In Your Dreams (8 page)

Chapter Three

P
aul didn't enjoy the next ten working days. In the morning, there was paperwork: all the admin and procedural stuff that every true hero gets some other poor bugger to do for him. There were applications in triplicate for Section Fifteen exemptions, incident reports, written notifications of intention to use restricted weapons in built-up areas, stores requisitions, expenses vouchers and mileage allowance chits (Mr Wurmtoter got ninety-five pence a mile for his winged horse; Benny Shumway got thirty-five pence a mile for his D-reg Suzuki jeep, but mostly seemed to take the Tube), time sheets and invoices and credit control printouts and a whole bunch of other stuff you won't find mentioned in the Norse sagas or the
Morte d'Arthur
. But the mornings were better than the lunch hour, because between one and two he was either in Mr Shumway's office being lectured or shouted at, or in the closed-file store, which doubled as an assault course, firing range and tournament lists. The experience helped Paul discover things about himself that he hadn't appreciated before: that Semtex brought him out in a rash, for example, and firing antitank rockets from the shoulder gave him a headache, and his fear of needles also extended to hand-and-a-half
katzenbalger
broadswords. His cunning plan of deliberately doing so badly at everything that Mr Shumway would despair of him and get him transferred to another department turned out to be a non-starter; mostly because he didn't need to pretend. Even when Mr Shumway yelled at him so ferociously that he gave it his very best shot out of sheer terror, he was still uniformly hopeless at everything. His fuses spluttered and died; he couldn't hit a barn door at point-blank range with the .50 Barrett; he consistently failed to remember the right proportion of SlayMore to water; and the only way he'd ever hurt a dragon or a gryphon with a sword would be if the unfortunate creature was standing directly behind him when he lost his grip on the handle. This, unfortunately, was precisely what Mr Shumway seemed to expect of him. ‘Don't worry about it,' he'd sigh, as Paul's dummy hand-grenade bounced off the opposite wall and landed at his feet for the sixth time in a row. ‘It just takes practice, that's all. Another couple of weeks and you'll be just fine.'

Lunchtimes, then, were bad enough; but they were a week at the seaside compared to the afternoons. In the afternoon, Paul helped Mr Shumway with the banking.

The first time had been the worst, because he'd had no idea. ‘Little job I'd like you to do for me,' Mr Shumway had said, poking his head round the door of Paul's office. ‘Won't take a minute.'

Of course Paul had said, ‘Yes, right, of course,' like the fool he was, instead of ‘No way', or ‘Over my dead body' – though, in the event, the latter would've been a very silly thing to say, because—

Just inside the door of Mr Shumway's office was another, smaller door. It was decorated with six bolts, four deadlocks, two Yale locks and a chain you could've anchored an aircraft carrier from – curious in itself, because the door was just standard office chipboard, with an aluminium handle. Paul had noticed it the third or fourth time he'd been in Mr Shumway's office, but compared with some of the other fixtures and fittings he'd come across at 70 St Mary Axe, it was prosaic to the point of brain damage, and he'd ignored it. This time, however, Mr Shumway was busy with a bunch of keys that must've weighed three pounds. ‘I'll go first,' he sang out cheerfully. ‘You follow on with that satchel on the desk there.' He was referring to a shabby-looking leather case, the sort of thing Just William carried his schoolbooks in. Paul picked it up; it felt as though it was empty.

‘Um,' he asked, as Mr Shumway shot back the fourth bolt, ‘what are we doing, exactly?'

‘Just nipping to the bank,' Mr Shumway replied. ‘Paying in some cheques, drawing petty cash, handing in some TT forms. Usual stuff.'

Paul nodded warily. He knew TT stood for ‘telegraphic transfer', which was when you sent large sums of money by fax or Internet or something. Why
usual stuff
needed two of them, with Mr Shumway going first, he wasn't sure he wanted to know.

‘Ready?' Mr Shumway had finished with the bolts and all but one of the locks. ‘Okay, then, on three. One. Two. Three—'

He turned the key in the last of the deadlocks, grabbed the door handle and pushed outwards. He hesitated on the threshold, not letting go of the handle, as if checking to make sure that it was safe. Then he took a step forward and disappeared.

Seriously unnerving stuff. Paul could distinctly see Benny Shumway vanish – made no sense, but that was what he saw. First Mr Shumway's left hand, then the rest of his left arm, his shoulder, then his head and torso, finally his back and right heel, and then he was gone.
Bugger this
, Paul thought,
no way I'm
—

‘Come on, then,' called Mr Shumway's disembodied voice. Paul shut his eyes, and followed.

When he opened them again, everything had gone dark. Panic flooded through him and he shuffled backwards towards where he remembered the door being—

‘No.' Mr Shumway again, calm but urgent. ‘Don't do that, you've got no way of knowing where it'll take you. It's complicated,' he added, ‘I'll explain later. Just follow my voice, OK?'

Paul tried to say something, but his words turned into a little trembly squeak. He stuck his left foot out; it was rather like trying to take the last step off an escalator with your eyes shut. Nothing bad happened, apparently. After that, it was very slightly easier.

‘Keep up,' Mr Shumway called back at him. Paul did his best; but each time Mr Shumway spoke after that, his voice sounded further and further away. ‘And don't look round, whatever you do,' was another helpful piece of advice. ‘Come on, we're nearly there. And don't worry, all right? This is just something you have to get used to.'

The lights came up gradually; first a faint grey gleam round the edges, then a glow that seeped into the darkness like ink soaking into blotting paper. Not that it helped much, because there was nothing to see; nothing to right or left, nothing up or (very worrying) down. Paul was a little animated cartoon figure walking across a blank grey screen—

And there was someone walking beside him. He didn't notice at first, so he had no idea how long he'd been there. It was only when he glimpsed movement out of the corner of his eye ...

‘And don't talk to
anybody
,' sighed a faint echo of Mr Shumway's voice. ‘Not
anybody
, got it?'

Just in time; because Paul had been on the verge of saying, ‘Is that you, Uncle Mike?' He'd only hesitated because it was such a silly thing to say, given that Uncle Mike had died ten years ago.

'Course it's me, you prat
, said a memory of Uncle Mike's voice inside his head.
And look at me when I'm talking to you.

(‘Don't turn round,' Mr Shumway had said.)

What's wrong, Paul? It's me, Mike. Aren't you glad to see me after all this time?
(Paul wasn't hearing the words, because there was no sound. Someone had hit the mute button, and he couldn't hear his footsteps on the lack-of-floor, or his own breathing or anything. But he could distinctly
remember
Uncle Mike saying the words, at some unspecified point in the past.)

He didn't look round, because he'd been told not to; but Uncle Mike had gone, and there was someone else.
Hello, Paul mate
, he remembered,
haven't you grown? Here, what's the matter? Haven't you got anything to say to your old grandad?

(Which was cruel; because Paul had so much to say, starting with,
Sorry I missed your funeral.
He'd pretended he'd had a migraine, but that had been a lie. He'd always hated funerals, anyhow.)

This is daft, son, we never had a chance to say goodbye. Don't just walk away, Paul. Please.
(Wherever this was, Paul decided, he'd rather be somewhere else. ‘This way,' Mr Shumway was calling, but Paul wasn't sure whether he was hearing him or remembering, the dwarf was too far away.
Don't look round
, he ordered himself,
don't say anything
.)

Then, quite suddenly, he could see Mr Shumway. He was kneeling down on the absence-of-ground, and he was reaching into his pocket. He pulled out a folded, tatty old baseball cap, opened it, reached in and pulled out (
Why am I not surprised?
) a white rabbit. In his other hand he was holding a knife. With a deft, quick movement—

(
Don't say anything
, Paul commanded himself; because what he wanted to shout was ‘No!', at the top of his voice)

—Mr Shumway cut the rabbit's throat, and its blood splashed on the empty space where the ground ought to have been, and disappeared, just as Mr Shumway had when he'd walked through the door. The rabbit stopped twitching in his hand; blood was still gushing out over his wrist, through his fingers. Now, however, where it stopped falling, there was ground; a flat, grey surface of dust, as though that was what the rabbit had had in its veins.

‘It's life, see,' Mr Shumway was muttering. ‘Where it lands—' He hesitated. ‘You do know where you are, right? Don't answer,' he added quickly. ‘In case you haven't figured, this is death.'

Fine
, Paul thought.

‘It's all right,' Mr Shumway went on. ‘It's only a magic rabbit, it never really existed. But the blood's real blood, so it does the job. Just about enough for what we've got to do.' He dropped the carcass, which vanished. ‘Right, you can talk now. But only to me, and
don't look round
. They'll say anything to make you talk to them, and you really don't want to do that. Trust me.'

Implicitly
, Paul thought. He had a nasty feeling that right behind him was a substantial crowd, all people he knew, relations mostly, all of whom he'd never expected to see or hear from again. He tried to concentrate on Mr Shumway, a tiny figure in a cheap suit standing on a minute patch of dust.

‘Greetings.' The man appeared almost out of nowhere, but not quite. Actually, he shot up out of the dust, like one of those shorts they show on television occasionally when something's broken down; a film of a plant growing from a seed, speeded up thousands of times. He was Chinese, about seventy years old, in a long blue silk gown with enormous sleeves. He had a wrinkled face and a lovely smile.

‘Afternoon,' Mr Shumway replied casually. ‘How's death treating you, then?'

‘Very dull,' the Chinese gentleman replied. ‘Yourself?'

‘Can't grumble. Paul,' Mr Shumway added, ‘over here. This is Mr Dao, the chief cashier. This is Paul Carpenter.' Short pause, significant. ‘He's with me.'

Mr Dao nodded politely. ‘Of course,' he said.

Then Mr Shumway turned round. His face was as white as paper. ‘It's okay now,' he said, ‘you'll be all right now they know you. Give me the bag, and then we can get out of here.' Paul handed him the satchel; he opened it. ‘These cheques to pay in,' Mr Shumway said to Mr Dao, ‘and these TTs; if you can get them out today that'd be a great help.'

‘No problem,' said Mr Dao, with a faint smile.

‘Thanks. Oh, and here's the cash slips.' Each time Mr Shumway handed something to Mr Dao, there was a moment between Mr Shumway letting go of it and Mr Dao taking it. The cheque or form or chit didn't fall to the ground – obviously gravity was optional here. Equally obviously, if the two of them both touched something at the same time, something unpleasant would happen.

Mr Shumway passed the bag back to Paul and nodded at the Chinese gentleman. ‘Seventeen thousand, four hundred and sixty-five pounds sterling,' said Mr Dao. Paul, holding the satchel open, felt a very slight tug on his hands, as something he couldn't see dropped into it. ‘Nine thousand and forty-one US dollars.' Another tug. ‘Eighteen thousand, nine hundred and forty Swiss francs. Seventy-two thousand Tajikistani roubles. Nine hundred and sixty Bulgarian lev.' And so on, through Moroccan dirhams and Haitian gourdes to Comoros francs and Korean won, wealth beyond the nightmares of avarice. The temptation to grab the satchel and run off with it was, however, no trouble at all to keep in check.

‘Right,' Mr Shumway said at last, ‘that's the lot, thanks. Same time tomorrow, then.'

‘Indeed.' Mr Dao bowed graciously, then glanced quickly at Paul. ‘But perhaps, if you aren't in too much of a hurry, you might care to stop for a cup of tea? Your friend—'

Suddenly, Paul realised that he'd never felt so thirsty in all his life. A cup of tea, yes. He could really do with—

‘No, thanks,' Mr Shumway said abruptly. ‘Paul,' he added, as if calling a dog to heel.

‘But—' Paul said; but Mr Dao was looking away, ever so slightly shamefaced. ‘My apologies,' he was saying. ‘It won't happen again.'

Was that compassion on Mr Shumway's face? ‘It's all right,' he muttered. ‘I understand. But we'd better go now.'

‘Of course,' Mr Dao said. He vanished, and the patch of dust with him. Mr Shumway breathed out slowly.

‘Turn round,' he said. ‘Gently does it. Now we're going straight back. Follow me, and no looking back or talking. Don't answer, just nod.'

For some reason, it seemed to take twice as long to get back as it had to get there, wherever ‘there' was. All the way, Paul kept his eyes fixed on the back of Mr Shumway's head, as if it was the most fascinating thing he'd ever seen in his entire life. At times it seemed like they were both wading knee-deep through something heavy and sticky – toffee sauce or cake mix – and Mr Shumway's progress gradually got slower and more laborious with every step. The memories raged in Paul's head like a snowstorm, so many of them, all of them so hurt, so disappointed, angry, because he just walked on past them and wouldn't even look them in the eye. He realised that he hadn't taken a breath since they'd met Mr Dao; but he didn't feel strained or uncomfortable. At last, Mr Shumway stopped, though Paul couldn't see anything to stop for. He was panicking about that when a tall rectangular hole appeared in the darkness, and the savage brilliance of the shaded hundred-watt bulb in Mr Shumway's office scorched him like a laser cannon.