The Eyre Affair_ A Novel - Jasper Fforde [42]
I stared at their earnest faces with some confusion until the penny dropped. They thought I was a full and pukka SO-5 operative on a rest-and-recuperation assignment. It wasn’t unusual. Back at SO-27 we used to get worn-out characters from SO-9 and SO-7 all the time. Without exception they had all been mad as pants.
“You’ve read my file?” I asked slowly.
“They wouldn’t release it,” replied Analogy. “It’s not often we get an operative moving to our little band from the dizzy heights of SpecOps-5. We needed a replacement with good field experience but also someone who can . . . well, how shall I put it?—”
Analogy paused, apparently at a loss for words. Bowden answered for him.
“We need someone who isn’t frightened to use extreme force if deemed necessary.”
I looked at them both, wondering whether it would be better to come clean; after all, the only thing I had shot recently was my own car and a seemingly bullet-proof master criminal. I was officially SO-27, not SO-5. But with the strong possibility of Acheron still being around, and revenge still high on my agenda, perhaps it would be better to play along.
Analogy shuffled nervously.
“Crometty’s murder is being looked after by Homicide, of course. Unofficially we can’t do a great deal, but SpecOps has always prided itself on a certain independence. If we uncovered any evidence in the pursuit of other inquiries, it would not be frowned upon. Do you understand?”
“Sure. Do you have any idea who killed Crometty?”
“Someone said that they had something for him to see, to buy. A rare Dickens manuscript. He went to see it and . . . well, he wasn’t armed, you know.”
“Few LiteraTecs in Swindon even know how to use a firearm,” added Bowden, “and training for many of them is out of the question. Literary detection and firearms don’t really go hand in hand; pen mightier than the sword and so forth.”
“Words are all very well,” I replied coolly, suddenly enjoying the SO-5 woman-of-mystery stuff, “but a nine-millimeter really gets to the root of the problem.”
They stared at me in silence for a second or two. Victor drew out a photograph from a buff envelope and placed it on the table in front of me.
“We’d like your opinion on this. It was taken yesterday.”
I looked at the photo. I knew the face well enough.
“Jack Schitt.”
“And what do you know about him?”
“Not much. He’s head of Goliath’s Internal Security Service. He wanted to know what Hades had planned to do with the Chuzzlewit manuscript.”
“I’ll let you into a secret. You’re right that Schitt’s Goliath but he’s not Internal Security.”
“What, then?”
“Advanced Weapons Division. Eight billion annual budget and it all goes through him.”
“Eight billion?”
“And loose change. Rumor has it they even went over that budget to develop the plasma rifle. He’s intelligent, ambitious and quite inflexible. He came here two weeks ago. He wouldn’t be in Swindon at all unless there was something here that Goliath found of great interest; we think Crometty went to see the original manuscript of Chuzzlewit and if that is so—”
“—Schitt is here because I am,” I announced suddenly. “He thought it suspicious that I should want an SO-27 job in Swindon of all places—no offense meant.”
“None taken,” replied Analogy. “But Schitt being here makes me think that Hades is still about—or at the very least Goliath think so.”
“I know,” I replied. “Worrying, isn’t it?”
Analogy and Cable looked at one another. They had made the points they wanted to make: I was welcome here, they were keen to avenge Crometty’s death and they didn’t like Jack Schitt. They wished me a pleasant evening, donned their hats and coats and were gone.
The jazz number came to an end. I joined in the applause as Holroyd got shakily to his feet and waved at the crowd before leaving. The bar thinned out rapidly once the music had finished, leaving me almost alone. I looked to my right,