Winter

by Rod Rees

  Her blood ran cold.

  “Those are my rooms they’re searching. I’ve got to see what’s happening . . .”

  Vanka took a firm grip on her arm. “I think that might not be a sensible thing to do, Miss Thomas. With the Checkya it is better to know what is going on in advance rather than trusting to those two mythical beasts, luck and the law. Why don’t you stay here, tucked away in the shadows of this doorway, and I’ll just go over and ask a few questions.”

  Ella was so upset by this development—through PINC she knew just how unprincipled and evil an outfit Beria’s Checkya was—that all she found the energy to do was nod. What troubled her most was the thought that the Checkya had come so soon after her arrival in the Demi-Monde. From what she understood from the professor, as long as she wasn’t cut, as long as no one discovered that she could bleed, she was safe. He had assured her that her identity and her background were foolproof. But if this was the case, why were the Checkya looking for her?

  She shrank back into the darkness of the doorway and watched as Vanka sauntered across the road to stand with the crowd of rubberneckers. For about ten minutes he chatted with the people around him, he laughed, he pointed out events happening in Ella’s room, he cracked jokes, he politely made way for ladies as they meandered into and out of the crowd and finally, unbelievably, he shared a cigarette with one of the Checkya officers. The man might be a rascal but he had the balls of an elephant.

  It was when Vanka began chatting with an enormously tall and very thin man, dressed in a long frock coat and high top hat, both colored a severe black, that Ella took especial notice. She had to do a double take: the man might have had his back to her but for a moment she could have sworn Vanka was talking with the doppelgänger of Professor Septimus Bole. Then the crowd shifted and the man was gone, swallowed up in the mob. Most peculiar . . .

  She shook her head. It couldn’t be him. Surely he would have told her he had a Dupe loose in the Demi-Monde.

  Finally, after doffing his hat to one of his new female acquaintances, Vanka meandered back across the road to Ella. “I would be grateful, Miss Thomas, if you would secure your veil snugly about your face.” He slid his hand through her arm and steered the shaking Ella toward the coffee shop.

  “You look cold, my dear,” he purred as he pushed his way through the revolving doors. “Let’s see if we can get a table near the fire.” They could: money was exchanged and she found herself being seated at a table at the back of the restaurant next to the fireplace.

  Distracted though she was, Ella couldn’t help but be impressed by the elegance of the room in which she was sitting. It reminded her of the pictures she’d seen of Viennese coffeehouses: all gilt, mirrors, stiff white tablecloths and uniformed waiters. Vanka ordered coffee and gateau and once they had been served he insisted that she sample both before they spoke.

  It was good advice: as she ate and drank, Ella found herself becoming calmer and much of this she attributed to her new friend. Vanka Maykov was a charmer. It was impossible to feel distracted or depressed in his company; he had a certainty about him that was immensely reassuring. Moreover, he was a very attentive charmer, who bustled around her making sure that she wasn’t sitting in a draft and that her coffee was prepared in just the way she liked it.

  Finally he turned to business. “It would seem, Miss Thomas, that you have attracted the attention of the Checkya. They have a warrant for your arrest and are currently searching your apartment.”

  “But why?”

  “The commander of the Checkya squad charged with your arrest informed me that you are wanted on suspicion of being a Suffer-O-Gette crypto, an agent provocateur working for the Coven to disrupt the peace and tranquility of the Rookeries. These are serious charges.”

  “I am not a Suffer-O-Gette!” Ella protested for the second time that evening.

  “Shh!” Vanka raised a finger to his lips. He used his chin to indicate the packed tables surrounding theirs. “I would be obliged if you would keep your voice down.” He leaned back in his chair and stretched his long legs. “In my career as a psychic, Miss Thomas, I have met a great many people and have developed an almost infallible nose for the liar and the scoundrel. You are neither of these; I believe you are telling the truth.”

  For some perverse reason Ella found these words oddly comforting.

  “Unfortunately the opinion of Vanka Maykov has no weight in Checkya circles. Clearly you are being sought in connection with a political crime; the Checkya do not lower themselves to become involved with day-to-day villainy. So we must assume that you have been traduced . . . dangerously traduced. Someone, for whatever reason, has convinced the Checkya that you are an Enemy of the People.” He took another nibble at his gateau. “Mmm, excellent, but one must be alive to the need to keep the girth of one’s waistline under reasonable control.” Reluctantly, he laid his fork down. “I have to ask, Miss Thomas, for my own safety as much as yours, have you in some way insulted or discomfited one of the ForthRight’s movers and shakers?”

  “No. I’ve never even met any of them.”

  “Heydrich? Beria? Crowley?”

  “No, no, no.”

  “You are a beautiful woman, Miss Thomas; have you rejected the advances of one of these people?”

  Annoyingly, Ella found herself blushing. “No.”

  “Could it be that you are the victim of the revenge of a jilted lover or a jealous wife?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “Then you must be in possession of information that is of a compromising nature.”

  “Absolutely not.”

  “Are you an agent of Shaka’s? You are, after all, a Shade.”

  “No!”

  Vanka took a thoughtful sip of his coffee. “As it would seem that you have committed no crime nor upset any in authority, I am left with two alternatives. The first is that the Checkya’s interest in you is the result of mistaken identity.” He shook his head. “No, they are too efficient for that and, to be blunt, your complexion is not common in the Rookeries. I am therefore left with only one other possibility.”

  “What’s that?”

  “That you, Miss Ella Thomas, are not all you seem. That under that carapace of innocence and femininity there is someone who threatens the ForthRight. I say this because the Checkya committed over thirty men to the raid on your rooms, when to the best of my knowledge, generally they would only have sent a pair of agents on such an errand. This indicates that Beria—and only he could have authorized such a large operation—wants you in custody very badly. He must regard you as an extremely dangerous person.”

  Ella’s gaze locked with his. “And if I am a dangerous person . . . what are you going to do about it?”

  Vanka held up his hands. “Please, Miss Thomas, I would be grateful if you wouldn’t flourish your pistol again. I abhor violence: I find it disrupts my digestion. To my mind, the need to resort to violence indicates a lack of wit. Understand that you are in no danger from me, quite the contrary, in fact. For good or ill we find ourselves united. The Checkya have a simpleminded approach to law enforcement and hence will interpret my association with you as complicity in whatever crimes you have been accused of. As a consequence, my fate is now enmeshed with yours, which gives me a vested interest in your remaining free.”

  He called for fresh coffee, waiting until it had been served before continuing. “I have a philosophy which convinces me that anything that undermines the ForthRight and the reprobates who administer it is to be encouraged. So I will do what I can to protect you, Miss Thomas.” He took a sip of his coffee and frowned. “That protection extends to a plea that you do not drink this coffee; it is stale.” He pushed the cup disdainfully aside. “And, of course, in the interim I am still interested in securing the services of a PsyChick. Have you had an opportunity of considering the offer I made in this regard?”

  “Do I have any choice in the matter?”

  “None whatsoever; I see it as a quid pro quo f
or any trouble you might cause me . . .” He stiffened and his face took on a serious expression. “For the trouble you are about to cause me. Miss Thomas, I beg you to trust me implicitly. Do exactly as I say and we will survive the night, and I emphasize the ‘we’ here.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “A Checkya officer has just entered the coffeehouse and is examining the papers of all the customers.”

  Chapter 17

  The Demi-Monde: 40th Day of Winter, 1004

  UnderMentionables in the ForthRight are only permitted to live within the walls of the Warsaw Ghetto. UnderMentionables are classified as Category B citizens and may only be educated up to the age of fourteen years, and must not receive medical treatment beyond the age of fifty years. No places of worship other than those consecrated by the Church of the Doctrine of UnFunDaMentalism are permitted within the Warsaw Ghetto. All UnderMentionables working or traveling outside the Warsaw Ghetto must be in possession of a valid visa, issued by the Checkya. All nuJus working or traveling outside the Warsaw Ghetto must be in possession of a valid visa, issued by the Checkya, and must wear an armband (not less than five inches in width) displaying a black five-pointed star on a white background.

  —DECREE 7823, RELATING TO THE CONTROL AND CONFINEMENT OF UNDERMENTIONABLES WITHIN THE FORTHRIGHT, FORTHRIGHT LAW GAZETTE, SPRING 1003

  There was no escape.

  One look at her skin color and she would be arrested, and the last thing she wanted to do was spend the rest of her life in a Demi-Mondian prison. Unfortunately there was no way to hide her color: her veil might mask her face but she wasn’t wearing any gloves. Desperate to keep her hands out of sight and stop them shaking with fear, Ella placed them on her lap and knotted her fingers. She could feel the color drain from her face—an unfortunately inaccurate description—and the sweat pooling under her armpits.

  “The man is two tables away,” said Vanka idly. “When I say laugh I want you to laugh out loud, I want you to guffaw. And then I want you to raise your napkin to your mouth as though embarrassed. Doing this will help mask the nervousness that has started to manifest itself in your body language.” He looked up. “One table away. Oh, yes, and if you are asked, you live at Twenty-three-A Morgan Street, and your name is Delores Delight. Now laugh!”

  It was hysteria that drove the laugh and once Ella had started she found she couldn’t stop. She found that she had to raise the napkin to her mouth to try to muffle her squawking. It took the appearance of the huge, black-uniformed Checkya sergeant alongside their table to terrify her into silence. She pushed the napkin and her hands back under the table.

  “Papers, Comrade,” he snapped.

  Vanka handed his over and the man, beetle browed and sporting a huge handlebar mustache, studied them carefully. “Says ’ere you’re from Rodina.”

  “That’s right, Sergeant, I’m in the Rookeries on business.”

  “And where are you residing whilst in the Rookeries?”

  Vanka flipped a card out of his top pocket. “At the Hotel Metropolitan, it’s—”

  “I knows the Metropolitan,” the sergeant interrupted brusquely. “Wot business is you about ’ere in the Rookeries?”

  “I’m a Licensed Psychic, Sergeant.” Vanka flashed his license and a smile. “I’ll be giving séances at the Prancing Pig all next week.” He gave the sergeant another smile. Vanka was a great smiler. “If you let me have your name I’ll arrange for complimentary tickets to be left at the door.”

  “I ain’t a great one for the occult, Comrade, it gives me the heebie-jeebies, it does. Best left to experts like His Holiness Comrade Crowley.” The sergeant turned to Ella, letting his eyes wander leeringly over her body. “Papers, miss.”

  Ella almost passed out, but realizing that this might be her last act as a free woman she dug her hand into the right-hand pocket of her coat to retrieve her papers.

  They were gone!

  A wave of ice-cold panic washed over her.

  “I’ve lost them!” she spluttered.

  All Vanka did was chuckle. “Calm yourself, Delores, my dear, the sergeant won’t bite. Don’t you remember, you gave your papers to me for safe keeping?” And with that he pushed his hand into his inside pocket and produced Ella’s papers. Well, not her papers exactly but certainly a set of papers. He handed them to the Checkya sergeant, who studied them carefully. “Address?”

  “Er . . .” For a heart-stopping instant Ella thought she had forgotten the address Vanka had given her. “Twenty-three-A Morgan Street.”

  A disappointed sniff from the sergeant. “And wot is your relationship wiv this man, Miss Delight?” he asked brusquely.

  Before Ella could utter a word, Vanka had answered for her. “Delores is my assistant onstage and my fiancée off it,” he said, beaming a puppy-dog look at Ella.

  “Seems to me, miss, that you ain’t much cop as a psychic’s assistant iffn you don’t even know which pocket your papers was in.” He handed them back, and Ella was obliged to reveal her hands in order to take them.

  Ella tried her best to make her reply as normal as possible. “Oh, even a PsyChick can be forgetful, Sergeant.”

  “You ain’t wearing no engagement ring neither,” observed the sergeant. It was then that he noticed the color of Ella’s skin. “Would I be right in finking that you are ov the Shade persuasion?”

  Vanka didn’t miss a beat. “Ours is a somewhat unofficial engagement, Sergeant.”

  “Yous, being a citizen ov the ForthRight, sir, must be aware ov the Seventh nuCommandment that condemns the practice ov miscegenation. I would be grateful iffn you would raise your veil, Miss Delight, so that I might confirm your racial bone fids.”

  Ella’s heart sank. Now there was no escape. She slipped her left hand into her pocket and closed her fingers around her derringer. If necessary she would shoot her way out.

  She could hardly believe this was happening. Two hours ago she had been a student, a part-time singer, and now here she was contemplating murder. She caught herself: it was an indication of how real these Dupes were that she could think of killing one as murder. The Demi-Monde was so persuasive a place that it was almost impossible for her to suspend belief.

  “Sergeant,” interrupted Vanka very sotto voce, “I would prefer it if my fiancée did not do that. Our tryst here tonight has not met with the approval of my family nor of the authorities.” He smiled and pushed a five-guinea note across the table in the direction of the Checkya sergeant. “You’re a man of the world, Sergeant.”

  “Is yous trying to bribe me?” asked the sergeant disdainfully.

  “Yes,” confirmed Vanka as he added a second five-guinea note to the first.

  “Then look here, I am a member of the Checkya and we’s—”

  In desperation Ella reached out and grabbed the sergeant’s hand. “Please . . . Sergeant Stone . . . I implore you—”

  “ ’Ere, ’ow do you know my name?”

  Fuck!

  Thank you, PINC!

  That’s the problem with knowing everything about everybody: I have to remember what I shouldn’t know about somebody.

  Or something like that.

  Swallowing hard, Ella tried desperately to think of a way out. There was only one thing for it. “I know your name because I’m a clairvoyant, Sergeant. My abilities allow me to commune with any man or woman I meet and to know their innermost secrets.”

  The sergeant eyed her suspiciously. “That right?”

  “Yes, Sergeant, perfectly right. If you really want to know what fate holds in store for you, why don’t you take up the colonel’s kind offer of those tickets and come along to see us at the Prancing Pig?”

  “Very kind ov you, I am sure, miss. But that does not alter the fact that yous a Shade and your identity papers state yours racial type to be Grade One: Anglo-Slavic, and this being the case I ’ave no alternative but to—”

  “I’ll make sure there are two tickets waiting for you; you will, after all, be accompanied by Arthur.
”

  The sergeant eyed Ella carefully. “ ’Ere . . . wot do you know about Arthur?”

  “Everything,” said Ella, the single word replete with ominous meaning.

  The sergeant’s face blanched. “But . . . you won’t be saying nuffink to nobody about Arthur, now, will you?”

  “My lips are sealed, Sergeant. If you forget all about having met me, then your wife and your superiors will never hear about Arthur.” Ella touched the sleeve of Sergeant Stone’s black uniform. “And we both know how severe Vice-Leader Beria is regarding members of the Checkya engaging in zadnik-like activities, don’t we, Sergeant?”

  “HOW . . . ?” BEGAN VANKA AS HE WATCHED THE BEMUSED CHECKYA sergeant shuffle, with a couple of worried backward glances and ten guineas of Vanka’s money in his pocket, out of the coffeehouse.

  “You first, Vanka. How did you pull that stunt with the papers?”

  Vanka shrugged dismissively. “Nothing to it. I knew there was a chance that the Checkya would start checking papers so I found the girl in the crowd that was the closest match to you in terms of age and hair color and lifted her papers. Of course she was a Blank, but in the circumstances it was the best I could do. There aren’t that many Shades in the ForthRight.”

  Ella bridled at the use of the word “Shade” but decided to let it roll. After all, the man had just saved her life.

  “Amazing; you must be a very accomplished pickpocket, Vanka.”

  He chuckled. “All stage magicians—close-up magicians, that is—are good with their hands. If you can’t palm things then you’ve no right calling yourself a magician.” His gaze settled on Ella and his face took on a more serious cast. “Now it’s your turn, and make it good.”

  “I have special powers, Vanka. I know about people.”