Carter went to the detectives’ bullpen to find somebody to report the death to, but it was silent there. Every detective sat at their desk, every one of them was dead, every one of them had been shot through the mouth, every one of them held Charlie Hammond’s gun.
Carter saw a flight of wooden stairs and climbed them, though no such stairs existed in the 76th Precinct house.
* * *
He was in the house of Martin Suydam. As he broached the top of the staircase, he walked through a length of crime scene tape that tore like gossamer.
Nobody else was there. Dark stains showed, soaked into the wooden boards and bare plaster by the wall where Suydam had died and in a wall spray where Charlie Hammond had emptied his skull. Now Carter felt he shouldn’t be there, no longer convinced even within the warp of the dream that he was still a cop.
Suydam’s psycho wall was still up. Carter thought that this was wrong, that somebody had specifically told him that everything had been taken away in preparation for the site to be razed, but he couldn’t quite catch the memory slipping eel-like through his recollection. He went through into the side rooms from where he’d made the call, and stood by the window. Outside was a patch of woodland. Beyond it, he thought he could see the sea. Above him, the great sky. The wind sighed. He couldn’t see a single building out there, just a green wilderness. As the wind blew, the sky seemed to bulge as if it were a diaphanous sail. The great blue arc of it seemed as insubstantial and flawed as a tangled cobweb, as deformed as Suydam’s tracery of yarn on his psycho wall.
At the edge of the world, the sea rose to meet the sky, and it was coming closer. The sea rose, the sky fell, forming a shattered horizon that came toward Carter like an avalanche, a cave-in under the vault of heaven.
The house of Martin Suydam, the only building in the world, shuddered as everything failed. Carter watched it, truly terrified in a way he had never felt before. There was someone standing by him. He managed to look away from the awful sight through the window. It was Charlie Hammond, the exit wound in the back of his head obvious. He looked at Carter and smiled at him, kind, reassuring.
“That’ll be The Twist,” he said. He handed Carter his S&W Model 5946 and nodded, kind, reassuring.
* * *
Carter woke up. There was a man in the room, standing at the foot of the bed.
* * *
Carter woke up. He was alone.
* * *
He met Emily at the door at eight thirty sharp. “Let’s get some breakfast,” he told her.
She’d already eaten, she said, but coffee sounded good. He locked the two Yales on the door and handed her the keys.
She took him to a diner on the other side of the block. There was a police cruiser outside, the cop at the wheel reading a newspaper. His partner was in the diner getting coffees at the counter when they came in.
They took a window table and ordered. Emily could hardly help but notice Carter’s distracted glances at the police car outside.
“On the run, are you?”
He looked at her, a little startled. “That obvious, is it? I tell you, I’m not going back to that chain gang.” He glanced at the car again. “No, it just made me think of a dream I had last night.”
“Guilty conscience?”
“I don’t think so. Just reminded me of a bad time. I used to be a cop.”
“And now you’re an investigator? Ken told me. He didn’t say what kind of investigator.”
“I didn’t tell him. I’m a private investigator these days.”
“Sounds interesting.”
“Sounds it, yeah.”
Carter’s plate of eggs arrived, and the conversation foundered for a while.
“You didn’t sleep so well, then?” said Emily a couple of minutes later.
Carter shrugged. “Unfamiliar bed. That place creaks a lot at night.”
“And you dreamed of your old job.” Outside, the police cruiser had long gone, but Emily looked at the space where it had been. “Bad dream?”
“Just a dream.” Carter didn’t want to talk about it at all. If he talked about it, it might settle into his memory. He was already disturbed by how much detail he could recall: his reflection on the cars’ windows as he passed them on Union Street; the feel of the police tape as it broke against him; the smell of blood when Hammond stood by him. He had never smelled anything in a dream before, of that he was sure. “Let’s talk about the bookstore.”
Emily drew a deep breath and let it out. “Sure.”
She was looking at him warily. “First,” he said, “let me put your mind at ease about the place’s immediate future. I haven’t seen the accounts, but it doesn’t feel like it’s on its last legs. What kind of turnover do you get?”
“Well, a little bit better now that Alfred’s been declared dead.” Carter frowned. Emily smiled wanly. “His pay’s been going into his checking account for the last seven years. I guess that’s yours now, too. Good luck proving it to the bank.”
“Seven years of pay has just been collecting in it?”
“Sure. It was his business, so I just carried on giving him his cut from the profits, just as I did when he was around.” She looked at him from under her bangs. “Gave myself a yearly raise, too, in line with inflation, and a Christmas and birthday bonus, just like I got when he was around. It’s all in the books.”
Carter finished his eggs and pushed the plate away. He signaled to the waitress to refill his cup. “That’s fine. Doesn’t sound like the store’s in any kind of financial trouble. I thought times were tough for bookselling?”
“Generally, yeah. Hill’s has always specialized, though. We hunt down stock you won’t find anywhere else. We get collectors from all over the world. A lot of the real business is mail order. The stuff you see on the shelves in the store is for casual browsers. Most of my day is spent on the Net hunting editions and doing deals, keeping the web and social presence alive, parceling books up and phoning UPS.” She leaned forward confidentially. “I can fill out a customs declaration in my sleep.” She leaned back and smiled. It was a pleasant, lopsided smile. No, he concluded, more the grin of a practiced shit-kicker. He decided he liked her.
Her eyes narrowed, but she kept smiling. “You’re looking at me weird.”
“Just … don’t take this the wrong way … Just you and a guy like Kenneth Rothwell. How did that happen?”
“Yeah, it’s a weird one, and no offense taken. He just came in one day, asking about a book for a gift. We got talking. He bought a small fortune of stock, and I thought that was that. Didn’t even know he was a Rothwell until he gave me his credit card and the delivery address. Then he came in the next week and asked me out. What’s a girl to do? And he does look good in a suit.”
Carter considered telling her Rothwell wanted to buy the store as a gift for her, decided it was impolitic, and told her anyway.
Emily was stunned. “As a gift?”
“Yeah.” Carter couldn’t tell if the news made her happy or angry. “I’m not selling it to him, though.”
Her expression became guarded. Carter thought that Rothwell was used to getting what he wanted, and Emily knew it, too. Before she could spend too much effort coming up with ugly scenarios, he said, “I’m giving you half. Not as a gift, but because you deserve it. Hill’s Books has been you for seven years, so I’m just making that more legal.”
“You’re kidding?” She was stunned all over again.
It was the idea he’d been playing around with the previous evening, and he still wasn’t sure whether it was wise, but he had gone with impulse and it felt right.
“I don’t kid much,” he told her. “I’ll be your silent partner.”
She frowned. “And I still end up doing all the work?”
“If you don’t like the deal—”
“No! Hell, no!” She put her hand reflexively on his, as if to stop him physically from withdrawing the deal across the table. “I love the deal! Equal partners?”
> Carter nodded. He could see her running figures through her head. “Same work I’ve always been doing, but for more money. What’s not to like? I accept, Mr. Carter.” She took her hand from his and held it out to him. He took it and they shook.
“Glad to hear it, Ms.…”
She winced slightly. “Lovecraft.”
“Ms. Lovecraft.” He thought at first the wince had been because she had the same surname as Linda Lovecraft, and she must get shit for it all the time. Then he remembered that was Linda Lovelace, but that he’d seen the name Lovecraft just recently. “Like the writer?”
“Yes,” she said heavily. “Just like the writer.”
“Any relation?”
She nodded reluctantly.
“You don’t seem happy about it.”
“The number of people I get coming to the store just to paw the books and talk to me. They never buy anything. Just turn up with Arkham House editions and ask me to sign them, like I wrote them or something.”
Carter smiled disbelievingly. “Why you? Because you work in a bookstore? Don’t the rest of your family get any hassle?”
“I don’t have any family. Not now. I’m the last of the line. Once I’m gone, the name dies with me. Kind of. There are other Lovecrafts out there, but they’re not blood.”
“That’s hard.”
“Hard? Do you have any idea how many times I’ve wanted to change my name? Every time some nut comes in and tries to tell me that Cthulhu lives, or the Necronomicon really exists. Mr. Carter, I am sick of this name.”
“Call me Dan, and I’ll stick to calling you Emily, if that’s okay?”
“That would be cool of you. Thanks.”
“I was going to say maybe you’d like to rename the place after yourself since you’d be the one running it, but I guess ‘Lovecraft’s Books’ isn’t such a great idea after all. Bring in the wrong crowd.”
“Don’t get me wrong. It’s great that people are reading, but it’s the ones who treat it like gospel.”
“‘It’?”
“H. P. L.’s ‘canon,’ his stories. Innsmouth and Arkham, all that garbage. His big idea was that there are super-powerful gods out there that are really aliens, and we’re beneath their perception because we’re nothing, or beneath their contempt if they even notice us. The big bad is Cthulhu, who’s like a huge thing with an octopus for a head.”
Carter remembered the green vinyl figure behind the counter in the bookstore and nodded. He guessed it had been a gift from someone poking gentle fun at her, someone she liked or she wouldn’t have it on display. “What’s an Arkham House edition?” he asked.
“Publishing house that popped up after he died, founded by a guy called August Derleth, one of H. P. L.’s friends. He thought H. P. L. deserved a bigger audience. But nobody would print his stuff, so Derleth helped create Arkham House to do it. I think it’s still going. The name comes from one of a bunch of fictional towns H. P. L. came up with to set some of his stories in. Arkham’s the main one, probably based on Salem.” She looked hard and a little suspiciously at Carter, as if she supposed he was playing with her. “This stuff gets referenced all over the place. Games, T-shirts, movies, you name it. You really haven’t ever read any?” Carter shook his head. Grudgingly, she accepted his ignorance. “H. P. L. couldn’t write. Not well. Ever hear of M. R. James? No? English academic who wrote some ghost stories on the side. H. P. L. was really impressed by him and wrote an essay that said as much. A friend sent James a copy, and James wrote back to his friend tearing H. P. L.’s writing style to pieces. He was right to, as well.” She looked in her coffee cup and sighed. “Just as well H. P. L. never heard that. It would have broken his heart. James was everything he wanted to be. Wealthy, educated, respected…” She snorted. “… English. If he’d ever found out what James thought of his work, it would have destroyed him.
“Actually, this”—she pinched the skin on the back of her hand—“would have killed him, too. H. P. L. was all about racial purity. If he only knew one of his descendants had fallen in love with a black girl. Truly, I would give serious money to see how he would’ve reacted. ‘Why, what’s all this spinning noise coming out of this coffin? Hi, Great-Great-Uncah Howard, I’m Emily. We’re family. Yay!’ ‘Ohmagawd! A mulatto! A mongrel! My precious genes! Nooooo!’”
She had a sip of coffee while her malevolent giggles abated.
“So, anyway. I get all these guys—they’re always guys—coming in and asking me if I’ve got the Seven Cryptical Books of Hsan in stock, so I do this smile”—she smiled a weak, reluctant version of her earlier grin—“and say, ‘Oh, you’re hilarious.’ Or they tell me the president is really an intelligent fungus from Yuggoth, ‘Not that intelligent, though, amiright?’” The grimace-smile again. “‘Oh, you’re hilarious. Now, are you going to buy anything, or are you going to get the fuck out of my shop? No, I will not sign your fucking Arkham House editions.’” She shook her head. “Sorry. I don’t cuss much, but … Yeah, okay, I cuss a lot, but they just…” She made a muffled scream. Then, unexpectedly, she smiled at him. “My shop. I like the sound of that.”
“Our shop. Maybe I should rename it Carter and Lovecraft so you remember your place.”
“Hell, no. You realize there’s a recurring character in H. P. L.’s stories called Randolph Carter? That name would just turn the store into an even bigger nerd magnet.”
“There is? Okay, maybe not in that case. Okay, it stays Hill’s Books as a memorial to your uncle, your former boss and my benefactor. I’ll ask Weston to handle splitting the ownership. Him, or somebody cheaper.”
“Weston?”
“Alfred’s lawyer. He handled the will.”
Lovecraft shook her head. “No, the store’s lawyers are Harlow, Harlow, and Glenn. Local firm. I’ve never heard of Weston.”
Carter frowned. “Maybe he was Alfred’s personal lawyer. Kept the store separate. Henry Weston of Weston Edmunds. Know the name?”
“Weston Edmunds? Are you kidding me? They’re huge. Big corporate lawyers.”
“That’s what I turned up. Maybe they were friends? I don’t know.” He took out his wallet to pay the check and flicked through the card pockets as he did. “He gave me his business card.” He riffled back and forth in growing frustration for some seconds.
“Can’t find it?”
He couldn’t.
Chapter 7
DAN, THE DETECTIVE
Carter walked back with Lovecraft to pick up his things.
“You’re not giving up the day job, then?” she asked.
“No. Not anytime soon, anyway. I’ve got a job starting on Monday, so I want to get up to speed on anything I can pull on the guy from the databases.”
“Job. You’re disillusioning me, Dan. I thought they were all ‘cases.’”
“I just don’t like sounding like Mike Hammer. When I was on the job, when I was still a cop, you saw some PIs who’d really bought into it. They were more Danny DeVito than Bogart, but they’d do everything short of talking out of the side of their mouth. Just playacting, pretending to be some gumshoe in a film noir. The guys used to make fun of them. I used to make fun. I don’t want that to be me. I do the job and try to do it like a human, not some dick from central casting.”
“A private dick,” said Lovecraft. “No bottle of rye in your desk drawer?”
Carter laughed. “Jesus, no.”
“You’re a real disappointment, Dan. No overcoat, battered hat, nothing. Not even one ‘Here’s looking at you, kid’ out of you. Detecting fail.”
“‘Here’s looking at you, kid’ is from Casablanca. Bogart’s not playing a detective in that.”
There was a silence and Carter looked sideways at Lovecraft only to find her smirking. “Did I just step in a bear trap?” he said.
“Shure did, blue eyesh,” said Lovecraft.
“Ah, come on. Knowing my movies doesn’t make me a Phil Marlowe wannabe.”
“I bet there’s a gin joint with a flas
hing neon sign right next to your office. You stand by the window with a smoke hanging on your lip at night, looking out at the mean streets, talking to yourself in voice-over.”
“It’s not too late for me to hold on to the whole bookstore.”
“Nah,” said Lovecraft, unimpressed by the threat. “We shook on it.”
“We didn’t spit on our palms.”
“Speak for yourself¸ Bogie.”
* * *
Carter packed his overnight bag, but left the sleeping bag and foam roll behind. After all, the place was his now. Half his.
Lovecraft stood by the top of the stairs while he gathered his belongings. “You planning to move up here?”
“To Providence? No, not right now. I need to think about this.”
“No, I mean this apartment. If I could move in, it’d save me rent.”
Carter paused. “In all the time Alfred’s been gone, it never crossed your mind to do that anyway?”
“No.” She looked uncomfortable. “It was his, you know. Any minute, he could walk through the door.”
“When did you stop believing that?”
She looked at the bed and the discarded plastic cover lying crumpled on the floor by it. “When you turned up. Bing! Reality check, please.” She wasn’t smiling.
Carter turned back to his packing. “Sure. We can work you living over the store in as part of the deal, I guess. But can you hold off for a while, just a few weeks until we’ve got everything legal with regard to the store? I’ll be coming up maybe once a week while that’s going on and I might as well crash here as anywhere.”
They said good-bye at the door. He said he’d try to come up again soon, maybe in a week or a fortnight, and get the papers organized in the interim. They parted quite formally, with a “Good morning, Ms. Lovecraft” on one side, and “Drive safely, Mr. Carter” on the other.
Four hours and five minutes later, Carter was back at his office.
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