Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch [11]
I spotted Nightingale at a back table eating out of a black lacquered bent box. He stood when he saw me and shook my hand. Once I’d settled myself opposite, he asked if I was hungry. I said no thank you. I was nervous, and I make it a rule never to put cold rice into an agitated stomach. He ordered tea, and asked if I minded if he continued eating.
I said not at all, and he returned to spearing food out of his bent with quick jabs of his chopsticks.
‘Did he come back?’ asked Nightingale.
‘Who?’
‘Your ghost,’ said Nightingale. ‘Nicholas Wallpenny: lurker, bug hunter and sneak thief. Late of the parish of St Giles. Can you hazard a guess as to where he’s buried?’
‘In the cemetery of the Actors’ Church?’
‘Very good,’ Nightingale said, and grabbed a duck wrap with a quick stab of his chopsticks. ‘So, did he come back?’
‘No he didn’t,’ I said.
‘Ghosts are capricious,’ he said. ‘They really don’t make reliable witnesses.’
‘Are you telling me ghosts are real?’
Nightingale carefully wiped his lips with a napkin.
‘You’ve spoken to one,’ he said. ‘What do you think?’
‘I’m awaiting confirmation from a senior officer,’ I said.
He put the napkin down and picked up his teacup. ‘Ghosts are real,’ he took a sip.
I stared at him. I didn’t believe in ghosts, or fairies or gods, and for the last couple of days I’d been like a man watching a magic show – I’d expected a magician to step out from behind the curtain and ask me to pick a card, any card. I wasn’t ready to believe in ghosts, but that’s the thing about empirical experience – it’s the real thing.
And if ghosts were real?
‘Is this where you tell me that there’s a secret branch of the Met whose task it is to tackle ghosts, ghouls, faeries, demons, witches and warlocks, elves and goblins … ?’ I said. ‘You can stop me before I run out of supernatural creatures.’
‘You haven’t even scratched the surface,’ said Nightingale.
‘Aliens?’ I had to ask.
‘Not yet.’
‘And the secret branch of the Met?’
‘Just me, I’m afraid,’ he said.
‘And you want me to what … join?’
‘Help,’ said Nightingale, ‘with this inquiry.’
‘You think there’s something supernatural about the murder?’ I asked.
‘Why don’t you tell me what your witness had to say,’ he said, ‘and then we’ll see where it goes.’
So I told him about Nicholas and the change of clothes by the murdering gent. About the CCTV coverage and the Murder Team thinking it was two separate people. When I’d finished, he signalled the waitress for the bill.
‘I wish I’d known this yesterday,’ he said. ‘But we still might be able to pick up a trace.’
‘A trace of what, sir?’ I asked.
‘The uncanny,’ said Nightingale. ‘It always leaves a trace.’
Nightingale’s motor was a Jag, a genuine Mark 2 with the 3.8 litre XK6 engine. My dad would have sold his trumpet for a chance to own a car like that, and that was back in the 1960s when that still meant something. It wasn’t pristine: there were some dings on the body work and a nasty scratch on the driver’s side door, and the leather on the seats was beginning to crack, but when Nightingale turned the key in the ignition and the inline-6 rumbled, it was perfect where it counted.
‘You took sciences at A level,’ said Nightingale as we pulled out. ‘Why didn’t you take a science degree?’
‘I got distracted, sir,’ I said. ‘My grades were low and I couldn’t get on the course that I wanted.’
‘Really? What was the distraction?’ he asked. ‘Music, perhaps? Did you start a band?’
‘No sir,’ I said. ‘Nothing that interesting.’
We headed down through Trafalgar Square and took advantage of the discreet Metropolitan Police flash on the windscreen to cut through the Mall, past Bucking-ham Palace and into Victoria. I knew there were only two places we might be going; Belgravia nick, where the Murder Team had their incident room, or Westminster Mortuary where the body was stashed. I hoped it was the incident room, but of course it was the mortuary.