to start something, this time. Just turning up is enough. I watch as one of them grabs a little Goth girl by the chin and stares hard into her face. She’s Japanese, and could be anything from seventeen to thirty years old. He pushes her away and she falls to the ground.
All the tourists are heading for the street exit, being clocked by a couple of hard boys guarding the arch above the stone steps. Once the street is empty they start checking everywhere, looking for the informant, or me. After a while they stop trying to look hard and kind of mill about, not knowing what to do next.
Jesus fucking Christ. Here I am, sitting in a bloody tree, on a street walked down by Samuel Pepys, looking down on a bunch of rape machines disguised as hurt robots, wondering how I can make them notice me without actually shouting ‘Cooee’!
Fuck it.
I pull on my extremely cool aviator goggles and face mask.
I light the fuse and throw down my first smoke bomb.
Tally-ho.
65
‘Well, I hope you still feel special, even though she didn’t send it to you this time.’
DI Loss and DS Stone are watching footage from Seething Lane Gardens on the TV set up in the incident room. They are sitting at the back, no longer central to the investigation. Since Suzanne’s DNA was uncovered on the cigarette butt found outside Candy’s, Loss has been in a box; a spectacle for speculation.