Barking

by Tom Holt

  All. Allshapes. All manner and every kind of shape: now a unicorn, now a pretty girl, and possibly even a dead woman, for the benefit of a doctor and possibly Her Majesty’s coroner. ‘So if that was her, pretending to be her own cousin or niece or whatever,’ he said slowly, ‘then who’s the dead woman with all the money?’ But of course, she wasn’t dead. Any of her. ‘Screw that,’ he said angrily. ‘That’s me all explained out. What’s it got to do with you?’

  She tried to close up, like the window at the Post Office after you’ve been queuing for half an hour, but something made her hesitate. ‘She’s a client of ours, like I said just now. Divorce. Her husband’s huge in mobile phones, it’s a nice fat—’

  ‘Client,’ Duncan repeated. ‘Yours? I mean, are you handling the file?’

  She opened her mouth, closed it and nodded. ‘I inherited it from a girl who left,’ she added quickly. ‘It was just a case of sorting out the finances—’

  ‘You know her. By sight.’

  ‘Yes, though if only you’d listen to what I tell you occasionally, you’d know that that’s pretty well meaningless. I’ve met her dozens of times, but I wouldn’t recognise her if I passed her in the street.’

  ‘All right.’ There was a hell of a lot more that she wasn’t telling him, for some reason, but time was short. Next item. ‘Why did your lot try and kill me?’

  Finally he’d done it; left her speechless.

  ‘I know it was your lot,’ he went on, casual as he could manage. ‘It was in a Moondollars coffee shop. You sent me this note.’ He fished out the yellow sticky, unfolded it and held it where she could see but not quite reach. ‘Your handwriting. I went along, just like I was told. Someone shot at me with a silver bullet.’ I know it had to be one of your lot who shot at me,’ he added airily, ‘because I looked for the shooter in a big mirror nailed to the back wall. Of course, I didn’t see anybody with a gun; but there were twenty-seven people in the café, not counting me, and twenty-six reflections.’

  Sally was looking at him with eyes big and round as saucers. ‘Oh Christ,’ she said. ‘Duncan, I’m so sorry. I never meant—’

  ‘What?’ He hadn’t meant to grab her shoulders. People were staring. ‘What didn’t you mean?’

  ‘It wasn’t my fault. Nobody ever tells me anything. Anyway, how could you be so utterly stupid, to walk straight into an obvious ambush like that? If you can’t be bothered to look after yourself, why the hell should I have to? You know what, you’ve got no consideration for other people.’

  That was Sally; never more ferocious than when in the wrong. ‘Just tell me,’ he said. ‘Why do your lot want to kill me? Is it because of Bowden—?’

  ‘I don’t know, do I? I was just doing as I was told.’

  Also typical Sally; when she was lying, she went pink. ‘That’s not true.’

  ‘Look.’ She’d raised her voice. Several passers-by had stopped to watch. ‘I haven’t got time right now, and neither have you. Have you got any idea how you’re going to get out of—’

  Of course he hadn’t. ‘Of course I have. Easy. All I’ve got to do is stay underground till it’s daylight again. It’ll be a bit boring, but no big deal. I can ride round on the Circle Line, like the tramps do.’

  ‘You can’t.’

  ‘’Course I can. The trains run all night, don’t they?’

  ‘No.’

  Oh, Duncan thought. Fancy me not knowing that. You can live in a city all your life, and not know the most basic things about it. ‘Well, I expect I can find somewhere. I mean, I’ve got the whole bloody Underground network to hide in, must be thousands of places. Don’t change the subject.’

  ‘For crying out loud, Duncan, it’s not that easy. They’ve got guards, security patrols—’

  ‘I’ll smell them long before they see me.’

  ‘CCTV.’ She scowled at him. ‘Dogs.’

  ‘Ah. The company of like-minded life forms.’

  ‘Be serious for just ten seconds, can’t you?’ Sally was practically shouting now. ‘If you get caught, it could be really bad.’

  ‘Nah. I can take care of myself.’

  ‘Oh really? They arrest you and take you outside to put you in a car. One second in the moonlight, that’s all, and then there’ll be bits of minced-up policeman all over central London. I don’t know about your lot, but mine prefer a rather lower profile.’

  He’d never liked Sally much when she was in the right. ‘Let me worry about that,’ he said firmly. ‘All I want from you is a straight answer. Bowden Allshapes. What exactly—?’

  ‘Oh shit.’ She gave him a glare that would’ve stripped varnish, then threw her arms around his neck and kissed him.

  Opinions differ. Even among the songwriting community, there’s a sharp divergence of opinion. Some practitioners reckon a kiss is just a kiss, others would have you believe it can be a blow-your-head-off spiritual experience. If he was honest with himself, Duncan would have to have admitted that he hadn’t collected enough hard data to form a reasoned opinion. Certainly, when they were married, kissing Sally had been mostly quite nice, but not—

  More to it than met the lips. Duncan couldn’t put it into words, and anyhow he was far too preoccupied to try; but suppose Captain Kirk had landed on a planet where writing and speech were unknown and they could only communicate by snogging; and suppose the prettiest girl on the planet had been assigned to recite to him the whole of their version of the Encyclopedia Britannica, complete with footnotes, index and alphabetical list of contributors, in three seconds flat. Something like that. Nice, but confusing.

  ‘All right?’ he heard Sally say; and then, while he was still struggling to snap out of it, she was walking away. That made no sense whatsoever. He started to run after her, but she was on the stairs that led to the street; a few more steps, and she’d be out of cover and exposed to the full fury of the moon - he called her name, but she couldn’t have heard him. She’d gone.

  Duncan looked round. To say that people were staring at him would be an understatement; in fact, his viewing figures were so high, he wouldn’t have been surprised if major companies had come rushing up pleading to be allowed to advertise on him. He growled and moved away towards the ticket barrier.

  All in all, then, a failure. He hadn’t found out what was going on, or how Sally fitted into it; he’d managed to drag out a few tantalising scraps of information, but really, they just made things more confusing than ever. In return, he was in deep, possibly permanent shit with the rest of the pack, and he had somehow to get from the Tube station to his flat without turning into a wolf and killing somebody. Even by his standards, a poor evening’s work, and he had every right to feel unhappy and depressed. Odd thing was, he didn’t.

  Why not? Three guesses.

  Only took one, didn’t it? Because Sally couldn’t have kissed him like that if she hadn’t, at some fundamental, subatomic level, meant it. In which case - well, there may be troubles ahead, but while there’s moonlight and laughter and love and romance, he was entirely prepared to face the music and run like buggery.

  Duncan should’ve been formulating a plan of action all the way home. Instead, his mind insisted on deconstructing every aspect of the kiss - a foolish exercise, but every time he tried to be worried or scared, a little voice kept telling him that it really didn’t matter, everything was going to be just fine, because . . . and there the little voice tended to mumble, so he couldn’t make out anything specific. But it sounded like it knew what it was talking about, and the stress melted like blowtorched snow. So Luke was going to be a bit vexed with him in the morning. So what? Besides, that’d only happen if he went into work, and when you thought clearly about it, he didn’t have to do that. So they might come looking for him at the flat. No big deal. London’s a big place, and even their noses couldn’t track him through its vast polyodorous crowds. As for getting from the station to his own front door - actually, he’d have liked to hear what the know-it-all little voice had to say about th
at, because he didn’t have a clue. Furthermore, it had just occurred to him that not only are wolves inadequately equipped to turn keys in locks, but also (if last night was anything to go by) his clothes and other portable possessions had simply gone away somewhere when he transformed, and returned automatically when he changed back. Even the little voice had to admit that that was an awkward one; he’d have to stop just inside the station entrance, put his key on the floor, go outside in the moonlight, change, come back, somehow pick the key up in his mouth—

  But what the hell, it’d be all right. Even if it wasn’t - even if he had to spend the whole night slinking around in the shadows of parked cars, trying very hard not to bite anybody or anything - he was somehow reassured that it must be possible, and if it was possible he could do it. It was only impossible things (like getting someone to be in love with you when they didn’t want to be) that merited worrying about, and right now, if he was asked to compile a list of impossible things he desperately needed to do, he wouldn’t be able to think of anything to put on it.

  She kissed me, Duncan thought. True, she swore at me first, but if memory served that wasn’t unprecedented. She didn’t have to do that, but she did it anyway. In which case—

  The train stopped. He looked up, saw the name of the station, and scrambled to get out before the doors shut. In which case - he carried on musing - the really big, important question was how could he get to see her again, and when? There was no doubt in his mind that one more interview was all that was needed to do the trick. Damn this stupid werewolf thing, because otherwise he could go round to her place right now, bash the door down if needs be - no, couldn’t do that, didn’t know her new address. But it had to be possible to find it; policemen and private investigators find out people’s addresses every day, so it can’t be all that hard. So: once he’d got that, it’d just be a case of—

  He stopped dead. The pavement under his feet was pale, almost milky, and the air felt cold and a bit damp. He sniffed: diesel. Fuck it, he thought, I’m outside. I must’ve left the station without realising it.

  Very reluctantly, he looked down at the backs of his hands. No thick grey fur. Also, he was standing upright, rather than being down on all fours. And he was still wearing his suit, and wiggling his toes told him that his shoes still contained feet, not paws. He looked up and stared straight at the round, bright silver disc in the sky. Full moon. It hadn’t happened.

  Duncan closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them again. No change.

  For all of two seconds, he couldn’t move or breathe. Then, as soon as normal service had been resumed, he threw his head back and howled - not from lycanthropy, but for sheer joy.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Not, Duncan realised, the most sensible thing he’d ever done; because if the Ferris Gang were looking for him, anywhere within a five-mile radius, he’d just told them where he was. Couldn’t be helped, though, and he’d have to face them sooner or later, unless he was serious about New Mexico; which he wasn’t, not any more, not unless Sally fancied going there with him.

  Talking of which: coincidence? Unlikely. It had to have been the kiss. How that could have been possible he neither knew nor cared, in the same way that he didn’t have the faintest idea how computers work but was only too happy to use them. More important still than the fact that she apparently had the power to save him was that she’d used it. You don’t save someone’s soul with a kiss unless you quite like them, at the very least. Yippee, he thought.

  A sudden noise made him jump; he realised it was a dustbin falling over, half a mile away. He still had the superpowers, then; that was nice, but he wasn’t really fussed. He yawned. God, he was tired. A long and weary few days.

  Brief pause for thought. If Luke and the gang were after him right now, they’d be here already. Since they weren’t, he was prepared to bet they were off persecuting small animals or chasing traffic, in which case he didn’t have to worry about them until the morning. A few hours’ sleep, therefore; then pack a few things in a bag and find somewhere to doss down for a while until he’d forced some kind of resolution.

  The stairs to his flat seemed painfully steep tonight. Duncan hauled himself up to his landing as though he was carrying a hundredweight of coal on his back, and rummaged in his pocket for his keys. No need. Door already open.

  Oh come on, he thought, why’s it got to be tonight? Whatever it is - unicorns, vampires, beautiful but unmemorable girls, accounts that won’t balance - couldn’t it wait till the morning and give him a chance to get some sleep, a bath and a bacon sandwich? Apparently not. With a deep sigh, he shoved the door open and walked in.

  When he saw the mess he was relieved. Cupboards ripped open, drawers pulled out, stuff scattered all over the floor: just plain, ordinary, comfortingly normal burglars again. He smiled and waded through his jumbled possessions to the kitchen. They wouldn’t have nicked his kettle. You couldn’t give it away.

  The kettle was still there, but they’d scattered the tea bags all over the floor and torn the door off the fridge. Big deal. Chances were, he wouldn’t be coming back here again, at least for a while, and a fridge is just a fridge. He found a stray tea bag that hadn’t been shredded (strangely meticulous burglars, these. What had they imagined he could have hidden inside his tea-bags?) dropped it into the one unbroken mug and filled the kettle with water.

  ‘I’m sorry about the mess.’

  Duncan froze. The voice (nondescript male) sounded like it had come from right next to him, but he couldn’t see anybody. He sniffed: no scent but his own. He held still for two minutes, listening carefully. Nothing but the soft whimpering of the kettle as it slowly persuaded the water to think about boiling. Oh well, he thought.

  ‘You don’t know me, of course.’

  He dropped the kettle on his foot. After he’d done a little dance, he burst out of the kitchen into the living room. Nobody there; nobody in the bedroom or the bathroom, either. But definitely not just his imagination. What little self-esteem he had left assured him that if he was going to hallucinate voices, they’d have to be more interesting that that one. He slouched back into the kitchen, and heard a faint muffled cough.

  ‘Oh, sorry.’ A patch of air directly ahead of him seemed to shimmer, as though God was playing with the vertical hold, and out of the blur stepped a man. He was short, bespectacled, podgy, a bit thin on top. ‘Forgot,’ he said. ‘It’s a nuisance, being invisible. I mean, you don’t tend to look at yourself, do you, so it’s easy to let it slip your mind.’

  Duncan heard a rather terrifying growling noise, and realised he was making it. Bad manners, of course, but never mind. The back of his neck was itching like crazy. ‘Who the hell are you?’ he said.

  ‘Wesley Loop,’ the man replied. ‘I was going to clear up a bit before you got back. Is it all right if I sit down?’

  ‘Wesley—?’

  ‘Loop.’ The intruder looked round, tutted and perched on the edge of the smashed-up worktop. ‘You know - or hasn’t Luke told you about me? I used to be his partner. Ferris and—’

  ‘You’re dead.’

  Mr Loop frowned. ‘Well, yes,’ he said, sounding mildly offended. ‘Look, would you mind not glaring at me like that? I’m really sorry about the furniture and stuff, but you know how it is. Time of the month and all.’

  At that moment Duncan happened to catch sight of the bedroom door. It had been ripped off its hinges, and something had taken a bite out of it, just above the handle. It occurred to him that, whatever Mr Loop’s reason was for being there, it wasn’t to steal his DVD player.

  ‘I got the curtains drawn as quickly as I could,’ Mr Loop went on. ‘But it was awkward without hands, and I suppose I got a bit carried away. I’ll write you a cheque in a minute, if you tell me how much for.’

  ‘But you can’t,’ Duncan said. ‘You’re dead, he repeated.’

  Mr Loop sighed, and when he spoke again, it was a bit slower and louder, as if Duncan was a small child, or a foreign
er. ‘That’s perfectly all right,’ he said. ‘It’ll be a company cheque. Crosswoods’s office account. You won’t have any problem with it at the bank.’

  ‘I don’t care about the stupid cheque. What the hell are you doing in my flat?’

  He could tell that Mr Loop was a sensitive sort of person, the kind who gets upset when people raise their voices. ‘I came to see you,’ Mr Loop explained, martyred-patient. ‘And obviously I couldn’t call on you at the office. What are you doing home so early, by the way? I didn’t expect you back till the early hours. Shouldn’t you be out with the rest of them?’

  ‘What are you doing in my flat alive?’

  Puzzled frown, followed by the clunk of the dropped penny. ‘Oh, I see,’ said Mr Loop. ‘You don’t know about—’ He paused. You could almost see the tip of the dilemma horn poking through his shirt. ‘I don’t think I’m supposed to tell you, actually. It’s a bit of a delicate situation, and—’

  Grabbing him by the throat had seemed like a good idea at the time; the only thing to do, in fact. As Duncan flew through the air and splatted against the wall like a fly on a windscreen, he had a fraction of a second in which to reflect on that; and yes, if he had his time all over again, he’d still try and strangle the bastard, because if there was one thing he hated more than anything else, it was bloody not knowing—

  ‘Are you all right?’ asked Mr Loop anxiously.

  Duncan sat up and felt the back of his head; then he turned half round and looked at the wall. The plaster was all smashed up, but he felt fine. Hooray for superpowers.

  ‘Please don’t try that again,’ Mr Loop said. ‘Really, if I’d known there was going to be all this violence, I wouldn’t have got involved to start with. Honestly, all I wanted was to acquire new skills that’d help me be the best possible lawyer I could be. Throwing people into walls—’ He shuddered. ‘The idea was, eventually, when we’d built up a good, solid practice, that Luke would look after the bread-and-butter work, leaving me to handle the more abstruse and intellectually challenging cases. Copyright,’ he added sadly, ‘intellectual property. Internet jurisdictions. Ecclesiastical law, even. As it turned out, though—’