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Contents
Chapter 1 – Unwelcome Arrival .............................3
Chapter 2 – Dubious Request.............................. 10
Chapter 3 – New Endeavours .............................. 19
Chapter 4 – Partners in Crime ............................. 26
Chapter 5 – Unlucky Lady................................... 34
Chapter 6 – Defective Memory ............................ 41
Chapter 7 – A Question of Depth ......................... 50
Chapter 8 – Unexpected Exit............................... 58
Chapter 9 – Private Enterprise ............................ 65
Chapter 10 – Betrayal of Trust ............................ 70
Chapter 11 – A Painful Truth ............................... 78
Chapter 12 – Overt Threats ................................ 85
Chapter 13 – Discreet Pressure ........................... 92
Chapter 14 – Surface Treatment ......................... 99
Chapter 15 – Protective Circle ........................... 107
Chapter 16 – Question of Motives ...................... 114
Chapter 17 – Surprise Descent.......................... 122
Chapter 18 – Dungeons… ................................. 129
Chapter 19 – … and Dragons............................. 134
Chapter 20 – Wisdom Arisen............................. 143
Chapter 21 – Blood and Water .......................... 150
Chapter 22 – Last Chance................................. 158
Chapter 23 – A Ray of Light .............................. 166
Chapter 24 – Sudden Moves ............................. 174
Chapter 25 – Bitter Ends .................................. 181
Chapter 26 – The Long Goodbye ....................... 188
Chapter 27 – Partners in Crime (Reprise) ........... 194

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 Chapter 1 – Unwelcome Arrival

I was on my way to visit a client; indeed, a very nearly ex-

client, assuming that he didn't come up with a further surprise
assignment for me. He was one which here must remain nameless
- I have no desire to risk unnecessary entanglements with lawyers
- although, for those of you read the gossip columns of the trashier
newspapers, his identity would not come as a complete surprise.
It had been a high-profile divorce case: dirty work, but
somebody's got to do it. Besides, it paid well enough. I had spend
several weeks tailing his wife - armed only with a camera with a
powerful zoom lens - who was, as it turned out, enjoying the most
intimate company of another while his back was turned. It was
just a pity that the one whose company she preferred turned out to
be his most recent mistress but one.
Anyway, the client had got what he wanted - or at least what
he said he wanted - a quickie divorce with a minimal settlement,
keeping his millions intact for his own enjoyment, or at least ready
for the taking by the next unscrupulous gold-digger he happened
across.
I too was seeking money for favours advanced, although in this
case it was extracting payment for a bill for investigative services.
I had done my job well, feeding the lawyers with what they
needed, and I saw no cause for delay in payment. Not that he
necessarily saw it that way, of course; once the pressure is off,
clients do have a habit of suddenly resisting handing over hard
cash for services rendered.
We had arranged to meet in a seedy bar I knew only by
reputation. He didn't want me to be seen visiting his office, or any
of his homes, and certainly not anyplace that I might be spotted by
his country club friends. Or maybe he just needed a stiff drink. Or
two.
The joint in question was called the Deepest Joy. It took me
twenty minutes to track it down when I arrived in the vicinity, even
though I was less than a hundred feet from the entrance the entire
time. The door, marked only with a single small sign, was on an
alley off a thronging main street in the lower levels. The area was
notorious as a meeting place between mainstream Goblin society

3
and those who elect to live on the fringe, or beyond it. It was,
quite literally, an Underworld bar.
When I finally entered, the lights were turned down low - even
by the standards of Goblins, who can see perfectly well in
conditions that humans would refer to as darkness. I blinked and
looked around, my large eyes instinctively opened to their fullest
extent in the gloom. I took off my hat and toyed with it in my
hands; I should have known better than to expect a hat-check in a
place like this.
After a few moments, I spotted him sat at the bar, already
toying with a murky green cocktail whose content I wasn't keen on
discovering. He was dressed in a well-cut business suit in a dark
fabric which probably cost more than the bill for my entire
investigation. Underneath, he wore a crisp cotton shirt with fine
blue stripes which de-emphasised his bulk, set off by understated
silver cufflinks and a tie which probably announced him to be a
member of some club I had never heard of.
I tossed my hat on the bar next to him and spoke his name
politely. He turned on the stool to face me.
"Gask," he said coolly, "You made it."
Before a witty rejoinder could form on my lips, the barkeeper, a
wiry and frenetic little Goblin in a waistcoat, bounced up and
wanted to know my drinks order.
"Scotch on the Rocks," I said, "Make it a double."
The barkeep scurried off. I sat on the next stool, leaned an
elbow on the bar and looked levelly at my client.
"I've been looking at your reports," he began, adopting a
managerial style that sounded like it had come straight from the
pages of one of those How to Deal With Difficult People handbooks,
"They're very thin. I don't see the value. You're charging too
much."
I sighed resignedly, then took a slug of the whiskey the
bartender had positioned in front of me. Twenty-five dollars a day,
that's all I ask, plus some pretty reasonable expenses. Cheaper -
much cheaper - than fancy lawyers.
"Look," I explained patiently, "There's long hours of surveillance
work behind those reports, day and night stake-outs. When
there's nothing to report, of course I report nothing. That's the
risk you take."
My bill lay on the bar next to his cocktail coaster, a few sheets
of badly typewritten paper bearing my letterhead. He picked it up
and waved it under my nose.

4
 "Frankly, this is a rip-off. I don't agree with the days you've
billed, you're not worth your rates and I'm not paying this."
He slammed the invoice back down on the bar. I shook my
head sadly. The bill was honest enough, with almost no padding,
and my expenses - mainly photographic film - were very modest
indeed. This kind of thing happens all too often, and certainly
often enough for me to take out an insurance policy.
"Long hours," I re-iterated, "I know a lot about your wife..."
"Ex-wife," he interjected.
"Ex-wife," I agreed, shrugging, "I also know a lot about you.
I've got lots of pictures featuring your good self - and a variety of
other people - and you will have seen how good the lens on my
camera is."
There was a sudden moment of stillness, amplified rather than
masked by the piped Muzac which permeated the bar, filling the
gaps like industrial-strength decorator's paste. I didn't elaborate
on what I might have captured on film. I didn't need to.
"Okay, Gask," he said eventually, "You'll get your dough.
He reached into his jacket pocket. I stiffened instinctively, then
forced myself to relax. He wasn't the type to pull a heater from its
holster just to avoid paying a bill. Even a private dick's bill. After
a few seconds rummaging, my ex-client produced a chequebook in
a leather cover with shiny silver corners. He then dug out an
expensive fountain pen, which I recognised as being a well-known
brand made doubly prestigious by the fact it had been
manufactured on the surface. He wrote for a few moments,
finishing with a flourish over the signature.
"There you are," he muttered, handing me the torn slip, the ink
still wet, "Just don't expect a reference."
I inspected the cheque carefully. It would probably not bounce.
He certainly had the money and could have just given it to be
without quibbling. It's just that the rich tend to be careful with
their cash - that's how they got to be rich in the first place, of
course. Later, I would pay it into the bank. The amount would
just about cover my current overdraft, so that the bank manager
might be forced to smile at me, at least for a few months. In the
money again, Gask.
*
My ex-client downed the remainder of his sickly green cocktail
in one gulp, grabbed the now-receipted invoice, scowled at me and
scurried off across the barroom floor. The last I saw of him was
close to the exit, nearly colliding with a swaying drunk tacking his

5
way across the floor trying to find the restrooms. He had left me
with the bar bill, of course. I grinning wryly, shaking my head.
Still, I had got his money in front of me. I'd have bought him a
drink anyway. Maybe.
I sat and sipped my scotch - it was good enough to be worth
savouring - and half-heartedly watching the goings-on in the bar
behind me in the mirror. It was very quiet. I studied my own
reflection for a few moments: a large and bulky Goblin - not fat,
just heavily-built - with tired-looking green eyes, and the long and
pointed ears of one perpetually alert, one who did not like anybody
sneaking up on them from behind. I was dressed in a two-piece
suit and long overcoat - both of which had seen better days - with
a well-laundered shirt and a tie which had come off the bottom
shelf at the haberdashers where, I suspect, it had resided for a
great many years before I acquired it.
*
It remains inexplicable to me how little those on the surface
know about the occupants of the Lower Realms. Oh, sure, there
are a few old myths in various human cultures, all of which are
now universally regarded as fairy stories suitable only for children.
Admittedly, the Goblins retreated to the security of the
underground warrens and interconnected caverns several millennia
ago, to avoid a direct conflict with the teeming hordes of humanity
which, even in those days, threatened to overrun the less
numerous but longer-lived Goblin race. I guess the humans have
such short memories: after a mere three or four thousand years,
they seemed to have forgotten all about us.
Conversely, the Goblin communities know all about the surface
world, although I do sometimes wonder whether very many of
them really believe what they are taught in school. So very few
Goblins ever visit the surface, or even imagine the possibility of
doing so. Those who do are very much a minority, widely
considered to be weirdoes or perhaps just terminally insane, in
which number I should probably count myself.
After all, humans are not so very different from Goblins as
natural variation in shape and size blurs the distinctions between
the two races. Like Goblins, humans have two arms, two legs, two
sexes, and just the one head - although in many humans it is
partially obscured by a strange covering called "hair". Humans are
on average much taller than Goblins, although an unusually large
Goblin - such as myself - are taller than some human females and
a few of the males.
Even so, on the surface, Goblins are more often than not
mistaken - at least at first glance, in the dark - for one of their

6
children. A second closer glance, in a better light, would make the
truth uncomfortably clear: long arms, long fingers and long nails -
they are not claws - and short powerful legs. Goblins also have
large eyes and see much better in low lighting than humans, which
is why such legends that persist in the surface world suggest that
Goblins - or trolls, or gnomes, whatever term you prefer - spend
their time sneaking around in the dark.
*
My whiskey glass was getting empty, the ice rattling as I put it
back on the coaster. The bartender scurried over, ostensibly to
offer me another drink although more likely worried that I would
attempt to skip the joint without paying. The discreet name-badge
affixed to his green-and-white striped waistcoat announced him to
be Maddoes. I pulled a couple of bills from my pocket and placed
them on the bar next to my glass. There was enough money to
cover the drinks already ordered, and maybe enough for a third
large one - or for a fairly decent tip. Instantly, a professionally-
friendly grin suffused his face.
"Who's your friend, pal?" he asked, nodding in the direction my
client had taken a few minutes before, "Seems familiar, somehow."
"Yeah, well, he's just got one of those faces you see
everywhere," I replied laconically.
"Uh-huh," the barkeep grunted, clearly unconvinced.
I pulled out a business card, one which included my name and
the telephone number of my answering service, not the office
number. I put the card on top of the bills next to my glass and
pushed the whole lot over the bar.
"Look," I said, leaning forward conspiratorially, "Sometimes I
need to keep tabs on a few people. You see that guy in here
again, you give me a call. Leave a message. It'll be worth your
while."
His grin widened, showing a large number of sharp yellow
teeth. His hands moved so fast they practically blurred, and
money and card disappeared in an instant.
"You got it, bud."
He winked and wandered off, not bothering to stop at the cash
register. I gave the cheque a final once-over, folded it carefully
and slipped it into one of the many capacious pockets of the long
overcoat I habitually wear. Then I nodded again to the bartender,
who was now chatting amicably with a couple of obvious regulars
at the other end of the bar, drained my drink and put my hat on
my head, tugging it down over my eyes. Time to go.

7
 *
For far too many years, I have maintained an apartment - a
small one with not very much style - in one of the rather less
fashionable caverns. For me, it's just somewhere to sleep, hang up
my clothes, make early-morning coffee, and to store a very few
mementos of purely sentimental value - although some of those
sentiments are pretty confused and strongly-felt.
In another cavern, similarly low-rent, I have a small office with
my name painted on the glass of the door: Findo Gask - Private
Investigator. For no readily apparent reason, I am still trying to
keep my work and what passes for my personal life separate. The
office is a single room, furnished with worn furniture inherited from
the previous tenant or bought cheap from the thrift store. I
advertise the office address and phone number, so most of the
junk mail and itinerant clients find their way to me there. The door
is never locked; these cheap joints have flimsy locks anyway, so
this policy just saves on the repair bill. I store nothing of real
significance at the office either; just a few dusty files in even
dustier filing cabinets.
I do have some much more important things - things variously
valuable, illegal, magical or just deadly - which are carefully stored
in a variety of unlikely places - some of which are on the surface.
Things put aside for a rainy day, for a genuine emergency; things
that, quite frankly, I would rather never have to use at all. But it
was a reassurance that I could put my hands on them quickly in
the case of need.
It was too early to go home, far too early for dinner, and just
too late to get to the bank before it closed. The cheque would
have to live in my pocket until tomorrow. I shouldered my way
through the crowded transit tubes, scanning the streets and alleys
automatically. I had decided to head for the office, to check the
mail and ignore the bills, and to conclude my notes of the case now
closed - notes soon to be buried in one of the filing cabinets, never
to be seen again.
The cavern where I rent the office space is mid-level, both
physically and socially. It is not so close to the surface that most
Goblins start to feel just a little insecure, nor is it so deep that one
is at risk of encountering any of the stranger creatures – not all of
which being Goblin-shaped – that inhabit the lower caverns. It’s
low-rent, and therefore tightly packed with shops and residences –
a far cry from the spacious mansions occupied by the rich and
famous – but at least people are usually able to pay for their own
accommodations.
I was trudging up four flights of stairs when I first noticed the
odour. Goblins have a much better sense of smell than humans -

8
their noses are entirely useless appendages. From two floors
down, I could identify the stench of dirty skin and unwashed
clothes, overlaid with the acrid esters formed by the breakdown of
alcohol in the body.
From along the corridor I could detect the cloud of cheap
cigarette smoke emanating from my office doorway, accompanied
by a sullen muttering interspersed with an occasional racking
cough. I knew who it must be before I could see him. Nether
Gask, my ne'er-do-well older brother: a drunk, a disappointment to
my dear departed parents and, until this very moment, one who
had completely disappeared from my life.
He was sitting in the squeaky swivel chair on my side of the
desk. He had managed to track down the office whiskey bottle, the
one I normally keep not-very-well hidden in the deep desk drawer.
It was probably the first place he looked. At least he was using
one of the accompanying shot glasses, rather than just taking a
slug from the bottle directly.
"Neth," I said, using the conventional diminutive that I knew he
had grown to loathe over the years, "What the hells are you doing
here?"

9
 Chapter 2 – Dubious Request

"Ah, Findo," Nether said smoothly, hardly slurring his words at

all, "That would be quite a tale. And one I'm sure you'll want to
hear. I need your help. Sit down and let me tell you all about it."
He raised his glass - actually my glass, containing my whiskey -
in a semblance of a toast, then knocked back the contents in one
gulp. In a single smooth movement, he swept up the whiskey
bottle, which stood open on the worn dragon-hide of my desk, and
poured another large measure into the shot-glass without spilling a
single drop. He returned the bottle to the desktop and, with a
supreme effort of will, managed to not pick up the refilled glass
immediately.
He didn't pour me a drink, though. Or even offer to do so.
Drunks rarely do. They resent anybody else drinking any alcohol in
preference to themselves. They want to keep it all for their own
consumption.
Annoyed, I snatched the bottle from the desk and placed it on
top of the filing cabinets, well away from Nether's reach. Then,
and only then, did I walk around the desk, open the deep bottom
drawer and pull out another shot-glass. I kicked the drawer
closed, returned to the client's side of the desk, put the glass on
the cabinet next to the bottle, and poured myself a stiff one.
"Look, if you want a loan, well, you're out of luck," I growled,
"My overdraft is at the limit."
Nether glared at me, willing me to return the whiskey to within
his grasp.
"That's not it," he said, not taking his eyes off the bottle in my
hand, "You really ought to listen to what I have to say."
I ignored his unspoken pleas and left the bottle - already close
to empty - well out of the way. Clutching my own glass, I slumped
in the better of my guest chairs and sipped at the whiskey. It
wasn't a patch on the scotch I had drunk in the Deepest Joy. The
office bottle is intended to be medicine, drunk out of necessity
rather than pleasure.
"Okay, I'll bite," I said, once I had recovered my composure
after the affront so thoughtlessly delivered by my brother, "You've
got something to tell me. So spit it out."

10
 Nether picked up the shot-glass from the desk in front of him
and held it at eye level, twisting the glass first this way and that in
the meagre light from the air shaft outside the window. He looked
for all the world like a connoisseur inspecting the clarity of a fine
vintage.
"Well, yes," he smirked, "But first, I need to establish our
arrangement. I want to hire you, in your professional capacity as a
private eye, to investigate on my behalf."
"Hire me! Pah!" I snorted, "What the hells for? And what
exactly are you planning on using to pay me with?"
Nether drank about half of the contents of his shot-glass, not
draining it immediately this time; another triumph for his own
willpower, I assumed.
"Findo, Findo," he murmered, barely wincing as the fiery spirits
burned their way down his throat, "Always such a cynic. Have you
no trust in your brother?"
"Frankly, no," I snarled, "And I'm sure as hell not going to work
for free."
He put down the half-empty glass and sat back in my chair,
looking very much as if he belonged there.
"That won't be necessary at all," he said airily.
He reached inside the greasy green tweed suit jacket he wore
and pulled out a fat bundle of notes, held together by an eclectic
arrangement of elastic bands, paperclips and those gummed
lengths of paper used by the banks to gather together bills of a
common value. The wad contained a mixture of bills in all
denominations, with no sense of order. All were well-thumbed and
dirty, and gave the distinct impression of having been accumulated
haphazardly over a considerable period but, at least as far as I
could tell at a distance, all the notes were the genuine article.
"Still charging twenty-five bucks a day?" Nether asked casually,
obviously already knowing the answer.
I nodded wordlessly, astonished by the sudden appearance of
considerable wealth, at least by my recent standards. Nether
peeled off a random fraction of the bundle and threw it down on
the desk. I had no idea how much money was there but, as the
bundle clearly contained at least fifty bills, there must be more
than enough to pay for my very valuable services for more than a
few days.
By his standards, Nether was hardly drunk at all. He was
articulate, practically clear-thinking, in that happy intermediate
state where he had drunk enough to remediate last night's

11
hangover but he had not yet reached the state of falling-down
incompetence expected later in the day. It was quite a success for
an alcoholic in the late afternoon. Even so, he was extremely
dishevelled and unwashed. He gave every impression that he has
gotten out of the habit of bathing, that he simply couldn't be
bothered to change his clothes.
I looked at the money on the desk, then slowly looked back at
my brother. I was, of course, immediately suspicious, and there
could be only one reason why Nether was prepared to squander
what money he had on engaging my services.
"Okay, Neth," I said slowly, calmly, "I'll admit you've got my
entire attention. And can I assume you want to pay me to ensure
you have my professional confidence, so that I won't spill the
beans should somebody ask me about your affairs?"
"Of course," he replied, again lifting the shot-glass and studying
the contents as if he expected the contents to have mutated from
mediocre whiskey to the finest cognac, "Perhaps you'd care to
write me a receipt?"
I snorted, then my sense of professional etiquette came to the
fore. I reached over and extracted a carbon-copy receipt book
from the top drawer of the desk, together with a cheap plastic biro
featuring the name of some hotel on the surface I visited once and
have now completely forgotten. I counted out the bills from the
scruffy bundle, sorting them into denominations and arranging the
notes so that they were all face-up and aligned. The total was
three hundred and seventy-seven dollars, enough to cover a couple
of weeks of work and a few modest expenses. I scribbled one of
those "...received the sum of ..." notes in the duplicate book, noted
that it was an advance on my investigative service, then signed
and dated it. I tore out the original sheet and presented it with a
flourish to Nether, who had watched me closely throughout the
entire process.
Neth picked up the receipt and studied it closely for a few
moments. Apparently satisfied that the legal situation was
unequivocal, he then stashed the receipt and the remainder of his
wad in an inside jacket pocket. He drained the little tumbler in his
hand, smacked his lips appreciatively and slid the empty glass onto
the desk.
"Well then," he said reflectively, "Time for a little story."
*
Goblins live for a long time, at least compared with the mayfly
human existence. My grandfather lived to the ripe old age of three
hundred and ninety three: a respectable age, but not in the least

12
unusual. On the other hand, my own parents both died relatively
young - but that is another story, and one we may get to later.
As a consequence of this longevity, Goblin children are few and
far between, and each infant is usually well on the way to
adulthood - into their thirties, at least - before a younger sibling
appears. Nether is my elder brother, the oldest of the family, the
one who, according to long-established Goblin convention, would
inherit the lion's share of the familial inheritance.
Some of my earliest and most poignant memories are of my big
brother playing with me when I was but a tiny child. On his return
from school or, later on, from college, Nether would challenge me
to games with balls or pucks or shuttlecocks, and bouts of tag and
hide-and-seek. Later he could sometimes be persuaded to
entertain me with tricks of sleight of hand and illusory magic, tricks
which gently introduced me to the properties of everyday glamours
and charms, not to mention the things that could be achieved
without magical assistance.
I grew quickly - I have always been big for a Goblin - but
Nether was for many years nearly as tall as me. He was himself a
strapping lad, quite capable to taking me on in a friendly wrestling
match with a decent chance of a throw or a hold. He would take
me on long walks, exploring many of the vast caverns which form
the Goblin world, and the sights and wonders which abound in the
Lower Realms.
I remember later encounters, when I was at school or when I
returned home from the long-established University I had been so
lucky to win a scholarship to attend, studying policing and law-
enforcement. Nether was already pursuing a career in the civil
administration, the lower echelons of government. When we met
at our parents’ house, Nether would regale me with tales of
derring-do, of assignments to exotic locations, and complex stories
of politics and the secrets behind the headlines in the newspapers.
He was my idol, the one I looked up to, the one I aspired to
emulate in every way, right up to the day he disappeared.
When the police eventually investigated his lodgings, they
found everything in its place, just as if he had left for work in the
morning and simply never returned. There was no break-in, no
evidence of foul play, nothing to suggest he had packed clothes
and toiletries and left for an extended trip. He was just nowhere to
be found.
He was still alive, though. The police told us that money was
being taken out of his bank accounts, in small amounts and in a
dizzying array of places. In the Goblin world, such a consistent
fraud would not be possible: it was quite definitely Nether's
signature or thumb-print, with his credit card Verified by Hexes,

13
that was being used to withdrawn ten bucks here and five dollars
there.
The amounts were puzzling - not enough to live on, I had
thought - and for a long time, we assumed he had simply moved in
with a lover, one he was too embarrassed about to introduce to his
friends, his work colleagues or to his family. Or perhaps he was on
some secret assignment, an extended mission from which one day
he would suddenly return and fascinate us all with astonishing tales
of his adventures. We put him out of our minds, at least mostly,
choosing to believe he was living happily elsewhere.
Much later, long after the death of my father, Mother was
already on her deathbed; she was never really well again after the
tragedy that killed her husband. She begged me to try and find
Nether, knowing that I had been, for a short time, a copper - my
career in the police force had been short and ignominious - and
that I was now setting myself up as a licensed Private Investigator.
I agreed at once, of course, although I had no idea of how to go
about the task. All the obvious leads had been exhausted long ago
and my training in police work tells me that it is nearby impossible
to find someone who has made a determined attempt to remain
un-found.
The money in Nether's accounts had dried up decades before.
If he was still alive, he must have found some alternative means of
support. The most likely possibility was that he was engaged in
some sort of criminal activity. The trouble was that the police
training, and the experiences I had had whilst a trainee cop, let me
to believe that he was likely to have come to the attention of the
law enforcement agencies before now. Contrary to popular
opinion, perhaps, coppers really do have a god idea about what's
going on in the Underworld, most of the time. It's being able to
prove it in a court of law - in front of those professional cynics
known as Judges - that seems beyond the wit of far too many
policemen.
The only alternative was he was removed from the Goblin
demesne altogether, which meant he was somewhere on the
surface. The more I thought about it, the more I became
convinced he was hiding somewhere in the human world. I needed
to find some way of tracking him down up there.
*
I started to spend a lot of time on the surface, more than most
Goblins would feel comfortable with; indeed, far too much time,
even in my own opinion, as I felt I was neglecting Mother. But I
was able to make a great many - very cautious - enquiries, using
as contacts some acquaintances in that branch of the Lower
Realms police force that was concerned with retrieving fugitive

14
Goblins desperate enough to think they could hide out on the
surface.
The Goblin's policing the upper world have a long-standing
reputation for weirdness and a wilfulness bordering on sloth. They
tend not to go out of their way to give themselves work, but prefer
to mooch about with their human cronies or drive powerful cars far
too fast. As far as anybody knew, Nether had committed no crime
and his "missing person" bulletin had been long forgotten.
Nevertheless, the coppers kept their ears to the ground for
rumours about the location of persons who might be runaway
Goblins - if only to make their task easier when they really did
have to go and arrest somebody.
It was from buying one of the coppers a few stiff drinks that I
got my real lead. They say there are more humans claiming Irish
extraction in New York City than there are people in Ireland. True
or not, there are certainly any number of taverns with an Irish
theme on Manhattan island, and they all seem to house a tight
coterie of regulars: men - and a few women - who never drink
anywhere else and leave unsteadily at closing time every night.
So it was that I was advised to talk to Tighe o'Chill, then the
proprietor of Chill's Bar, an Irish pub in one of the quieter parts of
upper Manhattan. I stood outside, in the rain, wearing a long
waterproof coat - collar turned up - and a trilby hat large enough
to conceal my ears. It was an ensemble I have made my own over
the years.
Through the misted-up windows, I sized up the place. The
decor featured scuffed wooden floorboards, panelling creaking and
groaning under the weight of endless coats of dark brown paint,
and beer-stained tables supported by empty barrels. It was dimly-
lit, dark enough for one such as me to be comfortable without
sunglasses; much of the light came from dusty illuminated signs
displaying lucky four-leaved clovers or advertising authentic dark
stout beer.
I pushed open the door and led it close quietly behind me.
Conversation didn't stop, although a few patrons turned their
heads lazily to see who had arrived. One group was clustered at
the end of the bar, and a few others were sitting at the tables in
conversation or with their noses buried in newspapers. Some
recorded music played on: traditional pipes and accordions
accompanying soft sad ballads of lost paramours and unrequited
love. Nobody seemed interested in me.
The barkeeper was short and fat, ruddy-faced and with a
polished dome as hairless as my own. His face was alive with
bonhomie, with smiling features which seemed to emit all the
welcome that an Irishman could want. The publican wore a clean

15
and crisply laundered white cotton apron over what looked like a
tailor-made shirt - white with fine emerald green pinstripes - open
at the throat and held together at the wrists by heavy gold cuff-
links.
I ordered whiskey - Irish, of course - and a large measure
appeared almost instantaneous on the bar in front of me. I sipped
and then nodded to signify my approval. It was good stuff.
"Looking for Tighe o'Chill," I said gruffly.
"You've found him," the barman said, "And in me own bar, too.
Welcome to o'Chill's very own pub."
"Glad to be here," I said, "Now, I've a couple of questions for
you. Could you spare me a few minutes?"
Tighe looked at me closely. I could practically hear the wheels
in his head turning.
"Are you who - or what - I think you are?" he asked shrewdly,
in a low voice.
I took off my glasses and looked the man straight in the eye.
He jerked back, then swore a loud and sustained oath which I half-
expected to turn the air blue, although the actual effect was that
every head in the place turned to look at him.
"Another one," he said to the room at large, "Thirty years
thinking he was unique, and another one comes along, just like
that."
A head appeared over the edge of the bar. Just a head. The
figure was too short for any more to show. It wasn't human. The
ears were a dead giveaway.
"Findo Gask," Nether said in the Goblin tongue, "Good of you to
find time in your busy schedule to stop by."
*
It turned out that Nether had become the resident leprechaun
at Chill's Bar. No doubt he looked the part, habitually wearing a
green tweed suit with clashing puce waistcoat, and a bowler hat
several sizes too small which emphasised rather than concealed his
ears.
For the price of a stiff drink from one of the regulars - he
seemed to have been smart enough to remain hidden when a
stranger was in the place - he would entertain the clientele with
tales from the Lower Realms translated, as best he could, into that
over-simplified language known as English. He would perform
tricks of sleight-of-hand or use rudimentary home-made glamours:
the same stunts that he used to use to entertain my childhood self.

16
 There are a few charms that all Goblins know: one of them is
good-luck glamour which delivers a limited form of prescience. I
prefer not to rely on them, since they are more than likely to show
you a true but utterly misleading version of the future. But they
can be manufactured at home, if you have the time and the
patience.
Nether had demonstrated his worth during that period known in
certain parts of the Upper World as Prohibition. During this period
when alcohol was officially banned, Chill's bar masqueraded as a
coffee house. Drinks were still served, of course, from under the
counter, and supplies shipped in from the underworld - that is, the
human underworld - sources to satisfy the thirsty public. Nether's
glamours gave reliable warnings when a police raid was imminent,
so that the alcoholic drinks could be spirited away and innocuous
substitutes provided. Chill's Bar, and presumably Tighe himself,
had prospered, and it was perhaps no surprise that he had been
permitted to take up residence there.
Nether sauntered casually around the bar, ducking slightly
under the counter-top in a casual motion. We sat on stools at a
table in a dark corner, a table which was markedly lower than all
the others, a table intended to be comfortable for a Goblin to use.
I got the impression he just wanted to talk. Perhaps it was just
that he wanted to use the Goblin tongue - presumably a language
he had not spoken much for decades. He told me about his recent
life while the two of us shared a bottle of whiskey; actually, he
drank most of it, but then again, that was fair, since he did most of
the talking, too.
He had been living in the bar itself or, more precisely, in some
spaces off the beer cellar below. Goblins prefer the sense of
security of being underground and he had converted some of the
rambling space into a bedroom. He showed it to me. It was untidy
and barely furnished, but it was at least warm and dry.
I asked him what had possessed him to disappear like that. He
didn't like the question, avoided it, the first time I asked. I asked
him again. Eventually, and after more whiskey, he admitted he
had simply not been able to cope with the pressure of his old life,
that he left unable to live up to the expectations of our Father to
succeed.
He finally asked what I was doing here. I conveyed the
message I had sought him out to deliver, that Mother was dying
and wanted to see him. He appeared unimpressed, dithered about
the possibility of returning below. I was unimpressed, and said so,
loudly. He shouted at me, I shouted back. He told me to go to
Hell and scuttled behind the bar out of sight before I could reply.

17
 To be fair, he did appear at Mother's bedside a couple of days
later, sober or some fair approximation thereto, to say his
farewells. After Mother's funeral, he disappeared again. I couldn't
be bothered to go looking for him.

18
 Chapter 3 – New Endeavours

Nether Gask was a Goblin with many tales, old and new, and I
did of course remember how he used to entertain me when I was
much younger. Despite myself, I could not help settling back into
the office chair in anticipation of him spinning a yarn for my
amusement. I was disappointed, and surprised, at his next
statement.
"Rosie's disappeared," he said shortly, "I'm getting worried."
"Who's Rosie?" I asked, sitting forward, genuinely confused. at
the dint of great effort, I managed to suppress some remark along
the lines of, well, you would know all about disappearing.
"Rosie o'Chill. Tighe's granddaughter," Nether went on, looking
genuinely worried, "She runs Chill's Bar now."
I sighed. These humans and their short lives. You spend some
time getting to know one and then, a few short decades later,
they're senile or worse. It's hardly worth the effort.
"I don't know her," I answered, "I remember the old man. I
imagine she was left the bar in a bequest when he died."
"It's more complicated than that," he replied, frowning.
"Inevitably."
"Look, Tighe left the bar to the both of us," Nether explained
patently, as if to a child, "In some kind of complicated trust. But it
only stands if both of us continue to run the place."
"You, running a bar?" I spluttered, "You’d just drink all the
profits."
"Well, thanks for your support, brother," Nether huffed, looking
genuinely put out, "Look, I don't drink that much. And the bar's a
real money-spinner."
I doubted the first point was true, although perhaps he was
drinking less than before. There was still whiskey in the office
bottle, and it had been only half-full even before he got his hands
on it. The second I could believe: low rent and overheads, living
on the premises, selling imported booze at high mark-ups. And in
an established tavern with lots of regulars, all intent in soaking up
the authentic Irish atmosphere along with pints of dark beer.

19
 "How long have the two of you been running this place?"
"Ten years, more or less," Nether said, "Hardly any time at all."
"Any problems?"
"No, not really," he replied, looking only very slightly shifty,
"I've been having to keep my head down a lot recently. Too many
humans with cameras in their pockets. I'm having to come down
here occasionally to buy a few glamours to keep myself hidden.
And a few other things, of course."
That would explain the sheaf of assorted bills. They would have
changed from US dollars at one of the seamier money exchanges -
hopefully, this Rosie would not have been stupid enough to trust
Nether with most financial matters - most used to purchase the
necessities not easily available in the Upper World, and the
remainder stuffed into some inner pocket a promptly forgotten
about.
"Okay, so you want me to locate this Rosie, then?"
"Yes," he said, suddenly plaintive, "Look, I like Rosie. She's
smart and sassy. And she takes care of me. I miss her. Can you
do it?"
"On my own, no," I answered, unsurprised by the sharp intake
of breath, "But I know just the man who can."
*
I sent Nether back to his den under the bar, with strict
instructions to keep himself out of sight. I handed him the
remainder of the office bottle to keep him company along the way.
Before he went, he told me that the bar was still operating
normally. The assistant staff - all human, of course, or what
passes for it in New York - were standing in, and nobody else knew
that Rosie was gone. She was "just out of town for a few days,
family business." That story might last a little longer, but I didn't
have a great deal of time to track her down before people started
getting suspicious.
All that whiskey was making me ravenously hungry. I soon left
the office, having spent no more than ten minutes opening and
binning the bulk of my mail. I also made a few phone calls - long
distance, very long distance - and set up some arrangements for
the following day. Then I made my way in the direction of my
apartment, stopping at David's Diner on the corner of my block.
David, the patron was standing by the door - his habitual place, I
knew - when I arrived and welcomed me inside with much of his
characteristic bustling bonhomie. I guess I am one of his more
regular customers.

20
 I was escorted to a small booth at the back - I like to keep out
of the public eye - and presented with today's menu. I glanced
over the standard items, all very familiar to me, then ordered the
Daily Special without knowing exactly what it was. It turned out to
be four kinds of fungi - in four iridescent colours - accompanying
small kebabs of minced meat - no further definition was available
on the menu - and soft baked biscuits. I washed it all down with a
large glass of Goblin beer, strong and dark and flavourful, and not
entirely dissimilar to the Irish stout served in Chill's Bar.
I lingered over my beer, smoked two cigarettes in quick
succession - this was one vice that Nether did not seem to be
indulging in, I noticed - them sauntered back to my little
apartment. I sat in my favourite chair for a long time, thinking
about Nether. Maybe he had mellowed a little with age. There was
no sign of the animosity between us when we last separated.
Clearly, he did not seriously expect me to say no to his request; on
the contrary, he evidently expected me to drop everything and
investigate on his behalf immediately. Not that I had a great deal
of work on at the moment, so his money would come in useful.
Much later, I went to bed and slept soundly, dreamlessly.
*
The following morning, fortified by a light breakfast and much
strong black coffee, I took a detour via the bank to pay in that
cheque and, against my better judgement, a substantial fraction of
the cash that Nether had so casually presented me with. The bank
must have thought all their Christmases had come at once. Or
maybe they wouldn't even notice, at least until my overdraft hit
rock-bottom again.
After that, I took a series of transit tubes and presented myself
at one of the official portals between the worlds. There are other,
less official, ways to the surface, but most of these involved
walking up several miles of stairs. No need for such efforts today;
I was barely slowed down. The border guard glanced at my PI
badge disinterestedly, as if he saw this kind of official
documentation every day. Perhaps he did. In any case, he waved
me through without hesitation.
Goblins prefer cool and dark places, and are generally more
comfortable when surrounded by solid rock, or at least masonry. It
is no surprise, then, that most exits from the Lower Realms open
out in human cities in temperate northern zones. This is not
universally true, of course, but if one takes a randomly-chosen
portal, one is most likely to end up in some dark alley in an old and
rundown part of town.

21
 I had used this particular exit many times before. It was the
closest one to the offices I needed to visit this morning.
*
It was time to call on an old friend - well, not as old as I am,
obviously, but one who has lived a long life to the full, at least by
human standards. Yes, a human, and an experienced Private
Investigator as well. His name is Martin Gamshack but he is
always known as Gumshoe to those unfortunate enough to have
made his acquaintance. As far as I knew, he still ran a little
company called Gamshack and Associates, although I never had
known him to have any actual associates, human or otherwise.
I emerged into an alley which most humans would have thought
a dead-end. Behind me, a high brick wall, featureless apart from a
rickety drainpipe. The brickwork was lavishly decorated with
graffiti, overlapping primary colours, reaching higher than even a
human could easily reach and more than enough to disguise the
secret runes which identified this place as an entrance to the Lower
Realm.
The weather was misty and damp, a sullen drizzle enough to
keep most humans of the streets. Low clouds overhead made it
grey and overcast, although it was still bright enough for me to
need to wear the dark glasses which Goblins find essential in any
visit to the surface. I turned up my collar, pulled down the brim of
my hat and set off in the rain.
My objective was a little more than three blocks from the alley
entrance, and eight floors up. I elected to walk up the fire stairs;
getting stuck in an elevator, even though highly unlikely, would
make it very difficult for me to retain my disguise. Besides,
approaching by a less obvious route gets to be something of a
habit for somebody in my line of business. The stairwell was
faintly dusty, and the concrete steps and walls were painted some
dingy institutional shade of cream.
My footsteps were soft - Goblins are light-footed by nature, and
I have had a lot of practice in stealthy movement over the years -
and I was breathing through an open mouth. Nobody could have
heard me approaching. My target was behind the first door on the
left along the corridor from the fire-door. The door itself was
heavy wood, darkened with age and infrequent coats of varnish,
and marked out with a tarnished brass plate which confirmed, as if
I really needed it, that I have come to the right place.
I straightened up and was just about to knock when the door
was yanked open from the inside by a large figure.
"Findo Gask," he boomed, "What an unexpected pleasure."

22
 "Gumshoe," I replied sardonically, recovering from my surprise,
"You seem to be expecting me, even so."
"Come in, come in," he said, less loudly, "You certainly haven't
forgotten how to move silently. But nobody with a legitimate
purpose walks up eight flights of stairs when there is a perfectly
serviceable elevator right there in the lobby."
"So how did you detect my approach?" I asked, my tone light
but with unfeigned interest.
"Ah, hah," Gumshoe grunted, "You really ought to keep up with
technology."
He indicated a large screen on corner of his desk; at least, it
was large in height and width, but measuring only a couple of
inches deep. I was sure the last time I was here, such screens -
for "computers", I believe - would have occupied the whole desk.
"I like to keep an eye on what's going on nearby," he explained,
his face breaking into a wry grin, "I put a few hidden cameras in
the stairwell and along the corridor. They're really tiny. And I
installed movement detection software on my computer, so any
change in an image sounds an alert. Simple."
I guess I had learned a lesson: trying to sneak up on a well-
prepared human was pointless if I wasn’t going to be bothered with
an expensive invisibility glamour. Sometimes I think these
humans are getting just a bit too smart for comfort.
*
Martin Gamshack was short for a human - although he still
towered over me, of course - but very powerfully built. Even in
late middle age, the bulky muscles of his shoulders flowed
seamlessly into a thick neck. He kept his head shaved, presumably
to disguise grey or receding hair, and tended to wear formal white
cotton shirts to deemphasise his bulk. He habitually wore dark-
coloured striped neckties too, but they soon became loosened,
sagging below his unbuttoned shirt collar as the day wore on. His
face was chubby and rarely flexed to show any emotion, although
his eyes would glitter with amusement, delight or malice as the
mood took him.
"Sit down," Gumshoe suggested, shutting the door behind me,
"Make yourself comfortable."
I selected a human-scale office chair which some thoughtful
person had lowered to its minimum setting. It was only very
slightly too high and certainly reduced the feeling I often have
when on the surface, that I am a child in an adult world. I took off
my hat and tipped back my collar, but kept on my dark glasses.

23
Gumshoe would understand; even with only the light from a desk
lamp, the office was uncomfortably bright for one such as me.
Gumshoe threw himself into the other guest chair, which
squeaked protestingly under the sudden load. Politely, he had
chosen not to try and peer over his fabulously cluttered desk at
me.
"Not much changed here," I remarked, looking around casually.
The walls were festooned with the mementoes of a sports jock:
trophies for football from his college days, more recent pennants
for golf and interspersed with just a few certificates for his
qualifications, the most prominent of which was his Private
Investigators licence in a lavish frame of polished wood.
"Yeah," Gumshoe growled, following my gaze, "Same office,
same debts. Don't seem to be able to shake either of them."
He shuffled himself to a more comfortable position in the chair,
then reached out and tilted the desk lamp away from my face.
"So what brings you to the surface?"
"I've got a job, and a client," I began, adding, "A client with
money. I need your help."
He looked at me dubiously.
"Hmmm. I seem to remember falling foul of one or two of your
assignments. Getting shot at, repeatedly; nearly breaking both my
legs. Left me nursing a sore head one time, as I recall."
That was all very nearly true. But I protested anyway.
"They all worked out in the end," I said reasonably, "We got
what the client wanted. And you did get paid."
"Eventually," he agreed grudgingly, "And maybe quicker than
some clients I could mention."
I reached into my inside coat pocket and drew out a bundle of
crisp green banknotes. This represented a smaller fraction of
Nether’s money – the cash I had not deposited with the bank –
converted into US Dollars just before I left the caverns. The Goblin
currency is very hard; a little goes a long was in the human world.
I inspected the roll of greenbacks closely for a moment, then
tossed it into Gumshoe’s lap.
"So here's a little deposit, on account," I suggested, "Are you
interested?"
Gumshoe's eyes lit up. He picked up and thumbed through the
fat wad of bills, then stood up suddenly, stepped over to the
framed PI certificate and swung it aside. Behind it, fixed in the

24
wall, was a modern safe with a keypad lock. He punched buttons
until the safe opened with a click, threw the stack of notes inside
then slammed it shut.
"Okay," he said, returning to his seat and looking satisfied,
"Count me in."

25
 Chapter 4 – Partners in Crime

In the quietness of Gamshack's office, I told him everything

that Nether had told me, as well as something of our background
together. Throughout the briefing, Gumshoe didn't make notes of
any kind; he just sat motionless, like a monolith in a white shirt,
and committed it all to memory. He did this for every case. I
asked him about this one time. He said that written notes were
too insecure, too dangerous, that you never knew whose hands
they might fall into.
When I ran out of steam, Gumshoe asked me a couple of
pertinent questions, then sat silent, digesting all he had heard.
Beneath that pugnacious exterior, there was a very considerable
brain at work. Many people - including more than a few Goblins -
had been fooled by the bulky man's apparent slowness and
phlegmatic character. And, yes, he had me fooled for a while on
first acquaintance, too.
"Okay," he said finally, "What do you want me to do?"
"You still have contacts in the NYPD?"
"A few, I guess," he replied uncertainly, "We're not looking at a
homicide here, are we?"
"I don't think so," I replied, "If there was, there's nothing we
can do. Perhaps Rosie has genuinely gone off on her own - an
overdue vacation, a new lover, a family emergency - something
that Nether was too drunk to remember being told about, or
maybe he just couldn't be roused before she left."
Gumshoe squinted at me shrewdly.
"You don't believe any of that, do you?"
I grinned, something I rarely do in human company since it
shows off a large number of my teeth.
"No, I don't," I said with conviction, "Nether made it plain Rosie
loved that bar, enjoyed socialising with the regulars, being the
centre of a certain amount of attention. And all her immediate
family are dead. I think she's been taken."
"Newspapers, or the media?" Gumshoe asked, probing as
always, "An imminent exposure of the existence of your kind?"

26
 I snorted derisively. He had always had something of a bee in
his bonnet about that particular possibility.
"If it is, then the whole matter will very shortly be taken right
out of our hands. The governments - yours and mine - and the
more secret of its agencies will step in, the press and TV will be
directed what they can or cannot reveal. No," I went on, "There's
a more private matter at stake here, and I have a sneaking
suspicion that it has something to do with old man Tighe and Chill's
Bar."
"Money, then?"
Gumshoe can get very terse when he's under a certain amount
of pressure.
"There's good money in the bar, but not a huge sum," I replied,
"Not enough to do anything this overt to get your hands on."
Gamshack nodded slowly, his mind turning over the
possibilities.
"So, you want me to talk to the police? See if there's been any
official report of a missing person?"
I nodded in response.
"Sure, I can do that," Gumshoe answered, "Might take a day or
two. I'll start this afternoon."
"Thanks," I said warmly, "And maybe you'd have a look at
Chill's place yourself. It's too risky if I go; I doubt anything I could
use to disguise myself as a human would stand up in a place where
too many people have seen a real Goblin. Sit at the bar, talk to
people. Nobody knows you there and perhaps you'll be able to
shake out a lead or two.
"Top o' the mornin' to you," Gumshoe said in an Irish accent so
marked that even my Goblin ears picked up on it.
"Pretty good," I observed, "But you might want to tone that
down just a little."
*
"Right," Gamshack agreed, emitting a series of throttled snorts
which I knew from prior experience to be his laughter, "I'll be less
obvious."
He stood up in one motion, and picked up his overcoat and hat
from the hatstand behind the door. Gumshoe was something of a
traditionalist when it came to the sartorial appearance of the well-
dressed private eye, or perhaps it was just because that's what the
punters expected.

27
 "Do you want me to call you later?" he asked, tugging the hat
down over his eyes.
"Yeah," I assented, "Leave a message with my service."
I prised myself from the oversized chair and shook out my coat.
"I'll get below," I suggested, "See what I can shake loose about
Nether. Somebody must know something, even after all these
years. I’ll see of the Lower Realms cops have any information."
He nodded his agreement, the modest dip of the head marking
one professional's acknowledgement of another's professionalism.
Standard practice dictated that Gumshoe and should not be
seen leaving together. Gamshack left first, striding out of his own
office as if he owned the place, pausing only to turn off the electric
lights, and then making for the elevator. I waited quietly in the
dark for twenty-odd minutes, alternately mulling over the
inexplicable disappearance of this human called Rosie and the
uncharacteristically altruistic behaviour of my brother.
When the time was up, I slipped back down the stairs - I
doubted that anybody else in this low-rent building was bugging
the entrances - and out through a fire exit which opened onto a
deserted alley. The side-street was blocked at one end, and I had
no option but to follow it back to the main road, where I cautiously
emerged not far from the main entrance. The New York street was
just as dark and wet as when I arrived. I drew up my collar
against the weather and scuttled off in the direction of the alley
where the entrance to the Lower Realms was located.
I walked quickly, keeping to the shadows, hugging the buildings
and the patches of shadow that lay between the streetlights. In
my line of business, you cultivate a certain sense of professional
paranoia, an awareness of what is going on around you, which is so
much embedded in the subconscious that it becomes almost like a
sixth sense.
I had a feeling, a prickling at the back of my neck, that I was
being watched. I glanced around unobtrusively and my suspicions
were confirmed when I caught sight of somebody lurking in the
damp shadows across the street. I thought I recognised the bulky
shape of a big human, much taller than Gumshoe and even
blockier about the shoulders. He was definitely following me, very
skilfully keeping to places where he would be difficult to spot and
taking advantage of the occasional passer-by to conceal his
movements.
Humans can enter the Lower Realms, if they want to - and they
know how to. They can even leave again afterwards. It's not
forbidden, exactly. But very few do. It is very hard for them to

28
remain inconspicuous. The caverns are dark; Goblins can see
better than a human in those conditions and a dazzling light - from
an electric torch, for example - is more likely to attract unwanted
attention than to assist the visitor in finding their own way about.
Many visitors engage a guide; it is a role I have undertaken myself
a time or two, and indeed this was how I made the acquaintance of
Martin Gamshack in the first place, all those years ago.
Besides, almost all humans tower over Goblins, which makes it
difficult to get through the smaller spaces - doors, for example.
And of course they stand out in a crowd, head and shoulders above
everybody else. In recent years, a few humans - presumably
selected to be smaller than the norm - have been seen making
their way around wearing bulky goggles which I was told was
military night-vision equipment. But they have bene few and far
between.
So it was a fair bet that my tail would not attempt to follow me
below. Sure enough, when I reached the graffiti’d wall in the alley
and make the few gestures which opened the portal, he was
nowhere to be seen. But maybe he had an accomplice in the
Lower Realms. I flashed my buzzer at the border guards, wound
my senses up one more notch and sought out the transit tube
which would take me back to my office.
*
According to the summary Gamshack would later leave with my
answering service - and follow up with a voluminous written report
- he had a distinctly curious time when he visited Chill's Bar that
evening. I hadn't anticipated any serious problems; Gumshoe
would have had a lot of experience in hanging around in bars,
sitting alone, nursing a beer, listening to the chatter and gently
questioning any garrulous drunk he chanced upon.
Chill's bar was busy but not packed when Gumshoe arrived, the
buzz of chatter almost drowning the traditional piped music, but
not so loud that it was impossible to have a conversation without
shouting. The place seemed to run smoothly enough without
Rosie's presence. The bartenders and waiting staff were uniformly
young and fashionably dressed entirely in black, their shirts
sporting the emblem of a well-known brand of Irish stout. They
chatted cheerfully to the regulars, each other and occasional
visitors; many were students taking part-time work to fund their
studies and several were actually from various parts of Ireland.
Gently questioned by Gumshoe, the youngsters invariably
professed ignorance about the history of Chill's Bar itself,
confessing that they had worked here only a few months and
giving the impression that nobody really expected to stay much

29
longer than that. Not unusual in itself; in a big city bar, waiting
staff would come and go frequently.
Hoping to ingratiate himself with the regulars, Gumshoe found
himself playing a game with pool balls and cues that he had not
seen before. There was a table covered in green baize and with
bumpers on three sides only but, instead of pockets, there were
holes in the table itself, each associated with different scores,
together with pegs which stood on defined spots and would negate
your entire score if any were knocked over. Given his
inexperience, it wasn't too hard for him to lose convincingly and
repeatedly, foregoing small bets of money and beer. His
opponents clapped him on the back when he lost, toasted him with
their beer glasses, but would not be drawn into any conversation
that did not involve sports.
The noise level went up steadily, and it was clear that a lot of
money was going over the bar. At various time during the
evening, Gumshoe was approached by several ladies, singly and in
small groups, and invited in lilting Irish accents to join them. He of
course declined, after he had chatted for a while. Invariably, the
ladies professed disappointment then left him alone.
Gumshoe concluded that the bar was a very friendly place, but
in a closed kind of way: a way which was intended to discover as
much as possible about strangers without disclosing anything in
return. The only thing that Gumshoe was able to pick up was a
rumour that the place was up for sale and even that was from
overhearing a snippet of a conversation from three tables away
during a brief lull in the ambient noise. There was no sign of
Nether. Whether this was because he was indeed following my
advice and keeping a low profile, or that he actually wasn't there at
all, Gumshoe couldn't tell. Even if he had not already known about
Nether's residence, he would have suspected that there was some
secret, something hidden from the public view in Chill's Bar.
As the evening wore on, Gumshoe drank his beers as slowly as
he thought he could get away with. There's always some loud-
mouth drunk in any bar: some large-boned bore fond of the sound
of his own voice and quick to anger should his unwilling audience
have the temerity to disagree with him. Apparently the resident
bore buttonholed Gumshoe as he approached the bar for his third
drink, spouting some near-incomprehensible but evidently extreme
political view as if it were self-evident truth. Gumshoe tried
agreeing with the man, which just invited more of the same
treatment, then politely attempted to change the subject, which
the drunk just ignored.
Finally, Gumshoe was forced to engage in debate with the man.
This just made him angry, pushing his face right up to Gamshack's

30
and threatening violence in a loud voice. With hindsight, Gumshoe
through it was curious, in such a friendly bar, than nobody seemed
inclined to intervene or even pay the slightest notice to the
increasingly noisy altercation. Rather than getting into a fight,
Gumshoe decided that discretion was the better part of valour and
quickly left the bar, his last beer untouched.
Being a professional sleuth, Gumshoe found a hidden spot
across the road and watched from the outside for a while.
Although the windows were small and his view restricted by the
clutter of the bar, just for a moment he caught sight of the bar
bore in conversation with several of the black-garbed staff, who
clustered around him. They seem to have been congratulating him
on a job well done.
*
Much to my surprise, there was no sign of anybody following
me once I had left the border station. This didn't stop me applying
a few basic techniques to shake off a tail I hadn't detected. PI
Class 101 stuff. Child's play.
I needed assistance in this case: individuals I could trust - at
least, somewhat - as long as I paid them well and, for that matter,
I didn't tell them anything of the slightest importance. Nether's
cash advance gave me a certain amount of leeway in the matter of
expenses and I didn't feel the need to stint unreasonably just at
the moment.
My destination was in one of the less salubrious caverns, a
back-street shop which did not, as far as I knew, have a proper
name. Even in my own mind, it was always just "that funny little
shop in the backstreets." I had been here dozens of times and I
had never come away empty-handed, usually with exactly what I
needed. Oh, sometimes I had to return to collect some very
special item which had to be acquired, although exactly how or
from where these were sourced I have always carefully avoided
enquiring.
I stood outside the shop front in the deserted alley, looking up
at the shuttered windows at every level to the roofline. From long
experience, I knew this place never looked open, or even occupied.
A dusty "closed" sign was just visible through the security bars that
covered the glass of the worn wooden door, the glass itself
reinforced by numerous self-adhesive signs advertising long-
forgotten products and dubious services.
I banged on the door with the flat of my hand and then,
anticipating a long wait, I stepped back and leaned on the wall
opposite, then lit a cigarette. There was no sound or movement
behind the glass, although I strongly suspected I was being

31
carefully scrutinised by hidden eyes or magical methods. I affected
a pose of nonchalant distain, the stance of one confident that in a
short time he will be permitted to enter, and blew smoke with a
casual disregard for personal or public safety.
When my cigarette had burned down to the filter, I flicked away
the stub and banged again on the door. Seconds later, I could
hear the distinctive sound of locks being undone, bolts being slid
back and chains being. This went on for quite some time;
somebody within clearly valued their privacy. No doubt a number
of less mundane protections were being deactivated
simultaneously.
Eventually, the door creaked open and I stepped forward
confidently. The inside was dark enough for even a Goblin to stop
and blink. While my eyes were adjusting, the outer door closed
softly behind me.
"Come in," a voice said in front of me, quiet and level, "This
way, if you please."
There was a slight movement in the gloom and the light level
went up marginally. An inner door had been opened. I edged my
way forward through the doorway, which was again shut behind
me. Then the light was turned up, bright enough to make me blink
again, and I could finally see my host.
The proprietor was Gaur, a tiny and ancient Goblin who had run
this place forever, or possibly longer. His arms and legs and face
were all wizened and dried-up, while his rotund body was so nearly
spherical that his limbs stuck out like twigs in a mud-ball. He had
a particularly obsequious manner, his permanently bowed head
reducing his statue still further. He was encased in an old-
fashioned leather jerkin and matching kilt, the join between the
two - more-or-less at the equator - marked by a wide leather belt
to which was attached so many heavy objects of dubious purpose
that it was a surprise he could move at all.
"Mister Gask," the obsequious little Goblin purred, rubbing his
hands together, "May I say what a pleasure it is to see you again."
"Mister Gaur," I acknowledged, "And how is business?"
"Well enough," he replied, "A few regular customers like your
good self. And what is it you seek this time?"
I told him what I wanted in a few words. I ordered a glamour,
a very special magic; one which was, shall we say, in restricted
circulation and not available to the general public, although not
actually illegal in itself. I had expected a certain amount of
haggling at this point and I wasn't disappointed. I managed to
persuade Gaur to acquire for me the glamour I needed, at a price

32
only slightly above the maximum budget I had set myself. I
advanced him a small deposit to secure the deal, again taken from
the advance that Nether had pressed on me. I would return later
with the remainder of the money – in hard cash, of course.
The uncontrolled use of magic - there is no other adequate
human word for these scientific phenomena - is gently but firmly
discouraged by the authorities in the Lower Realms, even though it
is part of the authentic Goblin heritage. Many of us remember how
to make home-grown glamours and charms - a skill on the decline
- simple magics which are amusing enough for children but
essentially harmless. The glamour I had just requested was a
magic of another order: infinitely powerful, carefully crafted and, in
the wrong hands, quite deadly. Frankly, I hoped I would never
have to use it.

33
 Chapter 5 – Unlucky Lady

I have a load of contacts in various parts of the Underworld

police forces, although many of them being the kind of contact
between fist and jaw. I well knew that only a fraction would take
kindly to any kind of approach from me. Fewer still owed me a
favour and, in the end, I could think of only one who might
conceivably react favourably to a dubious request from an
underpaid and over-worked Private Eye.
Captain Harriet Luncardy sat behind her desk in her cool office.
The grey dragon-hide of the desktop was unadorned except for a
stone ashtray, a complex-looking telephone, a thin black-bound
notebook and an elegant silver fountain pen. The entire office was
uncluttered and calm, with everything in its place; the walls were
bare except for a couple of certificates of commendation discreetly
declaring her rank and her achievements.
Luncardy was cool and uncluttered, too. She was a tall skinny
Goblin who wore mannish grey suits which entirely concealed any
feminine curves she might have. She affected a smoking stick, a
long tube flattened at one end to be easily held between the teeth,
and with a gasket at the other to retain a cigarette. Hers was
high-gloss black lacquer, with a single ring of gold paint by way of
embellishment.
The Captain had quite a reputation around the 14th precinct,
one that - perhaps inadvertently - I had helped to enhance. She
was a stickler for the rules and procedures, completely dedicated to
the job, but a good copper for all that: cautious, thoughtful and
painfully honest. The police under her command probably didn't
like her very much; she carefully displayed no hint of warmth or
compassion even to her closest colleagues - as a deliberate pose, I
was entirely sure - but they trusted her judgement. If she said
jump, every Goblin in the place would levitate to ceiling level
immediately.
She had reluctantly agreed to this interview after I had made a
couple of calls on her office number. She probably felt badgered
into it. As I entered, she was screwing a cigarette into the holder
of her cigarette holder. She waved in the direction of the guest
chairs while she took a lighter from her pocket, lit the cigarette,
took a long drag and returned the lighter to her pocket. She didn't
offer me one.

34
 The young uniformed type who had guided me through the
warren that was the police house waited at the door for instruction;
Luncardy nodded once and the youngster backed out closing the
door silently behind him.
"Findo Gask," she said coolly, "I wondered when I'd see you
again."
"Luncardy," I nodded, throwing myself untidily into one of the
chairs that stood on my side of the desk, "You're looking well, very
well. Tip-top condition. Your elevated rank agrees with you."
She narrowed her eyes at my flattery and glared at me over the
desk.
"You want something, don't you?" she said shrewdly.
You don't get to be a Captain of Police by being completely
stupid. Luncardy was a sharp cookie, clearly destined for greater
things, if something didn't take her down permanently on the way
up.
"I do," I replied, suddenly serious, "I really need your help."
"Look, Gask," she said, leaning forward over the desk and
waving her smoking stick about for emphasis, "I don't owe you any
favours."
"I'm not asking for a favour," I said, lying only slightly, "I'm
appealing to your better nature. I know you've got one in there
somewhere. Just listen to me for a minute."
I told her Nether's story in shortened form, leaving nothing of
significance out, and contrived to convey a degree of nervousness
about his partial rehabilitation.
"I have a bad feeling about this case," I concluded, "And not
just because it's my own flesh and blood who is somehow involved.
There's something more complex going on, something with deep
undertones. Something that the police might be interested in."
Luncardy looked at me silently for a long moment, not moving,
the smoke from the cigarette in its holder lazily trailing its way to
the ceiling undisturbed.
"Okay," she said eventually, unbending just a notch, "Let's for
the sake of argument assume that you are on the level. What
exactly do you want me to do?"
*
"I want to know more about my brother," I explained, "I want
to know what the police know about him, and what he's been doing
in the decades since I saw him last."

35
 "Couldn't you just ask him?" Luncardy pressed, her attention
apparently returning to her cigarette.
"I could," I said, "But I wouldn't necessarily get the truth. He
might lie or dissemble, or he might just have plain forgotten what
he's been up to all these years. Remember, he's a drunk, so I
doubt his memory is everything it could be."
"Hmm," Luncardy responded, blowing smoke, not sounding in
the least convinced.
"Look," I went on, "I'm pretty sure he's not spent all of that
time on the surface. He must have come to the attention of the
police in some way. Where's he been, any known associates, that
sort of thing. It might just help your clean-up rate statistics."
"Okay," she agreed, knocking cigarette ash into the grey stone
ashtray, "Just this once, mind you. I'll see what Central Records
know, make a few inquiries in the other precincts. Might take a
few days, maybe longer. I'll call you."
She rested the cigarette and holder against the ashtray, then
opened her notebook, unscrewed her pen and made a few
economical annotations on an otherwise black page.
"You won't regret this," I promised her, "Frankly, I think at
least one of us is going to be surprised by what you turn up. It'll
probably be me, but you can never tell."
Luncardy nodded thoughtfully, then pressed a button on the
telephone on her desk. A few moments later, the office door
opened and the same junior officer stepped inside.
"Mister Gask is just leaving," she said dismissively, returning
her attentions to her notebook.
I stood up, put on my hat and trailed after the young copper.
As I was guided through the open-plan area where cops write up
the reports for filing, I was reminded that police houses are strange
places and the individuals in them even more so. Police work is
fuelled by a mixture of mind-numbing boredom interspersed with
bowel-churning excitement, and this affects different individuals in
different ways. Some become introverted and withdrawn. I
recognised one old Sergeant - whose name I had never learned -
efficient and respected though he might be, but who was so
taciturn I could not remember ever hearing him utter more than
two words together. Others become gung-ho, blasé, overconfident
- I could see a gaggle of younger cops bullshitting around the
water cooler, their individuality overcome by immature bluster and
macho banter, perhaps just to drown out the nagging voices in
their own heads.

36
 When we reached the foyer, I nodded my thanks to the young
officer - who seemed well on the way to professional reticence -
pushed open the door, and made my way out of the police house
and down the street.
*
I made my usual cautious way through the caverns, deep in
thought, with just a couple of changes on the transit tubes which
link underground spaces all over the world. They are not actually
tubes or tunnels, of course; this is just the best rendering of the
word into human languages. In reality, they are a magical form of
transport, instantly moving goods and people from one cavern to
another, travelling hundreds or even thousands of miles in an
instant. The entrances and exits are numerous and often crowded
with travellers from all parts of the Lower Realms; Goblins of every
description hurrying home or on errands of their own. The tubes
also served a secondary purpose from my point of view: they were
the perfect way of losing anybody who might be trying to follow
me.
As I have mentioned before, I advertise my office address and
telephone number in a few select places, and quite a number of
much more obscure ones. You'd be surprised how many clients I
pick up from a card left behind in a bar, or from the Classified Ads
section of glossy magazines targeted at the female of the species.
I'm much more careful about my apartment, my home. I keep it
out of the public eye, out of the public record - as far as is possible
- and I have identified a whole host of hidden routes that obscure
my destination whenever I go back there.
So I should not have been at all surprised to discover Trinity in
my apartment when I got home. It seemed it was my month for
siblings.
"Hi, sis," I said, feigning a casualness I did not feel while I hung
my coat and hat on the stand by the door.
Trinity Gask is my kid sister, as much younger than me as I am
younger than Nether. All grown up now, of course. She always
was a wild child, determined not to conform to the conventions of
society or the expectations of parents and teachers. This may be a
family trait. While still in her third decade, she ran away from
home several times, to be returned the first time under the escort
of two stern-faced members of the child protection agency. The
other times she came back just because she wanted to: no
explanations, no reasons given. She just expected to be welcomed
with open arms, which our parents did unhesitatingly.
The last time Trinity had deigned to come home was when
Mother was still lingering on her deathbed. Father had died some

37
years before - suddenly and unexpectedly - and Mother never
really recovered from the shock. Trinity arrived on the doorstep in
the company of a male, one Forneth Butterstone, a fussy-looking
and over-dressed individual, suspiciously vague in describing what
he did for a living.
I confess I didn't like Butterstone from that first meeting, an
opinion amplified when Trinity declared she was going to marry
him. She was evidently completely besotted, repeatedly swearing
eternal fidelity and life-long togetherness. To me, though, it was
transparently obvious that he was only interested in my parents'
money. Not that there was a huge amount - my parents were
never really rich - but they had been wealthy enough to attract the
attention of a swindler and confidence trickster.
I set myself a task which determined, to a certain extent, the
future direction of my life. I set out to prove that Trinity's intended
was not all she could see on the surface. It turned out to be easier
than I anticipated. Butterstone made no attempt to conceal his
womanising and profligate behaviour, and it was but a few hours
work to tail him and take a few photographs, which I duly
presented to Trinity at the earliest opportunity.
Her reaction to Butterstone's perfidy was at first predictably
dramatic: hysterical crying interspersed with rants and curses and
inprecations, all uttered at full volume while pacing the tiny
apartment she rented. It was unfortunate that her soon-to-be-ex
fiance turned up a few minutes later, although fortunate for him
that I was still there. Trinity's reaction as Butterstone strolled in
was one of the most frightening things I have seen in a long
career. Her face hardened to a mask of fury and she grabbed the
two largest knives from the kitchenette and advanced on her
erstwhile fiancé.
Butterstone froze in the doorway, eyes wide in terror and
seemingly unable to move a muscle. I swear to this day that
Trinity would have carved off his ears, at the very least, if I had
not stepped in and wrested the knives from her hands. I pushed
the now-disarmed Trinity onto the davenport with more force than
was, perhaps, strictly necessary and shouted at Butterstone to get
out. He emerged from his catatonic state, shrieked wildly and fled,
slamming the door behind him. I never saw him again.
*
"Nice place you've got here," Trinity purred, inspecting me
closely from her seat on the davenport, "Discreet, and so very well
hidden. You've spent your money on glamours rather than the
services of an interior designer, I can see."
"It suffices," I replied, "For my modest requirements."

38
 She was right, of course. I had expended some considerable
sums in acquiring magics which shield my home from prying eyes.
They did not actually make the apartment invisible, of course; such
glamours are unreliable and, in any case, people notice the
absense of things nearly as easily as their presence. No, these
glamours make things unremarkable; the eye just slides off the
nondescript and focuses instead on something more relevant, more
interesting.
It helps the magic considerably if the underlying mundane
appearance does not itself stand out. My carefully-selected
apartment is one of hundreds of similar places in a large tower
block, one of a set of seven which decorate the sloping floor near
the edge of one of the less fashionable caverns. Inside, the
apartment was an uncluttered one room space doubling as a
bedroom, a sitting area and a kitchenette, with a walk-in closet and
bathroom - about the same size as each other as the only other
rooms. It was decorated unstylishly in shades of brown - I had not
changed it since I had moved in, many years ago - and decorated
with a small collection of memorabilia from cases old and new.
I shook my head at the clarity and directness of Trinity's
insight. She would notice such things as a matter of course, much
as I would do, and for much the same reason, too. She was, in
truth, a highly-trained professional - at least as much as I am -
although in a slightly different field to myself.
Over the years, Trinity had evolved an eclectic personal fashion
sense. She usually dressed in black - of itself, not uncommon in
the Lower Realms - but the glossy black cat-suit she wore was so
tightly-fitting that the eye could follow every line of her powerfully
sinewy body. She was tall and extravagantly muscular, bulky
about the shoulders and thighs in a way that most females - even
Goblin females - are not. The cat-suit was set off with heavy black
boots - not the stiletto-heeled idiocies that overheated
imaginations might have suggested, but practical ankle-length
laced boots which would undoubtedly protect her feet under almost
any circumstances.
After Trinity's profoundly unsettling experience in so very nearly
marrying an obviously exploitative bastard, she swore never to be
so defenceless again, either emotionally or physically. She took up
the study of a number of martial arts disciplines, undertook an
intensive programme of firearms training and close-combat drills of
a style that a human would undoubtedly recognise as para-
military, or something close to it. She also worked on her physical
strength and fitness with grim determination and supreme self-
sacrifice, and was now capable of moving swiftly and decisively if
the need arose.

39
 And the need did occasionally arise. She has long undertaken
the role of bodyguard for the rich and important - well, rich
anyway, if my understanding of her daily rates were correct. By
now, she had acquired quite a reputation, a reputation that said
that she had never lost a client, that she had been injured twice in
the line of duty, and that she had apprehended, disabled or, in two
cases, killed those who threatened those she protected.
I sat heavily on my favourite armchair opposite her, leaning
back and fumbling in my pockets for cigarettes and matches.
"So, to what do I owe the pleasure of your company?" I asked.
"I've lost a client," she said flatly.
"That's a bit careless," I replied casually, "Somebody finally got
past you. A sniper rifle at long range, perhaps?"
Trinity snorted derisively.
"No fucking way. He's still alive, at least as far as I know. He
just stepped out of his own bedroom for a moment, then
disappeared. No traces, no clue, nothing."
"Okay," I said, placatingly, "So who is this mysteriously
disappearing person?"

40
 Chapter 6 – Defective Memory

"His name is Professor Urquhart Garrick," Trinity said.

I sat up straight in my chair, dropping my - fortunately, not yet
lighted - cigarette on the carpet.
"Garrick," I spluttered, "How in the hells did you get mixed up
with that old reprobate?"
Trinity looked amused at my discomfiture.
"You know of him, then?" she asked snidely, then added as if an
elusive memory were returning to the forefront of her mind, "Oh
yes, you knew him, didn't you, at that stuck-up University of
yours."
Trinity never went to a University, never gave any sign of
having wanted to go to a College of any kind. But it still rankled
with her that I was able to attend a moderately prestigious
institution - as did Nether - funded almost entirely by our parents.
Not that it had got me very far, in any case: a moderately good
degree in an esoteric subject that made me practically
unemployable, hence my segue into police work.
I leant over to recover my errant cigarette from under the
chair, put it in my mouth and lit it. Unusually in the Lower Realms,
Trinity didn't smoke - some misguided notion that it was bad for
the health, I suppose - and I knew she disliked the pungent aroma.
I blew smoke not quite in her direction. She coughed pointedly
and fanned a hand in front of her face.
"Look, I had a run-in with Garrick a year or two back," I said,
recovering some of my composure, "People got hurt, even killed."
"Yeah, I heard that," she sneered, "That's why I thought you'd
want to find him for me."
"Maybe. Why do you want to find him?"
"He owes me money," she said, "A lot of money."
"For your professional services?" I enquired, genuinely puzzled,
"I thought you'd charge in advance for those?"
"I do," she agreed, "Mostly. But we were conducting a little
private business on the side. You don't need to know about that."

41
 "Uh-huh," I responded noncommittally, nodding as if the matter
was of no moment.
When somebody says "you don't need to know" to me, it's
usually the case that it's vitally important that I know. And there's
a good chance they say that just because it’s illegal, or immoral, or
maybe just embarrassing. I didn't worry. I'd find out about it
eventually. I always do, even if I have to prise it out of somebody
with heavy equipment.
I took another puff from my cigarette and leaned forward to
knock ash into the ashtray, which was the only thing on the low
and slightly dusty coffee table which separated Trinity and myself.
"Garrick's a slippery customer," I went on, settling back in my
chair, "Good at hiding. Better than most at disappearing."
"Don't I know it," she said, then added, "Look, you just find
Garrick for me. I imagine your rates haven't changed? No. And I
suppose there's no point in asking for a family discount. Didn't
think so."
Trinity unzipped an outer pocket in her glossy black cat-suit,
one over her left breast, and reached inside delicately with two
fingers. She drew out a couple of folded bills and tossed them on
the table nonchalantly.
"An advance," she explained sarcastically, "Against your ruinous
daily rate and no-doubt enormous expenses."
I let that one slide, and looked instead at the money on the
table. Two C-notes, two hundred dollars. A very modest fortune.
Everybody seemed to be throwing folding currency in my direction
at the moment. Still, I did have bills to pay.
"Okay," I said slowly, "You've hired yourself a private dick."
"Huh," Trinity replied disdainfully, "I don't need any more dicks
in my life."
*
"Fair enough," I said noncommittally, not wanting to be
sidetracked now that I had an investigation - indeed, another
investigation - to undertake.
I took a last drag on my cigarette and stubbed it out in the
ashtray.
"I need to note down a few details of the case," I continued,
"Which might take a while. I for one am getting hungry. So why
don't we grab some dinner?"
Trinity glared at me then, sensing I wasn't being obviously
ironic, her face softened into something resembling a smile.

42
 "Okay, then," she replied, "You can pay - claim it from
expenses, if you must. And leave those disgusting cigarettes
behind."
I stood up and crossed the room to retrieve my hat and coat.
Trinity unfolded herself from the davenport and picked up her own
coat, a full-length affair in a dull black which she has tossed over
the arm of the settee.
"Somewhere local?" I suggested, "There's a little place on the
corner of the block I know quite well."
She nodded, surprisingly amicably. I held open the door for her
- these gentlemanly urges will be the death of me, one of these
years - then closed and locked it behind us. Not that those locks
had been successful in keeping Trinity out, but I didn't want to
make it too easy for all and sundry to come wandering in. One of
these days I'll have to find out how she managed to get in, and
how she managed to identify my apartment. But the reason I
wasn't surprised by her presence was that there was at least one
glamour she had not detected or evaded, one I had relatively
recently installed at considerable expense, one which flashed me
an early warning image of anybody in my apartment as I
approached.
There was another reason I wanted to guide Trinity out of the
apartment: it was to see if she was genuinely unaccompanied or
whether she had some of her colleagues staking the place out.
When we hit the street, Trinity strode off purposefully in the
direction I indicated, causing me to hurry to catch up with her.
She showed no interest in anything around her, but marched on
apparently oblivious. I looked around as discreetly as I could
manage, but there were no shadows in places I did not expect, no
furtive movements in the entrances to alleys, nothing out of place
to my trained senses. Perhaps she had come on her own after all.
*
"This is the place," I said, indicating the brightly-lit entrance to
David's Diner.
I held the door open again and Trinity swept inside. The
eponymous owner was, for once, not had his usual station by the
door, but he spotted me across the half-full restaurant and scurried
over to welcome me, his characteristic bonhomie coming to the
fore.
"Table for two this evening, Mister Gask?" he enquired in a
particularly avuncular tone.

43
 "Yes, please, David," I responded in my finest cheery voice,
carefully declining to introduce Trinity despite David's obvious
curiosity.
Normally, I would be directed to a quiet booth at the back, not
from any disrespect but simply because this is what I would have
asked for anyway. But tonight, with a young woman on my arm of
quite distinctive appearance - not to mention powerful physical
presence - I was shown to the best seat in the house. We were
rapidly directed to a large table in the centre of the dining room,
clearly visible from the window, not to mention from almost every
other diner in the place.
Trinity looked around disinterestedly. David's place is not a
posh gourmet restaurant with white linen tablecloths, but has an
honest homely atmosphere, and honest homely food, too. It has
always had a short and well-chosen menu which varies frequently -
which is one thing that keeps me coming back - featuring food
which is not messed about with unnecessarily, but competently
cooked to order within minimum delay.
"Come here often?" she asked with conscious irony, after David
had seated us.
The patron bustled off to chivvy his staff along, most of whom
seemed to be relatives of one kind or another. It was a real old-
fashioned family business.
"Reasonably frequently," I answered, ignoring her barbs, "The
food's pretty reasonably priced and it hasn't killed me yet."
"There's always a first time."
I knew that, by now, her pointed comments were simply
automatic defensiveness: nothing personal intended, particularly,
just another mechanism for keeping the rest of the world at bay. I
perused the menu card, paying special attention to the hand-
written specials section. Trinity glanced at the card then put it
down. She prided herself on her ability to make even the most
inconsequential decisions quickly.
David himself came back to take our order, notebook in hand.
Trinity ordered in a few terse words, while I dithered for a while
over which of the specials to select. I ordered my usual beer;
Trinity would take nothing but water.
"So," I began, "Tell me about your dealings with my dear old
tutor, Professor Garrick."
*
As the food started to arrive, Trinity seemed to wind her prickly
personal armour back a notch or two. I gently prompted her about

44
Garrick's disappearance, which she told me at some length,
between mouthfuls. Trinity has always had a raging appetite.
Even when she was a child, she ate twice as much as her elder
siblings, much to my Mother's despair at dinnertime. I guess, even
now, her regime of high-stress work assignments and intense
physical exercise meant that she still burned calories really fast,
even compared with a big male like myself.
"You'll know that much of my work comes through agents of
one kind or another," Trinity explained between mouthfuls.
I nodded. Her line of business was not the kind of thing that
one would expect to find in the trade pages of the telephone
directory. Unlike mine, where desperate housewives and
frustrated businessmen seem more than willing to find some
random stranger in the phone book to listen to their woes.
"Garrick came to me through a personal recommendation," she
went on.
"Who recommended you to him?" I interjected.
Trinity chewed thoughtfully for a moment.
"It's not entirely unusual, but I don't remember asking him,"
she said slowly, "And I'm sure he never told me exactly who it
was."
She shook her head.
"Anyway, Garrick called my office, wanted to engage my
services. I called him back and agreed to an introductory meet. It
was in a cafe at a shopping mall, nowhere special. He was a bit
jumpy - but, then again, most of my clients are. He said he had
been hiding out, afraid for his life, he said, although he didn't say
who or what was threatening him."
"Didn't you ask?" I pressed.
"Frankly, no," she replied wearily, "My experience is that a
panic-stricken client either doesn't know what he's facing, or thinks
he does, but turns out to be just plain wrong. Anything a customer
says in answer to that question is likely to be misleading at best,
and a distraction at worst."
"Did he say where he had been hiding out?"
"Again, I didn't press, although I got the impression that he had
been living in the Deeps."
The Deeps are really off the beaten track, the Goblin equivalent
of the back of beyond. The further down one goes, the warmer the
caverns get, and more likely you are to encounter some of the
more unusual creatures with whom we share our Realm. There are

45
persistent rumours - even in this day and age - of unknown and
sometimes violent denizens secreted in the side-tunnels and
hidden ways although, personally, I suspect this is some
combination of urban myth and wishful thinking.
"Anyway," Trinity went on, "We agreed terms, and Garrick
handed over a bankers draft as a deposit. Within the hour, I had
arranged to transport him to a safe house, one of several my
organisation manages. I got him installed, set up a standard roster
from my staff; teams of two changing three times a day, usual
stuff."
She paused again to wipe clean her plate with the last piece of
toadstool bread.
"And then?" I prompted.
"I took to calling on the Professor every two or three days..."
"To conduct that mysterious business you're not tell me about,"
I added.
Trinity looked peeved. One of David's waiters chose that
moment to hurry over and take away our empty plates.
"Including a little business on the side," she agreed acidly, once
the waiter had disappeared, "So, there were no real incidents, just
a couple of false alarms which were undertandable enough.
Further instalments of his fees turned up in my bank account with
monotonous regularity. From my point of view, the dream client."
Trinity fell silent. I waited as patiently as I could manage.
"Two days ago," she resumed eventually, "I visited the safe
house as usual. Garrick was there, looking relaxed. After the
pleasantries, I broached the subject of our business" - she frowned
- "Garrick nodded amiably enough, then explained he needed to
step into his bedroom for a moment. He was still dressed in his
pyjamas. I waited and waited, getting increasingly agitated.
There was no answer to knocks or shouts. The door was locked
from the inside, and took all three of us to break it down."
"Not there?" I said softly.
"Garrick wasn't there," she agreed simply, "It was an old-
fashioned Goblin bedroom, all heavy masonry and hewn stone. No
windows. No furniture other than the bed itself, and a couple of
small cabinets. The kind of place designed to make you feel safe
and secure. There were no hidden tunnels or secret exits we could
find. I used up a fortune in Reveal spells and detection glamours.
That's another thing he owes me for," she added sourly.
Trinity sat back in her chair, looking at me levelly over the
table.

46
 "So," she said finally, "I've a score to settle. So have you. You
track him down, I'll grab him and extract what he owes me - from
his hide, if necessary. Then, you can turn him over to the
authorities. How's that sound?"
*
I told Trinity that I had no immediate idea how I would go
about tracking down the missing Professor Garrick, although in
truth I did have a few initial thoughts. She seemed to accept this;
I suspect she has always underestimated my intelligence and
imagination. Or maybe she just didn't believe anything I said.
We had little more to say to one another. I paid David for the
meal using money from the advance that my sister had presented
me with only a little earlier, then parted from Trinity at the door of
the restaurant. She set off down the street at a brisk march, not
once looking back at her elder brother. Job done, her stance said,
on to the next task.
Shaking my head, I made my way back to my apartment.
There, I found my cigarette packet and lit up. Then I called my
answering service, one of the very few which will take messages in
the major human languages - Mandarin, Spanish, English - as well
as most of the variants of the Goblin tongue. The efficient-
sounding voice at the other end told me I had two messages. One
was from Gamshacks, summarising his visit to Chill's Bar and
promising a full report in writing. The other was from Nether,
insisting that I call him as soon as possible; he left a telephone
number with a New York area code. It was timed less than an hour
ago. It must have arrived while I was dining with Trinity.
I picked up the phone receiver and dialled a telephone number.
Not the number Nether had left; this was one I knew from
memory. It was another agency I used occasionally: for a fee,
they would connect your home or office phone to a number in the
surface world. A voice answered on the second ring and I gave
them the number that Nether had left. I don't use this service very
often - which is just as well, since it is very expensive - but it is
extremely convenient if you really need to speak to a human in a
hurry.
There were a series of clicks, whirrs and other obscure noises
on the line, then the ring tone started again.
"Chill's Bar," a gruff voice said.
A surprisingly large number of Goblins are fluent in one or more
of the myriad of languages in use on the surface. All human
languages are simple and unstructured compared with the elegant
complexities and nuances of expression of the Goblin tongue, a
language which has been in use since humans were still grunting at

47
each other in caves. Even so, to the educated ear, there are tell-
tale signs: a certain guttural quality, various tones which would be
near-subsonic for the human listener, which mark out a Goblin
speaking a human tongue.
"Hello, Nether," I said, "You wanted me to call."
"Rosie's back," he said without preamble.
"Glad to hear it. Is she okay?"
There was a pause.
"More or less," Nether replied eventually, the uncertainly plainly
audible in his voice.
"What happened?"
Nether was clearly a little distraught and his narrative was
disjointed and repetitive. In summary, then, it seemed that Rosie
had just turned up, wandering the streets, feeling dazed and
confused, and with no memory of where she has been or even that
she has been away.
I didn't say so at the time, but she was probably suffering the
characteristic effects of certain memory-modifying glamours,
magics which are not widely available - evern from the more
disreputable vendors - but which are sometimes used by several
Lower Realms enforcement agencies to remove human memories
of an encounter with Goblins.
Rosie had been discovered by the New York police and taken to
a human hospital. By the time that Nether had been in touch - by
telephone, appearing in person would be far too much of a risk -
she did not appear to be seriously ill, and it was suggested that she
would be discharged in the morning. He was worried, but not as
worried as when she was missing. But her mental state suggested
that she had encountered something or somebody who had very
close connections with the authorities in the Lower Realms.
My brother's monologue finally ground to a halt.
"Okay, Nether," I said, "There's nothing either of us can do
now. You go to bed. I'll come and see you both in the morning,
when Rosie's been discharged. Let me talk to her, see if she can
remember anything."
"Okay," Nether assented, relief sounding in his voice, "See you
tomorrow." He hung up.
I sat in my best chair for a long while, musing. It looked like I
was going to be busy for a few days, or weeks. Two cases to deal
with, each with their own variation on demanding clients, clients

48
who wouldn't consider moderating their demands just because they
happened to be relatives.
I went to bed. Guess I was going to need the sleep.

49
 Chapter 7 – A Question of Depth

I woke early with the aid of an old-fashioned but highly reliable

alarm clock. I guess it would have to be reliable given the way I
habitually smote it when it rang in what felt like the middle of the
night. Thirty-five minutes later, and fortified with much strong
black coffee, I was making my way through the as-yet uncrowded
transit tubes to the cavern that lay closest to the human city of
New York. Not quite underneath it, in fact, although most of the
portals which link the world above with the Lower Realms are close
to vertical, if only for engineering convenience.
I completed the border controls with the flash of my PI's
licence, and soon emerged from the same seedy alley in one of the
less fashionable parts of the island of Manhattan. It was still the
dead of night in East Coast America, which suited me just fine; my
disguise would not withstand close scrutiny from close range or in
bright light. I habitually wore a brimmed hat and a long dark
raincoat with a great many pockets in which I keep necessities, like
my packet of cigarettes and book of matches, as well as a number
of more dangerous things I sincerely hope I will never have to use
in anger.
This morning, since I knew I would be travelling to the surface,
I made sure I had packed a pair of sunglasses; so much of the
human world is so brightly lit that Goblins need eye protection and,
besides, my eyes are so unlike the average human's that I needed
to hide them anyway. I had also donned a heavy pair of lift shoes
which discreetly add a couple of inches to my height, thereby
bringing me just a little closer to the human norm as well as
making my legs look longer. It felt like I was walking on stilts; it
takes a certain amount of practice to learn how to move in the
jerky and angular gait that is the human version of a walk.
I tucked my ears into my hat and turned up my collar against
the night, then set off through the early morning gloom.
*
I knew that Chill's Bar would be closed at this hour, shut up
tight. Not even the most hardened drinkers would still be
conscious at this time of the morning. I would not want to try and
wake Rosie: it would make far too much noise and draw attention I
could well do without. But there were other possibilities for entry,

50
means available only to those from the Lower Realms which, I
imagined, would be more than likely at the long-term residence of
even the most solitary Goblin.
Chill's place was set in the middle of a block with a narrow alley
down one side; the other abutted a store of some kind, its windows
shuttered tightly against the night and those who might be abroad
in the dark hours. Like me. I entered the alley which was graffiti’d
lavishly, as so much of the darker parts of the urban landscape are
wont to be. The wall on the side where Chill's Bar was located was
featureless brick, with no windows or doors that the eye could see.
The wall opposite contained a couple of heavy steel doors, of the
kind which could only be opened from the inside, each framed by
large wheeled dumpsters which smelled loathsome to my Goblin
senses, and which would probably have offended any nearby
humans, too.
I knew what I was looking for, and I was not disappointed.
Towards the end of the alley, I could make out the sign which read,
simply, "door", the runes concealed by the angular and stylised
artwork of the graffiti. I reached out at a natural height for a
Goblin - about eighteen inches below where a human would
expect. My questing hand found the cold metal of a handle, even
though my eyes saw only the energetically painted brick.
It was a simple concealment glamour. Cheap stuff. I did not
even need to disable it; indeed, better not, in case some iterant
came along and took it into his head to try the lock. Ignoring the
vibrant paintwork, I lifted and turned the handle and stepped into
the doorway.
*
Once inside, I could see that the door had originally been meant
for humans: wider than necessary and much too tall to be
comfortable for even a big guy like me. It had probably been part
of the original building, refitted at some point after Nether had
moved in with Goblin style fixtures and the concealing magic.
I carefully closed the door behind me, then looked around
cautiously. From the inside, the door was equally invisible,
appearing to be just part of the grubby wall of a storeroom, one
which gave every impression of not being used a great deal.
Plastic crates, either empty or part-filled with dusty empty bottles,
were piled in one corner, towering over my head. Elsewhere, there
were cardboard boxes stacked on slightly rickety-looking shelving,
whose labelling suggested they contained new drinks glasses of
various shapes or assorted species of those bagged salty snacks
that barkeepers the world over deploy in order to encourage their
customers to drink more booze.

51
 The storeroom appeared to have just one door which led, I
imagined to a corridor and thence the rest of the bar. I didn't
believe it for a moment. Nether must have a private hiding-place
nearby, somewhere which opened onto this room, some place were
he would feel safe as well as having a convenient swift exit should
the need arise. I studied the walls carefully, running my hands
over their surface, seeking the slightest sign of an irregularity
which might mark an entrance. Nether's inner sanctum would be
much more carefully concealed than the tatty glamour on the outer
door.
I was inspecting the plasterwork in one corner, kneeling on the
floor, when a slight noise behind me made me jump up and spin
around.
"Hello, Findo," a familiar voice said ironically, "Breaking and
entering again? You could just have called, you know."
"Just trying to avoid attracting undesired attention," I said
smoothly, "Besides, you didn't give me a telephone number."
"Excuses, excuses," he laughed wearily, then added, "You'd
better come inside."
The wall behind Nether was unbroken, unmarked other than for
the occasional scuff mark or grubby fingerprint. I had been over it
with a fine-toothed comb already. Even so, as soon as Nether's
hand touched a particular spot, the dirty plaster faded away and a
Goblin-sized doorway stood in its place. This magic was expensive
stuff, an entrance keyed to his own hand. I would have had to use
a similarly expensive glamour even to detect the presence of such
a well-concealed entrance and I doubted there was anything I
could afford which would have opened it without Nether's
permission. Which begged the question: exactly where was Nether
getting so much money from?
My brother ushered me inside and closed the door with a similar
touch of his hand. From within, the door gave the appearance of
intricately carved and polished wood, bound with shiny brass
hinges and fittings. We stood in a spacious living room elegantly
decorated in classical Goblin style: furniture of heavy carved wood
and leather-covered chairs. It all spoke of much money and taste,
and was entirely at odds with Nether's raggedy drunk appearance.
Nether threw himself into an overstuffed armchair and waved at
the davenport. I went and sat down where he indicated with my
hat in my hands.
"Did you send a stooge into the bar yesterday?" he asked.
"Yeah," I replied, "Thought it would help, maybe shake
something loose."

52
 "Did it work?"
"Don't think so. Nobody would talk to him."
"Huh. The regulars thought he was another reporter. We get
those from time to time. When rumours get out."
I nodded. It seemed plausible.
"So what happened to Rosie?" I asked, changing the subject.
"She was locking up the front doors when she heard a noise
behind her," Nether said, "Then, nothing until she woke up in an
alley with an ache in her head."
"Which alley?"
"I don't know. Not very far away from here."
I nodded thoughtfully, unsure of whether it was worth trying to
track down the exact place she woke up.
"Anyway," he resumed, "Somebody found her, dialled nine-one-
one. The cops - humans - took her to the precinct house, then
onto hospital. Unexplained amnesia. Held overnight for
observation, then released when one of the waiting staff went to
collect her."
"Hmm. So now you've got Rosie back, I guess you'll want a
refund."
Nether's florid face was suddenly serious.
"No, I don't," he said quietly, "If anything, I think I need your
services now more than ever."
"Why?" I asked, although I suspected I already knew the
answer.
"She can't remember anything," Nether replied, "But she's
clearly been treated with a glamour - quite definitely a Goblin
magic - to make her forget. I need to find out, where she's been,
who took her and, most importantly, why."
"Okay," I said slowly, "I need to see her myself, talk to her."
"Why? I've told you everything she's said," he replied warily,
"You'll only upset her."
"It's what she's not said that interests me," I said, sounding
more confident than I felt, "Just let me talk to her, okay?"
*
"Of course," Nether agreed, "But not right away. Rosie needs
her sleep."

53
 It was still before dawn. Those who run pubs and bars for a
living do not, as a rule, rise early. I doubted there would be any
movement upstairs for an hour to two yet. There was no point in
rushing things.
"Got any coffee?" I asked.
"Sure. Come with me."
Nether got up and went though an inner arched doorway. I
followed. It was a compact kitchen with fittings suitable for a
Goblin - a human would think them child-sized - which included a
breakfast bar with two stools. I pulled one out, sat and watched
Nether bustling around, rather surprised with his domesticity.
"Something to eat?" he asked casually.
"Sure," I replied. I was getting peckish.
Nether slid a plate of the hard flat biscuits that are so popular
for breakfast in the Lower Realms. I picked one up and bit into it.
It was fresh from the ovens, made very recently, possibly even this
week. Nether must visit the Lower Realms more frequently than I
thought.
A cup - human made, and big and clunky by Goblin standards -
appeared next to my plate. It was filled with hot black coffee, thick
and poisonously strong. Just how I like it.
"Splash of scotch in it?" Nether asked, waving a human-sized
whiskey bottle languidly in my direction.
The bottle was opened, the metal foil long gone, and the amber
fluid could be seen sloshing about inside. Still a fair bit left, I
noted.
"Bit early for me," I said, shaking my head.
"Suit yourself."
I noticed he didn't pour himself one, just put the bottle back on
the shelf.
We ate breakfast languidly, lingering over our coffee refills.
Nether told me a little more about his life since I had seen him
last; a selection of tales and anecdotes from his life in the bar. In
exchange, I told him a few of my stories: some of my more hair-
razing exploits as a Private Detective. I talked up the element of
luck in my investigations and played down the importance of
deduction. I also quizzed him again about Rosie’s predicament,
although he came up with the same story as last time. He really
didn't know how to ask the right questions.
Finally, Nether glanced at the kitchen clock set into the wall
above the cooker.

54
 "Rosie will be awake by now," he said, "Let's go talk to her,
since you are so insistent."
I shrugged, then jammed my hat back on my head. Just force
of habit - a good one in the surface world where ears like mine
would attract far too much attention.
Nether guided out of the kitchen and to the hidden entrance to
his private suite, which closed behind us at Nether's touch. We
went through the mundane door which opened onto an even more
mundane corridor and along the corridor to the stairwell. It was a
short walk up two flights of stairs to the point where my brother
tapped diffidently on a bedroom door.
*
There was a creaking noise from within, as if somebody was
carefully manoeuvring themselves to a more upright posture in bed
and arranging the bedclothes.
"Who is it?" came a soft voice through the door, not as high-
pitched as I might have expected.
"It's Nether," my brother said.
"Come in."
Nether tugged on the handle and pushed the door open. I
followed him inside. A human female sat up in a small bed, a bed
which would never have allowed two to share in comfort. Her eyes
widened slightly as she caught sight of me trailing in, then she
looked at Nether and back to me again, as if unsure of what she
was seeing. Then she nodded, a single dip of the chin than
seemed to signify her acceptance of the situation: that it was not
bullshit and wishful thinking, but there really were two mythical
creatures at the bottom of her bed.
All humans tend to look the same to me, even under ideal
circumstances, and Rosie was so swathed in pyjamas and
bedclothes it was hard to determine any distinguishing features at
all. She was shorter than most, a little rounder than most. Her
hair was that orange colour that humans call "red", her eyes were
somewhere between blue and green, and her pale skin was dusted
with those marks known as freckles.
"Are you the one that came for Nether all those years ago?"
Rosie blurted out, smiling uncertainly at me, "The one my
grandfather told me about?"
"Findo Gask, Private Detective. And Nether’s brother," I said,
bowing in an exaggerated fashion and lifting my hat in a parody of
formal politeness.

55
 "Please to meet you, Findo," she said, "My grandfather
remembered you well, I think."
"I remember him," I said civilly, "Although I only met him the
once. That was a long time ago."
"Indeed," she replied, "He was a good man, if a bit earthy at
times."
Rosie looked sad for a fleeting moment, then she was
distracted. She held her hand to her head, swallowing awkwardly
and repeatedly, and grimacing at some discomfort around her face.
"Are you okay?" I asked solicitously.
"My ears hurt," she said simply, "I can't seem to clear them."
I looked at Nether, whose anxious gaze returned my worried
expression in spades.
"You're right," I said to him levelly, "You really do need my
help."
Rosie looked confused, turning her head from Nether to me and
back again.
"What's wrong?" she demanded. I explained.
The Goblin caverns are deep down in the earth, many
thousands of feet - even miles - below the surface. The portals
which link surface and deeps aren't tunnels, at least in the
conventional sense. They utilize the same technology as the
transit tubes which link the caverns together, but are set vertically
rather than nearly horizontal.
Anybody entering or leaving the Goblin world will always
experience a sudden change in air pressure. It is something that
Goblins are not very sensitive to. But most humans can feel
pressure changes in their inner ear - when they fly up in an
aircraft, for example, or even when they take a high-speed lift in a
tall building. An entrance to the Lower Realms drops you a mile
into the ground instantaneously, with a rapid pressure change.
This causes discomfort, even severe pain, to almost all humans; it
is another one of the reason why people from the surface do not
frequently visit the caverns of the Goblins.
In a few places, there are staging points for human visitors,
allowing them to acclimatise to the air pressure before continuing
their descent, or ascent. Or there are conventional stairs, although
nobody in their right mind really wants to walk up, or down, a flight
of stairs a mile high.
If Rosie was still suffering from pains now, she had probably
been abducted to the Lower Realms, by person or persons

56
unknown. And it looked quite possible that she had returned very
quickly, without the courtesy of stopping to let her recover. That
would certainly hurt like hell, adding to her pain and confusion
when she was dumped in that alley.

57
 Chapter 8 – Unexpected Exit

Rosie o'Chill looked confused again. It was getting to be a

habit.
"You're telling me I've actually been to the kingdom of the
Goblins, and I can't remember it?" she exclaimed.
"It's not a kingdom, but basically yes, that's right," I replied
calmly.
She shook her head.
"It's all such a blur," she said glumly, "I still ache all over, but
the doctors said there isn't anything seriously wrong with me."
"Don't worry," Nether said with a surprising degree of
tenderness which made me wonder about the real nature of the
relationship between the two of them, "I'll look after you."
I had to get things moving in what I hoped was the right
direction. Things were drifting and nobody was showing any sign
of urgency. Rosie was obviously feeling sorry for herself, probably
just wanting to curl up under the bedclothes and put everything
behind her, and my brother showed every sign of wanting to
become her willing handmaiden, or some close approximation
thereto.
"Look, I need to take a look at the alley," I said firmly, turning
to face Rosie squarely, "I want you to come with me, see what you
can remember of the place you were found. It might be very
important."
Nether looked at me askance.
"Are you sure?" he asked.
"Yes," I said solemnly, "I am. Entirely."
Rosie's eyes widened as she took in the seriousness of what I
was suggesting.
"So, get dressed. We'll go take a look-see," I told them both
firmly, adding, "I'll arrange us some transport."
"Okay," Rosie said uncertainly, "If you think that's really
necessary."
"I do," I emphasised, "So get dressed".

58
 She looked to Nether for affirmation.
"He's right," my brother confirmed, nodding vigorously, "And I'll
come too."
Nether and I backed out of the room, leaving Rosie to her
ablutions in private. Once the bedroom door closed behind us, I
reverted to the Goblin tongue.
"Are you telling me everything you know?" I demanded,
rounding on my brother so quickly that he backed into the wall.
"Of course," Nether replied, his face an expression of wide-eyed
innocence. I wasn't sure whether to believe him or not.
"Okay," I let it ride, "Is there a phone in this joint?"
*
Nether led me downstairs again and into a small and cluttered
room that could only be the office of a person for whom paperwork
is a necessary chore, to be avoided or at least deferred wherever
possible, rather than an end in itself. There was a row of four-
drawer filing cabinets with at least two drawers open and papers
resting loose on the files within. There was a desk with a computer
screen and a printer, although keyboard, mouse and - I hoped -
telephone were buried beneath. Nearby was a waste paper bin full
to overflowing with geological layers of discarded correspondence
and at least two pencils broken in apparent frustration.
"Your Rosie's not keen on the paperwork, then?" I said to
Nether wryly.
My brother regarded the explosion of misfiled paper and shook
his head.
"It does tend to get on top of her," he admitted.
If it really did, I thought, she would be buried forever, never to
be seen again.
Nether waded forward and gingerly lifted some of the more
easily moveable paperwork. After a minute or so, he unearthed a
telephone, one of the new-fangled push-button ones which have
become popular up here in recent decades. Up here, everything's
so fickle, fashion's changing for no apparent reason; what's wrong
with a simple, reliable mechanical dial, I wondered.
I levered myself into the swivel chair - human-sized, so I felt
like a child again - and Nether handed me the telephone. I dialled
Gumshoe's office number from memory - meaning I pressed the
over-sized buttons - and waited patiently. No answer. Too early
for the hard-pressed PI to be in the office just yet. I tried his home
number instead; he answered on the fourth ring.

59
 "Morning, Gumshoe," I said as brightly as one who already had
his morning coffee twice over could seem.
"Gask!" he answered, already sounding a lot more alert,
"What's up?"
"I need your help, and quickly, please," I replied directly, "You
still got a car?"
"Yeah," he replied, "You just want a taxi service, then?"
"I could just take a yellow cab," I snorted. New York cab
drivers pay little enough attention to what's in the back seat, "I'd
rather have the use of your eyes and your brain."
He chuckled.
"Okay. Where are you?"
"Chill's Bar. Meet us out the front."
"Us?"
"Rosie's turned up. And Nether. I'll explain later."
"Right," I replied, "Twenty minutes - no, make it twenty-five at
this hour."
"We'll be waiting."
*
Gumshoe's car was one of those vast old-fashioned Oldsmobiles
styled by some designer with a vision of what the next century
would look like, but now looked quirky and aggressively retro. It
was well-looked after, though, and there was plenty of space in the
back for two large Goblins and a smallish human female; even
Gumshoe's bulk failed to fill the space between steering wheel and
the worn leather of the driver's seat. He put the automatic
transmission in Drive, set off from the kerb with a jerk and slotted
neatly into the traffic.
Gumshoe had nodded politely to Nether and Rosie when I
introduced them, then he asked: "Where to, Gask?"
I looked at Rosie, who appeared to be searching her memory,
then reeled off one of those number-and-avenue locations that
mean nothing to anybody who has not spent at least five years in
New York. Gumshoe grunted in acknowledgement, then pulled a
highly illegal U-turn at a traffic light with a squealing of tyres and
the sounding of horns.
"The purpose of car horns in this city," Gumshoe said
conversationally as we accelerated, "Is for feedback: to let the
other guy know that you know he is driving like an idiot."

60
 By the time we were in the vicinity of the intersection Rosie had
named, there was no problem with driving slowly. The rush-hour
traffic was so dense that Rosie had plenty of time to study the
shop-fronts and alley entrances for anything she might recognise.
We criss-crossed the area for at least an hour without any
response from her other than occasional apologies.
It must have been at least the second time along this particular
street when Rosie pointed at a shop-front and said: "I'm sure this
looks familiar."
"Can we park up?" I asked Gumshoe.
He swung the car right at the next junction and drove for a
block or two, then managed to slip the vehicle into a spot vacated
for all of ten seconds by the previous occupant. We got out. There
were a few pedestrians about. The thing about humans on New
York streets is that nobody really looks at you, regardless of how
outlandish your appearance.
"Know anything about this part of the city?" I quizzed Gumshoe
as we walked.
He looked up and down the street for a moment, obviously
deep in thought.
"Uh, no," he said finally, "It's, like, nowhere in particular. Sure,
Upper Broadway's about ten blocks that way" - he waved a hand
vaguely - "and I thought I'd been everywhere in this town."
*
We turned onto the sidewalk of the avenue we had passed a
few minutes earlier. The immediate area seemed curiously low-
key, quiet and subdued. The buildings which lined the block were
full of stores which, while definitely open, seemed to stock goods
which were selling goods either impossible to identify or merely of
a kind which I could not imagine anybody wanting to actually buy.
None of the pedestrians seemed interested in the shop windows
but hurried on past, intent on whatever business had brought them
out at this hour. It was as if the displays were intended to repel
rather than attract potential customers.
A few minutes stroll brought us to the mouth of the alley that
Rosie had tentatively identified from the car. Even Nether
managed a credible attempt at walking like a human. I was
impressed.
"Is this the one?" Nether asked, looking up at Rosie.
She looked around, once again uncertain. I took a few steps
into the narrow entrance to take a closer look. I spend far too
much time lurking in alleyways in this city.

61
 "Bingo," I said softly in the Goblin tongue.
"What's that?" Rosie asked from the end of the alley.
I repeated myself in English for her benefit. I've never been
too sure of Gumshoe's level of fluency; he rarely utters more than
a few syllables in the language, although I suspect he understands
more than he lets on.
The narrow alley had all the usual furnishings: squalid-looking
dumpsters and bins on wheels, tightly bolted metal doors and
nowhere enough lighting to make most humans comfortable. Even
so, I had spotted the unmistakable sign of Goblin runes hidden
among the palimpsest of graffiti that seem to grow like mushrooms
on every available surface in the surface world.
There are rather more paths and passages between the surface
world and the Lower Realms than the authorities would like.
Nobody, I'm sure, knows them all and, even after all these years,
the Goblin border police are still uncovering new ones or, more
precisely, ones which had remained undiscovered for the
thousands of years since the Goblin caverns were created. I knew
of a dozen or more in various parts of the island of Manhattan
alone and there are tens of thousands spread all over the surface
of the planet. But I didn't know of one here, in this nondescript
part of town.
I was just about to take a closer look when I caught a faint
sound, only just audible over the roar of traffic, together with the
slight movement of air which suggested that a hidden entrance was
about to open.
I backed away hurriedly, scurrying back to the alley entrance.
"Hide!" I hissed, "Get out of sight, quickly!"
Gumshoe grabbed Rosie by the arm and dragged her to one
side. Nether slid behind a rubbish bin with the flair for
concealment which comes naturally to a Goblin. I ducked behind a
dumpster on the other side of the alley, then pressed my eye to
the gap between wall and metal.
A Goblin, lithe and quick-moving, stepped through the wall at
the point marked by the runes, and looked about cautiously. I
recognised the black-garbed figure at once, of course. It was my
sister Trinity emerging from the exit.
*
Trinity adjusted the black beret she wore to disguise her ears
and her baldness, then turned up her collar and fastened her coat
closely at her throat. She turned and walked towards the exit with
a sway of the hips which would have been grossly exaggerated for

62
a Goblin but looked authentic up here. I was impressed. She
could have fooled me into thinking she was an aloof yet stylish
human female, a petite and well-dressed woman holding the world
at bay behind her sunglasses.
"Hi Trinity. How're you doin'?" I stood up and drawled as she
drew level with my hiding-place.
Her guise as a human disappeared in a flash. Her pose became
that of a state of readiness from one of the martial arts - Goblin
martial arts, designed for those with sharp teeth and strong
fingernails - with claws outstretched and fangs bared. She saw
who it was and relaxed - at least, a little.
"What the hell are you doing here?" she yelled.
Then her eyes narrowed suspiciously.
"Have you been following me?" she added in a low growl which
conveys more unsettling undertones than the shouting moments
earlier.
I grinned in response. Always an effective gesture for a Goblin,
since my teeth are at least as long and sharp as hers.
"Not at all," I replied, "I'm on another job, for another client.
One you might recognise, as it happens."
I gestured in the direction of Nether, who had silently appeared
from his own hiding-place. Trinity swung around, then gasped
aloud as she recognised her other brother.
"Isn't this nice?" Nether drawled, evidently enjoying the irony of
the situation, "A family reunion. Quite touching. We might want to
explain ourselves to the natives, mind you."
Rosie and Gumshoe had emerged and were now standing in the
entrance to the alley. Rosie stood with her mouth open, her head
turning from one Goblin to another with an expression of
disbelieving astonishment on her face. Gamshack was much more
phlegmatic, his expression more one of amusement than
bemusement. Still, I doubted either of them had fully understood
the words we had used, although I suspect the tone of voice was
fairly telling.
The Goblin language is widely thought - amongst ignorant
humans, at least - to resemble grunts and snarls. A gross
misrepresentation. A great deal of the intonation and the subtle
emotional markers in our speech is in the upper harmonics, in the
registers that the surface-dwellers find difficult to detect. Human
languages are extremely blunt and one-dimensional by
comparison.

63
 Trinity's reaction to her human observers was fascinating. Her
martial arts readiness diminished noticeably and she was clearly
fighting the instinct - one I have struggled with on occasions - to
run and hide in the presence of the surface folk. This is not
because humans are individually dangerous - they may be big, but
they are slow and noisy too - but because the Goblin race has long
felt threatened by the vastly more numerous humans.
With commendable swiftness, she managed to recover her
composure, noting that neither Nether nor I were in the slightest
perturbed by the presence of Gumshoe and Rosie. Even her
perpetual wry smirk re-asserted itself.
"I take it you know each other, then?" Gumshoe said, making it
clear he had picked up something from our exchange.
I laughed aloud.
"Ladies and Gentlemen," I said in a mockingly formal tone,
"May I introduce my little sister Trinity. Sis, this is Miss Rosie
o'Chill, present proprietor of Chill's Bar, when Neth has been living
these last, oh, eighty years or so. My other client, just at the
moment. And Mister Martin Gamshack, Private Investigator, my
business partner."
Gumshoe nodded affably, while Rosie bobbed a curtsey which
would not have looked out of place on a shy eight-year old.
"So," I continued in a more serious tone, turning to Trinity,
"Now that we are all suitably acquainted, perhaps we can go
somewhere just a little more out of sight. Then, you can tell us
exactly why you're lurking around in the place where Miss o'Chill's
kidnappers released her, not twenty-four hours ago."

64
 Chapter 9 – Private Enterprise

I guess Trinity really didn't like being asked this kind of direct
question. She fumed silently for a few moments before
condescending to reply.
"Okay," she snorted, trying to regain some control of the
situation, "An explanation. Yeah, you're right. I do want to know
what in all the Hells is going on."
In case you didn't know, the Hells is a conventional name for a
very dark mystery. The reference is to the Lost Caverns, caves
abandoned by Goblins long ago. Some are reputed to have
become filled with water when the bed of some surface sea or lake
ruptured, or with lava from the magma channels of a volcano not
quite as dormant as the original surveyors thought. It is also said
that there are ways to travel to these caverns, hidden and
mysterious ways, full of danger - which seems only too reasonable,
given that they are supposed to be either molten rock or water
under extreme pressure. Such nonsense. They are stories fit only
for children; nobody takes them at all seriously.
Trinity took another deep breath, and looked up and down the
street. I followed her glance with my own. There was very little
traffic on the road, and absolutely nobody on the sidewalk. It
really was a well-chosen site for a illicit entrance to the Lower
Realms. I wondered idly how much of this was the result of
intensive observation and careful selection, and how much was the
application of subtle - and entirely forbidden - magics in this area.
"We need get off the street," Trinity said resignedly, the
inevitability of the situation dawning on her, "You'd better come
inside. Then we can talk."
She turned and walked back in the direction from which she had
come. I followed her, Nether a step or two behind me. At the
point where the runes nestled amongst the swoops and whorls of
eagerly-executed urban street decoration, she stopped and said a
few words that, inevitably, I could not hear - this is a standard
characteristic of Goblin glamours - and waved a hand nonchalantly.
At her gesture, some concealment glamour flickered and died,
revealing a battered-looking doorway set into the grafitti’d brick
wall. It was, I noticed, a human-sized door, its lintel way up over
my head. It looked as if it was part of the original fabric of the

65
building, erected no more than a hundred years ago. It was now
very worn and damaged; humans never really build to last.
"Come on," I turned and yelled at Rosie, who was still standing
at the alleyway entrance looking entirely bemused. Gumshoe
grabbed her by the arm and urged her forward. Trinity pushed the
door open and we all followed her inside.
*
Within, the contrast from the quiet alley outside could not have
been greater.
It was a huge space, at least by the standards of human
construction; it would of course have been dwarfed by the vast airy
underground caverns which I call home. I looked up; above me,
the high ceiling was cluttered with girders and lights and sprinklers
and all the paraphernalia deemed necessary by the guardians of
Health and Safety that infest the interstices of the modern human
world.
Gumshoe and Rosie squinted through what I imagine seemed
like near-darkness to them, especially after the brightness of
daylight outside. I took off my sunglasses and tucked them
carefully in an inside pocket; I never knew when I might need their
protection again. It was clear that the lighting had been set at a
level presumably intended as a compromise of convenience: dim
enough to be comfortable to Goblins but still bright enough so that
humans did not spend the entire time walking into things.
The half-light was full of noise and movement. Figures scurried
purposefully back and forth carrying boxes and cluttered
clipboards, although not at the same time; figures whose
distinctive shapes showed them to be human and Goblin in
approximately equal measure.
A large fraction of the space was filled with high racks of
perforated metal supporting plywood shelves stretching up to the
ceiling. The racking was filled with a profusion of goods, some
strapped to pallets, others contained in wooden packing cases and
cardboard boxes, and all clearly - if misleadingly - labelled in
human script and more obscurely - and correctly, I guessed - in
Goblin runes disguised as aerosol graffiti.
Between the rows of racking, fork-lift trucks were being
manoeuvred with great skill and dexterity by Goblin operators as
well as humans, and with a surprising lack of that irrepressible,
even manic, driving style that characterises all too many denizens
of the Lower Realms when operating vehicles and powered
machinery in the surface world.

66
 At one side, a couple of eighteen-wheelers had been backed
into loading bays - all entirely under cover, I had already noted -
with spaces for a dozen more similarly-sized trucks further down
the space. These, at least, had human drivers in evidence: large
men in overalls who stood together, cigarettes in hand, watching
the bustle of other people with the wry amusement of those whose
job does not require them to scurry around like lunatics.
Across the floor, an archway marked an entrance to the Lower
Realms stood against a solid wall, its edges picked out in a faint
purple glow which indicated in was in operation. It was one in the
larger size which is generally intended for high-volume transfers
and outsize goods items. From what I could see, it was in near-
continuous operation, with a stream of boxes and pallets being
transferred in both directions.
I could see at once that the whole block had been converted
into a warehouse for goods in transit between the two worlds, no
doubt for reasons of administrative and operational convenience
while retaining the appearance of multiple separate buildings and
independent businesses from the outside. Clever. Very clever.
The kind of cleverness that would appeal to somebody like my
sister.
Trinity completely ignored the bustle going on at full speed
around us, and stalked across the floor. She was clearly entirely
familiar with the layout of the building. With no evident choice in
the matter, I followed her, trailed by Gumshoe, Rosie and Nether.
She nodded at one or two of those wielding clipboards as she
passed but did not stop. She was single-mindedly heading for one
of the offices situated on a mezzanine level at the side of the main
floor, overlooking the expanse of the racks and shelving stretching
into the dark distance. We trailed after her up a flight of stairs
fabricated from steel gratings and girders, our footsteps banging
and rattling on the steps.
At the top, Trinity kicked open a door marked Operations
Director in two languages. I followed her inside, trailed by
Gumshoe and Rosie, with Nether bringing up the rear. Rosie
looked askance at the gyred and curlicued Goblin script on the
door, perhaps realising that this was a form of writing and not
mere decoration. Judging by her curiosity, this may have been the
first time she had encountered the undisguised everyday form of
the Lower Realms script.
Inside, to nobody's particular surprise, was a modern office
space furnished with moderately expensive but efficiently
nondescript furniture, indicative of those who expect to spend their
time working for a living rather than impressing their visitors by
the tasteful and sophisticated nature of their working environment.

67
 On one side, a large glazed window provided a comprehensive
view over the warehouse floor, an essential feature for any hard-
pressed - and hard-nosed - boss. On the opposite side, a high
window let in a modicum of daylight although, to my relief, the
blinds were sufficiently well closed that it was not uncomfortable.
The other walls were lined with of new-looking grey-painted steel
filing cabinets, and folders and files arranged on shelves. A few
folders lay opened on the top of the cabinets, looking as if they
were actually used on a regular basis.
*
Trinity marched over to the desk, its surface cluttered by the
usual collection of paperwork, several telephones and what looked
like a powerful personal computer. She flung herself into a large
executive chair positioned on the far side of the desk, then pressed
some hidden button or lever which caused the chair to rise in the
air and give her a clear view over the untidy polished wood
surface.
"Take a seat," she said casually.
She waved at the high-tech office chairs that littered the office.
Chairs in two distinct sizes, I noticed: three built to a human scale
and a single one more suited to a human child, or a Goblin; all
designed to the same pattern in sleek polished metal and all
capable of being raised up to a level so that humans and Goblins
could face each other eye-to-eye. Again, very clever, I thought.
Humans and Goblins working together as equals or, more
precisely, giving reassurrance to the humans that they weren't
giving offence by looking down on the elder race.
Gumshoe sat, as he had been directed, in the furthest of the
human sized chairs. He too had been carefully checking out the
industrial operation that was going on all around us. Rosie
followed him and sat daintily, and Nether took the Goblin-sized
model. He rummaged around for a few seconds then, having
discovered the elevation control, rose smoothly upwards. I jumped
up into the remaining oversized - well, human-sized - chair, which
was already at its highest setting, bouncing and twisting to make
sure I landed facing Trinity across the desk.
"Nice little operation you've got here," I drawled.
Trinity treated that remark with the contempt it probably
deserved. She swivelled in her executive chair glaring at me and
Gumshoe alternatively. I caught Gumshoe's eye and nodded. He
took the hint. With an economical choice of words, he explained to
Trinity about Rosie o'Chill's apparently motiveless abduction and
equally mysterious re-appearance, and how Nether had been
resident at Chill's Bar for a great many decades. Nether chipped in

68
to say a little more about his sojourn at the Bar, although he
carefully advanced no clear reason why he had chosen to reside
there for so long. Trinity asked questions, many questions,
questions with the overlapping and demanding nature of a court
cross-examination, fired off at double-quick pace as if to catch one
unawares.
I had been distracted for a while now, hardly listening to the
words that Nether and Gumshoe had been using. An idea had
been circling in my head like a fly around a particularly tasty piece
of dirt.
"Let me guess," I interjected, bruskly cutting across Trinity's
next question, "This place, this is the business that you were doing
with Urquhart Garrick on the side - the business you wouldn't
discuss with me."
Trinity fumed silently for a moment, then nodded once. The
look on my face could probably have been mistaken for a smirk,
although I'd swear on solemn oath in any court in the caverns it
shouldn't have been. Honest.
"So you agreed to run this business," I went on, sitting back in
the chair and looking around, checking to see if Gumshoe was
following the direction of the conversation, "You even put some of
your own money into it. Then Garrick disappeared, without trace,
and you're still running it, waiting for him to turn up."
"Yeah," Trinity replied sourly, "Sucks, doesn't it. And I've had a
very close look at the books, and this business is nothing like as
profitable as he led me to believe."
"Well I can see why you're keen to track down Professor
Garrick," I acknowledged, shrugging off Trinity's misfortune, "I
guess you must have been pretty desperate to come to me at all.
But it worse than that."
I jabbed a finger repeatedly at her for emphasis as I spoke.
"You've been set up for a fall."
I'd like to think it was poetic justice, or perhaps professional
intuition at its finest, but it was most likely a lucky coincidence. It
was just at that moment that the first faint sounds of approaching
police sirens reached my ears. Nether and Trinity heard it too, an
unusual sound in this quiet neighbourhood, even in New York city.
The sirens were getting closer very rapidly.
*

69
 Chapter 10 – Betrayal of Trust

The sirens seemed to be very close now. They would be here

within the minute, I judged. I stuck my head into the darkened
entrance in front of me. Inside, there were steep steps downward
- not the drop-tube I might have been expected - which went on
for several flights, with damp concrete walls. It looked as if it
would take us well below street level, but of course nowhere near
the subterranean caverns of the Goblins.
"Come on," muttered Nether over my shoulder, "We should be
gone already."
I had to agree. As one, Nether and I slipped inside, followed by
Rosie and with Gamshack following up the rear. As Gumshoe
ducked inside, his head bent, the doorway formed from the front of
the filing cabinets slamed shut, leaving us in almost complete
darkness. There was a squeak from Rosie. My eyes adjusted
quickly; I could just see Nether reaching out to take her hand
gently while Gumshoe fumbled for her other hand.
"Keep together," Nether hissed, "Findo, lead the way."
I scurried down a few steps. Nether tugged on Rosie's hand.
"Careful now," he said, "Just feel the steps with your feet."
A Goblin would have been down those steps and away in ten
seconds, but it took several minutes for the humans to manage it.
It was just as well neither Rosie nor Gumshoe are particularly tall,
for humans, otherwise it would have been impossible for them to
squeeze through. Even so, Gumshoe's muscular bulk must have
been uncomfortably tight and particularly claustrophobic, especially
in the complete darkness that a human would be experiencing.
The bottom of the stairwell was featureless except for a
battered steel door that looked as if it was rusted shut, although it
opened easily enough to my touch. On the other side was what
seemed to be a human-constructed sewer, although not
particularly noisome and with nothing more than a tiny trickle of
water running along the gully. Mercifully, there was a little more
light, enough for even Rosie and Gumshoe to see their footing.
"Which way?" Nether whispered.

70
 There was a soft whistle along the sewer. We all swung
around. It was my sister. She waved once and turned on her heel,
disappearing out of sight around a curve in the tunnel. I looked at
Nether.
"Better follow her," I said, "Unless you've got a better idea."
He shook his head, then tugged at Rosie's hand again. We
hurried along, splashing through the occasional puddles and trying
to avoid the worst of the liquids that poured or dripped from the
roof. We could hear, and occasionally see, Trinity ahead of us; she
managed to stay far enough ahead that we had no difficulty in
determining which way she had gone at the junctions and
intersections.
Finally, Trinity stopped and turned to face us as we hurried
towards her. She gestured, then sprang upwards into a hole in the
ceiling. When we reached the same spot a few moments later, I
could see a steel ladder bolted to the wall, running into a vertical
pipe that led to an inspection hatch on the surface. I could hear
Trinity's footsteps on the rungs, receding quickly.
"Up there," I said to Nether, "You go first. Then you," I added,
turning to Rosie.
Rosie followed Nether with barely a hesitation. Gumshoe
followed her, while I kept a lookout until I judged that the humans
were reaching the top of the ladder. Then I scurried up the ladder,
my long arms helping me to move two - human-sized, natch -
rungs at a time.
The inspection hatch at the top was already moved aside and I
tumbled onto the pavement, in full daylight, at Gumshoe's feet. I
fumbled for my sunglasses in my pocket and slipped them on.
Mercifully, my hat was still in place, not that there were any other
humans in this alley. Why do I spend so much time in the surface
world skulking in alleys?
Gamshack gripped Rosie by the elbow and helped her to her
feet. Then he hurried to the alley entrance and looked around
urgently, getting his bearings, while Nether and I pushed the steel
manhole cover back into its proper place. The he turned back to
us.
"This way," he said firmly and pointing along the street, "Two
blocks."
I too looked around, suddenly suspicious. Trinity had
disappeared; vanished without trace in the way that Goblins are
very good at, with or without magical assistance.
*

71
 I knew better than to try and track Trinity just now. If she was
determined not to be found, it would be very difficult. Anyway,
there was no point. She would turn up when it suited her,
probably just after I left her a message about that old reprobate
Garrick. I was quietly confident I would be doing so, although I
didn't have too many leads just at the moment.
Nether had noticed Trinity's disappearance too, judging by the
wry look he gave me. Gumshoe affected not to notice, or perhaps
not to care. Rosie was looking stunned, in shock perhaps, frozen,
but still holding Nether's hand.
"Okay," I said to Gumshoe, "Let's get to your car pronto and
get out of here."
The Oldsmobile was still where we had left it and there was no
sign of anybody lurking about. Mercifully we had parked far
enough away to be well clear of the cordon of police whose blue
lights could be seen reflected from shop windows. We piled into
Gumshoe's car which, much to everybody's evident relief, started
at the first turn of the key. Gumshoe put the monstrous old thing
into gear and set off with a screech of tyres.
"Where to?" Gumshoe called over his shoulder.
He was driving fast and only moderately like a lunatic - that is,
like almost everybody else in New York.
"Back to Chill's Bar," I suggested, "Let's takie Rosie home."
Gumshoe grunted, swung across two lanes of traffic without
indicating - to a chorus of driver-feedback horns, of course - and
ran a yellow light unhesitatingly. Definitely a native New York
driver.
*
An hour later, we were in Rosie's cluttered little office at the
back of the bar. Rosie herself had been marched off to bed by
Nether, with a mixture of brooking-no-nonsense firmness and
touching tenderness. When he re-appeared, he looked distinctly
careworn.
"Is she okay?" Gumshoe asked from his perch on the end of the
desk.
"She's asleep," my brother replied, "I've slipped her a little
something to calm her nerves, so she’ll probably sleep for a few
hours now."
Gumshoe nodded. Nether hopped up into Rosie's worn office
chair and sat back, then closed his eyes. I had found a bottle of
whiskey and three shot glasses - this was an Irish bar, after all -
and poured a modest measure for Gumshoe and myself. The

72
remaining glass and the nearly full bottle I had left on the other
end of the desk.
"You look like you could use a drink," I said to Nether.
He looked up blearily, seeming to catch sight of the booze for
the first time.
"Not just now," he said, "Maybe later."
I was beginning to wonder just how much of an alcoholic Nether
really was. In fact, I was beginning to wonder all sorts of things
about my elder brother.
Fortified by the whiskey, I had been pacing up and down, chain-
smoking cigarettes and either thinking or just trying to wear out
the carpet. There was definitely more going on here than met the
eye.
"Right then," I said in a determined voice, loud enough to make
both Nether and Gumshoe sit up and take notice, "That little
escapade was all very exciting, but we're no closer to finding out
exactly what happened to Rosie."
"Oh, we've learned something," Nether said wearily, "We know
that our sister and Urquhart Garrick were running a grey-area
import-export business" - flat-out illegal was my view, but I let it
ride - "and it was almost certainly the route by which Rosie was
returned to the surface. And possibly abducted, too."
"Yeah, well," I replied laconically, "But we don't know who, and
we don't know why. And you said you wanted to know those
things."
Nether just nodded.
"So what next, then?" he said, half to himself.
While we had been waiting for Nether, I had called my message
service, using one of those nearly-secret telephone numbers that
allow calls to be made to numbers in the Lower Realms from a
phone on the surface, or vice versa. There was just one message,
from Luncardy and typically terse: "My office. 4pm."
"You, just stay here and look after Rosie," I instructed Nether,
then turned to Gumshoe, "I take it you've not got anything out of
your contacts in the NYPD?"
"No," he replied, "I'll better go bother them some more."
“Okay. But do me a favour. Come back here this evening.
Hang around in the bar. Maybe the regulars will be a little more
talkative. Besides, you might get a free drink.”
Gumshoe shrugged.

73
 “That wouldn’t be too much of a hardship,” he said, his face
breaking into a wry grin.
Nether roused himself.
"And what are you going to do?" he demanded.
"Put some more enquiries in motion," I said obscurely, "Down
below. And before that, I'm going to visit a lady."
*
Gumshoe left quietly, the silence only broken by the rumble of
him starting his ancient car outside. After he left, I turned to my
brother.
"Are you sure there's nothing else you want to tell me, Neth?"
He shook his head sadly.
"There's nothing else I can tell you," he said with a strange
inflection, "I am relying on you, you know."
"Yeah, okay," I replied, "You look after your tame human, and
I'll get going."
"Look after yourself, too," he urged, "They're tough worlds out
there, okay?"
I nodded and adjusted my hat to maximum tilt. Time to up my
attitude a notch or two.
*
Captain Luncardy's office was just as cool and organised as the
last time I was there. The same could be said for the Captain
herself. As I was escorted in, she held her long elegant cigarette
holder in one hand, forgotten, smoke trailing lazily to the ceiling,
as she studied the contents of a thin manilla folder intently. She
looked up, frowned slightly at me, then placed the report carefully
back on the polished surface of the desk.
"You're late," she said bruskly, conveying with economical
gestures that the young copper who was my escort should leave
and I should sit.
I sat and looked at my watch. Three minutes after the time she
had stipulated; not bad by my standards. Once again, I was
reminded how very glad I was that I did not have Luncardy for a
boss.
The Captain regarded me coolly for a long moment. I toyed
with my hat in my hand, waiting for Luncardy to speak. She was
the kind of person who would say what she had to say, only when
she was good and ready.

74
 "I have to confess that you have managed to interest me,
slightly," she said finally, contriving to sound as if this was entirely
against her better judgement, "It seems that your mysteriously-
disappearing brother has a connection to somebody who I have
been investigating for quite some time now."
"How so?" I asked, trying with modest success to keep the
sudden interest out of my voice. I don't think I was successful.
"Your brother was on the Missing Persons list for a long time,"
Luncardy snorted, "Yet his file is surprisingly thin. He seems to
have pulled down the curtain quite successfully for a long time.
Nobody seems to know where he's been and there's certainly
nothing definite on his whereabouts in the file at all."
Luncardy paused, puffed on her smoking stick for a moment
and blew smoke over her shoulder.
"About the only concrete thing that is in the files," she resumed,
"Is a reference to one Coupar Angus, who's got a very curious
reputation on the street, and is somebody I would very much like
to interview."
"Why don't you just pull him in?"
"Because he's done nothing illegal, at least anything that we
have any chance of proving," she growled, "And, contrary to
popular belief, we do have to have a reason to bring people in for
questioning."
"So who is this Coupar Angus?"
"He's in business as a Realtor," Luncardy said thoughtfully,
"Offices in several caverns. Fair enough. But he seems to have a
very odd client list: bankers, racketeers, gamblers, the occasional
politician. Lots of people who might just have money acquired in,
shall we say, ways that we, or the tax office, might want to know
more about."
I had been trying without success to crane my neck to read the
notations in the file that Luncardy was holding. All I could be sure
was that the file had Nether's name on the front.
"Okay, so he might have information about what Nether's been
up to," I said uncertainly, "Where will I find this Angus guy?"
"Huh. Use the Telephone Directory. Let your fingers do the
walking."
Luncardy took another drag on her cigarette and added, "Or,
even easier, you could just ask your sister. She's had business
dealings with him, not so long ago."

75
 I hate coincidences. Both my siblings turn up and employ my
professional services, within hours of each other, and now they've
got a disreputable businessman in common, and a dodgy import-
export business. It looked like I was being taken for a patsy,
again. Not good, Gask.
The Captain shook her head, then leaned forward, gathered up
the papers on her desk and slipped them back into the file.
"That's what I've got, Gask. More than you deserve," she said
curtly, "And don't make a habit of turning up like this. I've got
plenty of real police work to do."
She slid Nether's slim file to one side and picked up up another,
fatter folder that sat hitherto unregarded on the other side of the
polished desktop. She opened it and started reading. It seemed I
had been dismissed. I stood up and put my hat back on.
"Oh, and Gask," she said, looking up again just as I was about
to leave, "One last thing. You might find out why your brother's
file has an FI stamp on it."
Federal Interest. Just my luck. I would be asking my brother
some much more pointed questions when I next got my hands on
him.
*
There was just enough time, I hoped, to make one last call
before most businesses started to shut up shop for the evening
rest period. Well, most conventional businesses, those businesses
conducted at least mostly legally. Those convinced of the truth of
the statement "crime doesn't pay" should take a very close look at
the way those less-legal enterprises are at work twenty-four hours
a day. And some more legitimate ones - like mine, for example.
Once I was a few blocks away from the 14th precinct police
house, I ducked into a sidewalk diner, one I had never visited
before. I didn't think anybody was following me; it was just the
normal kind of paranoia that everybody in my profession seems to
develop after a few years, if you manage to survive that long.
I sat in a booth right by the public phone, one with a good view
through the windows. I ordered a coffee from a sullen youth in an
apron; the beverage was delivered quickly and with a notable lack
of delicacy. I sipped my coffee - it was weak and stale-tasting -
while pretending to be immersed in a day-old newspaper that some
previous customer had left on the bench. After ten minutes, and no
sign of a tail, I simply followed Luncardy's advice: I looked up
Coupar Angus in the Yellow Pages.
He was remarkably easy to find in the directory. At the
beginning of the appropriate section I could not help but notice a

76
half-page advertisement proclaiming in bold type: "Coupar Angus
and Associates: Realtors. Exclusive properties in all areas." I
jotted down addresses and phone numbers in my notebook, threw
a small bill on the table to cover the price of my coffee - a total
ripoff - and set off at a brisk pace in the direction of the nearest
transit tube entrance.

77
 Chapter 11 – A Painful Truth

I was just in time to catch Mister Angus at his office. The office
building itself was a masterpiece of modern architecture and
interior design, all plate-glass windows and furniture formed from
angled lengths of chrome-plated tubing supporting black leather
bolsters. The lights were on and at least some of the desks visible
through the glass were occupied.
I marched straight up to the door, following the School of Ham
Acting approach and attempting to give every impression that I
had the wealth and influence which would make buying one of the
properties on sale here a mere blip on my bank balance. It must
have worked. The doorman opened the door for me and ushered
me inside, his smart uniform and peaked cap not quite successfully
disguising the crooked teeth, broken nose and slightly run-to-seed
look that marked him out as a retired pugilist.
A young female Goblin sat behind the reception desk. She was
dressed in a sharpy-cut business suit set off my no more than the
minimum of discreet but tastefully expensive jewellery. A trust-
fund babe, I surmised, working while waiting to be introduced to
her future husband, somewhere which required manners and class,
but nothing much by way of vital business skills, like typing. The
desk itself was formed from what appeared to be a single block of
polished green granite and marked with a helpful sign which read
"Reception" but was otherwise devoid of decoration or even an
appointments book.
The youngster - surely no more than fifty - looked up as I
sauntered in, a polite professional smile tightening her lips but
somehow failing to quite reach her eyes.
"I'd like to see Coupar Angus, please," I announced breezily,
looking around as if I had designs on buying the whole joint.
"Do you have an appointment?" she asked primly.
"No," I replied, looking her up and down with a bare minimum
of interest and the faintest of sneers, "But I'm quite certain he'll
want to see me anyway. We have business to discuss."
"I'm not sure whether Mister Angus is available," she said,
slightly more uncertainly, "Let me check."

78
 She asked my name, which I gave, truthfully - false names
always give rise to future misunderstandings, and I didn't want to
get on the wrong side of those draconian Goblin laws about
misrepresentation of identity - and suggested I take a seat for a
moment.
I nodded my thanks and sat in one of the smart-looking but
incredibly uncomfortable chairs in the waiting area. The
receptionist toddled off to a door marked "Private", ducked inside
for a few moments, then returned to her post, eyes downcast and
careful to avoid acknowledging me in any way.
I wondered what tack Angus would take to get rid of me. It
didn't take long for me to find out. A few moments later, Couper
Angus himself bustled out of his office. He was a big Goblin, as tall
as me and quite a lot heavier, and with what is usually described
as a larger-than-life personality. I know the type: he probably
liked to think he is coming across as avuncular, but ends up just
being a bore. This particular sample sported a loud double-
breasted suit with a waistcoat buttoned tightly over his expansive
belly, complete with a fob-watch on a chain, booming voice and, as
I was about to discover, a crushing handshake.
"Mister Gask," he cried, grasping my hand with unnecessary
firmness as I levered myself from the chair.
I returning the handshake with slightly more than enough force
to make it plain I wasn't intimidated by it.
"Mister Angus," I replied, "I'm sure we haven't met but I've
heard good things about you. You may have just what I need."
"Well, delighted to meet you, dear boy, but I'm afraid it'll have
to wait. Need to rush off now, don't'cha'know. But Belna, my
receptionist will fit you in, tomorrow, perhaps the day after."
He glanced at the young female behind the desk, who took her
cue flawlessly.
"Full diary tomorrow, sir," she interjected, "Three o'clock the
day after?"
Angus's attention swung back to me.
"Works for you?"
I nodded amiably, as if I had all the time in the world.
"Sure. If it has to wait, too bad," I drawled, "Day after
tomorrow. It's a date."
I swung on my heel and set off for the door, where the
doorman tugged open the door for me with alacrity. Once on the
pavement, I affected a jaunty swagger and set off in the direction

79
of the nearest travel tube entrance. I glanced back just once; the
doorman, the receptionist and Coupar Angus himself were
watching me with more than casual interest.
Once definitely out of sight, I ducked into the shadows and
doubled back, sticking to the narrowest of alleys until I reached a
point with a decent view of the realtor's offices. I did not have
long to wait. Within ten minutes, Mister Angus himself appeared at
the front door, his bulk now swaddled in a heavy overcoat. He was
followed out by a few of his workers, although not the snooty
receptionist or the thuggish doorman. Left behind to secure the
place, I imagined.
Angus was not hard to follow. His height meant that he stood
out in a crowd and he appeared to be making no effort to lose
anybody who might be following him. A perfect mark. I kept well
back, merging with knots of pedestrians as much as I could and
keeping to the shadows when I couldn't. I followed him to a bar
called the Deepest Joy, a bar where I had been before, just once
and very recently. I wondered whether that was just a
coincidence.
*
I hung around outside alley that led to the Deepest Joy for ten
minutes or so, trying to look inconspicuous. I needn't have
bothered. Nobody passing by paid me the slightest bit of
attention, and probably wouldn't have done so even if I was naked,
painted in yellow and purple stripes, and performing handstands.
I decided I had waited long enough and strolled casually down
the alley to the nearly-hidden tavern doorway. Once inside, I
stood quietly for a few moments while my eyes adjusted to the
gloom, then made my way to a vacant stool at the bar itself. As I
seated myself, the skinny barkeeper scurried up, apparently
wearing the same green waistcoat from my previous visit. There
was a faint glimmer of recognition in his eyes, although nothing of
that recognition was apparent in his professional demeanour.
"What'll it be?"
"Scotch on the Rocks."
The whiskey appeared almost instantly, neatly laid out with a
paper coaster and a little bowl of spicy toadstool snacks. I sipped
the drink - a decent measure - and nodded approval; I was pretty
sure I had got a better class of single malt than any average Joe
would have received.
I beckoned to the bartender whose name I recalled as Gaur -
confirmed by his badge, of course - and pointed out Angus, who
sat at a small table away from the bar itself. One of the waiting

80
staff was presenting him with a large glass of dark liquid - his
second, judging by the empty being collected - and a bowl of bar
nuts, into which he immediately dug one paw into and scooped out
a handful.
"What do you know about that one?" I asked quietly.
Gaur looked over briefly, then leaned forward confidentially.
"He comes in here almost every night. Don't know his name.
He drinks much, but not too much eats the bar snacks greedily,
tips meanly when he is on his own and overtly generously when in
company - which doesn't happen often. Always pays cash. Oh,
and he eyes up the females in a hungry kind of way."
I nodded. No doubt a shady place like this would attract
unattached ladies of a variety of kinds, all trouble.
"So he likes the ladies, does he?" I sneered.
"I guess he does, but," Guar hesitated for a moment, then
when on, "Only in a theoretical kind of way. He never approaches
any, never tries to talk to them. Frankly, he doesn't seem to be
able to summon the backbone."
"So who does he talk to?"
Gaur shrugged.
"He occasionally meets people here, males always. They're
always strangers; they arrive, seek him out, take just one drink,
talk to him for a while, then leave. Otherwise keeps himself to
himself. Never any trouble."
"So, a good customer then?"
The bartender snorted.
"As good as any we get here."
Just at that moment, Coupar Angus caught sight of me across
the bar. Even from that distance, I could see a frown wrinkling his
forehead; the familiar look of somebody who recognises another -
they are almost certain of it - but cannot quite place when or when
they met.
I swallowed the rest of my whiskey and threw a few bills on the
bar - enough to pay the bar tab and a generous tip to thank Gaur
for his helpfulness, and to ensure his future helpfulness, too. It
was time to leave. I needed more information; I had someplace
else I needed to be tonight.
*
My face was getting to be too well-known to pass unnoticed in
many parts and, if I was going to make any headway on the two

81
cases, I needed to be in several places at once. I decided to
employ a couple of other professionals; good though Gumshoe
was, he wasn't going to be much help down here in the Lower
Realms.
To that end, I was currently hanging out in a bar in one of the
better class of downtown hotels, toying with a small bar snack and
a large Scotch, and waiting for the ladies to arrive. A few quiet
enquiries on street corners had led me to this joint; apparently the
ladies I sought would come in here maybe four nights in seven. I
was hoping my luck held this evening.
Using the mirror behind the bar, I kept half an eye on the guys
- they were mostly male - who started appearing in the room.
Most were part of two or three groups which rapidly got louder and
drunker as more individuals joined the party, then the whole group
would peel away, off to a restaurant or some other entertainment.
The remaining few sat quietly, nursing expensive drinks and toying
with Club Sandwiches, generally reading magazines or typed
documents that practically had Important Work written on them in
large letters.
I was three-quarters of the way down my over-priced and bland
whiskey when the ladies I sought arrived. The noisy parties had
long since departed, and the quiet room collectively held its breath
as the two pretty females made their entrance. Grinning, I turned
around on the bar stool and waved unsubtly for them to join me.
It was a pity to spoil the drama of their entrance, but needs must.
"Good evening, girls," I said cheerily as they approached, "Buy
you ladies a drink?"
Arlie and Lorny were definitely professionals, yes, but not
detectives; the ladies were both long-standing members of the
oldest profession of all. They had no other names that I knew or
they would admit to - not that it really mattered who they really
were, as far as I was concerned. Their professional rates are
probably higher than mine, on a daily basis at least, but both of
them owed me a favour, after a case I worked on years ago
seemed to lead to them being implicated in a grisly murder. They
were innocent - of the murder, at least - and I got them off without
unnecessary entanglements with the police.
"Findo Gask," Arlie said, her hands firmly on her hips, "Turns up
like a bad penny. I knew life had been too good recently."
"Now, now, ladies," I admonished, a wry smile cracking my
features as I looked them up and down, "That's not very friendly, is
it? No way to greet an old friend, a guy who needs to call in a
favour."
"Huh," Lorny responded, "Now he wants something."

82
 Arlie wore a low-cut crimson top which exposed a considerable
amount of décolletage and was barely held in place by thin
shoulder straps, set off with a black leather miniskirt and
teeteringly high-heeled boots, also black. Lorny had eschewed the
subtle approach of her friend altogether and was clad in an eye-
wateringly tight cat-suit in some shimmering blue and
exceptionally elastic material which left even the most casual
observer in no doubt exactly where all her curves were.
Lorny turned to the bartender, who had approached with
professional efficiency.
"Champagne," she said firmly, to Arlie's evident approval. Then
she turned to me.
"Then, Mister Findo Gask, you can tell us all about your little
problems."
Were they trustworthy? Almost certainly not, at least, not
entirely. But the offer of a small payment in advance and the
promise of more money would ensure their cooperation, and all for
a little meeting and greeting, a little careful observation, with their
clothes on, and not even having to bed anybody at the end of the
evening.
*
I spent quite some time in the bar briefing Arlie and Lorny on
the tasks I wanted them to do. This was accompanied by much
banter and ribald humour which did not quite conceal the
seriousness of the challenge we faced. I also helped to pour the
girls' Champagne - I didn't drink any of it, not to my taste - and
otherwise feed and entertain them. After that, I left them to their
own devices and made my way back to my own little apartment.
Back home, I took a long shower - it had been a long and
sweaty day - wrapped myself in my favourite dressing gown and
poured myself a small nightcap to top up the Scotch I had
consumed at both bars I had been in tonight. I sat in my favourite
armchair, the lights down low, with a notebook in my lap, and my
cigarettes and matches conveniently to hand on a side table. I sat
and thought for a long, long time.
It was time I faced an uncomfortable, even painful truth: my
brother was not really a drunk, a runaway, a ne’er-do-well who had
taken refuge in a bar in the surface world. The alcoholism and the
Irish leprechaun impersonation was all just an act, a cover to throw
the most curious off the scent - even professionally curious types
like me, or even Trinity. Nether was almost certainly an agent for
the Feds.

83
 Well, perhaps a word or two of explanation might be required
for some of my readers.
In principle, there are still independent state governing bodies
covering groups of caverns, large and small - the "Realms" of the
"Lower Realms" - but nobody takes them in the least bit seriously,
not even in an election year. The state legislature has become a
haven for tin-pot politicians of all brands and flavours; indeed,
these state institutions could have been invented just to keep that
kind of interfering busybody harmlessly occupied.
In reality, it is the Federal government which holds all of the
reins of power in our society. Oh, of course there are a plethora of
elected officials in the Senate, where there is much heated debate
and politicking, but little policy is decided; most of the real control
is delegated to the organs of bureaucracy. The bureaucrats really
decide what happens in the Lower Realms, all of them.
Amongst the legion responsibilities of the Federal bureaucracy
is deciding what items of commerce can, and what can not, be
exported to the upper world, and what could be imported from the
surface. Of course, this includes the granting of licences to those
who were permitted to undertake such businesses and the
extraction of considerable customs duties from the revenues of
those licensed import/export companies.
Inevitably, smuggling and customs duty evasion was
widespread, leading to a thriving black market. The Federal
customs authorities had plenty of highly-visible, uniformed officers
to discourage the illegal trade. But it also had more secret,
undercover operatives, in whose number, I was now nearly sure,
was counted my very own brother, Nether Gask.
I finished my whiskey and went to bed.

84
 Chapter 12 – Overt Threats

There was no need to rush the following morning. I slept late,

dressed at a leisurely pace and strolled down the street to David's
diner for a substantial late breakfast assisted by three cups of
strong coffee and a leisurely wander though the morning
newspapers. Well, that's what I had in mind when I went to sleep.
Needless to say, what actually transpired was nothing like that at
all.
I was woken in what felt like the middle of the night by the
phone ringing. I was awake enough to snatch it from its hook by
the fourth ring. It was Gumshoe. I had long ago trusted him with
one of the telephone numbers which allowed the redirection of calls
from the surface world to the Lower Realms, although with a strict
admonishment to use that facility only when absolutely necessary.
Gumshoe's opening gambit brought me to full alertness in an
instant, exactly as if somebody had thrown a large bucket of ice-
cold water over my bed-sheets.
"Gask? It's Gamshack. There's a suspicious guy hanging
around Chill's Bar," he said without preamble, "He’s been there all
night. Been badgering the regulars."
"A human?" I asked, answered by Gumshoe's immediate
affirmative grunt, "What's he look like?"
"A big man, muscular, late thirties maybe," the other detective
replied, "Looks like he might have been in the military at some
point. Speaks with a distinct British accent. Oh, and he has
shoulder-length blond hair."
Goblins are naturally entirely hairless, and it takes a certain
twist of the average Goblin mind to fully comprehend the hirsute
nature of the surface dwellers, and the implications of a feature
that so often appears in human descriptions of other humans.
We’re much better at languages, though.
"It's Rigg!" I breathed.
"What's that?"
I explained to Gumshoe at some length. Rigg was a human I
had tangled with before. He even got the drop on me once. I

85
wasn't about to let that happen again in a hurry. Besides, I had a
score to settle with that particular man.
"Well, he's back," Gumshoe said bluntly, "And definitively
making a nuisance of himself. Though I think I scared him off."
From his description, it seemed that a few hours after I had left
Chill's Bar, a stranger had appeared; one with an apparently
bottomless wallet, intent on striking up conversations with anyone
who would entertain him and buying drinks for the most chance
acquaintance. All in all, the man was behaving much as Gumshoe
himself had attempted on his first visit to the pub, although with
less subtlety and a great deal more pushiness.
I sat on the side of the bed in my nightshirt and quizzed
Gamshack carefully enough to piece together the whole story.
Rosie had felt well enough to return to her familiar place behind
the bar, chatting to the regulars, and enjoying the warmth and
humour of their company. Gumshoe himself had been keeping a
lookout in the shadows, sipping a light beer on a bar stool at the
far end of the counter, although it was clear to the more observant
of the clientele that, rather than being an unwanted interloper, he
was now in a position of some trust. Nether had been staying
completely out of sight, holed up in his secret room, presumably
out of some hyper-developed sense of caution.
Rigg had appeared at the door, shaking raindrops off his
expensive yet fashionably understated leather coat. He was at first
perceived as harmless, just another passer-by, but he soon set
about buttonholing everyone present in a determined fashion.
Even the resident bore who had persuaded Gumshoe to depart on
his first visit seemed unable to upset Rigg, and the threat of
unreasonable violence had noticeably zero effect on the hard man
with what looked like a background in Special Forces.
Rosie, seeing what was happening, closed the bar at the
earliest acceptable hour, the regulars taking the hint and slinking
off to their homes, or whatever passed for that establishment, with
a minimum of fuss. Rigg made no attempt to out-stay his welcome
but gave every appearance of finishing his last drink, extending a
cheery goodnight to all his new best friends and wandering off -
apparently slightly unsteadily - into the night.
Gumshoe wasn't fooled. After the bar was locked up and the
lights turned right down, he kept watch from behind the closed
blinds of the bar and through the hidden observation lenses that
prudent publicans in both worlds deploy to ensure that no
undesirables are hanging around after closing time. For a long
time, all was silent, as silent as the grave, maybe – or at least
some graves.

86
 *
An hour or so of careful observation made it clear to Gumshoe
that there were watchers abroad; Very good watchers,
professionals. He noticed shadows in places where there shouldn't
have been shadows, observed the tell-tale twist of the head from
the vry occasional passer-by glancing into the darkness of alleys
and doorways where they had caught the suspicion of somebody
concealing themselves.
After a hurried whispered conference with Rosie and Nether,
who had emerged from his hiding-place after the clientele had
been ejected, Gumshoe decided on a course of action. With my
brother's assistance with the tricksy Goblin magic, he made his
way out of the secret exit then, using his own New York street-wise
smarts, he made his way around in a rough circle, following his
nose through the back alleys and making a reasonable job - for a
human, of course - of remaining undetected.
Unexpectedly, Gumshoe disturbed somebody at the far end of
an alley, a man dressed entirely in black; not Rigg, he was
immediately certain, but a smaller man with swarthy skin and dark
hair, which he took to be a henchman or hired hand of some kind.
Startled by Gumshoe's sudden appearance, the goon dropped
whatever it was he was holding and darted off, yelling some kind of
warning - either a code word or in a language that Gumshoe didn't
recognise. The detective chased him, but the man in black got
away; his deftness and his head start allowing him to lose
Gumshoe almost immediately in the maze of alleyways and
dumpsters that threaded behind the buildings.
Backtracking rapidly and - I strongly suspected - cursing
profusely, Gumshoe returned to the place where he had disturbed
the henchman. At first, there seemed to be nothing to be found,
but then his foot nudged something hard and heavy which turned
out to be a lump of cement which looked like it had come from a
building site. It was the object the mystery man had dropped.
Gumshoe picked it up. There was a note taped to the block, the
words formed in the time-honoured way from cuttings from a
newspaper pasted onto a sheet of paper, no doubt.
"What did the note say?"
"This could have been a Molotov Cocktail," he intoned.
I drew a blank.
"What's that?" I said after a moment.
"A bomb," Gumshoe said slowly, clearly, "A gasoline bomb; a
bottle filled with flammable liquid, and with a wick to explode when
the bottle breaks."

87
 "Ah," I said levelly, "Nasty."
"Indeed. And it is a very British term," the human detective
went on, "The devices were used by paramilitaries of both sides in
the recent Irish troubles. Rosie would know what it meant."
A worrying development. Somehow, Rosie knew something or
somebody that made her worth threatening.
"Where are you now?" I asked.
"Back inside the bar," he replied, sounding just a little weary,
"Rosie and Nether are still here. I've sent Rosie off to bed. Nether
and I have been keeping watch. There's no sign of anyone
hanging around at the moment."
"Do you want me to come up?"
"Nah. I don't think there's anything you can do. In any case,
I've a better idea."
Gumshoe suddenly sounded smug.
"There's a private security firm I know," he went on, "Did a job
for the boss once, not so long ago, so he owes me a few favours.
I'll give him a call, get a few of his boys around here to flash a bit
of muscle. That should prevent any problems, and give me a
chance to get back to my place and get tooled up."
Gumshoe didn't usually carry a gun. He was clearly sufficiently
rattled to break this particular habit. I hope he didn't do any
stupid.
"Fine. But be careful," I said, emphasising the last point.
Gumshoe snorted.
"You got it," he agreed, "One last thing. Nether said he was
coming down."
My brother, returning to the Lower Realms. Another worrying
development.
"Okay," I replied slowly, "Where does he want me to meet
him?"
*
It took me a few minutes to gather my wits after the shock of
being awakened ludicrously early and the alarming tale that
Gumshoe had told. I pulled myself together with the aid of strong
black coffee - not completely poisonous - a quick shower and a
much-needed cigarette. Then I pulled on some clothes, and my
coat and hat, and went out.

88
 The meeting with my brother in the Lower Realms was for
breakfast at David's diner. Nether obviously knew more about my
habits than he let on when we had met again so recently. Or
perhaps I shouldn't be surprised. He always was a smart boy,
excelled at school and destined to be a high-flyer, until whatever
event caused him to drop out of sight.
By the time I arrived, Nether was already settled at a table near
the front, sipping coffee and reading a newspaper with the ease of
one who had all the time in the world. He glanced up and waved
languidly when I entered and looked around. I gently deflected
David, the avuncular patron, who was trying to usher me to my
usual quiet booth at the back, and slid into the chair opposite
Nether.
"Good morning, Findo," he said, folding his paper neatly and
placing it on the table.
"Nether," I responded curtly.
David bustled over, clutching two menus - not that I needed
one, of course - and proffered them deferentially. Nether took the
card graciously, with the air of one who has spent their entire life
dining in fine restaurants. Maybe he had, for all I knew. I was
beginning to wonder just how much I really knew about my elder
brother.
"I'm buying," he said, placing the menu on the table in front of
him and nodding to David, who was hovering at a discreet
distance. Not that Nether's offer was particularly generous.
David's diner was generous with its portions and not at all
expensive. It offered solid traditional Goblin cooking - heavy on
the fungus - rather than haute cuisine and costly imported
ingredients.
The avuncular patron, displaying much more deference to my
brother than he had ever done to me, bustled over. Nether
unselfconsciously ordered the most expensive item on the menu,
while I took the blue-plate special which would, I felt sure from
long experience, offered the best ratio of stomach-filling to wallet-
lightening.
Our breakfasts appeared in double-quick time, delivered by
David himself, rather than one of the interchangeable youngsters
he habitually employed to heft plates from kitchen to table and
back again. I tucked in heartily while my brother picked at his own
plate with apparent indifference. Nether wisely declined to engage
me in conversation until the food and more coffee hit the point, the
calories beginning to compensate for the short night's sleep and
the shock of awakening.

89
 Chapter 12 – Overt Threats

There was no need to rush the following morning. I slept late,

dressed at a leisurely pace and strolled down the street to David's
diner for a substantial late breakfast assisted by three cups of
strong coffee and a leisurely wander though the morning
newspapers. Well, that's what I had in mind when I went to sleep.
Needless to say, what actually transpired was nothing like that at
all.
I was woken in what felt like the middle of the night by the
phone ringing. I was awake enough to snatch it from its hook by
the fourth ring. It was Gumshoe. I had long ago trusted him with
one of the telephone numbers which allowed the redirection of calls
from the surface world to the Lower Realms, although with a strict
admonishment to use that facility only when absolutely necessary.
Gumshoe's opening gambit brought me to full alertness in an
instant, exactly as if somebody had thrown a large bucket of ice-
cold water over my bed-sheets.
"Gask? It's Gamshack. There's a suspicious guy hanging
around Chill's Bar," he said without preamble, "He’s been there all
night. Been badgering the regulars."
"A human?" I asked, answered by Gumshoe's immediate
affirmative grunt, "What's he look like?"
"A big man, muscular, late thirties maybe," the other detective
replied, "Looks like he might have been in the military at some
point. Speaks with a distinct British accent. Oh, and he has
shoulder-length blond hair."
Goblins are naturally entirely hairless, and it takes a certain
twist of the average Goblin mind to fully comprehend the hirsute
nature of the surface dwellers, and the implications of a feature
that so often appears in human descriptions of other humans.
We’re much better at languages, though.
"It's Rigg!" I breathed.
"What's that?"
I explained to Gumshoe at some length. Rigg was a human I
had tangled with before. He even got the drop on me once. I

85
wasn't about to let that happen again in a hurry. Besides, I had a
score to settle with that particular man.
"Well, he's back," Gumshoe said bluntly, "And definitively
making a nuisance of himself. Though I think I scared him off."
From his description, it seemed that a few hours after I had left
Chill's Bar, a stranger had appeared; one with an apparently
bottomless wallet, intent on striking up conversations with anyone
who would entertain him and buying drinks for the most chance
acquaintance. All in all, the man was behaving much as Gumshoe
himself had attempted on his first visit to the pub, although with
less subtlety and a great deal more pushiness.
I sat on the side of the bed in my nightshirt and quizzed
Gamshack carefully enough to piece together the whole story.
Rosie had felt well enough to return to her familiar place behind
the bar, chatting to the regulars, and enjoying the warmth and
humour of their company. Gumshoe himself had been keeping a
lookout in the shadows, sipping a light beer on a bar stool at the
far end of the counter, although it was clear to the more observant
of the clientele that, rather than being an unwanted interloper, he
was now in a position of some trust. Nether had been staying
completely out of sight, holed up in his secret room, presumably
out of some hyper-developed sense of caution.
Rigg had appeared at the door, shaking raindrops off his
expensive yet fashionably understated leather coat. He was at first
perceived as harmless, just another passer-by, but he soon set
about buttonholing everyone present in a determined fashion.
Even the resident bore who had persuaded Gumshoe to depart on
his first visit seemed unable to upset Rigg, and the threat of
unreasonable violence had noticeably zero effect on the hard man
with what looked like a background in Special Forces.
Rosie, seeing what was happening, closed the bar at the
earliest acceptable hour, the regulars taking the hint and slinking
off to their homes, or whatever passed for that establishment, with
a minimum of fuss. Rigg made no attempt to out-stay his welcome
but gave every appearance of finishing his last drink, extending a
cheery goodnight to all his new best friends and wandering off -
apparently slightly unsteadily - into the night.
Gumshoe wasn't fooled. After the bar was locked up and the
lights turned right down, he kept watch from behind the closed
blinds of the bar and through the hidden observation lenses that
prudent publicans in both worlds deploy to ensure that no
undesirables are hanging around after closing time. For a long
time, all was silent, as silent as the grave, maybe – or at least
some graves.

86
 *
An hour or so of careful observation made it clear to Gumshoe
that there were watchers abroad; Very good watchers,
professionals. He noticed shadows in places where there shouldn't
have been shadows, observed the tell-tale twist of the head from
the vry occasional passer-by glancing into the darkness of alleys
and doorways where they had caught the suspicion of somebody
concealing themselves.
After a hurried whispered conference with Rosie and Nether,
who had emerged from his hiding-place after the clientele had
been ejected, Gumshoe decided on a course of action. With my
brother's assistance with the tricksy Goblin magic, he made his
way out of the secret exit then, using his own New York street-wise
smarts, he made his way around in a rough circle, following his
nose through the back alleys and making a reasonable job - for a
human, of course - of remaining undetected.
Unexpectedly, Gumshoe disturbed somebody at the far end of
an alley, a man dressed entirely in black; not Rigg, he was
immediately certain, but a smaller man with swarthy skin and dark
hair, which he took to be a henchman or hired hand of some kind.
Startled by Gumshoe's sudden appearance, the goon dropped
whatever it was he was holding and darted off, yelling some kind of
warning - either a code word or in a language that Gumshoe didn't
recognise. The detective chased him, but the man in black got
away; his deftness and his head start allowing him to lose
Gumshoe almost immediately in the maze of alleyways and
dumpsters that threaded behind the buildings.
Backtracking rapidly and - I strongly suspected - cursing
profusely, Gumshoe returned to the place where he had disturbed
the henchman. At first, there seemed to be nothing to be found,
but then his foot nudged something hard and heavy which turned
out to be a lump of cement which looked like it had come from a
building site. It was the object the mystery man had dropped.
Gumshoe picked it up. There was a note taped to the block, the
words formed in the time-honoured way from cuttings from a
newspaper pasted onto a sheet of paper, no doubt.
"What did the note say?"
"This could have been a Molotov Cocktail," he intoned.
I drew a blank.
"What's that?" I said after a moment.
"A bomb," Gumshoe said slowly, clearly, "A gasoline bomb; a
bottle filled with flammable liquid, and with a wick to explode when
the bottle breaks."

87
 Trinity was waiting for me. She had correctly identified the
least disreputable of my guest chairs and was sitting with every
evidence of patience: most unlike her, really. Perhaps she really
hadn't been waiting very long; after all, it was still early - at least
by my standards - and I had not been detained all that long by
breakfast with Nether.
"Findo," she said sardonically as I entered, "Nearly keeping
office hours these days?"
"Usually," I agreed amicably, "Delayed by a breakfast meeting
with our dear brother."
That wiped the faint smirk from her face. She scowled at me
suspiciously.
"What did he want?"
I grinned at her, then swung around my side of the desk and
slotted myself into the squeaky swivel chair.
"He wanted to give me some words of advice," I replied.
"Care to tell me what they were?"
"No."
"Do you intend to follow his advice?"
"Not sure yet. Maybe."
Trinity huffed in exasperation then, perhaps realising she wasn't
going to get anywhere with this particular line of questioning,
promptly changed the subject. She drew out a folded newspaper
which had been wedged between the shiny black leather that
covered her thigh and the tatty leather that covered the arm of the
chair, and flung it on the desk in front of me. She tapped urgently
at a few column-inches.
I picked it up. It was the very same newspaper and the same
report that Nether had brought to my attention no more than an
hour ago. I did my best to hide that fact from Trinity, trying
instead to give the impression of reading it closely, pursing my lips
as I did so. Finally I tossed the paper back on the desk with a
shrug.
"Pretty run-of-the-mill journalism, don't you think?"
"I'm not interested in a critique of the writing, you jackass,"
Trinity said, "It's a report of the raid on the warehouse yesterday."
"I guessed that," I agreed, "Just one of those risks you take
when you run a black-market operation, I expect."
"But it wasn't supposed to be an illegal operation!" Trinity
exploded, "I was set up."

93
 *
I suddenly found myself paying a lot more attention to what my
dear sister had to say. I sat up straight and leaned forward over
the desk, looking closely at Trinity to detect any signs of duplicity
or deceit. But she seemed to be entirely earnest in what she said,
completely truthful.
"It was supposed to be a licensed company, entirely legit and
above board," she insisted, "Garrick even showed me the
documents, and I checked them most carefully."
I should explain at this point that the authenticity of most
documents, legal and the like, is enforced by the use of a
specialised glamour, a magic that means that document forgery in
the Lower Realms is an extremely rare phenomena. The glamour
usually used is one of these sensitive psychic types that give any
reader of a document an uncanny sense of the true intent of the
parties involved in the contract. There is no point is trying to lie or
dissemble under these circumstances since the magic will
inevitably point out the deceitful purposes. This expectation, borne
out by a long and ancient history, gives most Goblins an almost
reverential view of contractual documents, although the more
cautious will still invoke the glamour that confirms the legitimacy.
"You saw the official permits?" I asked in a level tone.
Trinity nodded wordlessly.
"I've been in business a long time," she asserted, "I've set up
partnerships before. I know the form, and I always check that the
documents are genuine."
"Careful with you choice of business partners, aren't you," I
responded ironically, "But it didn't stop you having a concealed
exit, though, did it?"
Trinity snorted.
"I'm not that trusting," she said, "And I'm pretty certain that
Garrick didn't know about that particular rat-hole. Besides, it was
on the surface; you'd want a hidden way out, wouldn't you?"
I had to agree with her. Folks like me can't be too careful up
there. There are too many rumours, too many dark tales, both
folklore and legend from long ago and urban myths from more
recent times. I would bet that the particular exit we used wasn't
the only one that provided a swift retreat from the warehouse.
But, since it used mostly human-constructed tunnels, it might have
been the only one constructed without the aid of magic, and
therefore not susceptible to detection from an adept like Garrick.

94
 There was no doubt that Professor Urquhart Garrick was indeed
an adept; one skilled in the ways of magic. Certainly, he might be
one skilled enough to falsify the credentials on an official permit.
That would be typical of Professor Garrick's style, and his warped
but still considerable genius. But, why bother - unless it was part
of some deeper play, some long-term plan.
"Well," I admitted, "You think Garrick forged the documents and
set you up?"
Trinity nodded again. It could be a coincidence but, on balance,
I was inclined to agree with her suspicions.
I sat back in the chair, the tired springs squeaking like a mouse
in a trap.
"I take it you still want me to track down Professor Urquhart
Garrick, then?" I said, affecting a degree of boredom with the
whole proceedings.
"Yes, I do," Trinity snorted, clearly spotting my pose for what it
was, "He owes me, big time. But you don't seem to be making
much progress at the moment."
"Well, he's a wily old bird," I said, "But I do have a lead, and a
plan. So why don't you just leave me alone to get on with it?"
*
After Trinity left, I sat and stared out of the window and
thought for a long time. Once again, I wondered how a Goblin - an
individual not easily mistaken for a human except in conditions of
near darkness – would manage the purchase of something
substantial in the upper world. Like a house, for example? I knew
from previous experience that Garrick had been a long-time
resident on the surface, so he must have managed it. And, if I
knew anything about the crafty old academic, he would have
avoided unnecessary risks.
After a few seconds thought - lasting, as is usual, for several
minutes - the answer was plain enough. It was the same way I
would do things in the upper world whenever possible: I use an
agent. To buy a house, I would use an estate agent, a realtor, a
realtor with good connections, perhaps even connections with
somebody in the same business in the Lower Realms. His
connection would be a Goblin with his own shady connections:
somebody known to a drunk who might also be a Federal agent;
somebody who ran a protection agency who might not be too picky
about the individuals she protected; in short, one Coupar Angus.
Talking of agents, it was time to catch up with Gumshoe again.
I was able to reach him by phone at his office at the first try. This

95
might have been a first; under normal circumstances I somehow
always end up talking to an answering machine.
"Everything okay at Chill's Bar?"
"All quiet," he replied, "I've got a few reinforcements in place."
"Good. If it's okay with you, leave the protection of Rosie to
your friends," I advised, "They don't need to know what's really
going on but I'd have thought that a small threat of violence in an
Irish bar in New York is unlikely to ring any alarm bells with them."
An inarticulate grunt was my only indication of Gumshoe's
agreement with my assessment. This was as much As I could
expect under these conditions.
"You caught up with any of your contacts in the NYPD?" I
asked.
"Nah. Got side-tracked," he replied, "You think it's time to have
another go?"
"I think you should," I assented, "See if you can find any traces
of Rigg and his merry men."
"Yeah," Gumshoe growled, "I'd like to catch up with that
particular individual."
"Good idea," I demurred, "And, in the meantime, I'll see if I can
shake a few leads loose down here."
I spent the next few hours pottering about the office sorting the
mail, which did not take very long at all, since most of what I
receive are either bills or circulars. The junk mail I filed in the
round cabinet I keep for this very purpose under the desk, but
some of the bills were sufficiently red and annoyed-looking that I
squandered more of my siblings' money on making payments. I
wrote cheques and licked stamps, interspersed with making a few
phone calls, until I had built a tidy pile of envelopes on the desk.
I took a stroll along the street to the post office to deposit the
letters, with only a momentary twang of conscience at spending
money I had not yet entirely earned. I returned to my office to
consume a perfectly adequate lunch of sandwiches and beer -
sliced smoked rat on toadstool flour bread, if you want to know -
bought from the deli counter further down the block. After eating,
I put my feet on the desk, tugged my hat over my eyes and settled
down for a long afternoon nap.
*
The sting on Coupar Angus went almost exactly as planned. I
don't really like this kind of approach; for one thing, it's not exactly
legal. But Angus was a sufficiently oily character - and one with a

96
sufficiently dubious reputation - that I was able to overcome my
qualms fairly easily. There might have been another way of
making progress in the case, but nothing had presented itself so
far, and I was running out of options.
It was early evening by the time I awoke, alert and refreshed
and ready for action. I made my way to the lower levels and found
the slightly sleazy rooms that the girls had rented - with a portion
of my advance - in a quiet side-street not very far from the
Deepest Joy. Obviously, I wasn't present in the bar that evening -
one sniff of my involvement would surely have tipped off of Angus,
and I wasn't necessarily sure how much I could rely on Maddoes’
discretion either, but I got it all, in stereo and in considerable
detail, from Lorny and Arlie later on.
The ladies had arrived and stationed themselves prominently at
the bar shortly after Angus's usual arrival time. The realtor was
already installed at his usual table, his usual drink already mostly
consumed. The two girls were wearing the kind of clothes which
would get them noticed - especially in a joint like the Deepest Joy -
but not so low-cut that their true intention - or profession - was
immediately apparent.
Lorny and Arlie had treated the obvious interest from Angus as
a flattering advance, rather than with the lofty distain that his
clumsy approach usually instilled. At the first opportunity, and
without waiting to be invited, my two accomplices joined Coupar
Angus at his table. Over the next few hours, they allowed him to
buy them endless drinks and, in the fashion of those professionals
who depend on their clients being at three sheets to the wind,
managed to avoid drinking more than a very little from any of the
glasses.
After much small talk, and a fair amount of overtly suggestive
body language, Lorny and Arlie guided Angus to the nearby rented
rooms. Once inside, they sat him on the bed, one girl either side,
and loosening his clothing with the aid of much fumbling and
panting on his part, and a certain amount of smooching on theirs.
Meanwhile I, hidden inside the darkened and partially-closed
cupboard, and equipped with the powerful camera which is an
essential part of any PI's kit, took a considerable number of
photographs of a ruddy-faced Angus and the two smiling girls.
With the prints in my hand - Goblin photography has long
dispensed with such cumbersome techniques as chemical
developers - I stepped from my hiding place to confront Coupar
Angus. I stalked over to where he sat on the edge of the bed,
flanked by the comely and widely-grinning forms of Lorny and
Arlie. He recognised me immediately, as I had expected he would,
despite the copious quantities of alcohol he had consumed.

97
 "You!" he exclaimed, nearly incoherent with shock and
indignation, "What are you doing here?"
I didn't answer. Instead, I snapped a phial under his nose, a
Goblin potion which had the disturbing effort of sobering him up
almost immediately. Then I shoved a sheaf of photographs into his
hand, allowing him time to realise exactly what kind of
predicament he found himself in, and handed the rest of the
pictures to Lorny. Angus looked around wildly for a few panic-
stricken moments, as if he were a cornered animal seeking some
kind of escape. There was none.
I turned and waved at the retreating forms of the girls on the
way out of the room, who nodded with the respect of one
professional to another. Once the door had closed behind them, I
bent to straighten Angus’s necktie, leaning forward so that my face
was close to his as I did so.
"Mister Coupar Angus," I whispered in his ear, "I hope you are
feeling alert and receptive to a suggestion or two. Perhaps ready
to answer a few simple questions? Otherwise, I may feel
compelled to make some different suggestions to your good lady
wife."
Angus stiffened perceptibly at that suggestion, then his
shoulders sagged in defeat. He knew when he was beaten.
"What do you want to know?" he asked despondently.

98
 Chapter 14 – Surface Treatment

I let go of Angus's necktie and pushed him back on the bed. He

was cowed to the point where he sat there meekly, like a
schoolboy caught out-of-bounds and now awaiting a visit to the
headmaster's study.
"I'm going to mention a number of individuals by name," I said
slowly and clearly, "I want you to tell me everything you know
about them: what business dealings you've had with them, where
and when you've met them, anything you may have seen or
overheard."
I picked up the remainder of the photographs, which had
slipped onto the bedcovers, and arranged them in a neat stack.
Then I fanned them under his nose. He shrank away as if they
smelled of something bad, really bad.
"You need to work hard to convince me that you're not holding
out," I went on calmly, "Otherwise the lovely Missus Angus will be
getting an express delivery package she might not be expecting.
Am I making myself entirely clear?"
Angus nodded sadly, his head in his hands.
"Okay. First up, Miss Trinity Gask."
Angus's brow furrowed with something which resembled honest
thought. I don't suppose this was something which bothered him
very often.
"The bodyguard company? Yeah, I've done several deals for
them. Quiet little places in obscure out-of-the-way spots. Often
able to shift properties that nobody else seemed interested in.
Paid cash, eventually. Sometimes had problems in collecting the
payments but I always got the money in the end. Steady repeat
business - not something you see often in my line of work."
"Now that’s a good start," I nodded sagely, "You should keep it
up. We'll come back to that individual later. Now I have a second
name for you: Mister Nether Gask."
Coupar Angus's face furrowed suddenly, as one trying to be
shrewd under difficult circumstances.
"So this is a family matter, is it?" he asked sharply.

99
 Gask is not a particularly unusual name for a Goblin family, so it
coming it twice could well be just a coincidence. But three times,
well - as the expression goes - that is a conspiracy.
"It might be," I growled, "But that's none of your business.
Your business is to tell me what I want to know."
"Okay, okay," Angus muttered, "I got the message. Nether
Gask, your relative" - he flicked a glance at me as he spoke, which
bounced off my poker face - "he wanted to buy a property in the
human world."
He stopped, again glancing slyly at me as if judging my
reaction.
"Let me guess," I said sardonically, "Some out-of-the-way
cottage, miles from any other building?"
"No," Angus replied, sounding genuinely surprised, "He wanted
to buy a bar, a pub, in a slightly sleazy part of the human city
called New York. I never could work out want he would want with
a place like that. A strange kind of name, too - some kind of joke
or pun I can never remember."
"Chill's Bar," I said in English.
Angus looked up sharply.
"That's the one," he said, "you've heard of it, then?"
"I may have come across it," I replied, "So how did you go
about helping Nether with his purchase?"
"I'm a Goblin with connections, a great many connections,"
Angus said with a trace of smugness in his voice.
"Yeah, yeah. And what connections did you use in this
particular case?"
Angus sat back on the bed, adopting more of the demeanour he
would have done in his own plush offices and surrounded by his
own flunkies.
"I’ve worked with a number of realtors and estate agents in the
human world," he said, "In this case, the firm of Huntly and
McCash acted on my behalf."
"On Nether's behalf," I corrected.
"Yes, yes, of course." He waved a hand dismissively. "It was
easy enough. The seller wanted to sell; the buyer had the money
and no appetite to haggle. I just arranged the legals and the
money transfers."
"And no doubt you made a pretty penny in fees and
commissions."

100
 "No more than the usual, for a sale of this kind," he responded,
only slightly defensively.
"Uh-huh," I snorted, "I guess you're on the level. Okay.
Contestant number three, then. Professor Urquhart Garrick."
Instantly, his face went pale and he started shaking. His
mouth dropped open and his eyes went wide with shock. He
looked terrified, frightened out of his wits.
"I'm not telling you anything about that," he croaked.
*
I bent forward and grasped Coupar Angus warmly by the
necktie again, then tugged his unresisting form towards me.
"Look," I growled in his ear, "You clam up on me now, you’ll
regret it when your wife finds out about this evening’s little
entertainment."
"You may be right," he replied with more spunk that I might
have given him credit for, "But at least I'd be alive and in one piece
to enjoy the legal skinning I'd get from the divorce lawyers
employed by my shortly-to-be-ex-wife."
I pushed him back on the bed, where he sat passively, cradling
his head in his hands.
"What do you mean?" I demanded roughly.
"Garrick said if I was to mention any of his business to
anybody, if any of it were to come out, then he'd know where the
information had come from. He said he'd track me down and
dismember me limb from limb, then make me choke on my own
fingers."
I couldn't see Garrick actually issuing such a threat; such
crudely graphical language was not his style. But I did suspect
that he had used a hypnosis glamour: an old-fashioned spell which
had convinced Angus had he was indeed in mortal danger were he
to divulge a single one of Garrick's secrets.
There was no way the simple threat of a messy divorce - for a
Goblin who has married money, I suspected - would overcome
such a deeply-held conviction that his life was in peril. It looked
like I may have been wasting my time after all.
"Look," I said more gently, "I can make this all go away. I'll
leave you alone, but you've got to give me something in return. I
just need a name. A person, a place, anything. Something I could
have got from somebody other than you, conceivably. This is your
chance to keep your life intact."

101
 Coupar Angus sat shaking on the bed for a long moment, then
he looked up and croaked two words at me, so softly I could barely
hear him. They were the last words he would speak to me. After
that, he collapsed into some near-catatonic state, so that I had to
practically manhandle him out of the door and point him in the
direction of home.
The words that Coupar Angus spoke were: "Dulelm Hollows."
Now, my problem was: who or what in the two worlds was
Dulelm Hollows?
*
The answer came from Gumshoe the following morning. The
name sounded like something in one of the surface languages,
probably English, so making a telephone enquiry with the human
detective seemed like a sound plan. I left a message on his
answering machine; Gumshoe almost never picks up the phone
when somebody calls.
After some searching, he phoned back with a report that Dulelm
Hollows was in fact a place in the surface world, in up-state New
York, in fact, not two hundred miles from New York City itself. A
quiet little village, apparently, a real backwoods place - and with a
reputation for unexplained phenomena: spooky noises, strange
creatures sighted, houses reputed to be haunted. It sounded just
like the kind of place a retiring Goblin might set up a hideout.
"Good work, Gamshack," I said, "I think a little investigation in
person is called for, don't you agree?"
"Sure," he replied, "This afternoon? Give me a chance to rattle
the cages at the NYPD some more?"
I agreed. Gumshoe also reported that it has been all quiet
overnight at Chill's Bar. The presence of Gumshoe's heavies
seemed to have scared off Rigg and his crew, at least for the time
being. Gumshoe had spent some part of the evening at the bar,
but had to contend with nothing more stressful than fending off
unwanted drinks from Rosie and her staff.
Gumshoe's NYPD contacts hadn't turned up any trace of Rigg
himself as yet. Frankly, I wasn't surprised. The goons were
probably just local muscle, and Rigg himself had probably jetted off
to some other part of the world on another mission.
I did get a message, one I didn't expect. It was from Luncardy.
Rather than her usual brusque instructions, this one was lengthy
and dripping with intended irony.
"Well, Mister Gask, you do seem to have stirred things up. If
you could spare a few moments in your busy schedule, perhaps

102
you would be good enough to drop by the office and explain it all to
me."
I went immediately. I know a direct instruction when I hear
one.
*
I was sitting in the lobby of the 14th precinct police station,
waiting for one of Luncardy's officers to come and guide me to the
Captain herself. I knew the drill by now: some young copper
would appear, guide me wordlessly to Luncardy's office and close
the door behind him. Then Luncardy would deign to notice my
presence, snarl at me a bit, and finally get around to talking about
whatever nugget of information she chose to deposit in my lap.
So it was quite a surprise when the great lady appeared in the
lobby herself. I stood up politely as she approached, my hat in my
hand, and nodded a greeting.
"Let me buy you a coffee, Gask," she said without preamble,
taking my elbow briefly and guiding me towards the main doors.
"Sure thing," I answered, "I'd be delighted."
I screwed my hat back on my head and followed her down the
steps and along the street. We walked in companionable silence
along the busy pavement to a coffee shop on the corner of the
block, one I had not been in before. The coffee shop was busy
enough, but not particularly full, and there were a dozen or more
unoccupied tables at the rear of the joint.
The waiting staff clearly recognised Luncardy, and we were
immediately shown to a quiet booth at the back. The Captain
ordered coffee for us both - strong and black - which appeared
almost immediately. I sipped at it - it was good, just the way I
liked it - while watching her over the rim of the cup. She took her
cigarettes and holder from the pocket of the mannish jacket she
habitually wore, screwed a cigarette into the holder and put the
end in her mouth.
Finally, she felt it was time to open up.
"There was a raid a couple of days ago," she said, blowing
smoke over her shoulder, "On an unauthorised import/export
operation in some outlying cavern, with the upper end in up-town
New York."
"I did read something in the newspapers," I said laconically,
"How did you find out about this operation?"
"We had an anonymous tip-off."
"How anonymous?" I pressed urgently.

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 "What do you mean?" Luncardy asked, apparently mystified.
"'Anonymous' as in 'we're not telling' or 'anonymous' as in 'we
genuinely don't know'?"
Luncardy's handsome face screwed up into a frown.
"We genuinely have no idea," she said slowly, a trace of
suspicion in her voice, "It wasn't from any of our usual sources.
None of the usual agencies had any leads. Then we get a phone
call, followed up by a note, with photographs. Photographs of your
errant sister, amongst others."
"I'm not surprised," I said calmly, sipping at my hot coffee
again.
"All right," Luncardy continued, suddenly more suspicious,
"What do you know about this raid?"
"I was there," I said simply, "I ran away."
Luncardy leaned forward over her coffee and waved the lit end
of her smoking stick under my nose.
"Gask," she growled, "I should have known. You seem to have
the knack of being in the right place at the wrong time. Want to
tell me all about it?"
Luncardy was a good cop, painfully honest. She could be
trusted, mostly. I told her everything, leaving out just one tiny
detail, for reasons I didn't know at the time. I emphasised that
Trinity thought she was running a legitimate operation and had the
documents to prove it. I told her that Trinity was in business with
Urquhart Garrick, which made Luncardy narrow her eyes. I told
her that Rosie recognised the warehouse through a haze of
memory glamours, that Gumshoe was helping me find out what
happened to Rosie. I told her about our escape through a hidden
tunnel - a human tunnel, not magical - that nobody except Trinity
knew about.
What I left out was the presence of Nether at the warehouse.
When I finished speaking, Luncardy blew smoke and ignored
her cooling coffee.
"Okay, Gask," she said grudgingly, "I think I can accept we're
on the same side here. If you see your sister, you might persuade
her to come and talk to us. We'll catch up with her eventually
anyway, and it would good if she came in by herself."
"If I see her, I'll tell her," I agreed, although I wasn't expecting
to see Trinity unless she wanted something from me.

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 "And this Urquhart Garrick," she said, emphasising her words
carefully, "He's a wanted criminal. You hear anything about his
whereabouts, you talk to me first. Okay?"
I nodded. It wasn't a promise I necessarily intended to keep.
Without another word, Luncardy crushed out her cigarette with
her long string-but-slender fingers, stood up in one smooth
movement and stalked out of the coffee shop.
*
I sat in the back of Gumshoe's ancient Oldsmobile, dark glasses
and brimmed hat sheltering me from what little light leaked into
what a human would consider a dimly-lit interior. Gumshoe was
concentrating on driving in heavy New York traffic - a task that
required the sounding of the horn at what seemed like ten-second
intervals - working his way out of the city and onto the freeway
which would take us most of the way to Dulelm Hollows.
After Luncardy had left, I finished my coffee slowly and tried to
piece together what I knew. There must be some common thread,
some sequence of events or interests linking together the people
and their motives, but it sure eluded me. This is not unusual; I
could accept that I may never learn the full details, but I was quite
certain that I would be able to discover a good deal more. I sure
wasn't going to give up just yet.
A little later, I arrived at Gumshoe's office using much the same
route as I had used the last time. With little ado, he swept me
down to the quiet street where he had parked his car and ushered
me inside. Now there was little for me to do; at our present rate of
travel, we should arrive at Dulelm Hollows in the early evening,
just when it would be getting dark, so that I would be able to move
around without undue discomfort. I tugged my hat down further
over my eyes and settled back for a catnap.
Gumshoe's resources turned up a little more information. It
seemed that Dulelm Hollows had long had a reputation for
unexplained happenings and ghostly sightings which appeared to
have become more pronounced in recent years. From the reports,
perhaps three buildings, all in isolated areas well apart from the
main settlement, were thought to be haunted and were generally
shunned by the local residents, especially after nightfall.
Gumshoe woke me when we drew up outside the first of the
properties on his list. The rumble of the engine died away to
nothing. He got out of the car cautiously, leaving the door wide
open. After a careful look around, he held the seat forward for me
to exit. We spread out and moved towards the abandoned
building.

105
 It had once been a farmstead of some kind, built of heavy dark
stone and heavy dark wood. Now, the windows and doors were
boarded up, and there were several roof tiles missing. It was set
in a clearing at the edge of a wood, with farmlands on the other
three sides. Even though sun had just set, a light mist was already
forming around the trees in complete defiance of everyday
metrological expectations. And it was quiet; even the birdsong
was muted and distant.
Gumshoe loosened the pistol in his shoulder holster, a nervous
reaction common to many in our profession and allied trades. He
clearly felt uncomfortable, on edge, although if he were challenged,
he would have found it hard to articulate just what was upsetting
him.
I already knew what was upsetting him. One of my senses was
tingling, alerting me to something I should have guessed. There
was magic here. Pervasive, old-fashioned magic, the kind used
thousands of years ago when there were more Goblins on the
surface, magic used to scare away any iterant humans from areas
which my people wanted to keep private.
Another of my senses was telling my something else. Goblins
have a very well-developed sense of smell, and get used to the
odour of one another. My nose told me there were no Goblins
here, hadn't been for a long time. And no humans, either. This
place was as abandoned as it looked.
"Gamshack," I called out wearily, "We're wasting our time
here."

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 Chapter 15 – Protective Circle

All three buildings on Gumshoe's list were the same:

tumbledown old properties where no human had lived for many
years. We looked around all three carefully, forcing open shuttered
windows and nailed-up doors, just in case my senses were
mistaken, but my first impression was the right one: no Goblins
and no humans anywhere, and hadn’t been for decades.
In between times, back in the car, I explained to Gumshoe
more about the glamours that I had sensed, long-established
glamours that were obvious in their presence - to a Goblin - at all
of the places we visited. Spells that induced a deep-seated sense
of unease in any nearby human; glamours projecting apparitions,
barely seen from the corners of the eye, hideous sounds emanating
from unexpected directions and unexplained movements of
physical objects when one's back was turned.
Gumshoe, to his considerable credit, toughed it out. Once he
understood that the sensations he was experiencing were a
deliberate attempt to scare him off, he was determined to remain
undeterred - although he looked absolutely terrified throughout the
whole grim ordeal. I was fine, of course - such magics are
carefully tuned to human sensibilities - and I did my best to shield
Gumshoe from the worst of the effects.
A few hours of investigation had us no further forward. We had
scoured three places, all within a mile or so of each other, their
locations roughly distributed around the hamlet of Dulelm Hollows.
All of them were carefully constructed to speak directly to the dark
side of every human psyche; all of them could easily be used as
hiding places for Goblins on the run, but all had certainly been
untouched and unoccupied for ages.
What, I sincerely wanted to know, did Garrick want with these
places? Were they some kind of hiding-place, as a fall-back, a
long-shot? Perhaps that would be a sensible precaution for such a
secretive and much sought-after Goblin. But why three hideouts
so close together? Any sniff of a trail leading to Dulelm Hollows
and all of the places would be identified immediately by any Goblin
with an ounce of magical training. It didn't make any kind of
sense. Perhaps it was some kind of elaborate double-bluff, but I
suspected not. There was something here we were missing, some
aspect both Gumshoe and I had overlooked.

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 *
I returned with Gumshoe to New York City and to his office,
feeling increasingly despondent.
I was getting nowhere fast. Nether was stone-walling me on
his motivations, as well as what he had really been doing for the
last hundred years or so. I was fairly certain there was something
he knew that would help break this case but I was short of a lever
to pull to prise it out of him.
Trinity appeared to be a victim of Garrick's dissembling and
trickery, and was probably on the run, now being perceived as a
criminal. Maybe she would get in contact soon; maybe I should
have asked her what she was going to do. On the other hand,
asking Trinity anything was not guaranteed to get a
comprehensible answer, or at least an answer anybody could
believe.
Coupar Angus had clammed up on me, frightened out of his
wits - quite literally - by Garrick's glamours. The entire set-up with
Lorny and Arlie had been a waste of time; I had used the favour I
had banked with the girls to no avail.
Gumshoe’s contacts in the NYPD seemed to be coming up dry.
I hadn’t really expected he’d be able to get close to the group
which had raided the warehouse. They would be some special task
force of human police, operating with minimal involvement of the
regular cops.
Rosie was also a victim, barely able to remember anything of
the ordeal - which was probably just as well - and appeared to
have been an innocent bystander - or at least just a cover story -
caught up in the action.
Dead-ends in every direction. Time to circle around and try
again, and hope for a break.
*
I sat and chewed the fat with Gumshoe in a desultory kind of
way. There wasn't much he had to add. Just then, the phone
rang. He ignored it; so did I. It rang four times, then the
answering machine cut in with Gumshoe's recorded no-nonsense
tones.
"Gamshank, PI. I can't take your call right now. Leave a
message."
At the time, I thought this was the break I was hoping for, that
Gumshoe's contacts had finally came up trumps. The caller was an
old acquaintance of his, a long-time copper in the city's police
force.

108
 "Hi, it’s Jaz. Just got off-shift. If you want to buy me a beer,
then meet me at the usual bar. I've got something you might want
to hear about some guy named Rigg."
Gumshow sat for a moment then glanced at his watch.
"I'd better do this one on my own. That bar is pretty crowded
and rowdy, especially late at night. My friend Jaz can be a bit
rambling when he likes, and he'll probably want me to buy him
beer all night."
"Okay," I agreed, "But put it on expenses."
The muffled rumble that was Gumshoe's laughter indicated that
he knew just what I meant.
*
I got a report by phone from Gumshoe early the following
morning, before I even made it into the office. He had caught up
with his contact in the bar, fed him a series of beers and bar
snacks, and listened to the old copper rattle on. Eventually, and
with many detours and distractions, he got to an interesting bit of
station-house gossip.
Jaz's story was that, the night before, somebody had got drunk
in a bar. Not of itself such an unusual event, of course. People get
drunk in bars all the time - even done it myself a time or two. Yes,
I know, you just wouldn't believe it, would you?
However, this particular drunk - a human, name of Milton -
started telling wild tales of strange creatures abroad in New York:
monsters and aliens of multitudinous aspects and diverse habits,
and invisible beings spying on innocent citizens. His tales had
attracted a crowd, some of whom had taken it into their heads to
buy him more drinks, perhaps just to hear him crazy-talk.
Through the haze of alcohol, he finally detected the derision and
disbelief in his audience. At this point, he got surly and
argumentative, which soon erupted into a full-blown bar-room
brawl rowdy enough that a couple of uniformed cops had to be
called in to break it up.
Milton himself was the only one stupid enough to hand around
when the police cruiser arrived. The cops hauled him away and
threw him in the drunk-tank, along with the night's other catch of
belligerents and ne’er-do-wells. He howled and wailed so loudly
and so piteously that the police medical examiner was soon called,
who rapidly concluded he was suffering some kind of psychosis
beyond the usual pink elephants stage of delirium tremens.
The strength of Milton's delusions clearly made an impression
on both examiner and the assorted uniformed coppers, enough so

109
that it became the subject of the day's gossip around the the water
cooler. Gumshoe's contact Jaz would have thought nothing of it if
Milon hadn't also mentioned the name "Rigg" repeatedly.
"Rigg'll be back," Jaz had reported Milton’s words, "To take
down the evil creatures. He'll send them back to where they came
from or blow them away where they crawl."
It all sounded very promising, I thought.
"Can you get to interview this psycho?" I asked urgently.
Gumshoe's laughter rattled the receiver in my ear.
"That's funny, Gask," he said, "My contact assumed I would
want to talk to this Milton guy. Jaz will have a word with his
Captain when he gets on-shift. I should be able to talk to Milton
himself later today."
*
On the phone, I briefed Gumshoe on what he should attempt to
get out of Milton, although he probably would have asked the right
questions anyway. Gumshoe was a professional and almost
certainly knew better than I what buttons to press to persuade a
human to open up.
It would be a few hours before he would be able to apply the
metaphorical thumbscrews to Milton, so I wondered what I might
do to advance the case in the meantime. Eventually, I decided
there was some legal research I could catch up on. I walked the
few blocks and took a couple of transit tubes to the downtown
area, and thence to the Public Library.
The Library was a grand old building with high stone walls and
tall columns and high overlapping domes, a veritable fortress of
learning, a stronghold against those who would misappropriate the
learned contained within.
I spent a couple of hours in there, reviewing various tomes with
some assistance from the Goblin librarian - a dried-up old stick of a
spinster who looked accusingly at me of the top of her half-moon
spectacles until I showed her my PI buzzer. Then, she suddenly
turned into helpfulness personified: nothing was too much trouble
for an officer of the law, or some close facsimile thereof.
What I was in the library to research was the Federal Interest
marker. I had heard something of the nomenclature before; I had
a dim memory as a minor part of the very fine police training
course that was wasted on me some years ago - indeed, quite a lot
of years ago. But I needed a refresher, and what I revised was
certainly of enormous interest.

110
 I made my way back to my office, my head in a whirl. I now
knew clearly that the FI indicator in official reports - those of
government bodies of various flavours, the police, medics and
hospitals, and so on - indicates that the subject should be
automatically regarded as above suspicion. Indeed, above the law.
There must be no questioning, no detention, nothing to prevent the
subject from going about their business, left alone to do what they
must do without let or hindrance.
Anybody encountering the Federal Interest mark was effectively
instructed to refer any enquiries to the Office of Internal Security, a
shadowy arm of government whose responsibilities were defined in
the vaguest possible terms. I felt it was better not making
enquiries with that Office, especially if I wanted to move around
without constant surveillance for the rest of my life.
It was not at all clear whether all this had any bearing on the
case - both cases - I had so precipitously become engaged in. But
I had a sneaking suspicion that it did have more than just a minor
bearing. And I was more than ever convinced that what my dear
brother Nether was telling me - or, more precisely, not telling me -
was of vital importance.
*
The ringing of the phone startled me from my reverie. It was
another urgent call from Gumshoe.
"Gask," he said, "It's Milton. He's been released already. Long
gone by the time I got there."
"How so?" I demanded, "I thought they were keeping him in for
psychiatric evaluation?"
Gumshoe's derisive snort was clearly audible over the phone.
"They got lazy, maybe," he replied gruffly, "Couldn't be
bothered with the paperwork. So they just charged him with drunk
and disorderly behaviour."
"But how did he get out of the cooler?" I insisted.
"Somebody made his bail," Gumshoe said, "According to Jaz,
one of the slime-ball sharks from those law practices that represent
known criminals turned up clutching a bail bond. Twenty thousand
dollars."
I wondered where Milton came up with that kind of cash. More
importantly, who would find the money to get a drunk with verbal
diarrhoea out of the cells.
"Go on," I growled, already suspecting the worst.

111
 Gumshoe told me that the lawyer was accompanied by another
man, tall and powerfully built, expensively if understatedly
dressed; one who affected a military bearing, spoke not at all and,
most tellingly, had long blond hair.
"Rigg," I breathed, "The bastard!"
"He certainly matches the description," Gumshoe agreed.
And it told me where the bail money came from, too.
The blond man was apparently greeted warmly by Milton,
although his effusive greeting was cut short by a curt hand gesture
for silence. After that, Milton waited meekly while the paperwork
was sorted out, then was briskly guided by the lawyer out of the
building followed by the blond man. The last anyone saw was
Milton being driven off in a large but anonymous-looking car.
"Can you track him down?" I asked.
"I can try, sure. Jaz has a few ideas, and he seems curious
enough to give me a hand - and a ride in his cruiser. You stay put
and I'll call you again when I have any news."
*
After I hung up on Gumshoe, I slumped in my broken-down old
swivel chair and wondered exactly what it was that Milton knew
about Goblins. The authorities in both worlds work very hard to
make sure the existence of the Lower Realms is known only to a
few. It sounded like Milton had picked up a few snippets,
somehow, but did not really understand the whole truth of the
matter.
I got up and strode across the office, thumping my hand on the
filing cabinet in frustration. What was the connection between the
drunk and Rigg? Was there also a link to that old reprobate
Garrick? Or to Nether’s activities, or Trinity’s? There were pieces
missing, pieces that Milton might be able to provide – or at least
direct me to a snippet or two.
I had been pacing the already worn and grubby carpet in my
office when I got a second call from Gumshoe. It was bad news -
worse news, even. Milton had been found, shot at close range, in
the back seat of what was probably the very car that had been
used to collect him from the safely of the police station. The car
itself was a wreck, having somehow managed to fail to crash
through the barriers that separated the road from the dock; the
vehicle was probably intended to have disappeared into deep water
and not found for a long time.
All this Gumshoe had picked up by listening to the police radio.
The call had come in while he and Jaz were investigating one of

112
several dives and low-life watering-holes apparently frequented by
Milton. It seemed that Gumshoe was not the only one with
contacts in the NYPD; there was another who was prepared to kill
to keep a secret. This looked like a panic reaction, especially when
much easier and less terminal methods - magical methods, of
course - are available for dealing with incidents which risk the
general exposure of the Lower Realms to the surface population.
"They must be getting desperate," I told Gumshoe, after he had
related the details, "Or maybe we are getting close to something."
I didn't add, although it doesn't feel like it at the moment.
Gumshoe's grunt of acknowledgment suggested he thought much
the same. But I had another concern, a more immediate one.
"Look, there's one other person who has already demonstrated
that she could remember enough to identify suggestive detail," I
said urgently, "Rosie's life is in danger."
Gumshoe got the message without further prompting.
"We've got to get over to Chill's bar right away."

113
 Chapter 16 – Question of Motives

By the time I got to Chill's Bar, Gumshoe had been there for
less than twenty minutes. An impressively speedy response; I
suspected his New York traffic navigation skills had been tested to
the limit. He had probably worn out his horn just getting here that
quickly. And there was an unusually strong smell of burnt tyre
rubber wafting around, too.
Gumshoe's first action had been to politely dismiss the man he
had called in a favour to provide security at the bar, and his hired
hands, reasoning correctly that none of us could take the risk of
them observing me at close quarters. It would get too messy, too
much risk of discovery. We would be better off without them, for
all the additional manpower they provided. Besides, there were
certain advantages - certain magical advantages - which I could
use if there were fewer human around to observe the effects or, at
the very least, human observers not on the receiving end of those
effects.
Rosie was in her accustomed place behind the bar. Gumshoe
was standing next to her when I made my way out of the hidden
entrance. Very close, I thought, very close indeed. Practically
touching. I was out of touch of human mores this century - they
seem to change every fifty years or so anyway - but I got the
distinct impression they were becoming emotionally close. But I'm
a Goblin; what do I know about human relationships?
Rosie and Gumshoe were speaking in low voices, so quietly that
few humans would have been able to pick out their words.
"But I don't know anything," she was objecting as I
approached, "I've told you guys everything I can remember
already. Twice."
"Maybe you don't know anything," Gumshoe's basso rumble
replied, "But Rigg doesn't know that. Rigg's a ruthless man with a
lot to lose. As long as he thinks you might know something, your
life is in danger. And just because we've scared him off once
already doesn't mean he won't be back. He's killed others.
Recently. Today, I think."
Gumshoe sure knew how to lay it on thick. Very persuasive.
Unfortunately, I suspected that his assessment wasn't too far from
the truth. This was a dangerous situation.

114
 Moving as quietly as only a cautious Goblin can, I walked up
behind them and said "Hi" casually, which made them both jump,
almost literally, out of their shoes.
"Findo!" Rosie squeaked girlishly, an attitude at odds with her
normal pose of worldly-wise New York bar-keeper.
"Huh, at last," Gumshoe grunted, feigning a degree of coolness
I felt sure he did not really feel.
"Evening, both," I returned chirpily, "Let's see if we can secure
this joint, shall we?"
The rest of the barroom was fairly empty, even by the
standards of an early midweek evening in New York. Rosie spoke
briefly and individually to each member of the waiting staff, who
themselves circulated quietly amongst the sparse crowd
encouraging them to drink up and go home. Meanwhile I kept out
of sight behind the bar.
"Anybody unusual in?" I asked Rosie urgently, "Any strangers,
anyone you don't recognise?"
Rosie glanced around the emptying bar with the practiced eye
of publicans everywhere.
"No," she replied quietly, "They're all regulars. Most of 'em
have been coming in here for years."
One or two of the punters - men perhaps a little wiser than
most, or more courageous, or maybe just more curious - sensed
that there was something going on, some threat unspoken yet real,
and approached Rosie directly with offers of help. Rosie, following
Gumshoe's advice, thanked these few brave men profusely, but
entirely declined their offers, assuring them that all would be well
that to put this evening out of their minds.
With the last of the paying customers - I could not help but
think of them as witnesses in my own mind - having left the
building, we sent the waiting staff on their way. Then we scurried
around closing and bolting the remaining doors, and shuttering
windows as best we could. We extinguished most of the remaining
lights, and did everything we could think of to give the impression
that Chill's bar had simply closed early for a want of paying
customers on this particular evening. I don't think we would have
fooled a close observer, but it was a ploy worth attempting.
Rosie was encouraged to hide in the storeroom, behind the
steel barrels and heavy crates that might provide a little protection
in the event of a fire-fight. I would have secreted her in Nether's
carefully hidden lair, but - even after I knew exactly were it was - I
found no way to open it. I took the precaution of reminding Rosie
of the secret exit from that room, stressing that it was to be used if

115
there seemed no other possibility. But she was not to put her own
life in danger; she should run away, run anywhere, rather than
allow Rigg and his goons to catch her. I really did not want
another innocent death on my hands.
In the sudden silence of the empty bar, Gumshoe and I checked
our handguns and other assets at our disposal, then settled down
to wait. I reminded Gumshoe about the low-rent but surprisingly
effective magic which should disable firearms in my close
proximity. He should keep a good distance from me to ensure his
gun wasn't affected. My own weapon is of course specifically
proofed against such everyday glamours.
We didn't have to wait long.
*
The attack, when it came, was rapid and fierce. It was
probably triggered by the assailants seeing a couple of waiting staff
leaving rather obviously through the rear door. The first we knew
was when the glass on one of the few unshuttered windows
suddenly shattered, followed by something small and heavy
crashing to the floor. The object exploded, quite literally,
showering the floor and furniture with flaming gobbets in every
direction.
The fire caught immediately, charring the heavily varnished
wood furniture and filling the air with dark smoke. Across the
room, I could see Gumshoe reeling back with his sleeve over his
mouth, coughing and retching, desperately fumbling for the fire
extinguisher behind the bar.
Goblins have a particular horror of fire, at least anything larger
than a flame to light a cigarette. It is such a danger underground,
at least in the historical past, what with explosive gases like
firedamp being all too common in mines and caverns, especially
those close to the surface where carboniferous minerals are more
likely to be found. We don't use naked flames for heating - our
caverns are naturally warm enough for our tastes, although most
humans would find them a little chilly - and traditional Goblin food
is served either raw or very lightly cooked.
In all probability, Rigg knew enough about Goblins - or he had
been briefed by somebody who knew very well - to understand that
a Goblin's nerve would be broken by a firebomb. Most humans
would be terrified, too. What the assailant failed to realise that
many Goblins - cautious, old-fashioned Goblins, Goblins who travel
to the surface on a regular basis - carry a glamour to combat fire,
to contain rather than extinguishing the flames. All this is no more
remarkable that a human maintaining a fire extinguisher in their

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car or in their kitchen - a sensible precaution against an everyday
risk.
I was, I suppose, expecting something of this kind. As a matter
of fact, I maintain a collection of useful charms and glamours in the
capacious pockets of my coat: some cheap and everyday, others
much more specialised, expensive, hard-to-come-by and, in a few
cases, entirely illegal.
I was already fumbling in my pocket for the suitable glamour,
trying to identify the correct item from the numerous cheap
cardboard packages in different shapes and colours, when there
was a soft whump. The flames instantly collected themselves
together in an orange-coloured ball that hung in the centre of the
room, leaving charred but rapidly cooling patches where the
flaming liquid had landed.
I turned around slowly. Nether was walking around the end of
the bar counter, dusting off his hands casually, followed by a wide-
eyed Rosie.
"Nether," I said, trying unsuccessfully to keep a derisive sneer
out of my demeanour, "What are you doing here?"
"I thought Rosie might be in danger," he replied softly,
apparently genuine concern radiating from his face, "Looks like I
got here just in time."
Behind me, the suspended fireball spluttered and died,
collapsing inwards and disappearing with a soft pop. The room was
still smoky, although the fug was dispersing rapidly as smoke
poured out of the ventilation ducts and the broken window.
"Come out, Gask!" came a loud voice from outside, "We know
you're in there."
I turned to my brother Nether.
"So which one of us is he referring to?"
*
"That'll be me, then," Nether snorted, grinning widely with
insane enthusiasm.
He suddenly looked confident, bright-eyed and alert, in
complete control of the situation; a far cry from the dissolute drunk
that had appeared so unexpectedly in my office. Whether this was
the result of some obscure and sophisticated magic, or merely
exemplary acting skills, I could not tell. But he was all of a sudden
the clever older brother I used to look up to all those years ago.
Right now, I was probably looking at him slack-jawed, to tell the
truth.

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 "Oh, Rigg realises that there has been some human muscle
hired to provide a degree of security," he went on, "Or at least
something of its appearance."
Nether glanced at Gumshoe, still crouched a little way across
the room, trying to make it clear he was deploying irony liberally.
He needn't have bothered. The human was peering out of the
window holding a handkerchief over his mouth with one hand while
the other clutched a large black automatic pistol in a fashion that
suggested he knew how to use it. I just hoped he had a licence for
it, too.
"But there's every chance he's not noticed your involvement,"
he continued, returning his attention to me, "You're pretty good at
keeping out of sight when you put your mind to it. And you've
sensibly stayed away from this place for the most part."
It was faint praise, perhaps, but I suppose it really was a
complement coming from my older - and, presumably, wiser -
brother. He tapped the side of his nose with a finger to emphasise
his next remark.
"That's why I wanted you to investigate Rosie's disappearance.
You were always much less likely to end up being spotted."
"So what are we going to do?" Rosie spoke up, echoing my own
thoughts. I was still too tongue-tied to get the words out.
"We are going to find out exactly what's going on," Nether said,
"Otherwise people are going to get hurt."
"People have already got hurt," I interrupted, finally finding my
voice "People have died!"
He nodded sadly.
"I didn't know that," he replied, "We'll have to catch up very
soon. But first we have to deal with the minor irritation of these
guys outside."
"And how exactly are we going to do that?" I asked, pointedly
emphasising the same word as he had.
His grin reappeared, wider than before, and his eyes narrowed
in feral amusement.
"We're going to keep them busy out there, trying to smoke us
out of here. While we sneak out the back way and circle round.
See if we can, err, dissuade them from trying anything like this
again."
*

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 It sounded like a plan to me. I wondered if my brother had the
wherewithal to make it work. As it turned out, I was not
disappointed.
Nether put thumb and forefinger into each of the pockets on the
greasy puce waistcoat he wore and drew out a couple of cardboard
boxes with a theatrical flourish. They were glamour boxes, slightly
worn and slightly squished from being carried around for ages, but
undoubtedly intact and ready for activation. He held them up to
me for inspection.
The box in his left hand was a simple smoke bomb, cheap and
readily available. A magic to make smoke without fire, no doubt
intended to give the impression that the firebomb was still burning.
I nodded in understanding and took the little package from his
hand.
The second glamour was much more sophisticated and gave
every impression of being a custom product from some specialist
supplier. I squinted at the crabbed runes on the cover. It was a
mimic; a magic capable of imitating us as if we were all still in in
the bar - complete with coughs, shouts and screams, gunshots
even - but without the obvious repeats that a simple looping
recording would give. I wondered where Nether got this kind of
thing from.
I shouted to attract Gumshoe's attention, then waved him over.
He scurried across the floor, bent double, holding his automatic so
as to be as far away from me as possible.
"Put the gun away, Gamshack," Nether instructed softly, "We
won't be needing it just at the moment."
Gumshoe looked uncertain, but holstered his piece without
comment. Nether then beckoned to Rosie, so that we were all
huddled at one end of the bar counter.
"We're getting out of here. Gamshack, follow my lead, and look
after Rosie," I whispered, "But first we all need to make as much
noise as possible."
"Make like we're panicing," Nether added, "Maybe getting
burned. Coughing from the smoke, that kind of thing."
"That won't be too hard to fake," Gumshoe rumbled.
"And Findo, squeeze off a couple of shots as well."
I nodded again and drew my revolver from my coat pocket.
Nether held up the mimic glamour in its box.
"On my signal," He said, "Three, two..."

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 He waved his hand and mouthed silently a few words, and the
lid of the cardboard box popped open. We all did a very credible
imitation of chaos, panic and confusion for about twenty seconds,
which included me firing my gun in the direction of the already
broken window, then Nether held up his hand to signal us to stop.
But the noise didn't stop. To my ears, it sounded convincingly
like we were all still acting flat out. From all around us came the
sounds of frightened and panicking humans and Goblins,
interspersed with occasional gunshots apparently from a number of
different weapons and calibres.
The spell appeared to be working. Nether dropped the little box
where we stood. I took my cue, read the invocation from the other
spell box then tossed it across the room to a spot close to where
the firebomb had landed. Black billowing smoke started emerging,
unnaturally quickly, and was sucked out of the broken window. It
must have looked very convincing from outside.
"Okay, move!" Nether hissed urgently, "Follow me."
As I expected, we hurried to the back of the building, to the
storeroom which also housed the hidden entrance. We piled into
the stockroom and closed the door behind us, then I moved to the
exit.
"Not that one," Nether said, "They probably know about it. Or
at least strongly suspect. There's a better way."
He made some subtle gesture with his hand that I could not
fully follow and the entrance to his hidden rooms faded into view.
Rosie seemed unfazed by the sudden appearance. I assumed she
had been inside Nether's lair before. It would only be polite, of
course. Inside, Rosie's head brushed the ceiling and Gumshoe,
despite his modest height by human standards, had to crouch
down in an uncomfortable fashion.
"Over here," Nether called, moving to stand in front of a patch
of blank wall behind the easy chairs.
He ran his hand carefully over the expensive wallpaper and
another secret entrance appeared. Goblins always feel much more
comfortable when they have an escape route. In any case, if
Nether had been resident in this bar for a hundred years or
thereabouts, then he would have had plenty of time to install all
kinds of features and facilities. And if he had plenty of money, of
course. Once again, I wondered where Nether was getting all his
money from?
The escape tunnel was magical in its entirety, utilising the same
technology used for the transit tubes underground. There was no

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physical connection between the two ends of the tunnel; it was
almost like stepping though a door from one place to another.
A moment later, we emerged into a dark alley. We could all
hear the tell-tale sirens in the distance as the local forces
responded to reports of flames and gunshots. Rigg's goons no
doubt disappeared into the alleys as soon as the human police
turned up; there was no report either Gumshoe or I could find that
told of any arrests on that night.
But it wasn't the goons we had to worry about. Rigg himself
was standing at the end of the alley; quite a distance away,
beyond the range of my protective glamour. Which was a shame
since, as we emerged, he turned sharply and raised two large and
nasty-looking handguns, taking careful aim in our direction.
" I've been expecting you, Gask," Rigg shouted.
Nether yelled something I didn't catch. His voice was drowned
by the roar of Rigg's pistols. My glamour definitely wasn’t working
But I could see, in the direction Nether was pointing, a suggestion
of a slivery light tracing an outline.
"Move!" I yelled at Rosie and Gumshoe, pushing the bulky
humans with all my considerable strength, assisted by Nether. As
one, we dived headfirst at the blank brick wall opposite.

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 Chapter 17 – Surprise Descent

Our mixed tangle of human and Goblin bodies were sprawled on

the landing mat. It must have been a humorous sight for any
onlooker, although the phlegmatic border guards did not seem to
be particularly amused. Though I did notice that Gumshoe's arm
was wrapped protectively around Rosie. She didn’t seem to mind,
and he didn’t rush to remove it either.
Nether and I picked ourselves up and counted the bullet-holes,
pleased to discover that there were none, while Gumshoe
gentlemanly assisted Rosie to her feet. She looked around wildly
for a few moments then, entirely confused, she turned to Nether.
"What happened?" she asked, adding, "Where are we?"
"It looks like you get your wish after all, Rosie," Nether said
kindly, "Welcome to the Lower Realms."
"This is the Kingdom of the Goblins?" Rosie squeaked, looking
around wildly, "How did we get here?"
"We used an unmarked entrance to the Lower Realms," I
explained, quietly emphasising the correct title.
I should have guessed Nether would have arranged a
convenient way to get below. On the other hand, I was
increasingly worried by just how much Rigg, and logically therefore
Garrick, knew about Nether's operations - whatever they were.
"Wow."
She looked around in awe, speechless. Actually, the current
surroundings weren't particularly impressive: a rather grotty
customs point, typical of those attached to officially-managed
entrances. Which was a shame really, since we had to spend half
an hour hanging around while immigration procedures were carried
out. There was no problem for Nether and myself, of course, and
Gumshoe had visited the caverns before, many years before, in
pursuit of a felon who was in the end very nearly the death of both
of us. Maybe that's a tale I'll document one of these days.
But Rosie had to go through the process, since an immediate
return to the surface was unthinkable, which involved quite a lot of
paperwork. Human visitors down here are not forbidden, but they
are not exactly encouraged, either. Both Nether and I were called

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upon to declare sponsorship and responsibility for the visitors, and
Gumshoe was able to pronounce a few pleasantries in the Goblin
tongue with not too bad an accent, which mollified the border
guards somewhat.
Gumshoe and I found the time to bring Nether up to speed with
what we had discovered about Milton. Later I alone mentioned
Coupar Angus - although omitting the connection with Trinity,
which was her business alone. Nether nodded sagely throughout
and admitted - out of earshot of Rosie, who was chatting excitedly
to Gumshoe and making both of them laugh - that he had bought
Chill's Bar without Rosie knowing about it. He said that he had
masqueraded as a property investment corporation – not difficult
since they are generally low-profile and anonymous organisations
at the best of times - bought the bar when the business got into
financial difficulties, then engaged Rosie to run the place as
manager.
"So securing your hidey-hole up there, then?" I asked
pointedly.
"Of course," Nether smiled gently in return, "Besides, Rosie and
her family have been my friends for generations. It's the least I
could do."
It sure seemed like a good deal all round - if one had the
money to make the investment in the first place.
But now we had more immediate concerns. I lit a cigarette and
found myself trying to imagine how a human visitor to the Lower
Realms would see the familiar caverns and cities of the Goblins. I
guessed I was about to experience that at close quarters.
*
Finally, we were released from the attentions of the border
guards who had completed their tasks with a degree of plodding
efficiency - every "i" crossed and every "t" dotted, or something -
and allowed to go on our way.
A hasty conversation with Nether suggested that we should
travel to my offices, on the grounds that we couldn't think of a
better place to go. It was, at least, reasonably defensible, highly
familiar - to me, at least - and there were a number of additional
resources and other advantages I kept carefully concealed around
the place.
On the way, Nether and I had to keep up a continuous stream
of answers and explanations, Rosie having reverted from being
dumb with awe to child-like curiosity about anything and
everything. Although he didn't ask any questions himself, I did
note that Gumshoe was paying close attention to the answers we

123
were giving, and I didn't doubt that all this information was being
squirraled away in the highly efficient brain that he keeps hidden
away behind his rather bull-like exterior.
She wanted to know how the travel tubes work - an explanation
that neither Nether nor I could manage in English, since neither
words nor concepts seemed to be translatable. We were easily
able to say that this building was a bank and that a hospital, that
this place was a museum, and that a manufactory of everyday and
household glamours, and the shops and markets were self-
explanatory anyway. Of course there were other buildings neither
of us could identify, and I began to realise just how little I knew
about the minutiae of our world.
She wanted to know what held the ceiling up - great big
supporting columns and careful engineering was the short answer -
and whether it ever fell down - never, for the same reasons. She
asked about money and food and clothing, and children and
schools and upbringing, none of which were amenable to any
simple explanation. I felt like a tourist guide, or perhaps a
schoolteacher - neither of which were professions I had ever felt I
had any aptitude for.
As we walked, we kept to quieter streets and byways as much
as we could. Powered vehicles are all but unknown in the Lower
Realms - unlike the plethora of planes, trains and automobiles
which litter the surface world - and the parts of everybody's
journey that is outside the transit tube network is on foot. Rosie
and Nether would always stand out in a crowd, head and shoulders
above everyone else, despite their relatively diminutive stature by
human standards, and humans tended to attract the attention of
passers-by, an attention I was keen to minimise.
In a little more than an hour we were all ensconced in my
office. Rosie was sitting reasonably comfortably in one of my guest
chairs and Nether - entirely at his ease, it seemed - in the other.
Gumshoe, whose bulk would inevitably mean that most Goblin
furniture would be impossible, chose to sit on the floor with his
back to the filing cabinets. I attended to such host-like duties as
the facilities of my office would allow, offering strong black coffee
to counteract the effects of a sleepless night, or whiskey and water
for nerves. To nobody's surprise, all present took both coffee and
whiskey, although the effects seemed to be most immediate on
Nether.
"You should all get some rest, sleep for an hour," he said,
looking exceptionally bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, "I'll keep watch
for now."
"Are you sure?" I asked, not quite stifling a yawn.

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 "I'll be fine," he replied jauntily, "I've done this kind of thing
before. Trust me."
I was dubious for a moment, but Nether seemed so confident,
so alert, that I could not harbour serious doubts about his abilities.
Besides, I was feeling distinctly tired and a short nap would
certainly put things to rights.
"Okay."
I plonked myself in the squeaky chair behind my desk - it
seemed to have become silent all of a sudden - lay back and put
my feet on the desk, tilted my hat over my eyes and promptly fell
asleep.
*
It seemed only a moment later when I awoke, feeling
surprisingly refreshed. A glance at the clock indicated that my nap
was more like two hours than one, and it was just the beginnings
of movement in the room that had awakened me. Rosie was
yawning and stretching and looking around bleary-eyed, while
Gumshoe went from being curled up on the floor like an infant to
complete alertness in a flash. Nether looked as bright-eyed as
before, sitting back and gazing around at us sleeping babes.
I prised myself from my desk chair and made more coffee, this
time omitting to offer any of the hooch from the medicinal bottle.
While I was handing out cups filled from the medicinal coffee pot,
Gumshoe moved over to sit on the floor at Rosie's feet.
"Rosie," he began, taking her hand in his and looking up at her
like a forlorn puppy, an attitude quite at odds with his usual hard-
nosed pragmatism, "There's still something we need to know. All
of us."
Rosie sat up straight, like a keen girl in the front row of a
schoolroom.
"What is it that you know?" he went on, "Or, at least, what do
they think you know? There must be something, or they wouldn't
be going to all this trouble."
Rosie shook her head sadly.
"I've been racking my brains. I can't think of anything.
Anything at all."
Gumshoe looked even more forlorn. A thought seemed to
strike Rosie. She put her other hand over Gumshoe's massive
paw.
"Thank you for saving my Bar," she said, looking directly at
Gumshoe, "And me."

125
 Her gaze glanced off me and settled on Nether.
"All of you. I'm most grateful," she added, "I just wish I could
help more."
I resisted the temptation to tell her that Nether was just
protecting his own interests, at least in part. That news could wait
a while.
A thought struck me. Perhaps that few hours sleep had done
some good after all.
"Have you got a photo of that Milton guy?" I asked Gumshoe.
"Sure."
He extracted his hand, with a degree of reluctance, from Rosie's
grasp and reached into an inside pocket. He pulled out a manila
envelope, opened it and extracted a couple of prints - obviously file
photos - and waved them at me. I put the coffee pot back on top
of the filing cabinet and took them from his hand.
The snaps showed a scruffy-looking human male or
indeterminate age, with wild staring eyes erupting from a face
framed by ginger hair, moustaches and beard. To the best of my
knowledge, I had never seen that man before in my life. I shook
my head briefly, then handed one photo to Nether and the other to
Rosie.
Rosie's eyes narrowed as she focussed on the face in the
photograph. Like all good publicans, she would have had a good
memory for faces; in her position, it's always important to
remember to welcome back a long-lost customer, or to eject
potential troublemakers before they start.
"I know this man," she said firmly.
I glanced at Nether, who also shook his head to confirm he
didn't recognise the face.
"Who is he, Rosie?"
"Don't know his name. He's been coming into my bar fairly
regularly over the last few months. Always on his own, always
with plenty of money - money he was happy to spend, maybe
more money than I think he was comfortable with."
She paused for a moment, suddenly aware of three pairs of
eyes on her.
"His name is - was - Milton," Gumshoe said gently, "He was
killed, murdered, yesterday. We didn’t know you knew him."
"I was always unsure about him," Rosie went on, barely
audibly, clearly shaken by the news, "He asked a lot of questions,

126
made a lot of the regulars quite nervous. I wouldn't let Nether
come out while he was around. Although Nether wasn't home
much around that time anyway."
"That sounds like a connection to me," I said, "But what did
Milton actually find out?"
Just that that moment, the phone rang.
*
Everybody in the room froze for a moment.
"Go on, answer it," Nether advised acerbically, "It might be
important."
I scurried back to my side of the desk and picked up the
receiver.
"Findo Gask, Private Investigations," I said formally into the
mouthpiece.
"Gask, it's Luncardy," came a familiar voice.
"Good morning, Captain," I continued in my best polite talking-
to-policemen voice, "How can I help you today?"
"Don't mess me about, Gask," Luncardy snapped, "I don't know
what contact you've had with your errant sister."
I began to say, "None at all" but Luncardy didn't wait for a
response of any kind.
"But right now she's in the cells downstairs," she went on
without pausing for breath.
"Trinity? How did you catch her?" I asked politely. I suspected
I knew what the response was going to be. I wasn't disappointed.
"We didn't," she said shortly, "She turned herself in. About two
hours ago. Accompanied by a high-powered lawyer who hasn't left
her side since they arrived. One of those where you hope their
knowledge of the law is in proportion to the size of their fee."
A long speech from Luncardy. Self-evidently she wasn't
particularly impressed. Although you would have been hard-
pushed to recognise that from the tone of her voice.
"Look," she went on, "She hasn't said more than ten words
since she's got here. And I'm going to have to release her in the
next hour or so."
The lawyer must be as good as advertised, then. Remind me to
find out his name, so that I can avoid him.
"So I want you to come and talk to her," Luncardy insisted.

127
 "Why?"
"Just talk to her, that's all," Luncardy exploded, "We're on the
same side, remember. If you can persuade her to cooperate,
maybe, just a bit, well there might be something we can use to
track down Garrick."
I wasn't absolutely convinced about that possibility, but then
again I didn't have much else to go on just at the moment.
"Okay," I demurred, "I'll be in shortly. I'll be bringing some
people with me. Try not to scare them off."
"Huh," Luncardy replied, "I don't care who you bring, as long as
you get here pronto."
"Okay, okay, I'll be there. Just be patient."
I returned the receiver to its hook and turned to Nether, the
ironic look on his face reflecting the wry one which I suspected had
suffused my own.
"Our dear sister's in the slammer," I announced, in English so
that I could see Gumshoe's reaction.
To his credit, Gumshoe was entirely unfazed.
"We'd better go get her out then, hadn't we?"

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 Chapter 18 – Dungeons…

It took about forty minutes of brisk walking and even brisker

transportation by the travel tubes to get to the 14th precinct.
Nether and I were slowed noticeably by having Gumshoe and Rosie
travelling with us. But it was inevitable, I suppose, under the
circumstances. I wasn't prepared to leave Rosie behind, even in
the care of the redoubtable Gumshoe. There were too many things
which would be unfamiliar to him, too many surprises which could
be pulled to catch him off-guard. Nether couldn't promise to stay,
apparently. He got suddenly shifty when I pressed him on his
immediate plans, although I doubted either Rosie or Gumshoe had
noticed the momentary lapse.
So we all had to tag along together. No doubt we looked a
peculiar group, especially on the busier streets in the morning rush
hour. Two tall and well-built Goblins - Nether is very nearly as big
as I am, and he seemed to have grown a few inches now that he
had stopped pretending to be a drunk - overshadowed by the two
humans, both moving cautiously so as not to crush the other
pedestrians, even though the locals were understandably shying
away from the oversized monsters in their midst.
Nether wan't keen to visit a police station either, for some
reason. Maybe he had a guilty conscience, or perhaps there was
some more pragmatic reason why his presence would cause a
problem. For him, or for the police, I couldn't tell. Who could?
Still, he promised to walk with us to the precinct station and then
remain outside - hidden somewhere nearby, no doubt - while I
talked to Trinity.
We made our way up the impressive - if slightly worn - stone
steps of the precinct station and checked in at the front desk.
Inevitably, our particulars were taken and then we were asked to
wait. I took a seat on one of the hard chairs that populate such
places, presumably designed expressly to make it impossible to fall
asleep in them or perhaps they're just supposed to be easy to
clean. Rosie squeezed herself onto a seat, looking particularly
uncomfortable; whether this was the chair or just being in a police
station it was hard to say. And Gumshoe moved to stand in the far
corner of the reception area to de-emphasise his bulk.
We got numerous curious glances and a few muttered
comments from the cops passing through, although the punters

129
seemed to have other things on their mind. Like whether their
loved ones were dead or alive, innocent or guilty, to be imprisoned
or set free. Police waiting rooms everywhere have this depressing
quality, in my experience. Even Rosie was subdued, looking
around with large sad eyes at the hard-nosed coppers and the
distressed customers that sat in silent huddles.
We didn't have to wait for long. Luncardy stalked through the
double doors which led to the inner part of the station, glanced
around and then scowled in our direction.
"Humans," Luncardy muttered in the Goblin tongue as she
approached, "What are they doing here?"
Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Gumshoe biting his
tongue, or at least struggling to give the impression that he didn't
understand what the Captain had just said. I guess Luncardy had
less practice than I in reading human facial expressions.
"Captain Luncardy," I said, speaking in English for Rosie's
benefit, "We're here to see my sister Trinity."
"I know why you're here, Gask," Luncardy growled, "And you
took your time. Her lawyer hasn't come back yet, so you still have
a chance to talk to her. But it won't be long before the" - she
swallowed hard - "professional representative returns. You've only
got a few minutes to persuade her to do the right thing."
"And what exactly is the right thing?" I asked calmly, one
professional to another.
Luncardy glared at me.
"Tell us what she knows about Garrick," she thundered, "She's
not going to be charged, and she's going to walk out of here in the
next half-hour. But she's been entirely silent, on the advice of her
lawyer. Just cautious, I guess. But we could really use her help."
"Okay, I’ll try," I sighed, "I'll talk to her. No promises, though."
"Try hard, Gask," the Captain growled, "We need information
here."
*
I was shown into the cell where Trinity was being held by one of
Luncardy's interchangeable young coppers, leaving Rosie and
Gumshoe in the waiting area. The police didn't seem keen of
having humans exploring even more places inside their station.
The surface folks get such strange ideas sometimes. For example,
I'm sure you'd like me to describe the holding pen as a squalid
dungeon, low-ceilinged and straw-lined, but in reality it was dry,
warm, had reasonable seating and was very well-lit by Goblin
standards.

130
 "Hi Trinity. This must be a bit of a come-down for you," I
suggested ironically.
Trinity seemed unfazed. She was lounging on the bolted-down
chair with every evidence of comfort, a Goblin who knew she
wasn't going to be hanging around for long.
"Nah," she replied, "Just a professional liability, and one I carry
insurance for. That overpaid lawyer of mine should be back shortly
with a writ from the Judge, and then I'll be outa here."
"So I hear," I agreed, "Although Luncardy seems to think you're
holding out on her."
"I don't much care what the police think. Especially Miss
Busybody Luncardy."
"But I do," I urged, "Look, I need Luncardy's help if I'm going to
stand any chance of achieving what we both want. So if you do
have something, if you know - or even suspect - something you've
not told them, or me, then you might consider doing so now."
Trinity shook her head slowly.
"I'm entirely in the dark," she said, "I don't even know why you
- or the cops, for that matter - think I know where Garrick is. I'm
a victim here. I've lost my investment in what I thought was a
legitimate import/export company. The cops seem to be nearly
convinced of my innocence, especially after my lawyer showed
them one of the falsified business permits."
"They are convinced," I said firmly, "So why don't you give
them something to go on? Something which helps build a case.
Even if you don't know where Garrick is right now."
"Like what?"
"Tell them everything about your business dealings with
Garrick. What the arrangements were, how he presented the fake
permits, his comings and goings. Anything."
Trinity thought it over.
"Okay, I'll talk to my lawyer," she said eventually, "If
Luncardy's on the level, and she can convince my legal advisor,
then I'll make a statement."
Later, I would learn that Trinity's statement was a considerable
help in filling in the tangled web of deceit and double-dealing which
would have put Garrick away for a long time. My sister missed
little of what was going on around her, and a smart cookie like
Luncardy would be able to put two and two together, to see
through the fronts and cut-outs, and get a better picture of what
Garrick was up to. It was complex, true, but also very profitable:

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Garrick would eventually be revealed as having access to a
considerable fortune, concealed in dozens of trusts and anonymous
bank accounts. And by that time I would already have discovered
what he was doing with all that money.
*

*
My head swirled as I tried to sit up. I couldn't make it at the
first attempt and I collapsed back on the warm sand, a move which
amplified the dull ache in my head. It wasn't hitting the ground at
the bottom which had made my head hurt - such a fall unaided by
magical restraints would kill any living being not equipped with
wings. I must have caught my noggin on something on the way
down.
I was in the depths of the caverns, the lowest of the Lower
Realms, in the region known as the Hells. I could tell this
immediately, of course, even with my eyes closed, from the air
pressure, the smell and humidity, and the stifling heat. I
remembered that this was a region where keeping your wits about
you would be a really good idea. I sat up, more successfully this
time, and looked around groggily.
Not all of the caverns were actually excavated by Goblins,
although we have been digging away down here for a great many
millennia. My distant ancestors found, something to their surprise,
that other creatures - wiser and stranger creatures - had long since
elected to leave the surface world to the upstart and energetic
races, and make their homes in the quiet depths. The system of
caverns is interconnected, of course, but these older regions are
sparsely populated and distinctly low-rent; not that they were
particularly dangerous - most of the time, anyway - but many
Goblins found the neighbourhood too hot, too oppressive, or just
too damn weird.
Gumshoe and Rosie were both lying on the ground next to each
other, not ten feet from me. I recovered my hat and crawled over
to them. They seemed shaken but otherwise uninjured.
"Where are we?" Gumshoe asked, gently helping Rosie to her
feet then loosening his tie. He found it hot, too.
"We're in the Hells," I replied, too bluntly.
"In Hell?" Rosie gasped, looking around wildly, "You mean,
literally?"

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 "It's not quite as bad as that," I quipped, trying to sound
reassuring, "It's just a name for the deeper regions."
Rosie didn't seem entirely convinced. She looked around at the
cave we were in. Goblin tunnels are finished perfectly, the
surfaces almost polished smooth and finished with cut stone
blocks. Here, the rock walls were all rough-hewn almost as if
carved by the claws of a giant creature. I hoped that wasn't
actually true, although you do hear some strange stories.
"How do we get out?" she asked.
This cave was a dead-end, except for the chimney above us.
The chamber narrowed to a funnel fifty feet over our heads. There
was no way to climb, even with Goblin claws. Just the one low
wide archway that led out of the nearly circular room. We had no
choice of direction.
"I'm not sure we do," I said, "At least, not yet. Somebody - or
something - has brought us down here deliberately. And I don't
think it's got anything to do with Garrick and his goons. They
seemed as surprised as I was when we fell into that trap.
Meanwhile, that way, I suppose."
I pointed along the wide track and kicked at the sandy surface
with the toe of my shoe. The way was lit by a reddish light that
seemed to flicker at random. It was unnervingly like firelight,
enough to disturb the ancient prejudices of the Goblin race, not to
mention being worryingly close to human preconceptions about the
fires of hell.
"We'd better go and find out," I said, "Somebody's got some
explaining to do."
Gumshoe shrugged and raised an eyebrow in what was
intended to be a meaningful way. I sometimes have difficulty with
human facial expressions, but it looked like he was turning over a
vast number of questions and possibilities in his head. He asked
nothing, though; like me, he realised we still had no real idea of
exactly what was going on.

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 Chapter 19 – … and Dragons

The tunnel ended after a hundred paces or so, on a wide shelf

of rock jutting out into an open space, the extent of which was at
first difficult to see. There was no barrier, no wall to mark the
edge of the balcony. Whoever lived here wasn't afraid of heights.
In fact, judging from the scuff marks in the sand and in the bare
rock, whatever lived here had large claws and preferred to fly
rather than walk. Beings like that are probably to be avoided
wherever possible.
I strolled up to the very edge and looked around. Gumshoe and
Rosie approached more cautiously, hanging back from the
precipice. Humans are not good with heights, I find, and always
seem to want railings and banisters at the edge of even the most
modest drop.
A vast cavern, bigger than most constructed by even the most
ambitious Goblin endeavours, stretched out in front of us. It was
sporadically lit by red glows from a multitude of places, on the
ground and on the walls. The red lights were not fires in any
conventional sense. The beings who inhabit this Realm, I knew
from my studies, had long ago perfected the art of making the
rocks glow to provide light from molten rocks deeper still in the
earth, without transferring more than a tiny fraction of the
associated heat. It was a trick not yet replicated by even the most
skilled Goblin magical artisan.
"What is this place?" Rosie asked in a hushed whisper.
"It's one of the Hells, the lowest of the Lower Realms," I told
her, "Not many Goblins ever come down here."
"So who does live here?"
I spoke softly.
"Other creatures. Ones we probably won't meet. Creatures
who like to keep themselves to themselves, who like their privacy.
We should stay out of their way."
"I think that would be a good idea," she whispered. Gumshoe
nodded violently in agreement.

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 The ledge we were standing on appeared to run along the wall
of the cavern in both directions, one leading vaguely downwards
and the other tilting slightly up.
"This way, I think," I said, pointing in the direction which led
upwards.
Together we set off at a slow walk. After a few minutes, we
approached one of the sources of the red light, a patch of rock
several tens of feet on a side, set in the face that edged the
balcony. Apart from the glow, there was nothing remarkable about
the rock. It was not even particularly warm to the touch, as
Gumshoe discovered when he approached for a closer look.
As we walked, a thought occurred to me. I turned to Rosie.
"When we fell," I asked, "You cried ‘Oh no, no again’, didn’t
you? What did you mean? "
Rosie stopped dead, as if a sudden realisation had occurred to
her also.
"Before," She said slowly, "I remember falling before. Just like
that."
I glanced at Gumshoe, who looked puzzled.
"I think," I said equally slowly, "That we’ve just realised how
you got to the Lower Realms last time."
Rosie’s eyes opened wide.
"You’re right. But I never remembered before."
We walked on in silence. There was no sign of movement,
other than the ever-present flicker of the red lights. Once or twice
I thought I caught a glimpse of movement in the far distance, as if
some vast creature was flying around. But otherwise it seemed we
were on our own, although probably not unobserved, given the
reputation of those who make this Realm their home.
As we walked, we passed a few shallow alcoves, huge
depressions in the rock face, which we cautiously explored. But
there was nothing to see, nothing to suggest they were anything
more than natural fluctuations in the wall.
We had just passed the third alcove when there was a grating
noise, as if a vast stone block was shifting lubricated by only a few
grains of sand. We spun around, both Gumshoe and I
automatically reaching for our guns - although I doubted such
crude technology would be any kind of protection against anything
we might encounter down here.
A voice boomed out of an open doorway which had appeared
where the alcove once was.

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 "Findo Gask!"
It seemed my fame had preceded me. I put the gun away and
walked towards the now-opened alcove. There was no point trying
to run.
*
In the Goblin tongue, these beings are known as The Old Ones,
or perhaps The Wise Ones, and they have been resident down here
for a lot longer than any of our histories. They have always been
few in number - at least in Goblin memories - and are exceptionally
long-lived, even by Goblin standards.
Only a human would think of them as winged monsters,
although they did sport impressively large wings, leathery and bat-
like, together with scales and claws like a lizard. Whether you
want to think of them as demons or dragons is up to you; they are
neither, human mythology and misinformation not withstanding.
The Old Ones can speak the Goblin tongue and their words are
widely regarded as being worth listening to - if they deign to
answer your query or even acknowledge your presence. They do
have names, too, but these names are not known to mere Goblins,
and they seem oblivious to the names of individual Goblins, too.
Except in a very few cases, in which case the named individual can
be expected to have a very interesting - and possibly rather short -
life in the near future.
They also have other ways of communicating: each of them
know what all the others know, and it is best - according to the
limited amount of lore on the subject - to speak whatever
statement or question you have in mind, and to answer their
enquiries, with total honesty and conviction. The Old Ones have no
truck whatsoever with duplicitous or self-serving individuals, and
any attempt to knowingly lie will be summarily dealt with.
The Goblin tongue is full of overtones, both metaphorically and
in the sound of the words being pronounced. In the mouth of one
of the Old Ones, the language is slow and sonorous, with subsonics
which rattle the bones and make one's stomach distinctly queasy.
"You are Findo Gask," the voice boomed out again, a hint of
interest just detectable within the guttural utterances, "Enter my
presence."
I stepped inside. Behind, I could hear Gumshoe and Rosie
following me. Gumshoe probably knew enough of our language to
understand what the Old One had said, and even Rosie would have
recognised the pronunciation of my name. Their movements
sounded hesitant, even fearful - and who could blame them - but
to their credit they had elected to follow me into the dragon's den.

136
 *
Inside was a large circular space with a high domed roof, nearly
hemispherical in its proportions. The walls were all of smooth
polished stone, and the floor stepped down steeply like an
amphitheatre towards a raised dais set in the exact centre. I had
half-expected the vast stone block which formed the door to slide
back into place. It didn't move. I found this only faintly
reassuring.
The Old Ones, I had once been told, had long ago mastered the
art of fluid masonry. They could make stone move, flow like water,
or become transparent or opaque in a moment. They could slide
one massive block through another on different trajectories, each
unaffected by the solid mass of the other. These techniques were
used to make vast constructions of intricate design and obscure
purpose. It was even said that some of these devices yet
remained in the lowest of the Lower Realms, quiescent and waiting
for who-knows-what event or contingency. Where the truth lay, I
couldn't tell.
As I stepped forward, the floor lifted, flattened and smoothed
itself into a seamless expanse of polished stone. Obscure and
complex patterns - decoration or mechanism, I could not be sure -
froze themselves into the unbroken surface. The Old Ones liked
their open spaces, we have always been told. If they had once
been accustomed to flying freely in the upper world, the theory
went, they might be prone to claustrophobia underground, which is
why they were always inclined to build their new habitats on a
monumental scale.
The red glow was brighter here, bright enough for a human to
be comfortable without being crippling for a Goblin. I waited for a
second for Gumshoe and Rosie to catch up.
"What is it?" Rosie hissed.
"One of the Old Ones," I replied, "Be very respectful. Speak
only if spoken to. Move slowly. And let me do the talking."
Rosie nodded, as did Gumshoe.
"Looks like a dragon to me," she muttered.
Together we trekked across the floor to the dais where the Old
One was waiting for us. He was a fine specimen: scales polished
and unbroken, the leathery wings shiny as if recently oiled, the
teeth and claws pearly-white and sparkling. These beings never
seem to age and always look as if they had emerged from some
giant eggshell not twenty-four hours before.
I stopped and bowed politely at what seemed like a prudent
distance, motioning Gumshoe and Rosie to do the same.

137
 "Ah, humans," the Old One spoke, switching to English with no
perceptible hesitation and speaking with a crisp accent that was no
more than a hundred years out of date, "I have not had the
pleasure of the company of your kind for a very long time."
*
The Old One was curled up on a stone plinth that had seemed
to be raised ten feet or more in the air when we started across the
floor, but now was no more than a low ledge that a human or
Goblin could comfortably have sat upon. The stone seemed to
have formed itself to the Old One’s shape, with depressions
moulded to his legs and belly. His wings were folded and his tail
was curled around his body in the manner of a sleeping cat.
Perhaps he was trying to minimise his true bulk to avoid
frightening the visitors overmuch. I wasn't sure it was working.
There was silence for a long moment, broken only by the
susserations of four creatures breathing. Three of them sounded
just a bit scared. The Old One cast his yellow unblinking eyes over
us three before speaking again.
"Welcome to my humble abode," he began, "Let me proffer my
apologies at the abrupt way I transported you here. I trust you are
not unduly alarmed."
There was a pause, as if an answer was expected. I glanced
around then nodded cautiously, responding for us all.
"Please, sit down. I mean you no harm."
I looked behind me. Three blocks of stone - no, three stone
chairs - had silently extruded themselves from the floor. Stone
chairs of differing shapes and sizes, tailored to the needs of two
humans and a large Goblin, chairs shaped to conform to our
individual contours. They were also, I would shortly discover,
extremely comfortable.
"I am sure you would have escaped those who would have
harmed you," the Old One resumed when we were all seated, "But
the opportunity to intercede was too fortuitous to ignore."
The Old One snorted as if in amusement.
"You are doubtlessly wondering why I - indeed, we - brought
you here."
I had been wondering on this exact question. The Old Ones do
not generally interest themselves in the undertakings of Goblins -
or anybody else for that matter. I thought it prudent to speak my
answer aloud.
"Yes, Old One," I said, trying to project undertones of polite
civility into every syllable, "I am. I'm sure we all are."

138
 The vast head nodded very slightly.
"We have long been aware of the actions and motivations of
another of your kind," the Old One intoned, a touch of steel
entering his voice, "A wily old Goblin with diverse interests and
obscure knowledge in arcane areas. One who is familiar to you."
"Professor Urquhart Garrick," I burst out, unable to contain my
reaction.
"That would be one of his names, yes," came the cold reply,
then with added subsonics for emphasis, "And he must be
stopped."
I was dumb-struck for a moment.
"You're interested in Garrick?" I exploded, "What in all the Hells
for?"
There was another distinct pause: quite enough time for me to
thoroughly worry about opening my mouth in quite so uninhibited a
fashion.
"We are interested, yes," the old One concurred coolly,
"Garrick's plans remain opaque to us, at least partially. This in
itself is a distressing situation since we are usually able to perceive
the ebb and flow of events in the Upper Levels without difficulty."
"So he is hiding something," I muttered, "Even from you."
"So we find yourselves in the position where we need your
help," he added, ignoring my remarks, "Help from all of you."
It seemed that I had suddenly acquired yet another client, one
that I had never heard of engaging the services of a Private
Investigator, even a Goblin one. And I was sure that Gumshoe had
never had such a strange customer for his services either.
Whether we'd ever get any kind of payment, and even what form it
might take, was a moot point. On the other hand, being owed a
favour by the Old Ones was probably worth a lot to a Goblin in my
position, one way or another.
"I would be honoured to give any assistance I can," I replied
formally, "Perhaps you would be so kind as to tell us what you do
know about Garrick and his associates."
The Old One sighed and contrived to look faintly embarrassed,
if that were truly possible.
"We believe he is attempting to steal our secrets, our magical
lore," he said, "He may even have succeeded."
*

139
 Once again, I was astonished beyond the point of speech. Well,
nearly, anyway. It takes a lot to get me to shut up. But the idea
that the near-omnipotent, all-seeing Old Ones could either find
something hidden from their powers of observation or, still worse,
be beyond their ability to influence events at a distance seemed
incredible.
The Old One might have spotted my state of speechlessness
and was covering for me, or perhaps he just didn't care. In any
case, he went on smoothly, addressing us all in turn with subtle
motions of his vast head.
"We have detected probes against our secrets, delicate magics
executed with skill and talent, almost too subtle to be of Goblin
origins."
The Old One harrumphed, sounding like a schoolteacher
addressing a particularly recalcitrant class who had, once again,
failed to complete their homework on time.
"Pilfering from our lore is a practice we thought you had long
done away with," the Old Ones said, displeasure suddenly radiating
from every nuance in his speech and motion of his body, "But
somebody seems to be trying it again."
I was unsure at the time, but I would later discover - after a
certain amount of delving into dusty history books in the public
library - that this was a coded reference to what has become
known as the Common Cause Pact.
It seems that Goblins have always been more than a little
acquisitive of others' secrets. We have certainly acquired
technologies from the surface world of the humans in recent times
and made them an integral part of our own existence - especially
where the human technology is more reliable, or just plain cheaper
- than any equivalent magic. It's just common sense to use the
best, and I'm sure we paid more than a few humans handsomely
for the expertise.
But before that - long before, when humans were still
scratching out a living from the forests - one of the earliest of the
Goblin clans delving in the deepness traded secrets with the Old
Ones, although always on terms which seemed equitable at the
time but turned out to subtly favour the Old Ones when inspected
with the benefit of hindsight.
It seemed that in millennia past, the Old Ones valued their
privacy and their quietness - personally, I have every sympathy -
and the sounds and the potential disruption of Goblins energetically
burrowing in the rock above their heads was intrinsically
distressing to them. The Old Ones skilfully guided the negotiation
the Pact and contrived to present my ancestors with certain

140
magical secrets: tunnelling techniques to make the construction of
caverns much easier and much quieter. They also gave us the
secret of the transit tube - effectively, instantaneous travel through
solid rock - so that fewer physical tunnels would be required and,
we would realise much later - so that the society of Goblins would
remain singular and unfragmented.
But my ancestors weren't satisfied with the bargain and
contrived to steal another secret from the Old Ones: the ability to
dispose of rock cut from the caverns within the walls themselves,
so avoiding the immensely tedious task of hauling the spoil to the
surface and depositing it in mountainous heaps, where it was at
risk of attracting attention from itinerant humans.
Unsurprisingly, the Old Ones were mightily displeased with this
magical thievery, once they had discovered their loss. They
became more secretive, retreated still further from the ken of most
Goblins - although not quite to mythical status, as seemed to have
happened for the surface population - and remaining hidden in
their own network of caverns - larger and much less populous than
our own.
"And you think Garrick is behind this?" I asked, my
investigative instincts coming to the fore automatically, despite my
earlier confusion.
"We do," the Old One confirmed, his voice deep and once again
calm, "Although I doubt we could prove it to the satisfaction of our
Laws, or your own."
I cocked my head, professional curiosity overcoming my sense
of awe.
"Our own probes," the Old One went on, "Honed and refined
over aeons, are being deflected, misled or blocked. Now we cannot
rely on magic to keep track of everything in the worlds above."
That, I surmised, meant both the caverns of the Goblins and
the surface world of the humans. Gumshoe glanced sideways at
Rosie; I guess both of them had picked up the inference that
people were being watched.
The Old One suddenly reared up, his head towering thirty feet
above us, causing all three of us to stand and attempt a step
backwards - in all three cases, successfully prevented by the stone
furniture.
"So, Detectives," he said, the subsonic rumble again adding
emphasis, "Will you help us track down this Garrick?"
Everybody in the world seemed to want to lay their claws on my
old tutor. I had no problem with that.

141
 "Sure," I replied laconically, sitting down again and taking a
cigarette packet and match-book from my coat pocket, "Tell me
what you know."

142
 Chapter 20 – Wisdom Arisen

Rosie sat down heavily on the soft stone chair behind her; more
precisely, she collapsed as if her legs were suddenly too weak to
support her. She was showing distinct signs of strain - not
surprisingly, given what she had been though over the last few
days. By contrast, Gumshoe seemed unfazed; he remained
standing and adopted the familiar attentive pose that meant he
was taking in everything that was said and all the body language
nuances as well. Exactly how he would get on with the involuntary
movements of a Hellish demon remained to be seen.
Meanwhile, I blew smoke and waited with badly-disguised mock
patience.
Faced with this level of alert attention, the Old One contrived to
look mildly sheepish, which is a difficult feat if you are fifty-foot
long fire-breathing winged lizard.
"We have to confess to being without reliable information," he
rumbled, "We hear a few things, we sense others, disjointed and
confusing. A few hints and whispers have reached our ears about
a great magic, one capable of changing the ways of Goblins
forever. We hear the name of this Garrick, with whom we know
you share a long history."
The Old One paused, his head moving almost imperceptibly as
his gaze swept over us all.
"And there is one word, a word we have heard repeated, a word
we believe is native to your language" - he nodded at Rosie and
Gumshoe - "but we are not sure what it means."
"Let me guess," Gumshoe said suddenly, stepping forward,
"Dulelm?"
The Old One's eyes narrowed and his head swivelled rapidly and
precisely to focus on the human PI. The Old Ones are reputed to
have exceptionally keen eyesight, even able to observe the throb
of a pulse in throat or temple.
"You've heard this word? Recently?"
"Dulelm Hollows. It's a settlement," Gumshoe answered
immediately, managing to avoid looking smug, "A human village.
On the surface. Not far from New York."

143
 The Old One narrowed his eyes further, bringing his head down
to a level with that of the standing human. Gumshoe stood his
ground, returning the penetrating stare with a surprisingly calm
gaze. After a moment, the Old One raised his head and shook it
momentarily, as if in disbelief.
"I knew we should have been paying more attention to what
you people have been up to," he muttered to himself, using the
Goblin tongue.
There was a faint chittering noise, almost inaudible even to
sensitive Goblin ears, as if a vast congress suddenly undertook an
earnest and high-speed debate on some minor and subtle point of
procedure. The noise was gone almost as soon as it had begun.
"So you don't know much," I said cockily, grinding out my
cigarette butt under my heel.
(It was only a little later that I noticed that the butt had entirely
disappeared, as if the floor had swallowed it up. I guess the Old
Ones just liked to be tidy.)
Oblivious at that point to my untidy littering, I ticked off the
points on my fingers as I spoke.
"Garrick is hiding things, even from you. He's probably stealing
magic from you, but you don't know what, and he appears to be
planning some masterstroke about which you know almost nothing,
except that it has something to do with some backwater township
almost nobody's ever heard of. A pretty picture, indeed. So what
do you expect a couple of flatfoots and a city barkeeper to do
about it?"
The Old One paused for a moment, visibly fuming. By which I
mean that smoke was emerging from his mouth, profusely –
perhaps more profusely than usual. Not really surprising, under
the circumstances.
Once again I could just hear that chittering sound, this time
sounding more positive as if a consensus had eventually been
reached.
"We have every confidence in you," came the reply after a short
delay, "We just do not have any more information to give."
It seemed that the Old Ones really did not like being without
their traditional omniscience. Perhaps I was going to enjoy this
new commission after all.
*
"Okay, then, I'll get right on it," I said, with more assurance
that I really felt.

144
 Confidence in front of the client. Maybe that's my default
operating mode. Or at least the one I choose to project when I'm
not sure exactly what I'm doing; tell the punter something he
wants to hear. Just bravado, I expect.
Gumshoe leaned close to me, speaking in what a human would
probably consider to be a low whisper and hissed, "So what are we
going to do?"
Unfortunately, he had forgotten, or just overlooked, that all of
the non-humans around him had much better hearing. Goblin ears
are large and mobile, like a cat's, and the Old Ones were reputed
to be able to hear the drop of a pin on the surface a hundred miles
above their heads.
"Let's get up above as soon as we can," I replied, equally sotto
voce, although with an ironic twist that I suspected the Old One
would have spotted, "I think the Old One may be able to help us."
Rosie shook herself, as if awakening from a shallow sleep. She
seemed to have been almost unaware of what was going on around
her, then, on looking around, she all of a sudden remembered
exactly where she was. She stood up, standing straight and
clasping her hands in front of her.
"Mister Dragon," she began.
I winced in embarrassment but the Old One smiled indulgently -
although this did have the alarming side-effect of showing even
more of his numerous large, sharp teeth.
"How do we get to go home?" she asked with a pleading catch
in her voice.
"I don't think you can go home just yet, young lady," he said
urbanely, "There are too many forces at work, too many people
chasing you."
Rosie looked shocked, then saddened. Her shoulders sagged
and the expression on her face was piteous to behold.
"Can we at least get to the surface, then?" she said in a small
voice.
The response was a snort.
"I can certainly arrange that, madam," the Old One replied,
"Indeed, I have already started."
He nodded, glancing behind us. I turned to look. Over my
shoulder, I could see that the stone chairs had disappeared, and
that a large dark circle was forming on the otherwise featureless
red-lit floor.

145
 "So it is time for me to say goodbye," he went on, "Just step
into the circle and wait."
Gumshoe took Rosie by the arm and guided her in the direction
of the stone circle. A crack tracing the circumference had already
begun to appear and hints of a brighter light begun to shine
through. I was about to follow when the Old One's voice boomed
out from behind me.
"Findo Gask!"
I stopped and turned around, finding myself abruptly face-to-
face with what was possibly the most fearsome creature I had ever
been this close to.
"We will meet again." the Old One said in the Goblin tongue,
with a slightly unexpected inflection, one with an unexpected hint
of a threat, "More than once."
I gulped, my confidence dented - only temporarily, you'll be
pleased to hear - with just a few well-chosen words. The Old Ones
were reputed to have perfected a limited form of prescience: the
ability to identify points of time in the future which are
unchangeable, entirely immutable by the will of human or Goblin
alike. I had the horrible feeling that a statement like that was not
a wish, or a promise, or even a prediction. It was a statement of
fact.
*
The Old One drew back his head, his eyes never leaving me for
a moment. I don't believe that anybody can hold the gaze of an
Old One for more than an instant. Certainly, I couldn't. I turned
and made my way to the centre of the circle where Rosie and
Gumshoe were already standing, all the way resisting the urge to
run.
I had just reached the others when the marked circle on the
ground began to move. It rose with impressive smoothness, a
perfect disc of solid rock supported on nothing that I could see. I
did take a look ro make sure, scurrying right over to the edge,
leaning out and peering down. There might have been a column of
stone emerging effortlessly from the floor of the Old One's abode
but, by the time I peered over as far as I could manage without
actually toppling off, we were already so high up that I could make
out almost nothing below.
The humans were terrified, of course, although Gumshoe did his
best to hide it. Few humans are truly comfortable in high places.
Both of them stood petrified in the very centre of the disk, clinging
to each other. Meanwhile, I tried looking down from the other side
of the disk, but there was nothing to be seen there either. A

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sudden gasp from Rosie made me spin around. Both were staring
upwards, their faces a picture of horror. For a split second,
perhaps, we all thought we would be squashed like bugs against
the roof. Then, above us, the ceiling of the vast cavern opened
and we were swallowed up.
The dim red light still emerged from the platform, its feeble
light enough to make out each other’s position. I got the
impression we were moving sideways as well as upwards.
Although the rock walls were glassily smooth, there was just
enough contrast to give an impression of considerable speed. It
wasn't really a tunnel, of course, just the application of the Old
One's magic which allowed solid objects - like the three of us and
the disk of stone upon which we stood - to pass though the miles
of solid rock between the caverns of the Old Ones and the cities of
the surface world.
I could not have been more than a minute later that we arrived
at the surface. We were unceremoniously deposited at a street-lit
corner in New York, the faintly-glowing rock that supported us
merging imperceptibly into the sidewalk. There were a few people
about, but none of them seemed to be looking in our direction at
the point of our sudden arrival. Just another example of the
omniscience of the Old Ones, I expect.
"Where are we?" I asked.
Gumshoe glanced around and spoke immediately. I guess his
claim that he knew the streets of this city like the back of his hand
was true enough.
"My office is six blocks that way," he added, waving a hand,
"And my car's parked up even closer than that."
Rosie had reverted to a near-catatonic state, probably in a state
of shock, as well as being tired and hungry. To be honest, I was
flagging a bit too. I must have been running on adrenalin the
entire time we were being interviewed by one of the Old Ones.
Gumshoe had noticed Rosie's state, too. I'm not sure he was
paying any attention to mine. Perhaps he thought I was able to
look after myself.
"I'm going to have to take Rosie home," he said, supporting the
lady in question with an arm around her waist.
"But she can't go to the bar," I said quickly, without thinking,
"It's not safe, and is probably fire-damaged, too."
Gumshoe snorted disparagingly.
"I'll take her to my home," he said, adding quickly in response
to my curious glance, "She can have the bed and I'll sleep on the
couch."

147
 I knew Gumshoe wasn't referring to the apartment he rented in
one of the shabbier parts of New York City. He meant his family
home, the old homestead upstate. It wasn't a bad idea. Few
people knew much of Gumshoe's history. Short of booking into a
hotel, there was nowhere more anonymous we could go right now.
*
With Gumshoe supporting Rosie by the arm and me hopping
along behind, trying to remember how to walk like a human, we
made the few blocks to Gumshoe's automobile. I slid into the
back, tugging Rosie in behind me; Gumshoe folded his bulk in the
front seat, turned the key in the ignition and, after an anxious
moment listening to grinding pistons and rattling crankshafts, the
vast engine rumbled to life.
Gumshoe drove through the night, two - maybe three - hours
on the highway. I don't know how he managed to stay awake.
There was little traffic on the road - perhaps that was a good thing.
We didn't hit anything, anyway. Rosie collapsed in the back seat
and snored with her head against the window for the entire trip.
The sleep would do her good, I thought. I myself catnapped,
jerking awake a time or two when the movement of the car made a
more than averagely violent wrench. We barely spoke, mainly
because I didn't want to risk distracting Gumshoe from his driving.
The human PI had inherited a rambling clapboard house set in
many acres of woodland, now entirely untended, more a jungle
than a plantation. The exact circumstances under which he has
come by the old place were unclear to me, although I knew he had
spend some summers of his childhood there, a mere thirty or forty
years ago. It was apparently a bequest from a maiden aunt, after
some detective service her had performed very early in his career.
The full story, I thought, would probably keep for another day.
At one time, I understood, the house was a grand country
residence maintained by a small army of servants and marking the
centre of the social scene for miles around. Most of the property
was now tumbledown and uninhabitable. Gumshoe had neither the
money nor the inclination to restore the place to its former glory.
But one part he did maintain: one of the outbuildings, a small
apartment over the garages perhaps once occupied by the
chauffeur.
The apartment had just two rooms, a kitchen-diner and a single
bedroom. I knew that Gumshoe spent a few days there every now
and again, resting between professional assignments and applying
a few coats of paint to the timbers in between walks down to the
lake that lay at the foot of the old gardens. I had visited just once
before, Gumshoe taking it into his head that somewhere away from
most humans would be more relaxing for a Goblin. It was okay,

148
although I had to work on my tolerance for an open sky over my
head rather than the solid protection of rock ceilings. But that did
mean that I am now more comfortable in the surface world, even
in daylight, than almost all Goblins.
Gumshoe turned the car into the weed-strewn and overgrown
track - once a grand entrance driveway but now reduced to a
simple gap in the hedges - that led to the old house, and took the
right at the fork that led to the garages. We stopped with a crunch
of gravel outside the closed doors of the three-car garage and
tumbled out, anxious to stretch our legs after being cooped up in
the vehicle for so long.
I followed Gumshoe and Rosie, supported in a gentlemanly
fashion by the private investigator, up the creaking wooden steps
that led to the upper floor. He turned the key in the lock and
pushed open the door. I tailed him inside, looking cautiously
around at the tiny living space. He flicked the light switch
instinctively - nothing happened, the power must have been turned
off - then blinked in the gloom.
Unsurprisingly, Nether was sitting calmly on the davenport.

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 Chapter 21 – Blood and Water

Nether nodded calmly at us from his comfortable seat.

"Morning all," he murmured nonchalantly, "You can put the
power tools away if you like."
Instinctively, both Gumshoe and I found ourselves with our
handguns drawn and our hearts racing, swinging the weapons
around wildly in search of secondary targets. There was nothing,
nobody else in the place. Gumshoe slipped into the bedroom to
take a look, but came out again a few moments later shaking his
head.
Rosie had squeaked in surprise when Nether had announced
himself but she was the first to recover from the shock.
"Nether!" she cried, rushing over to where he had been
lounging and sliding onto the couch next to him, "What are you
doing here?"
I put my automatic back in its holster and glared at my older
brother.
"Yeah," I drawled, "That's a very good question. What are you
doing here, Neth?"
"Well, it’s all rather surprising. I heard that you had popped up
again in New York City," he began.
"How did you hear about that?" I interrupted, upping my glare
another notch.
"Hey, I have a few contacts of my own, you know," he replied
smoothly, "And one of them was keeping an eye on Mister
Gamshack's car. So I knew you were back in circulation. It soon
became clear that you were not going to the Bar," adding quickly
as Rosie swung around sharply with a pained expression on her
face, "Which isn't badly damaged, by the way. Your staff worked
hard at getting the place cleaned up, and even arranged for the
window to be repaired. Open as usual yesterday. You could hardly
tell that there had been anything going on."
Rosie breathed a huge sigh of relief and slumped back on the
couch. I knew how much the place meant to her, and to her father
and grandfather, too.

150
 "And you sensibly stayed away from Mister Gamshack's
apartment and offices," Nether went on, "Which are being
discreetly if effectively staked out by some very shady-looking
hoodlums. So there weren't a great many other places you could
go. A few reports on the location of your car told me your
direction, so I thought it best to be here to welcome you."
It was Gumshoe's turn to glower in Nether's direction.
"Very few people know about this place," he said slowly, turning
his automatic over in his hands, "I didn't think you were one of
them."
Nether laughed casually.
"I guess that would be true, in the general scheme of things,"
he replied, "But, in your case, certain Goblins - certain official
Goblins, shall we say - have been interested in you for some time,
thanks to your long association with my brother."
I nodded. I'm fairly certain that the comings and goings of
Goblins who visit the surface frequently attract a degree of
scrutiny. I did wonder how Nether would have access to that
information, although it had already become clear that he had
more connections than I had ever imagined.
Gumshoe shrugged and put his gun away. He moved softly
around the familiar room, flipping on the electrical power using the
circuit breaker in the corner of the kitchenette and filling a kettle
from the tap.
"Coffee anyone?" he asked casually.
There was a general chorus on the theme of "yes" from around
the room. Soon he was handing out mugs of hot drinks. There
were no chips in any of them - Gumshoe was more house-proud
than you might expect from his appearance and profession.
Meanwhile I told Nether about recent events: being chased by
Rigg and his crew, being intercepted by a suddenly-appearing
portal to the Hells and the unnerving interview with the Old One. I
didn't mention the even more unnerving prediction that I would
encounter the Old One again. Nether came back to the question of
Dulelm Hollows again and again, chewing on it like a particularly
fine pickled toadstool. Finally he fell silent.
"We're going back to Dulelm," I said firmly.
"When are we going?" Nether asked, leaning forward and
suddenly looking keenly interested.
"I meant Gumshoe and me," I replied curtly, "You've got to look
after Rosie. Keep her safe. And, to answer your question, we're
going tonight."

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 *
Dulelm Hollows was just as boring on this visit as it had been
on the previous one. With a distinct feeling of deja vu, Gumshoe
and I retraced our steps with me once again concealed in the back
of Gumshoe's ancient car.
We had spent the day recuperating, mainly sleeping - with
Nether keeping watch - and a lot of eating. Between the four of
us, we did serious damage to Gumshoe's larder of tinned and
preserved foodstuffs. Human food is in general a bit bland for
Goblin tastes - we prefer stronger flavours and more robust
textures, something to get our teeth into - but there is an old
saying about "hunger being the best sauce". It was certainly true
that day; I wolfed down everything that Gumshoe's stock cupboard
could provide. I know for sure that the PI will be filling the trunk of
his car with groceries the next time he comes up here.
Feeling somewhat recovered, Gumshoe and I left Nether to look
after Rosie in the little apartment over the garages. She was keen
to come along but all three males did their best to persuade her it
was too dangerous. Besides, Nether was not here entirely alone;
he clearly had managed to gain access to some backup, some
resources I hadn't known he could draw upon - although perhaps I
should have guessed before now.
It was two hours drive from the sleepy backwater that was
Gumshoe's family home to the sleepy backwater called Dulelm
Hollows. It was getting dark by the time we arrived and the whole
place was wrapped in a chilly mist added to the sense of gloom. I
followed the human PI out of the car, tugging up the collar of my
coat against the dampness and looked around.
"Nothing much changes here, does it?" I asked Gumshoe wryly,
receiving a terse grunt in reply.
For the next three hours, we criss-crossed the dour hamlet that
was the entirety of Dulelm Hollows, revisited each the broken-down
homesteads we had searched the last time and with Gumshoe
again gritting his teeth against the repulsive glamours that still
held as strongly as ever. There was no hint of Goblins in
residence, and precious little evidence of any humans either.
Finally, Gumshoe stopped and leant on a high stone wall that
marked the edge of some property we had passed half a dozen
times in our quest.
"We're wasting our time," he said glumly.
I had to agree with him. There had to be something strange,
something out of the ordinary, something beyond the reach of
ordinary senses going on in this gods-forsaken backwater.

152
Everything we had heard hinted at some astounding coup, some
world-changing deployment of magic to be perpetrated by my old
tutor Urquhart Garrick. But the Old One had said that they could
not perceive events around Garrick and surely the Professor had
something to do with Dulelm Hollows.
It was time for a long shot. I reached deep into the
commodious pockets that line the inner of the long coat I habitually
wear and pulled out a small cardboard box colourfully marked with
complex scripts that humans still insist on referring to as "runes".
It was a residual magic detection spell, that very expensive
glamour I had acquired from Gaur's emporium only a few days
ago.
Now, this kind of magic is tricky stuff. It's prone to all kinds of
malfunction, the grosser kinds of which are often supposed to be
sabotage or just the vendor making a fast buck by palming off
substandard goods as the real thing. I had established a
grudgingly-respectful professional relationship with Gaur over - oh,
it must be getting on for a hundred years - and I judged it unlikely
he would deliberately rip me off. His wares were expensive, to the
point I was reluctant to use his glamours unless there was no
alternative and the prize for success would adequately compensate
me for the ruinous expense.
I was convinced that, if used properly, Guar's glamours would
almost certainly work as advertised. The trick, of course, was
actually using it properly. Magics of this complexity are prone to
more subtle failures: deployed incorrectly, or in the wrong place,
they are liable to give entirely misleading results. It is for these
reasons that the results of using such a glamour are not admissible
as evidence in a court of law. Indeed, this kind of spell is illegal to
either own or deploy, which was of course why I was forced to
acquire them from a back-streets dealer like Gaur.
I held up the little box that contained the puissant glamour so
that Gumshoe could see it.
"I think it's time," I said slowly, "To apply a little magic to the
situation."
*
There's a point in almost any investigation, in my very
considerable experience, when a single piece of luck is required. If
the luck turns up on schedule, you solve the case to general
admiration all round; if not, you remain clueless and the case is
relegated to a dusty folder in the back of the filing cabinet. This
case had been almost devoid of luck from the start, although made
up for by a worryingly large number of unlikely coincidences, not

153
least of which was the sudden re-appearance of both of my
siblings.
This was, I fully admit, entirely a stroke of luck. We could have
been standing anywhere in the village or the immediate environs,
looking out at any of the three tumbledown properties we had been
investigating. Or we could have been traversing what passed for
the main road or any of the lonely lanes and paths. But instead we
were almost exactly at the centre of the village.
"What does it do?" Gumshoe asked, eyeing the little box warily.
He had recognised it for what it was: a conventional container
for commercially-available Goblin magic. He had been bitten, more
than once, by the effects of such glamours. No wonder he was
being cautious.
"Relax," I said casually, "This one doesn't go bang. Not even a
bit."
"Huh," he replied, "You've told me that before."
I let that one ride. Instead, I explained, quickly and as well as I
could in English, that the glamour enhanced the natural ability - in
Goblins, at least - to detect magic that had been used recently.
Maybe even a thick-skinned human might be sensitive enough to
get some hint of what was going on.
"But we know some kind of magic is in use," Gumshoe
objected, "That awful feeling in the stomach when we entered
those places."
He jerked a thumb over his shoulder.
"Yes, yes," I agreed, "But there's something else, something
we're missing. Something that the repulsion spells - very obvious
and crude spells - are hiding."
"if you say so," Gumshoe said, not sounding at all convinced,
"But will it work?"
"It ought to," I said glumly, "It was expensive enough."
Gumshoe chuckled, and I belatedly joined in. I wasn't sure I
saw the joke; the glamour would only find something only if there
was, actually, something to find. I had paid Gaur the equivalent of
a month's wages for this single charm and I was taking a
considerable gamble in using it now.
"Here goes."
I flipped open the lid of the cardboard box and read aloud the
few carefully-chosen words printed on the packaging. They
wouldn't have made any sense to Gumshoe even if he had been
able to hear them - the language of magic is an ancient Goblin

154
dialect now entirely disused except for the activation of glamours.
The old language is taught to all in schools, in much the same way
that Latin was once a compulsory part of the curriculum in parts of
the surface world. Although slightly more useful, of course.
As soon as I spoke the last syllable, the world around me began
to change. Overlaid on the mundane surroundings of stone
buildings and damp foliage was the spin and sparkle of magic at
work. I had expected one or two glimmers, hints at magics long
since past, but the reveal glamour had lit up like the entire
settlement had suddenly decided to celebrate with the aid of
lanterns, flashing lights and near-soundless fireworks.
"What the hell's going on?" came Gumshoe's anxious squeak.
"Shh," I hissed, "Let me concentrate."
There was almost too much to take in. I looked around wildly,
identifying a repulsion spell here and a disguising glamour there,
protections and disguises of all kinds, all fresh and recently
deployed. Every building, every wall and fence and hedge as far as
the eye could see showed the signs of magics being used on them.
I had only a few minutes until the spell worked itself out. But one
thing was immediately clear: a considerable amount of expensive
and sophisticated magic had been expended here in recent years.
One particular marker I paid special attention to. I strode over
to it, followed closely by Gumshoe. It was a large circle on the
ground, not thirty feet from where we were standing and, as far as
I could tell, right at the geometric centre of the village. The
residual marker was brightly-lit in a fiery glow I recognised. It was
one I had experienced at first-hand only the previous day. It was
exactly like the transport which had returned Gumshoe, Rosie and I
back to the surface from the realm of the Old Ones.
It seemed I had discovered proof that Garrick had indeed
successfully stolen a forbidden magic from the Old Ones.
*
A sudden thought caused me to look up. Against the scudding
grey clouds I could make out a faint dome overhead, outlined in
silver and blue fairy-lights. It was a spell I didn't recognise, but I
could guess its function. It was also one which was still active, but
so subtle in its effect that I hadn't noticed it on our previous visit.
My guess - I have some track record at this kind of guess - was
that the dome would extend underground too, and it kept the
magical senses of the Old Ones at bay. That was why the Old
Ones needed my assistance: a residual magic glamour would only
work inside the dome, and the Old Ones were rather too
conspicuous on the surface to risk travelling here in person.

155
 As quickly as it had appeared, the magic faded, and the little
cardboard box that had contained it crumbled into dust. A
standard security measure for illegal glamours. Goblin magic can
be used only once and the more cautious vendors left no lingering
traces behind to inform cops and competitors. Gaur was a
professional and took no chances.
The last of the magic to linger were crimson markers on the
ground: worrying streaks and splashes. Now that it had been
pointed out, I could detect even with merely mundane senses that
there were splashes of blood on the ground, mingling with the
rainwater, where something - somebody, unfortunately - had died
messily. Using magic to kill is quite possible, of course, but also
quite rare these days. It's just so expensive to do so; if you want
to harm somebody, it's generally much cheaper to use non-magical
weapons like guns or knives. Somebody around here had too
much money, or too much magic, and wasn't afraid to use it in a
heavy-handed - not to mention fatal - fashion. Either way, a
dangerous combination.
Gumshoe pointed to the spot where the circle of red light had
once been.
"That kinda looked familiar," he said, his eyes narrowed with
suspicion.
"Too right. I guess the Old Ones will be interested to learn
what's been going on here. But there's something else we need to
take a look at."
I peered over the stone wall we had been leaning on earlier at
the building beyond. I could sense bright lights and faint sounds
emerging from within. Up to a few moments ago, I would have
sworn that it was inhabited - by humans - and that the instincts of
millennia would cause me to give it a wide berth. Gumshoe joined
me, his height allowing him to see over the wall without effort
while I was forced to stand on tip-toe.
"Let's take a closer look at this place," I said softly.
"Okay," he replied, unholstering his automatic. I didn't bother
with my gun. I was pretty certain I knew what we would find.
We scrambled over the wall and made our way cautiously to the
house. We peered through windows and cracks in curtains then, in
a whisper, I asked Gumshoe to open the back door. He shrugged
and produced a set of lock picks wrapped in an oiled leather cloth.
Two minutes of muffled swearing and the scrape of metal on metal
was enough to get us inside. Within, the television and lights were
turned on, and the sounds of movement were all around us: doors
closing, creaking floorboards and childish feet on the stairs. But

156
there was nobody actually in residence; the house was entirely
empty.
"Is this place haunted?" Gumshoe asked after we had searched
every room for a second time.
"Sorta," I replied, "It's a glamour - a subtle one. You know how
you can always tell whether a house is empty or not? This glamour
gives the subconscious impression that a place is occupied. Very
clever. And leaves us with an important question: who owns this
property? And why is it empty?"

157
 Chapter 22 – Last Chance

To answer my questions, we decided to drive back to New York

City where Gumshoe's contacts would be able to provide the
genuine answers, rather than the fictions that were recorded in the
publicly-accessible records. On the way, I alternated between a
briefing for Gumshoe on the glamours I had identified - quite a
substantial task in itself - with listening impatiently while the
human detective negotiated on the phone with representatives of a
variety of grey-area and semi-legal organisations.
Gumshoe also put in a couple of calls to check if Rosie and
Nether were OK. After a long conversation, he reported that Rosie
seemed surprisingly calm and suggested that the re-appearance of
Nether has reassured her that nothing bad was going to happen. I
had another theory. I could have been wrong. Then again, now
was probably not the time to explore that particular aspect of
human behaviour.
It was the middle of the night by the time we returned to
Gumshoe's office. Even so, Gumshoe seemed tireless. He fired up
his computer and pounded the keyboard endlessly and made any
number of phone calls. He also slipped out for an hour or so to
meet with a couple of underworld types who would not consider
talking on the telephone, or indeed any interaction where a handful
of high-denomination bills in an anonymous brown envelope could
not be handed over. Meanwhile, I twiddled my thumbs, smoked
too many cigarettes, reviewed again what we had learned in
Dulelm Hollows, and fed Gumshoe and myself several mugs of the
poisonously strong coffee we share a taste for.
By four in the morning, the results were clear: as far as any
human knowledge was concerned, every piece of real estate in the
settlement of Dulelm Hollows had been acquired by one of two
mysterious corporations, both of which owned at least one of the
properties acquired with the aid of Coupar Angus. We knew for
certain that Professor Urquhart Garrick controlled all of the
property in that village.
More darkly, it also appeared that at least some of the previous
owners had disappeared. Not all, mercifully - there were tales of
unsolicted buyers offering silly money for perfectly ordinary houses
– but some people were missing, presumed travelling or just gone
away. No hint of foul play in the official reports. But it did look as

158
if Garrick had committed murder to get his hands on the last few
properties.
"But does it get us any closer to finding Garrick?" Gumshoe
asked, yawning and scratching his head.
"No, perhaps not," I agreed, "But I'm beginning to think that
finding Garrick may not be the most important thing in the world
just at the moment. Still, I guess I should report to our clients."
I meant Nether and Trinity. I strongly suspected that the Old
Ones would have been keeping a close, if metaphorical, eye on us
all, and by now they would know everything that I had told the
human.
Gumshoe grunted in reply.
"Why don't you get a couple of hours sleep," I suggested, "Then
get back to the old homestead to brief Nether on what we've
found, and to look after Rosie. And take some groceries with you."
He seemed very happy with that suggestion.
"But what are you going to do?" he wanted to know.
"I'm going to get back below while it's still dark," I replied, "See
if I can get a message to Trinity. And I need to talk with the
authorities. This is way beyond anything in our remit. We need to
get some reports heard in certain high places."
Gumshoe didn't seem convinced.
"Who'd believe us?" he demanded.
"Hmm. That's a fair question. Certainly nobody up here. I'd
keep very quiet about all this if I were you."
The PI nodded in agreement.
"So you can leave the Goblin authorities to me," I said grimly.
It looked like it was time for another trip downtown to be glared
at by Luncardy.
*
Moving as quietly as only a trained Goblin can, I made my way
down the back stairs of the low-rent block where Gumshoe's offices
were located. I was trusting that Gumshoe could look after
himself. His office was a veritable arsenal of weaponry - mostly
legally acquired - and I knew he was competent enough to use it
effectively. I also knew his office was more well-defended than
might appear at a first glance, with defences other than firearms.
Besides, there were enough shady businesses in the building that
an out-and-out fire-fight there was an unlikely possibility.

159
 I quickly made my way to the nearest entrance to the Lower
Realms, bounced out of the arrival portal and waved my PI's
buzzer at the uniformed customs officials and border guards. I
wanted to move swiftly, to get to Luncardy to persuade her to take
my message where it needed to be heard. But the Captain
probably wouldn't be on duty for an hour or so yet, for all that she
was an early riser. Time to kill for the moment.
It was many hours since I had been below, and it was time to
check in with my messaging service. I ducked into a bar - one I
had never entered before or since - which was still open even at
this early morning hour and ordered a stiff whiskey while I spied
out the telephone in a booth at the back. I dragged the receiver
from the rest, gulped half of the mediocre scotch, fumbled for coins
in my pocket and dialled a number from memory.
There was a couple of messages from names I vaguely
recognised who thought I owed them a modest debt, one dubiously
prospective client - which came to naught in the end - and one
annoying cold-calling salesman for the kind of gadget - for the
"Professional Consulting Detective" - that I could never in a million
years imagine a use for. The last message was from earlier this
evening, a terse missive from Maddoes the barman at the Deepest
Joy: "Call me." And a telephone number I vaguely recognised.
I shrugged, rummaged deeper in my pockets for more coins,
swallowed another portion of the whiskey and dialled the number
Maddoes had left. I didn't doubt for a second that the other bar
would still be open. Places like that never close.
"Deepest Joy Bar."
"Hello. Is that Maddoes?"
"It is. That'll be Mister Gask, then. I thought you'd get back to
me sooner."
"I've been out of town. A long way out of town. Just received
your message now."
"You're too late. He's gone now."
"Who's gone?"
Maddoes sighed. I could almost see the faint sneer on the old
bartender's face.
"Look, Gask. You managed to scare off one of my better
customers," he said with a hint of reproach in his voice, "I saw
what you and your lady friends did."
It seemed that Coupar Angus had re-appeared in the bar. I
mumbled some apology but Maddoes shrugged it off. He was
probably just making a point.

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 "Anyway, Mister Angus is back. Not looking very happy, not
happy at all. Like he didn't want to be there at all. And he was
talking to a very strange-looking cove, most unlike the usual
customers we get in here."
"What did he look like?" I demanded, "This other one."
"I thought you’d be interested in this one," Maddoes snorted,
sounding amused, "He was a fastidious little Goblin, dressed in an
old-fashioned way. Looked like he ought to have been a Professor
or something."
"Garrick," I breathed.
"You recognise him. I'm not surprised. Anyway, the little
professorial guy seemed to be accompanied by a couple of large
muscular Goblins. And just as well. I couldn't hear what they
were saying, but Angus got violent, attempted to attack the little
Goblin. He had to be dragged away by his companions, even
before our own bouncers to grab him and throw him out. He might
be a good customer but we don't tolerate that kind of thing here."
Maddoes paused, then went on despondently, sounding like a
punter who had bet everything on a horse which had come in
second place.
"Anyway, they've all gone now. I thought maybe you'd be
interested."
At some later time, I would reward Maddoes handsomely. It
was only fair, after the loss of a regular customer like Coupar
Angus. Oh, and the valuable information he had passed over.
*
After I had finished the call with Maddoes, I sat for a long while,
sipping the remnants of the scotch and thinking about what I had
just heard. Why had Coupar Angus felt compelled to visit the
Deepest Joy, given his embarrassment on the previous visit? From
Maddoes' report, he wasn't at all happy, indeed unhappy enough to
attack a Goblin he was mortally afraid of.
Travel in the Goblin realms is cheap and fast, so nowhere is
very far away by transit tube. But such travel is rarely private;
there are people around on the transit systems at all times of the
day and night. And it's a natural place for the police to have a
presence. So, a Goblin who wishes to keep out of sight or away
from the eyes of the law either has to stay put or resign himself to
moving at little more than a walking pace. And Garrick had
managed to stay out of sight of the police and other agencies for a
great many years.

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 It was entirely possible that Garrick had a hideout somewhere
not far from the Deepest Joy. That made some kind of sense: a
base in the lowest part of the Lower Realms might be a good spot
to spy on activities in the even deeper demesnes of the Old Ones.
Not to mention easy access to the kind of Goblin who would loyally
carry out almost any instruction given the application of a large
enough sum of money. The cavern which contained the Deepest
Joy was one of the smaller ones. A sufficiently determined police
action might just be able to smoke out Professor Urquhart Garrick
from his lair.
It was time to visit Luncardy. I swallowed the last dregs of the
whiskey, paid my bill and swung out of the bar. It was a fairly
quick trip to the 14th precinct station; just a couple of changes on
the transit tubes and perhaps a total of ten minutes walking.
Unusually, I was distracted, thinking about what Maddoes had said
and wondering if there was some way of narrowing the search for
Garrick's hideout. Normally, I watch the street and keep an eye on
the shadows to see who might be lurking there. But this morning,
in a haze of confusion and alcohol and sleeplessness, I was not
paying my customary attention to what was going on behind me.
So it was entirely my own fault that Trinity and a couple of her
goons got the drop on me. Before I knew it, I was looking at two
blank-faced Goblins blocking the way in front of me and listening to
a familiar sneering voice behind me.
"Findo! I thought you were better than this. A human would
pay more attention that you."
I turned around slowly.
"Hi Trinity. I wondered when you'd reappear," I said, grinning
at her and gesturing with a thumb behind me, "And you seem to
have picked up some supporting cast."
"These guys have worked for me for a long time. They're very
good. So don't try disappearing on me."
"Me, disappear! You're the one who's disappeared more times
than a conjurer's rabbit."
"Yeah, well, I have my reasons. But now we're both here, why
don't you tell me what's going on?"
I saw no reason to share my experiences in the Hells with her
but, as for the rest, why not?
"Fair enough. The bad news," I began, "Is that I still don't
know where Garrick is, precisely. The good news is that I think I
know where he is, approximately. And I also know that you're not
the only one he's ripped off to further his plans."

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 "Yeah, yeah. It's my money I concerned about," she
interjected, "Other people can look after their own dough."
"Maybe," I agreed, "But at least you're alive, and free, to moan
about it."
Her eyes narrowed. It was time to explain more. I told her
about the narrow escape from Rigg and his murderous henchmen,
although not exactly how we managed to get away. I explained in
some length and detail about our exploration of Dulelm Hollows,
about the disguised and deserted nature of the houses there, and
the fact that all of the properties there were indirectly owned by
the old Professor, and the worrying bloodstains in a few places.
"Okay, okay, all very interesting," Trinity said impatiently, "But
where can I get my claws on Garrick himself?"
"This is a task for the professionals," I said, adding quickly, "By
which I mean the cops. They've got the manpower for this kind of
job."
Trinity glared at me. She was getting good at that kind of
glare. Another few decades and I might have felt intimidated.
Still, she did deserve a chance.
"There's a bar, in the Underworld," I said carefully, "Called the
Deepest Joy. Garrick's been seen in there. There's an evens
chance that he's somewhere in that cavern."
Trinity's eyes narrowed further.
"Be careful," I urged, "Garrick's got support and weapons, and
he's had people killed already."
Trinity nodded in acknowledgement. I wasn't going to be able
to dissuade her even if I wanted to. My little sister had always
been nearly impossible to protect.
"Right, you two," she said, addressing the big lads who still
stood behind me, "Let's get to it. See you about, Findo."
The three of them set a cracking pace in the direction of the
nearest transit tube.
*
It was remarkably easy to get to see Captain Harriett Luncardy
when I finally got to the 14th precinct station, despite the earliness
of the hour. As I was shown in, she was sitting at her desk, an
elegant fountain pen in one hand and her trademark - and even
more elegant - smoking stick in the other. She blew smoke, then
used the smoking stick to point me in the direction of a seat on the
other side of the desk. I took off my hat and sat down, fumbling
for cigarettes and matches. I needed a smoke badly.

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 The young copper acting as gopher was clearly well-training,
since she hung around, quiet and motionless, by the door.
Luncardy made a last few, and no doubt essential, annotations on
the report she was reviewing before gathering up all the papers
into a manila folder and handing them to the patiently waiting
officer. Then she steepled her hands, rested her chin on her long
thin fingers and looked over them levelly at me. Her cool grey
eyes missed nothing.
"You ought to get more sleep, Gask," She said, "You really look
like shit."
"Yeah, well I feel like it, too. It's been a busy few days."
"And I suppose you want to tell me about it?"
"You guessed it. You're a good listener. You might find it
interesting. And, besides, I'd like to see the look on your pretty
face when you hear what I've got to say."
"Huh." She pursed her lips and took an elegant puff from her
smoking stick. "You know how to apply the flattery, I'll give you
that. Okay, I'll bite. Spill the beans."
I gave it to her both barrels. Her eyes opened wide as I spoke.
She grabbed her pen and flipped open her notebook and scribbled
notes like the most earnest of students in the front row of the
lecture theatre, her cigarette burning unregarded on the ashtray.
Notes, places, dates, times: all committed to the fine vellum in her
round and elegant handwriting. I left almost nothing out. The
expression on her face when I told her about the encounter with
the Old One was a picture, an oil painting, an old master to be
savoured and appreciated for a long time.
Her expression when I told her about the sighting of Garrick
was a picture of a very different kind: The Huntress, perhaps, or
maybe something more feral in shades of black and red. She could
be very focussed when she was on the scent. The only thing I left
out of my narrative was the name of my informant in the
Underworld bar - she could probably have shaken that out if she
wanted to, but she understood the value of trusted informants as
well as I did - and the promises made by the Old One, which I
figured were entirely a private matter.
In the end, she needed no further encouragement. At the end
of my narrative, she sat for a few moments studying her notes,
finally remembering the remnants of her cigarette. Her eyes
flicked from notebook to me and back again a couple of times, her
expression more calculating than suspicious.
"Okay, I need to get a crew down there as soon as possible. I
want you to come too," she said with grim determination and

164
waving her cigarette holder in my direction, "It might be a long
shot, but this may be our only chance to apprehend Garrick before
he pulls that disappearing act again."

165
 Chapter 23 – A Ray of Light

I had to admit that Luncardy could move quickly when she

wanted to. And her crew were well trained. She also had the
contacts, and the influence, and the trust quotient, to get support
from others in her organisation without question. There seemed to
be little resistance to her requisitions.
Maybe it was just a slow day in the police department, or
maybe the cops had more information - or just more suspicions -
about Garrick's activities past and present than I was aware of.
Perhaps some senior officers treated it as a training activity, or just
a fishing trip: not really likely to succeed in its stated objective, but
nevertheless a good excuse to get a force on the ground to shake
out whatever criminal activity came to hand. Or maybe some of
them were privately keen to see Luncardy fail, to do something
foolish, on the principle that, given enough rope, she would hang
herself.
Whatever the reason, Luncardy was readily able to draft in
reinforcements from other precincts. The combined force made
rapid time to the particular cavern which contained the Deepest Joy
bar. But not as rapid as Luncardy. She and a few of her most
trusted staff made double time through the transit tubes, much to
the consternation of the regular commuters and itinerants, I don't
doubt. It seemed I had been temporarily included in this privileged
number.
Following Luncardy's unerring direction, we made our way to an
observation platform, working our way to the steps which spiralled
up and around one of the immense stone pillars that supported the
roof of the cavern. Luncardy's long legs made short work of the
steps while leaving me very slightly out of breath at the top. From
this vantage-point, we had an unparalleled vista across the shallow
bowl that was the cavern floor, this surface punctuated irregularly
by supporting columns and modulated by buildings of every shape
and size.
Luncardy muttered quiet instructions to a couple of her officers,
who in turn spoke into communication devices that a human might
think of as a walkie-talkie, although actually worked by subtle
glamours. We know that radio waves don't propagate through
solid rock at all well. After a final command from the Captain, we
watched the uniformed coppers swirling out of the transit tube

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exits like black ants scurrying from a nest, ready to attack or
defend, all set for the sting.
The massed police forces set about working their way
methodically along the boulevards and side-streets, knocking on
doors and waving search warrants in the face and barging past
anybody who tried to stand in their way. For those cases where
nobody answered, the coppers deployed legal-only-when-used-by-
authorised-police glamours to look inside those properties.
Fortunately for everybody, for obscure technical reasons these
glamours are extremely short range and short-lived, and therefore
much less invasive than one might expect. I wondered idly
whether this was another magic that had been donated by the Old
Ones, a technique carefully hamstrung so as to be useful only
under marginal circumstances and with much effort.
All this police action seemed astonishingly heavy-handed.
"What's going on here, Luncardy?" I asked the Captain, "There’s
a lot of manpower down there."
She was standing at the very edge of the platform and peering
over - there were no protective barriers as a human construction
would have included. She turned and moved and stood just a little
bit too close to me. I was suddenly aware of her feminine form in
the most basic way possible: her scent, her flesh and her bright
eyes boring into me.
"We've been trying to track down this Garrick for a long time,"
she breathed, her professional words at odds with the animal
presence forcing itself to my attention, "And now we have a chance
to lay hands on him."
"Ah," I replied, edging backwards cautiously, "So you know a
lot about the Professor?"
"Urquhart Garrick has been on the Most Wanted list for a long
time," she replied, her demeanour suddenly darkening, "Even
before your little run-in with him."
As if realising just how intimate her actions might have seemed
to those around her, Luncardy spun away, returning her focus
entirely on the actions of the blue-coated flatfoots hurrying about
below her.
*
Suddenly ignored by the Captain and all of her crew, I stood
and watched the teaming hordes of uniformed policemen in action.
Putting that much manpower on the ground anywhere in the Lower
Realms was bound to shake down something illegal, and here and
there I could make out Goblins being led away meekly in handcuffs
or manhandled to the ground. They were the unlucky ones, the

167
ones too stupid to run away, or stupid enough to swing a punch;
all-in-all, those too stupid to allow the police to turn a blind eye
just this once.
There was no sign of Garrick. Eventually, I got bored and
backed away from the edge of the crowded observation platform. I
made my way slowly down the steps, wondering whether we were
wasting our time. Away from the column, and probably out of
sight of the watchers above, I stepped into a public telephone
booth. It was time to check in again with my answering service. I
pulled coins from my pocket and spun the dial.
There was only one message, a rather alarming one from
Gumshoe: "Call me as soon as you can, at the old house" and a
telephone number I already knew. I swore under my breath,
rummaged furiously for more coins - dropping several in my haste
- and put through a call to Gumshoe's place. The phone rang and
rang, and I was on the verge of hanging up when it was answered.
"Gask!" Gumshoe said breathlessly in response to my mumbled
greeting, "Thank goodness you've called."
"What's going on?" I asked urgently, "And why are you out of
breath?"
"I just ran back to the house. I've been searching the woods.
We had visitors. One of them got the drop on me. Knocked me
out cold."
"Are you okay?" I asked anxiously.
"Yeah, I'm fine. Just a sore head. But Rosie's gone, so is
Nether. I've been looking for them. No signs of them anywhere.
No marks on the ground. It's almost as if they've disappeared off
the face of the planet."
"Rigg," I growled, adding placatingly, "And his goons."
"Could be," Gumshoe agreed grudgingly, "But they must have
had some help from your world. No human could get away from
here without leaving some kind of trail I could spot."
He might have been right. Most humans are clumsy movers.
But some are not. On a previous encounter, Rigg had managed to
sneak up on me and knock me out. I hadn’t told Gumshoe that.
"What do you want me to do?" Gumshoe asked plaintively.
"Stay put," I said firmly, "Have another look around. Keep
sharp. They might come back. And let me know any
developments."
Gumshoe grunted his agreement and signed off. I hung up the
telephone receiver slowly, deep in thought, wondering what this

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new development might mean. So I was shocked almost out of my
skin by a bang on the glass of the kiosk. It was Trinity, flanked by
the same two bully-boys, or perhaps others too interchangeable to
be able to tell the difference.
"Don't start, brother dearest," she said as I swung out of the
kiosk, holding up a finger to her lips, then whispering, "I know
where Garrick is."
*
"Are you sure?" I demanded.
Trinity nodded, looking irredeemably smug.
"Pretty sure," she smiled nastily, "My boys ran around here
more quietly than your dear Captain's flatfoots. Although I'd admit
there's a certain amount of luck involved, too."
"Where is he?" I wanted to know.
Trinity seemed to be enjoying the moment.
"We were just watching the streets," she said with relish, "And,
for a while, there was nothing much to see. But, then I noticed a
lot of Goblins, big mean-looking Goblins, converging on a place
over that way."
She waved a finger vaguely.
"The Library Theatre."
Living space in the Lower Realms is always at a premium, but
those with more money than sense can usually find a way of
overcoming the planning and zoning regulations. The Library
Theatre was a circular building set in the centre of the plaza that
few people visited. It was an architectural folly with a domed roof,
originally erected as a library by a generous but misguided
philanthropist on a budget, a minor palace of learning for the lower
orders. It soon became too small for its original function and
operated for a time as a theatre in the round, but the size and
shape of the building meant that it was both operationally
inconvenient and not large enough to turn butts-on-seats into a
profit. The theatre was closed down and the building boarded up
for quite a while, at least according to the newspaper reports, the
memories of which had started stirring behind my eyes.
"Ah," I retorted, "I should have guessed. So why haven't you
and your boys gone and got him then?"
Trinity snorted.
"Reinforcements," she replied shortly, "There's a small army in
there now, if the number of bodies I saw can be believed."

169
 The old theatre would make a superb defensible position, with
lines of sight in all directions, including upwards. It would be
impossible for anyone to approach without getting shot at. It
would need a massed attack - and serious protections - to take
such a stronghold.
"You're the one with the Establishment connections," she went
on, "Time for you to help."
It was my turn to grin as well.
"There's a quicker way of getting Luncardy's attention than just
asking," I said wryly, "Follow me."
I reached into my pocket for my PI buzzer, then set off at a run
in the direction of the Theatre. One of the universal rules of
policing is that running people always attract the attentions of the
police, and I had not gone more than a couple of hundred yards
when I heard a voice behind me.
"Hey, you! Stop, police!"
I stopped and raised my hands slightly. My sister and her
henchmen did the same, Trinity in particular looking frustrated.
The young copper didn't recognise me, so I flashed the PI badge at
him.
"Findo Gask, Private Detective," I said sharply, "I know where
Garrick can be found. Get on the blower to your Captain and get
her down here pronto!"
It didn't take long for Luncardy and her crew to turn up. They
had probably seen me hurrying about from their command and
control eyrie in any case. The Captain stalked up to me, her eyes
narrowed in professional suspicion, distracted only briefly with a
glare in the direction of my sister.
"Two Gasks in the same place at the same time," she muttered,
"Can't be good."
"Very funny," Trinity sneered. Goblin faces are very good at
sneering.
"Quit messing about," I said grumpily. I had been skipping far
too much sleep to be able to tolerate very many of these games.
"Okay, so what's the urgency?" Luncardy demanded, her gaze
flicking from Trinity to me and back again.
"I've found Garrick," Trinity replied shortly,
"Are you sure?" Luncardy responded, sounding stereotypically
cop-sceptical.

170
 "Look, I want Garrick detained as much as either of you,"
Trinity said, sounding annoyed, "And I would've gone and got him
myself if I thought there was the slightest chance I could do it
without being shot."
I interjected with a quick explanation of the Library Theatre
before the two ladies started trying to tear each others throats out.
To her credit, Luncardy saw both the problem and the logic behind
it immediately. She sullied her immaculate face by furrowed her
brow for a few seconds before summoning over her most trusted
lieutenants for a brief conflab.
Within moments, we were off, a large fraction of the combined
police forces making their way along side-streets and trying to
keep under cover. But to no avail. I guess it was impossible to
hide the approach of such a considerable force from those
emplaced in the theatre. Some of the advance guard - including
Luncardy and myself - were attempting to conceal ourselves in
alleys and doorways when we all felt a surge of that difficult-to-
describe feeling, the innate sense of magic being deployed that,
after thousands of years of exposure, most Goblins are very finely
attuned to.
I looked over the plaza to the old theatre. As I watched, it
seemed to shimmer in a pale blue haze, as if it had suddenly
receded to a great distance and I was seeing it through many miles
of dusty atmosphere. I recognised it immediately, of course,
although I had never seen one this big. It was a protection
glamour, an impermeable magical shield. It must have cost a
fortune.
I sprinted across the plaza, my sudden anger and frsutration
allowing me to outpace even Luncardy's long legs. I rammed the
translucent, faintly-sparkling shield with my shoulder - pointless,
since I just bounced off and collapsed on the stone flags of the
plaza. My shoulder ached for days afterwards. Picking myself up,
I could see that the old theatre was entirely surrounded by the
magic, with a gap of just a few dozen paces between the shield and
the worm stonework of the building.
Then a door opened and I could see a solitary figure walking
across the stonework of the plaza, a figure I recognised. Professor
Urquhart Garrick. He stopped on the other side of the barrier and
regarded me coolly.
"So, dear boy, here we are again," he said, as calmly as if it
were an afternoon tutorial in a cosy little office off the quad.
"Garrick," I acknowledged, barely keeping my seething anger in
check.

171
 "A stalemate," Garrick went on in the same professorial tones
he always used, "Time to call off your dogs.
I have what your friends in the police would undoubtedly call a
hostage. Miss Rosie o'Chill."
"No!" I cried, hammering on the impervious magical shield with
my fists and the butt of my gun, "Let her go!"
The Professor just shook his head.
"I don't think so," he said calmly.
*
From the other side of the shield, Garrick watched my antics
with wry amusement. Finally I stopped wasting my time beating
on the wall of magic and deployed a cliché instead.
"You won't get away with it," I shouted, "The whole area is
swarming with cops. You're surrounded."
Garrick reacted with mild amusement.
"On the contrary, I believe I have just got away with it. You're
wasting your time. We all have been, for a long time. We have
been hiding in these caverns and caves for much too long, pushed
out of our true realm by the humans and held in check by the
machinations of the so-called Wise Ones."
The old Professor just couldn't help but deliver a lecture, even
at a time like this. Old habits die hard.
"And now, dear boy, I must be going."
He made a gesture which was barely a twitch of the fingers.
Flamboyant movements were never the Professor’s style.
"You won't be seeing me again. Do remember me to your
relatives."
There was a burst of light, bright and golden from the floor all
around the perimeter of the magical shield. I instinctively threw up
my arm to protect my eyes and took a step backwards. The light
faded, as quickly as if it had been just switched off, but it took a
few moments for my eyes to recover. The whole circle, the area
where we thought we have Garrick and his compatriots hemmed
in, had started to move upwards.
Within moments, Garrick's party was far above my head,
supported on a vast column of polished blue-grey rock which
flowed smoothly and seamlessly from the floor. If this was another
example of the magic he had stolen from the Old Ones - and it
looked very much like it was - then Garrick might well have been
correct in his assertion. This magic could take him anywhere, at

172
considerable speed, and in a fashion which would be very difficult
to trace.
Around me, uniformed cops were shaking or scratching their
heads, like me unable to think of anything to do. A few fired their
guns at the column - quite uselessly, of course - while a similar
number managed to turn the air blue with oaths and curses.
I watched the rising column despondently until it reached the
cavern ceiling thousands of feet about my head. As it touched, the
column of rock froze suddenly, unexpectedly immobile and
somehow looking like it had always been there. It seemed that
this particular cavern had just gained an additional supporting
column.
A thought struck me. Garrick was a smart cookie, but he might
just have missed something. Reveal spells like the one I had
deployed at Dulelm Hollows are delicate things by their very nature
and very personal in their effect. They have to be, since their
intent is to detect the left-over traces of other magic. Garrick was
sure to have watching eyes all over Dulelm Hollows, but only
magical ones: I was certain that I would have been able to smell
out the presence of even a single Goblin.
So, all the poking around that Gumshoe and I had done latterly,
and the deployment of a single subtle spell, might just have slipped
below the old Professor’s radar. Besides, the Old Ones were
looking out for me, they said; they might have helped too.
I had the strongest hunch that Garrick and his entourage were
on their way to Dulelm Hollows.

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 Chapter 24 – Sudden Moves

Captain Harriett Luncardy was a Goblin to whom swear words

and coarse language did not usually come either fluently or
frequently. So when she said: "What the..." and followed it up with
a string of choice epithets I knew for certain that she was severely
rattled. Despite my frustration, I could not help but smirk at her
discomfiture.
Characteristically, Luncardy regained her composure with
commendable speed. She took a deep breath, put her gun back in
its holster under the sharply-tailored grey suit and gestured me
over.
"That was quite some magic," she said shortly, her eyes
narrowed as if I had something to do with it.
"Yes," I agreed, "And probably nicked from the Old Ones."
"So we won't be able to trace it?"
"I doubt it," I agreed, nodding.
She snorted, thought for a moment and then said: "I'm out of
options. Any thoughts?"
I was suddenly distracted.
"Just one," I said uncertainly.
Various things came together in my head just at that moment.
I had a sudden intuition about the nature of Garrick's true intent. I
gasped soundlessly as the full nature of Garrick's plan, the sweep
and majesty of its scale, sunk into that overheated and over-tired
grey matter between my ears.
"Don't be coy," Luncardy snapped, "Spit it out."
I explained as best I could, trying to express myself clearly but
forever going around in circles with the complexities and
interlinkages. I think the message got through eventually.
Dulelm Hollows would become a new living space for Goblins on
the surface. The real estate was already owned by Garrick either
directly or indirectly. The hamlet would be turned into one vast
repulsion zone, protected by magic stolen from the Old Ones to
keep away any itinerant humans and more puissant glamours to
keep away Goblins. In any case, it would be a location on the

174
surface which would be hard for Goblins to approach, even under
cover of darkness.
Dulelm Hollows would become a base for Garrick's nefarious
operations and a base for his own power in the Goblin world.
Come to the surface, and set yourself free, from the oppression of
the official Goblin government and their lapdogs, the police, and
away from the tyranny of the humanfolk from whom we have
hidden these last five thousand years.
Luncardy and the few of her team who were within earshot, and
Trinity too, listened to my ramblings in silence until I wound down
to a stop. I felt drained, shocked by the enormity, the audacity of
the scheme Garrick had hatched. He must have been working on it
for years, decades.
The Captain was the first to respond.
"Right," she said, "Let's go and get him, before he gets
entrenched."
"No!" I insisted.
Both Luncardy and Trinity looked at me strangely.
"We've tried the mob-handed, brute-force approach," I
explained, "And look where that got us. Besides, they'll be
casualties; people will get killed. Perhaps, lots of people. Neither
of us want that kind of body count."
I could see realisation sinking into the psyche of both ladies.
"We need a softly-softly approach," I went on, "Just a couple of
reliable Goblins. And me."
"And me," Trinity added grimly, "You're not leaving me out of
this."
Luncardy sighed.
"Okay," she said slowly, "But let's have plenty of backup to
hand, just in case."
It was my turn to nod.
"And I'm coming in too," the Captain added in a voice of steel,
"Nobody's going to do my job for me."
*
Getting to Dulelm Hollows by more conventional means took
hours, which meant that it was once again getting dark by the time
we were approaching the hamlet by road. I napped in the back of
one of the motley assortment of motor vehicles maintained by that
branch of the Goblin law enforcement agencies which specialises in

175
surface operations. My sleep was interrupted repeatedly by dark
uneasy dreams that seemed to vanish as soon as I awoke.
The cavalcade of motorised transport converged in a field
several miles outside the settlement and a motley crew of police
disgorged onto the grass. The cops were well-trained and well-
disciplined, and most seemed unfazed by being under the open
sky, although there were a few nervous glances upwards.
The Captain had obviously been studying maps and considering
tactics on the trip over, and I had contributed a little in my few
waking moments. She seemed in no doubt how to proceed. In a
sequence of whispered instructions, she directed the bulk of the
force to encircle the entire hamlet in groups of two or three. The
cops were directed to wait exactly thirty minutes and then come in,
handguns drawn, unless it was obvious that a gun battle had
already broken out.
The advance guard divided into two groups, with Luncardy and
her men in one party, and Trinity and me in the other. Luncardy
chose the entry-points. If I knew her at all - and I did all too well
by now - she would have selected the approach which she judged
would have the best chance of undetected penetration. She waited
until the agreed moment when the backup forces should be in
place, then nodded decisively.
"Right then," she said firmly, "Let's go."
We set off, moving as quietly as only Goblins can. The route
that Trinity and I had been allocated was the longer one, skirting
several areas of woodland and running along hedges, although
there was much more cover on the approach. We were barely out
of earshot of the other party when a soft whistle caused us to spin
around, pointing our guns wildly at innocent patches of darkness.
"That's no way to treat a relative," came a familiar voice.
I breathed a sigh of relief. Nether strolled out of the
undergrowth clutching a couple of big guns and looking worryingly
like he was both willing and able to use them.
"I wondered what happened to you," I exclaimed as he
approached.
"Thought you might need some assistance," he replied smugly.
There was a soft snort from Trinity.
"Besides," Nether went on, "I'm on the trail of those who
kidnapped Rosie. Again. And the trail led me here."
"I'm not surprised," I said, "So are you coming with us, or
what?"

176
 "Yeah, let's get on with it," he muttered.
The Gask party set off again in stealthy single file. We got
closer, edging our way through back yards and around porches,
checking house by house for any signs of occupancy - there were
none - and carefully making our way towards the centre of Dulelm
Hollows. I was beginning to suspect that Garrick had set up his
base of operations in the largest house in the hamlet, the grand
affair set in its own grounds we had noticed in our previous visit.
Nether held up his hand and we all stopped, huddled together in
the shelter of mature trees and the high stone wall that surrounded
the grand old house.
"Can you feel it?" he hissed.
I could. As softly as a gauze curtain falling from a window, the
magic around us suddenly became much less strong. Not absent
entirely, but vastly weakened. It seemed that the Old Ones had
somehow managed to exert some of their influence at last.
*
Our second attempt at a stealthy approach was as unsuccessful
as the last. We clambered over the stone wall that surrounded the
old mansion, picking a place far from the house obscured by
overgrown foliage. We were just considering the next stage of our
route when we heard shots being fired from the house. But only a
few shots and none of them aimed at us, as far as I could tell.
Instantly, we sprinted for the house, running zigzags across the
damp lawn towards the kitchen door, keeping our heads low, until
we reached the shelter of the doorway. The small army we were
expecting was nowhere to be seen. Perhaps Garrick thought that
fifty Goblins would attract too much attention, even in this
protected enclave. Or perhaps Garrick just didn't like company. In
any case, it transpired that he had sent them away some time
between his disappearance and our own arrival in Dulelm Hollows.
According to the reports and descriptions I got later, I pieced
together what happened on the other side of the house, more or
less. The Captain and her coppers were heading for the side door,
perhaps expecting that their approach would be unnoticed. It
seemed they triggered some alarm, and Rigg's face appeared at
one of the windows, followed shortly by breaking glass and the
shots we had heard, causing Luncardy and her companions to dive
for cover.
There was silence for a minute or so, enough for the coppers to
start peering out of their hiding-places to try and see where the
shots were coming from. Then, without warning, Rigg burst out of
the front door, holding a struggling Rosie bound at the wrists. He

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stopped just outside the door and shouted, in passable Goblin and
then repeated in slightly accented English, "Stay back or I'll shoot.
I mean it!"
"Stay back," Luncardy repeated the instruction, "We don't want
unnecessary bloodshed."
Seeing the police hesitate, Rigg started making his way to the
garages where a powerful car waited outside on the gravel. He
must have pressed some button inside the house which opened the
electrically-powered gates, the low rumble of which we could hear
from our position around the back.
Then we all heard the roar of a car, not Riggs. Gumshoe had
ignored my instructions to stay put - as I strongly suspected he
would - and driven over to Dulelm Hollows as quickly as he could.
He drove his ancient Oldsmobile at high speed with headlights
blazing into the hamlet, through the gates as they swung open,
and screeched to a halt not thirty feet from where Rigg was holding
Rosie.
Obscured by darkness and smoke from the car, Gumshoe threw
open the driver's door and then, rolling low, he slipped out of the
door on the other side. Half a dozen bright lights let up the entire
front of the old house, dazzling the big human who still held Rosie
tightly.
The ruse was sufficient to distract Rigg. He got off a couple of
shots through the car door - bullet-holes which Gumshoe would
have carefully repaired and repainted afterwards. He always was
ludicrously fond of that old car. But Gumshoe was no stranger to
gunfights, and he was both fast and accurate with the heavy
automatic he usually lugged around with him. From his position
flat on the ground, he took aim carefully and shot Rigg in the thigh.
It was not a fatal wound, but one which slowed him down enough
so that the human cops would easily pick him up later.
Rigg cried out in pain and collapsed, blood pouring from his
thigh, his gun bouncing away to one side. Rosie fell to the ground,
then picked herself up and rushed over to Gumshoe. The human
PI grabbed her, but he didn't take his eyes of Rigg. And just as
well. Gumshoe advanced cautiously to where the other human was
lying, kicked away the handgun, and knocked a second gun away
that Rigg, despite his injury, was retrieving from under his coat.
Gumshoe put his own automatic to Rigg's temple and fumbled for
handcuffs.
"Stay put, punk," the detective snarled.
*

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 Meanwhile, around the back, the Gask party had heard the roar
of the car and more gunshots, and used the disturbance to deploy
a favourite little glamour of mine, one which opens locked doors.
We slipped inside and swept through the kitchens of the old house,
finding nothing either interesting or dangerous, until we reached
the main hall.
There, Garrick too was attempting to flee, but in a very
different fashion. Perhaps I had expected he would have prepared
another of the magical secret passages that Goblins in general -
and the Professor in particular - always like. But it seemed he had
not. Instead, he was attempting to use the Old Ones' glamour, to
conjure a magic circle and sink effortlessly into the ground, to turn
up who-knows-where.
It didn't work. I didn't know why, although I suspect the claws
- and magic - of the Old Ones had something to do with it. The
frustration was visible in Garrick's face and the set of his shoulders,
even at a slight distance. He knew it wasn't going to work.
Of course, magical escape routes are not the only way of
leaving a building. Garrick turned and saw us bearing down on him
with weapons drawn, moved with surprising speed to a small door
under the main staircase. We followed him. The door lead to the
cellars of the old house, and we could hear the Professor not very
far away breathing heavily, followed by a creaking noise I could not
immediately place. At the bottom of the cellar stairs, the Gask
party split up, each of us taking a different one of the subterranean
rooms.
I got to the far reaches of the cellar I had selected just in time
to see an entrance closing. It was some kind of secret doorway
concealed behind a wine rack, a tunnel of human construction, the
kind of thing that would have been used by smugglers and
bootleggers in years past. Garrick had slipped through my fingers
once before and I was determined that her was not going to get
away again.
"Garrick's getting away!" I bellowed, "After him!"
Nether and Trinity all converged on my cries. I tugged
ineffectually on the now-closed door.
"Stand aside," Nether instructed.
I did so. My brother put a couple of rounds into the lock, then
all three of us tugged at the heavy wooden construction. With
excruciating slowness, the door opened and we slipped through in
pursuit of our quarry.
On the other side of the door was a long straight tunnel, low
and narrow and dark of a human, although perfectly acceptable for

179
Goblins. At the far end, we could make out Garrick reaching up to
a iron ladder set into the wall, moving very deftly even for one of
his advanced age.
Again, we followed, hearts pounding and guns held at the
ready. We reached the ladder and climbed rapidly, Nether leading
the way, followed by Trinity and then myself. The top of the ladder
led to a manhole cover in the road. No streetlights, just a few
scudding clouds in front of the moon, and Garrick nowhere to be
seen.
"I'll go this way," Nether said, pointing down the road, "You too
try that way."
Trinity and I ran off, following the road as the stone walls on
either side we high enough to slow down an old Goblin. We
rounded a corner and there, visible in the fitful moonlight, we again
caught sight of the Professor.
I had never known Garrick carry a gun but, somehow, the rules
had changed today. The old Professor pulled a little handgun from
his jacket pocket, cocked it awkwardly and swung it in my
direction. And then the tragedy happened. Trinity, for so long a
bodyguard and protector, saw Garrick take aim and threw herself
in front of me. The bullet struck her in the heart.
It was the last shot, the last bullet. The police force that had
surrounded the place had rushed in on hearing the shots, and four
different coppers now approached Garrick from as many directions.
Garrick dropped his gun and raised his hands.
Ignoring the Professor, I fell onto my knees next to my sister.
"Trinity," I urged, tears in my eyes, "Stay with me here."
Her lips moved in a pale approximation of a wry grin.
"Too late for that," she gasped, "Take care of things for me."
I cradled her head in my arms.
"Findo," she croaked, "Thanks. For everything. I never said so
before. You always were my favourite brother."
Her eyes closed, her head lolled back, her heart stopped
forever.
"No!" I howled in anguish, "Nooo!"

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 Chapter 25 – Bitter Ends

I wasn't in a fit state to pay much attention at the time, but I

was later able to piece together what happened next from the
reports of others.
The force of Goblin cops pointing guns that had surrounded
Garrick had evidently taken him unawares. For once, he was
nonplussed, uncertain what course to take. Fortunately - for him -
the decision was taken for him.
"Freeze!"
When a copper from the Lower Realms tells you this, he really
means it. All Goblins know that even a minor movement can be
the trigger for a glamour, and so the police are trained to shoot
first and pick up the pieces afterwards. The old Professor also
knew this, unsurprisingly, and kept his hands motionless and well
away from his body.
At a nod from Luncardy, one of her crew deployed a disabling
glamour - again, a magic rarely used and legal only when deployed
by sanctioned members of the police force. Threads of silver and
ribbons of lilac appeared from nowhere, folding themselves around
Garrick's body like some elaborate giftwrap, a perp in translucent
silver foil. These glamours are required to suppress all magic and
slow bodily movements, and few are able to counter their effects.
Garrick was not one of them.
The Professor was formally arrested; extremely formally:
encased in the festive wrapping of the disablement magic, he was
addressed using the archaic words long custom has required.
Some humans might think them similar to Miranda Rights although
in truth they are rather longer and much more complicated. After
that, he was taken away - quite literally carried bodily from the
area in the cocoon of magic by four burly coppers, deposited in the
back of a human-scale transport and rushed to the nearest
entrance to the Lower Realms.
At first, it was expected that Professor Garrick would stand trial
in the usual way, Goblins being, generally speaking, fanatical about
the rule of law, even those who spend most of their time
circumventing them. But it was not to be. By instruction from the
Senate - this is a conventional form of words that indicates that
somebody in a position of real power has taken an interest in the

181
matter - Garrick was transferred to a secure institution: a place
reputed to be genuinely impossible to either escape from - using
magical as well as physical methods - or to bribe your way out.
Garrick might have had friends in high places, sympathisers with
his objective to returning to the surface world. If he had, none of
them put their heads over the parapet to support him now.
*
In another place not far away, a quiet copper from Luncardy's
force gently disengaged me from Trinity's silent corpse and led me
away. It was a long time before I was able to piece my life back
together again.
*
It is a bad habit of mine to want to tie up all the loose ends
when a case is closed. Some of those loose ends are purely
intellectual curiosity: to understand the motives of those found
guilty, or those no longer living, to augment my limited
physiological and sociological understanding of Goblin and human
alike. Or sometimes it is to elicit a last piece of information, to tidy
the files and tick all the boxes. It helps put the whole thing in
perspective, even if it does waste a certain amount of time.
Of course, the most likely reason for dealing with loose ends is
to collect fees owed, plus expenses. Normally I would prepare an
itemised bill of hours spent and necessities purchased. But, this
time, I wasn't expecting any more cash out of Nether, and I
wouldn't touch Trinity's estate even if she did have any money.
But I did think the denizens of the Hells owed me something, even
though I had not clue as to the form their payment might take. I
wasn't even sure how to track down the Old One who had
commissioned me to act on their behalf. But I was going to try.
One morning before Trinity's funeral, sober, as rested as I could
manage, and fortified by a good breakfast, two cigarettes and
three cups of coffee, I set off for the one place from which I had
known access to the Hells: the dingy alley where Rigg had shot at
us. Not that it represented a permanent portal, of course, but if
the Old Ones were still keeping track of my whereabouts, they
might conceivably take the hint. Or they could just ignore me,
ignore the implied promise of reward. They were reputed to be
both capricious and honourable; anything could happen.
I did not have long to wait. A red circle lit up as soon as I stood
still and I sunk into the broken asphalt as smoothly as any
elevator. This time, though, I was lowered directly into the lair of
the same Old One - at least, I assume it was the same one,
although it was probably impossible to be sure. All dragons look
alike to me.

182
 The Old One was once again curled on his pedestal, watching
me calmly as I walked across the floor to the extruded stone chair
which awaited me. Without waiting for an invitation, I plonked
myself in the seat and lit a cigarette.
"Welcome again," the Old One intoned formally, "Findo Gask,
Goblin Detective."
"Hi," I said tersely, "I guess you know why I am here."
He nodded serenely.
"You have two reasons. You want to know what happened in
Dulelm Hollows, and you want to know if we were serious about
rewarding you."
He blew smoke serenely, then continued.
"Yes, we did interfere, much against our usual custom and
practice, on that occasion. And I am afraid we used you – all three
of you – to facilitate that interference. We marked you, attached –
if you like – our eyes and ears to you, so we could follow you even
inside the areas otherwise protected from our surveillance. We are
sorry to have used you so, but we had no other option."
"Huh," I grunted, "I guess I should have known you weren’t
telling me everything."
The vast head nodded again.
"So, we owe you. We would like to give you something,
something very special, by way of payment for your services."
The Old One gestured in the direction of a low table of the
extruding red-tinged stone that they used for everything. The
surface was cluttered with tiny cardboard boxes of the kind used
for Goblin glamours.
I was suddenly, irrationally angry.
"My sister is already dead, and my brother is exposed as a
spy," I snarled, jumping to my feet and tossing aside my cigarette,
"What could you possibly give me that would in any way
compensate?"
The Old One brought his head down so that it was level with
mine. One brief fiery exhale would put me out of my misery for
good. At the time, I almost wished he had done so.
"We are genuinely sorry for your loss," he said softly, almost
tenderly, "It was as unexpected and unforeseen for us as it was for
you. And, no, we do not expect to be able to offer you
compensation."

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 The vast head on the sinewy neck pulled away, again towering
above me.
"We want you to help us, again," he went on, almost absently,
"We believe you are a force for order, for good, with the ability to
act in ways we cannot ourselves. And we can give you something
you most definitely want, even though you don't know it yet."
I shook my head. I couldn't imagine anything I could want
from them.
The Old One snorted.
"We know you well. We know you hate to fail, to be unable to
close a case once you have taken it on," he said with careful
emphasis, "We can give you the ability to succeed, to be lucky in
your dealing with the world and its inhabitants. Not infallibly, of
course. That would be inappropriate even if it was possible. But
we can enhance an ability you already have; the gift of making the
right decisions, of being in the right place at the right time."
"Can you really do that?" I breathed, astonished.
"We can. It won't make you rich. It won't make you anything
more than very slightly famous. But you will succeed in your
endeavours more often than not. And we'll give you some other
unconventional and powerful glamours to assist you."
The Old One paused again. He already knew I was going to
accept his offer.
"We can make you the luckiest detective in the world."
*
The fate of Coupar Angus might have been one of the least just
outcomes of the whole sorry affair. True, he was an unscrupulous
businessman who had made a very good profit from selling over-
priced properties to those whose money had been acquired in
dubious ways - for all that it was his wife's money which allowed
him to set up the business in the first place. And he was a tedious
bore, a drunk and a faithless husband, at least in a theoretical way,
but he probably didn't deserve everything that was meted out.
In any case, his business came under the close scrutiny of the
police, ostensibly as part of the investigation into Garrick's plot,
although I suspect that a fat file had been building on Mister Angus
for a long time back at police headquarters. According to the
prosecution's case, it seemed he had been a very naughty boy
indeed.
Top of the charge sheet was money-laundering: helping
racketeers to buy properties with cash acquired in a variety of
illegal and, in some cases, highly improbable ways, and selling

184
them again at a modest loss but releasing untraceable cash. Then
there were charges related to irregularities in some of his
accounting practices - basically, he had his hand in the till - and,
perhaps worst of all, he had been under-reporting his income to
the tax authorities. The last of these was a crime where I suspect
few Goblins are entirely innocent, the fault being one of degree
rather than commission, but the authorities seemed determined to
make an example of him.
As with all legal processes, bringing Angus to court took an
exceedingly long time, and it was much later when I saw him
again. I sat in the back of the courtroom for much of the trial, as
my part in his activities was too small for me to be called as a
witness. He cried and wailed through most of the proceedings, his
supposedly affable and avuncular demeanour collapsing to the
snivelling of a schoolboy caught with his fingers in the cookie jar.
Coupar Angus sensibly elected to plead guilty and throw himself
on the mercy of the court. In the end, he would suffer a large fine,
a short prison sentence, and the end of his country-club lifestyle
for ever. Even while he was being prosecuted in the criminal
courts, his wife was engaging a lawyer in the divorce courts, citing
mental cruelty - so much for "for better, for worse, for richer, for
poorer". She would take him to the cleaners; the money was
originally hers and she argued that she should be allowed to keep
almost all of it.
Afterwards, he became a sad old Goblin, often penniless and
always dreaming of the one big deal which would re-establish his
fortunes. In between times, he frequented bars even more seedy
than the Deepest Joy where a punter desperate for company might
be persuaded to buy him a drink in exchange for being regaled
with garbled stories about fabulous business dealings and dark
mysteries and faithless partners. But, basically, the world forgot
about Coupar Angus.
*
A loose end which I did feel a strong need to track down was
the part played by my elder brother Nether in this whole sad story.
This was to prove to be a frustrating and ultimately unsuccessful
quest, for all that it consumed a considerable amount of time and
energy. I had just three more encounters with my elder brother,
none of which were in the least bit satisfactory.
I felt I had an incomplete realisation of what Nether was up to
and what his place in the grand scheme of things. But it was clear
to me that he was part of a larger shadowy organisation. There
are several candidates whose existence, at least, is known to the
general public, although I never did determine exactly which group
he was affiliated with.

185
 A little later, after Trinity was safely buried and on her way to
being forgotten by all but a very few, I was waiting in an anteroom
in an obscure government office, hoping to meet with some minor
government official. I was trying to seek permission to access
secret records which might, or might not, throw some light on what
had happened.
The office building was like so many government buildings
everywhere: vast echoing edifices in polished stone and
beautifully-executed but somehow bland carvings that supported
the high ceilings and tall windows. A monument to power and
authority, designed to keep the lower classes in their place, and all
paid for with taxpayers' money.
I was sitting in one of the uncomfortable chairs in the anteroom
when two burly heavies in dark suits suddenly appeared at the
outer door. They marched over and grabbed me without any
warning, twisting my arms behind my back so that I was
immobilised. I struggled ineffectively against the two Goblins, then
froze when I saw Nether himself appeared.
"I know you're looking for me," he said smugly, "And you're
wasting your time. Records about Garrick and his activities - and
mine - for the last hundred years are now sealed, forever."
"A hundred years?" I shrieked, "So you knew about what
Garrick was up to, years ago?"
"Not for certain, not for sure," he replied placatingly, "We had
to let things run to make sure we could wind in all the tentacles, to
make sure that Garrick didn't slip through our fingers again, as he
has done so before."
I was apoplectic.
"And your actions - or inactions - directly led to our own sister
being shot dead!"
I threw myself against the unyielding bulk of the goon on my
left, with little visible effect.
"Well, yes, that was very sad," he replied with some semblance
of emotion in his voice, "She was, perhaps, a sacrifice necessary to
ensure the safely of Goblins everywhere."
"You monster!"
"Dear brother, it is time for me to disappear, again. Your
occasionally clumsy actions and intermittent insight may have
netted Garrick - who won't be going anywhere ever again, by the
way - but you have certainly thrown a spanner in the works of
many decades of careful work. So, goodbye."
"No!"

186
 With a superhuman effort, I struggled free of the two big
Goblins who had grabbed me and I would have grabbed Nether
there and then if one of the heavies hadn't deployed a stun
glamour. Before I could reach my brother, I fell instantly asleep.
There was no sense of falling, no blurring or blackout, just the end
of all memory.
I awoke confused a few minutes or hours later, slumped in the
uncomfortable chair. The government clerk was shacking me
politely on the shoulder to tell me that the official would see me
now. I don't know why the functionary bothered; he imparted no
useful information whatsoever, effectively denying the existence of
the records I was here to view. Of course, the records probably
didn't exist now.

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 Chapter 26 – The Long Goodbye

At this point, I have to tell you about Trinity's funeral. Frankly,

I would much rather not, as the thoughts and recollections it brings
back - even after all these years - are almost too painful to bear.
But these memoirs would be incomplete without some small
account of that day.
One cool morning, I found myself following a line of professional
bearers carrying a heavy stone coffin and leading a small band of
black-garbed mourners along a meandering trail through the
graveyard. The graveyard itself was in a quiet area of my home
cavern, notable for vertical expanses of polished rock separated by
terraces and shallow ramps wide enough for three or four Goblins
to walk abreast. Few Goblins ever went there, and those that did
always had solemn faces and sombre attire.
The funeral party zigzagged up the face of the cavern until we
reached a point where a hole in the rock wall had been carefully
carved and decorated. A human would have thought it a strange
construction. It was high and wide enough to admit the bulky
coffin, but just a couple of inches deep. The slab which would later
cover the burial spot, carved with Trinity's name and an
assortment of dates, stood at an angle against a frame a
convenient distance to one side.
The coffin was lowered carefully onto a trestle positioned
adjacent to the shallow depression. The heavy and well-fitting lid
was draped with a remembrance flag, a mark of respect used when
Goblins died honourably before their time. One by one, the official
mourners approached, bowing their heads and, more often than
not, depositing not flowers but paper tokens of remembrance on
the coffin lid.
The official mourners were few. Nether had turned up, not
even pretending to be a drunk any more, and wearing a finely-
made black suit of a cloth and cut to which I could not even aspire.
My brother was accompanied by a couple of large Goblins, dressed
in well-fitting dark suits with that telltale extra space under the
armpits, and professionally anonymous faces that had "government
service" written all over them. Whether they were minders or
bodyguards was hard to tell. Perhaps both.

188
 Most unusually, there were a couple of humans present. Both
Rosie and Gumshoe had agreed to return to the Lower Realms for
this event, and I had arranged the services of a tourist agency to
provide a guide to help them to and from the surface world. I
wasn't going to trust myself with this delicate task, not today. The
tall people stood at the back, arm-in-arm with each other, saying
little and weeping much.
When it came to my turn, I stepped forward but could not think
of anything to say. I just stood mute for several minutes until
Rosie took pity on me. She took the black-edged paper token from
my unresisting fingers and placed it on the carved lid next to her
own. Then she led me by the elbow and gently guided me away.
Harriett Luncardy and a small contingent from the 14th Precinct
stood at a respectful distance. I recognised the taciturn old
Sergeant flanking the Captain. The coppers had not been invited
to the funeral but had turned up anyway as a mark of respect.
Policemen are always respectful of bravery and courage in the face
of danger, perhaps because they face much the same thing on a
daily basis.
Goblin services are mercifully short. The few ancient words that
are traditionally used under these circumstances are almost
untranslatable into English, so are best thought of as a variant on
the "dust to dust, ashes to ashes" theme. The professional leading
the funeral completed the burial by deploying a small and simple
charm which made the edges of the grave sparkle. Smoothly, the
stone coffin slid into the solid rock. When the magic faded, a few
seconds later, Trinity was gone, the rock face encasing the
deceased for all eternity. It had become a mausoleum for my
sister, entombed forever next to the markers for her mother and
father, and mine.
*
The wake for Trinity was held in some dingy hall in a low-rent
cavern I had hired for the occasion. My budget wouldn't stretch to
anything more elaborate and, besides, there were so few mourners
that even this little place barely felt filled by the company. The
surroundings were as depressing as the occasion and matched my
mood precisely. I stood in the centre of the room, resisting the
temptation to drink far too much and in any case barely able to
taste the whiskey and water in the glass I held in my hand.
Around me, the mourners were being offered finger food and a
selection of alcoholic drinks by the caterers, waiters circulating
endlessly with trays and bottles. Rosie and Gumshoe kept
themselves to themselves, standing at the back of the room where
their height and bulk would be less obvious. They were clearly
unsure what to expect at a Goblin wake and politely determined

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not to cause any embarrassment or social gaffe. Few Goblins
spoke to them.
Most of the rest of the guests were old, very old even by Goblin
standards. Trinity had no children, and neither did I and Nether, at
least as far as I was aware. Both our parents were dead, so the
place was filled - if that is the right word - with maiden aunts and
aged uncles and second cousins. Across the room, I spotted
Nether chatting quietly to some distant relative of my Mother's, the
glass of light wine in his hand barely even touched and the blocky
goons hovering discreetly in the background.
Nether had fooled us all for a long time. He was clearly an
agent for one of the more secret parts of Goblin federal
government, and had managed to survive undercover in the
human world for the best part of a hundred years. The sudden
disappearance from mainstream society, the smelly drunk, the
leprechaun mascot of a back-street Irish bar - it was all an act, a
cover story.
Nether's disguise had been entirely convincing, but now he was
exposed. Too many people in the Lower Realms knew, or guessed,
the truth. His part in Trinity's death was perhaps his biggest
mistake; if he had followed my instruction, she might have been
alive today. It was just as well the large Goblins in dark suits were
standing close by, or I would have beaten him to a pulp with my
bare hands.
I raised my glass in a silent and ironic toast across the room,
which Nether returned with a nod, then I turned away to accept
the mumbled condolences from another relative I barely
recognised. When next I looked, Nether and his heavies had
completely disappeared.
*
It was much, much later that I saw Nether again; long after the
events otherwise related in these notes had been forgotten by
nearly everybody. It was in a sleazy bar, in the Lower Caverns. Of
course there are any number of sleazy bars in the Lower Caverns;
sometimes I think I have visited every single one of them in the
course of business over the last three centuries or so.
I was meeting a client - the kind of client for whom a sleazy bar
in the Lower Caverns represents a significant step up in the world.
Not that he was poor or down on his luck, particularly; it was just
that his business ventures started at the bottom of the pile.
Besides, I don't usually work for destitute clients, simply because I
can't afford to.
In any case, I was early for the meet, or maybe the client was
late - I can't remember for sure - so I found myself sipping a beer

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and watching the clientele. They were roughnecks and working
types to a Goblin, with the bent backs and callused hands of those
who performed physical labour on a daily basis, and the furrowed
brow and vacant expression that marked those for whom any kind
of thinking was a chore best left to others. It was a gentle
company with predictable responses, right the way down to the
inevitable fist-fight before closing time. Still, it was easy enough to
stay out of trouble if you knew what you were doing.
In places like this, I tend to drink over-priced light beer from
bottles, partially to remove the risk of exposure to badly-kept draft
beer, but mainly in order to keep a clear head so as to be able to
duck punches should the need arise. I was nursing my second
bottle, still resolutely sober - mostly - and therefore I was more-or-
less certain of my reaction when Nether turned up.
Oh, I'll readily admit I didn't recognise him at first. He had
spent a lot of his money - or somebody's money, anyway - on very
good plastic surgery, which transformed him completely. The
complexion of his face and nose had been roughened, and his ears
had been lowered and notched in a fashion that suggested they
had been bitten in more than one barroom brawl. His shoulders
had become blocky with ropey muscles - whether that was because
of surgery or hard labour was difficult to tell - and he had adopted
the slightly knuckle-dragging appearance of the Goblin who labours
long and hard during the day, and drinks long and hard during the
night. All in all, it was a far cry from the sophisticated and
educated brother I remembered. It was, I had to admit, an
effective disguise.
Nether recognised me at once, of course, although he did his
best to hide that recognition from his drinking companions. But
there was a sudden moment when I was sure it was him, when I
caught his glance across the crowded and smoky room. And I
knew he knew I was now sure it was him.
I stood up and made a bee-line across the room, the drinkers
parting before me like the bow-wave of some ship of retribution.
Nether turned when he saw me, a sneering half-smile splitting his
lips. I grabbed his shoulder and pulled his face towards mine.
"This is for Trinity!" I yelled.
I swung a vast punch at him. The swing caught him full on the
jaw. He rocked, took a step back from the force of the blow but,
astonishingly, I had failed to knock him down. I'm big for a Goblin
and not entirely inexperienced when it comes to fist-fights, and I
suppose I expected I would have felled him with one strike. Maybe
I was going soft in my old age. In any case, Nether recovered
quickly; before I realised it, he had straightened up and swung
back at me. His blow caught me on the jaw with a tooth-rattling

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crack; my vision blackened, I felt myself swaying, toppling. Then I
felt no more.
I woke, sometime later – how long, I do not know – slumped
against a wall in a noisome back alley-way some small distance
from the bar. My jaw ached, my clothes were torn and dirty, and I
smelled strongly of cheap liquor of the kind I had not been
drinking. I took the hint. Nursing my face, I slinked off back
home.
I never saw my brother Nether Gask again after that evening.
*
The wake was finally over. I had shaken hands with every one
of the pitiful number of mourners and listened unheedingly to their
mumbled words of sympathy and consolation. It took no solace
from the conventional words of comfort. I could not even tell if
their expressions of compassion were genuinely heartfelt or merely
platitudes mouthed to avoid embarrassment on their part or mine.
Gumshoe left early to guide Rosie home, to the upper world of
sunlight and the teeming human kind. They had been seen
standing close together throughout the burial and the wake, she
crying on his shoulder and he comforting her with a degree of
tenderness which made me suspect that they might want to see
more of each other in the future. I was right, of course; it would
not be three years before I would be attending their wedding,
standing in the deep shadows of a little chapel in a quieter part of
New York City, the sparse guests and sombre witnesses an
unwitting reminder of today's events. Or maybe it was just me.
I was alone, at last. Around me, the caterers were close to
finishing tidying away the plates and glasses, and removing the
crusts of the mass-produced sandwiches and the dregs of cheap
wine that seem to be called for at these events. It was time to
leave.
I could have gone home - if that is the right word for the tiny
and rather cold little apartment I rent by the month. I could have
gone anywhere. As it turned out, I found my way to that
sophisticated hotel bar where by good fortune alone I found Arnie
and Lorny at their station at the counter, speculatively eyeing the
bar's clientele and on the lookout for one or two who would have
the inclination - and the money, of course - to become clients of
their own.
The girls turned and saw me as I entered the bar. In my best
dark suit and dark tie, my hat and coat freshly cleaned, I might
have been mistaken for this night's john. I weaved across the floor
and parked myself on a stool two down from those occupied by the
professional ladies. They must have seen the look on my face.

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 Lorny looked over with the concern visible in her large dark
eyes while Arlie moved around to sit next to me. She gestured to
the bartender and a large whiskey soon appeared in front of me.
"What happened?" she asked softly.
"Trinity's funeral," I said simply, "It was today."
There was a pause, a soft exhalation from both girls.
"Gask," Arlie said, laying her hand on my cheek in an
authentically tender fashion, "You need a drink. And you need
some company, so that you don't drink too much. Tonight, my
friend, we will be looking after you."
I got that drink - in fact, I got a lot more than one - but the
drinking was well-paced and, in any case, the alcohol seemed to
have been evaporating from the glass before it ever made it down
my throat. Arlie and Lorny guided me to a booth and sat one
either side of me, comfortably close. All evening, they regaled me
with tales from their own experience. They were earthy and
uninhibited, ruthlessly exposing the many foibles and weaknesses
of the male of the species. The cut and thrust of their descriptions
and their worryingly accurate observations from real life would
have my hair curl, if I had any. I ignored the glances - pitying or
amused or faintly jealous - from the waiting staff and the more
knowing of the bar's clientele. And I laughed, a lot - a lot more
than I would usually do - and somehow managed to put the events
of the day out of my mind, at least for a while.
I got the company, too. Much later, I awoke in the darkness, a
sleeping form who turned out to be Arlie under the sheets next to
me. Not my bed. She was a whore with a heart of gold, and had
taken me in as one professional to another. I have no idea, even
to this day, what might or might have happened between us under
the covers in Arlie's bed.
Again, it was time to leave. It really was time to go home this
time.

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 Chapter 27 – Partners in Crime (Reprise)

Both Rigg and Garrick were soon arraigned and placed in

prison. I was to visit them both, at different times, over the next
few months. The processes of law take an exceedingly long time
to grind through - although very finely, of course - a fact made
doubly sure by the fact that both seemed able to afford expensive
lawyers of the kind that seemed guaranteed to make my teeth itch.
It's a fact of life, it seems, both here and in the surface world, that
the law makes lawyers rich and everybody else both poor and
disillusioned.
In the case of Rigg, my visit was in the company of both Rosie
and Gumshoe, with me wearing my best attempt at a disguise as a
human - lift shoes and all - and sporting one of several aliases I
have established over the centuries. Our task was to provide a
formal identification as witnesses of the person of one Johannes
(a.k.a. "John") Rigg. It was the usual process: one at a time, we
were escorted from the dingy waiting area to a viewing gallery
where, through the expanse of one-way glass, we could see a line-
up composed of the usual suspects.
Eight big men with blond locks, most without facial hair,
standing in front of a white board with black horizontal lines. They
say that all humans look the same to Goblins. This is patently
false: we may not be attuned to nuances of behaviour and
languages, but we can tell colours and sizes and shapes as well as
anybody. I have had plenty of exposure to humans of all kinds and
I can certainly spot one I know in a crowd. I pointed out Rigg
unhesitatingly.
For a time, I harboured doubts whether Rigg would actually be
convicted at all; after all, it might be difficult to explain to a jury of
his peers exactly what he had been doing without opening up a
whole can of worms about the true nature of the Underworld.
Nobody in any position of power up there wants that kind of
exposure.
As it turned out, the prosecution and defence lawyers seemed
to have come to some understanding; perhaps some half-way
acceptable plea bargain was struck in some plush office or private
club. It seems that Rigg was wanted for a wide range of offences
which involved firearms, explosives and cross-border smuggling.
He pleaded guilty to a small number of charges which would put

194
him in prison for perhaps five years - he was smart enough to play
the system to get time off for good behaviour. Rigg would be
somebody to carefully watch out for in a few years time.
My visit to see Garrick was completely different. For one thing,
it was face-to-face. When I was escorted in, I found my old
Professor sitting on the hard prison chair as if it was an old
overstuffed leather armchair in his own comfortable study,
surrounded by books and artefacts, and all the comforts of home.
He turned to face me when I entered the interview room and
sat on the other side of the beaten-up old table that separated us.
"Ah, Mister Findo Gask", he said in much the same tones as he
used in one of his tutorials back at the old University, "I had
expected to see you sooner."
He would have used very much the same disapproving words if
I had been two minutes late for his lessons. I had to hand it to
him, the old boy had class, lots of class.
He sat back, steepling his fingers and looking at me through
hooded eyes.
"I have to say," he went on in a didactic tone, "That you have
surprised me. Considerably. I had not considered it possible that
you would have been able to determine the direction of my
schemes, although I am quite there are some elements you will
have missed, even now."
"Like what?" I countered. True to form, he ignored me
completely.
"Perhaps you would have done better if you had applied your
apparent talents to your studies," he went on as if I had not
interrupted him, "Rather than frittering away your time on this law
enforcement nonsense."
"I'm a Private Investigator," I growled, "People pay me to get
even. It's got nothing to do with the law."
"Self-evidently," he said smoothly, "And this satisfies your
intellectual curiosity how, exactly?"
"Listen," I said, standing up and leaning across the battered
table, "You're here because my sister is dead. And it's your fault,
as surely as if you pulled the trigger yourself."
"Detachment, dear boy," he drawled, "You need more
detachment."
The prison warders managed to pry my fingers from his throat
before I killed him. There was no official report of my actions; I
wonder why.

195
 *
The day after the funeral I eventually gathered the force of will
to attend my own office, ostensibly to catch up with the paperwork.
Not that there was much to do, really. Just my own notes and
recollections, carefully and obscurely encoded in case they fell into
the wrong hands, and a few receipts and invoices to keep my
accountant and the tax authorities off my back.
The important documentation was produced elsewhere. After
Trinity's death, there would be any amount of official documents: a
police report and one from the coroner's office; a few column-
inches in the tabloid press and an even briefer entry in the obituary
pages of the heavyweight papers. And there would be a will which
no doubt the legal processes would grind through probate in due
course and without any particular input from me.
Trinity had died a pauper; any funds that she had spare would
probably have been sunk into keeping her undercapitalised
businesses afloat. She would have had debts a-plenty, all of which
would now be called in. It was probably her need for a few ready
dollars that had caused her to accept Garrick's offer of business,
even against her better judgement. I doubted there would be any
money to distribute after the vultures had circled a few times. In
any case, I would rather her be alive and well and enjoy her rather
spiky company than profit by a few dollars from her death.
There was a diffident knock at the door. I glanced up from my
seat behind the desk. It was Luncardy. I guess I should have
expected her to put in an appearance at some point. She had
probably come to gloat at my stupidity. I waved her inside. The
Captain usually liked to travel accompanied by a squad of
uniformed types ready to do her bidding at a moment's notice. On
this occasion, she appeared to be alone, although I did peer
carefully in the direction of the office door for a long moment just
to make sure.
"Just me, Gask," she said gently, seeing the direction of my
gaze, "Just me."
"Captain," I acknowledged softly.
Luncardy closed the office door and moved swiftly to sit in the
better of my guest chairs. She leaned across the desk and took
my hand in her own.
"You once said something about being friends," she said
urgently, "But friends don't need to be distant from one another.
We could be close, very close."
I let out a sigh. I just couldn't help myself.

196
 "You've suffered a terrible loss, another terrible loss," she went
on, "I feel for you, I really do. You could be a better person, a
stronger person. Let me help you, if only for a while. Or maybe
longer."
There was something inside her which wanted a big strong
Goblin to look after her, some child-like part which would invert the
desire to be supported into a need to support: part mothering, part
wifely advice and guidance. A relationship like that would smother
me. Sure enough, the physical intimacy would be wonderful - she
sure was a wonderfully sexy creature - but I could get that
anywhere. Besides, that kind of thing rarely lasts more than a few
decades.
"Harriett," I said, squeezing her hand, "I really appreciate the
offer. I like you, respect you; and that like and respect won't
change any time soon. But ..."
I let the words hang in the air. She could see, without my
actually saying so, what my answer would be. Still, and true to
form, she did not completely give up hope. Abruptly, she stood up
and moved to the door.
"Think about it, Findo," she said softly, "The offer stands. You
need somebody. Somebody who will be good for you. Somebody
to help you. Somebody who understands what you've been
through. Call me, soon."
She turned and left, closing the door gently behind her.
I never did accept Luncardy's offer. Sometimes I wonder if
things would have been better if I had.
*
After the Captain left, I sat and looked sadly at the spot where
Luncardy had been sitting. Finally, I shook my head and took
stock of my situation. It seemed I was alone in the world: without
parents, without siblings - and certainly without children. Perhaps
it had been true for a while, but suddenly I felt the full weight of
the loss of - well, of something that had been absent for a very
long time already.
And without friends? Well, perhaps I shouldn't be too harsh
here. There were a few Goblins - and a few humans, too - who
would tolerate my company. Lorny and Arlie didn't count; sure, I
could enjoy their most intimate company any time I wanted,
although I would certainly end up paying for the privilege one way
or another.
Luncardy would probably talk to me again, at least
professionally. Indeed, she probably owed me a favour; she had
acquired yet another gold star on her report: with limited effort

197
and less risk, she had finally put the force's hands on a notorious
wanted criminal and several of his henchmen.
And the rest? Just professional detachment, surely? It was
case closed; ticks in boxes all round. The bad guys locked up with
every prospect of them being sent down for a long time. A great
success. But would anybody else notice?
I opened the deep drawer of the office desk, took out the large
bottle of cheap hooch I keep there - for medicinal purpose only,
you understand - and stood it on the desk. I looked at it for a long
time.
*
Drinking alone was not going to be good for me, so I elected for
the lesser evil: drinking in company. I put on my hat, tugged my
sunglasses over my eyes and drew up the collar of my raincoat.
There was nobody outside the office, nobody on the stairs, not
even anybody on the streets. Just me. I made my way directly to
Chill's Bar in New York City, stopping only once to make a short
phone call.
I went in the back way, the hidden way that Nether had
installed. Judging by the noise, the bar was already busy with
early evening drinkers. I found Rosie in her little office, apparently
searching for some vital piece of paper from amongst the mountain
of abandoned paperwork on the desk. I coughed discreetly. Rosie
span around, gasped then, collecting herself, smiled warmly.
"Findo Gask," she said sympathetically, "How are you?"
"I hate funerals," I said gruffly, "I need a drink."
Her smile widened and the look in her eyes softened.
"Well, you've come to the right place."
Within moments, Rosie has installed me in a darkened corner,
one where the stools were low enough to be comfortable for a
Goblin, and where the beer barrels which functioned as tables
made it difficult to tell that one's legs did not quite reach the
ground. One of the young and friendly - and worldly-wise,
especially in the world of the Goblins - waiting staff hurried over
carrying a tray and presented me with a glass - a human half-pint -
of the best dark Irish stout accompanied by a shot-glass of what I
would shortly discover was a very good Irish whiskey.
Sensibly, the waiter left me to my own thoughts and bustled
back to the bar. I scanned the room automatically - I very rarely
fail to take the most basic precautions - but sensed no threat, no
risk. Rosie was on best form, entertaining the regulars at the bar,

198
and the clientele seemed to be delighted to have another
Leprechaun about the place, if only for a while.
Ten minutes later, Gumshoe hurried in, looking faintly
harassed. I think this is just his default appearance, the way his
face settles when no strong emotion is driving him. He looked
around wildly for a moment, then saw me nearly hidden in the
corner.
"Martin Gamshack, finally," I said as he approached, "So you do
pick up your messages sometimes, then?"
"Gask," he replied, "I came as quickly as I could. You said it
was an emergency."
"It is an emergency," I replied, "It was my sister Trinity's
funeral yesterday. I haven't slept much. Now I really, really need
to get drunk."
"Ah," he said, sitting down heavily on one of the low stools, "I
can relate to that. What do I have to do to get a drink in here?"
Gumshoe looked around but the attentive waiting staff was
ahead of him. The same young person hurried over with a refilled
tray: another couple of glasses for me and the same for him. I
lifted the replenished shot-glass in a toast, Gumshoe following my
lead. Our glasses clinked, then there was that moment of internal
struggle while we both winced at the fiery liquid burning its way
down our throats.
We talked for hours, the human detective and I, while the beer
and spirits flowing freely. Every now and then, one of the more
forthright of the regulars would drop by and press yet more
beverages into our hands. Rosie stayed at the bar, but she
glanced frequently in our direction, a glance that was always
returned by Gumshoe.
We talked about the closed case, confirming all we both knew
about recent events. Then we moved on to previous glorious
triumphs - modestly downplayed in my case - and ignoble
disasters, played for laughs. Gumshoe seemed to have as many
tales as I did, all suggestive of a detailed knowledge of the seamier
side of life on the surface, at least as far as the East Coast of North
America was concerned. It all helped take my mind of things.
"We should form a partnership," Gumshoe suggested suddenly,
out of the blue, "Gamshack and Gask."
It was an intriguing idea, especially after a few drinks.
"Gask and Gamshack," I countered, grinning broadly.
"Nah," he replied airily, gesturing with his half-empty beer
glass, "Doesn't scan as well. Better my way."

199
 "Ah," I said levelly, "Nasty."
"Indeed. And it is a very British term," the human detective
went on, "The devices were used by paramilitaries of both sides in
the recent Irish troubles. Rosie would know what it meant."
A worrying development. Somehow, Rosie knew something or
somebody that made her worth threatening.
"Where are you now?" I asked.
"Back inside the bar," he replied, sounding just a little weary,
"Rosie and Nether are still here. I've sent Rosie off to bed. Nether
and I have been keeping watch. There's no sign of anyone
hanging around at the moment."
"Do you want me to come up?"
"Nah. I don't think there's anything you can do. In any case,
I've a better idea."
Gumshoe suddenly sounded smug.
"There's a private security firm I know," he went on, "Did a job
for the boss once, not so long ago, so he owes me a few favours.
I'll give him a call, get a few of his boys around here to flash a bit
of muscle. That should prevent any problems, and give me a
chance to get back to my place and get tooled up."
Gumshoe didn't usually carry a gun. He was clearly sufficiently
rattled to break this particular habit. I hope he didn't do any
stupid.
"Fine. But be careful," I said, emphasising the last point.
Gumshoe snorted.
"You got it," he agreed, "One last thing. Nether said he was
coming down."
My brother, returning to the Lower Realms. Another worrying
development.
"Okay," I replied slowly, "Where does he want me to meet
him?"
*
It took me a few minutes to gather my wits after the shock of
being awakened ludicrously early and the alarming tale that
Gumshoe had told. I pulled myself together with the aid of strong
black coffee - not completely poisonous - a quick shower and a
much-needed cigarette. Then I pulled on some clothes, and my
coat and hat, and went out.

200