The Diabolist (Dominic Grey 3) (34 page)

Viktor noticed a stone archway just past a closed jewelry shop, and he pulled Philip through the archway and into a darkened courtyard that dead-ended thirty feet away, at the iron-studded door to a cathedral. The courtyard was empty, its walls high and sheer.

The footsteps grew louder. Viktor spied two plastic trash cans in a corner and pulled Philip to them. They hunched behind the cans, praying the fog would help conceal them.

The footsteps manifested into a booted foot that appeared out of the fog. Viktor held his breath, knowing the trash can failed to conceal half his body, praying the fog and darkness concealed the rest. He could feel Philip trembling beside him.

Viktor had his knife in hand, but he knew the members of L’église de la Bête rarely worked alone. Even if Viktor managed to overcome their pursuer, the noise would carry into the night and betray their position.

As the figure peered into the courtyard, Viktor thought the pounding of his heart would announce their presence, like Poe’s telltale organ. The way Viktor was positioned he could just see the side of the man’s face, and Viktor gripped the hilt of his knife.

It was the same man he had seen twice in San Francisco, the customer from Zador’s bookshop.

Viktor lost five years of his life as he waited, but the man scanned the courtyard without moving farther inside. When he turned to leave, Viktor
sagged with relief, thinking it odd that L’église de la Bête would send someone halfway across the world when they had local chapters. He must be higher up in the hierarchy, perhaps an assassin sent for Viktor alone.

Whatever the reason, Viktor had no doubt there were more of them prowling within the fog, and his fear metastasized as they waited. They couldn’t stay where they were.

He helped Philip to his feet. “Let’s make a run for the Fleece,” Viktor whispered. Philip nodded, his face ashen.

They emerged again near Saint Helen’s Square, dashing down Parliament and turning left onto Pavement for the final few meters. The Golden Fleece was just ahead. Just as they reached the distinctive sign, a group of people emerged from the Shambles, led by a man in a black cloak.

Limbs rigid with panic, Viktor dug in his heels and twisted to sprint in the other direction. He yanked Philip by the sleeve, almost pulling Philip off his feet. There had to have been twenty people behind the lead man, and Viktor and Philip had walked right into their line of sight.

As they fled, he saw Philip look over his shoulder, then slow and stop. Viktor was about to shout at him when Philip said, “It’s the bloody Devil’s Hour, the three a.m. ghost tour. The Fleece is one of the stops.”

When Viktor turned he saw the group with new eyes, this time not blinded by fear: the black-cloaked, unshaven figure smoking a cigarette and addressing the crowd, pointing at the Golden Fleece with a flourish as the crowd of tourists looked on with eager faces.

Philip pointed at his car just down the street. Viktor felt like a fool, but there was no time to relax. They hurried forward while the tour group was still within sight, the tension in Viktor’s body not lessening until they were safely inside the vehicle, speeding into the night.

G
rey left Dickie’s gym and got on the Tube again. Though he didn’t think Alan Lancaster, the speaker at Speakers’ Corner, was clued in to the underbelly of the cult, Grey did expect Alan to have been questioned after their meeting.

Dangerous or not, paying a visit to the director of the Earls Court chapter house was Grey’s only link to the upper hierarchy, so he had decided to don a disguise and hope for the best. The Earls Court chapter house was a two-story flat in a cramped row of brownstones near the Exhibition and Convention Centre. Grey showed up in clothes he had picked up in a secondhand store along the way: ripped jeans and a long-sleeved Rolling Stones concert tee, a ragged Union Jack scarf, clip-on earrings, and a long-haired wig. With his week’s growth of scruff and his wiry frame, Grey thought he pulled off the starving artist look nicely.

He didn’t notice anyone watching the entrance. He knocked on the front door, keeping a close eye on anyone and everything, seeing nothing out of place in the bustling commercial district.

A handsome, middle-aged man with a full head of blond hair opened the door. Behind the door Grey saw a sitting room slick with modern furniture.

The man’s accent was posh. “Can I help you?”

“Hey, man,” Grey said, “is this the Order of New Enlightenment?”

“Indeed it is. I’m Director Thomas Greene.”

“Yeah?” Grey said. “I wasn’t expecting a director.”

“This isn’t normal hours, but our door is always open.”

“Yeah, man, I’ve been hearing good things about this New Order thing, saw the sign outside and thought I’d check it out.”

“Let me get you a pamphlet.” Thomas disappeared, and while he was gone Grey spied a stack of mail on a table just inside the door. He quickly flipped through the mail, seeing a copy of the
Times
, a few items that looked like bills, and an envelope addressed to Director Thomas Greene from a company called Central London Staffing Agency on Inner Ring Road. It was the end of the month, and Grey had a hunch about the contents of the envelope. He pocketed it just before Thomas returned to hand Grey the same pamphlet Alan had given him.

“Services are Saturdays at ten,” Thomas said, “but they’re held in our auditorium down the street, just behind the bus stop. This is the chapter house.”

Grey ran a hand through his fake locks and gave Thomas a knowing look. “Where the bigwigs are.”

Thomas chuckled and said, “I’m just a director. The, ah, ‘bigwigs’ are a few steps above me.”

“I heard this was a regular-Joe kind of thing, no more rules and bishops and popes, if you know what I mean. How many steps are there?”

“I meant steps in a strictly intellectual sense. While we reject the frivolous hierarchy inherent to today’s religions, we do believe the tenets of our system are best digested over time, with wisdom. You can think of it as learning algebra before you learn calculus.”

Grey thought,
I’ve heard your analogy parroted before, and it sucked when the last guy said it
. “I’ve seen the head guy on YouTube and I gotta say,” Grey said, “I like what he says. But I thought it was a universal kind of organization. No more secrets.”

“I must be doing a poor job of conveying what we’re about. We’re not trying to keep people out, but advancing each person as they’re ready.” Thomas spread his hands. “Trust me, there’re no secrets to be kept here.”

Grey found that whenever someone asked to be trusted, he probably wasn’t trustworthy. And what he wanted to say was,
I suppose that’s why your
leader’s keeping the location of his headquarters secret and pretending he’s not a Satanist?

“You know,” Grey said, “you remind me of the guy on TV, real polished. I bet you’re on the fast track. Out of curiosity, how many levels are there between you and the big man? Are you like, say, a governor? Bishop? Prez?”

Thomas chuckled again, this time with a slight edge. “The people who report to the council contact me. I assume they report to Simon.”

“What’s he like in person?” Grey said.

“Simon?”

“Yeah.”

“Couldn’t say. I’ve never met him, though I hope to change that once the new headquarters are functional.”

“I’m dying to see where these headquarters are going to be,” Grey said.

“Me, too. No one knows outside of the council.”

“You’re pretty close, right?” Grey said. “A million followers, isn’t that the goal?”

“We’re within fifty thousand, if you can believe it.”

“Hey, maybe I’ll be the millionth! Is there a special prize or anything?”

Thomas brightened. “That’s not a bad idea. Maybe I’ll raise it at the next meeting.”

Grey had already decided Thomas didn’t know much of anything, and that he was going to have to find a way to jump a few levels.

His fingers closed around the envelope in his pocket. He might have just the thing.

“Why don’t you come by on Saturday?” Thomas said. “I usually stay after the service and answer questions.” He beamed a smile. “No dress code required.”

“I like the sound of that already.”

Thomas held the door for Grey. “Cheers, then.”

“Cheers.”

After Grey merged into the chaos of Earls Court he opened the envelope he had lifted. When he saw the paycheck, confirming his suspicions, he beamed a grim smile of his own.

Paychecks were paper, and paper left trails.

Grey walked to Kensington High Street before finding a café tucked into a shopping center. He sat in a corner with a view of the street, knocked back an espresso, and took another look at the return address on the paycheck: Central London Staffing Company, Suite 550, Inner Ring Road, London, WC1X 8VH.

He knew Inner Ring Road was a major road encircling central London, thus the name, so that didn’t narrow it down much. He entered the zip code into his smartphone and discovered the address was in King’s Cross. King’s Cross was the gateway to East London, and Grey was getting the feeling that East London played an important role in Darius’s plans.

It made sense: East London was notorious for housing London’s roughest neighborhoods, yet it was also home to revitalization projects, one of the few areas of the city where property was semiaffordable.

Of course, East London was about the size of Houston.

After his coffee, Grey took a taxi to King’s Cross and then to the address on Ring Road, which turned out to be a mailing store. Grey stepped inside the store, his suspicions confirmed as soon as he saw the wall lined with numbered metal containers.

Suite 550 was a PO box.

“Central London Staffing Agency” was clearly a front, and Grey had to hope someone made daily pick-ups. The Order of New Enlightenment was a large organization now, so it was a possibility, and could short-circuit his search. On the other hand, the Order might use the PO box only as a return address for paychecks.

He supposed there was only one way to find out.

Luckily, a street window afforded a view of PO box 550. Unluckily, there was no café or bar across the street, just a ragged park. Grey found a bench with a view of the window, concealed enough that no one would spot him unless they entered the park.

It was almost noon, and the store closed at eight. Masses of charcoal cloud banks governed the sky, and by four p.m. no one had approached the PO box. Grey rose to shake out his legs. At four thirty p.m. his cell rang.

His forehead wrinkled when he saw the long exchange, coming from somewhere outside England. Then he picked out Romania’s country code, and realized Rick Laskin must be returning Grey’s voice mail asking him to look into Anka’s background.

He rose to take the call. “Rick?”

“It’s been a while, buddy. How the hell are you?”

“Older,” Grey said.

“I hear that. You know you’re a bit of a legend around the DS water cooler.”

“I’m guessing of the infamous variety,” Grey said.

“Depends on who you talk to. The top brass use you as an example of what not to do, Harris and his middle-management cronies hate your guts, but most of the grunts like me, especially the old SF types, respect the hell out of you. Of course it helps you’re a badass, or else you’d just be a whiny dissident.”

“I don’t think that counts for much of anything.”

“You wouldn’t,” Rick said.

“How’s the posting?” Grey said.

“Romania’s beautiful. Bucharest, on the other hand, is dirty, poor, corrupt, and full of stray dogs and prostitutes. A real shame what Ceauşescu did to this place, Commie asshole. They say it used to look like Paris.”

“How much you have left on your rotation?”

“Year and a half,” Rick said. “I’m hoping for ASPAC next, or even a banana republic, to be honest with you. I’m sick of being cold.”

“I’m not that partial to it, either,” Grey said.

“So what’re you up to these days? Rumor is you’re hooked up with some international PI outfit, investigating cults or something like that? That true?”

“Pretty much,” Grey said.

“Gotta say, I never figured you for that sort of thing.”