Underbelly (54 page)

“
A hundred per cent. I’ve been a medium for nigh on 11 years. I wish I was wrong, Allan.”

“
I’m sorry, pal, but I need proof. It’s too big a claim to take on trust alone.”

“
I know that your dad gave you a hiding when you wouldn’t go with them to kill Earl Gaines.”

“
It was a couple of slaps.” Allan said, downplaying it fiercely. He shook his head, exhaling loudly.

“
Do you mind if I cadge a cigarette, my nerves are shot.”

“
Whatever,” Allan said, still no closer to coming to terms with it several hours later. Grey knew he couldn’t leave him to go to work and asked Allan if he could stay the night.

“
Is this some scam for getting cheap lodgings?”

“
It would be pretty fucking inventive, don’t you think?” Grey said edgily. “Sorry about the language, but I’m leaving my wife alone in a flophouse to be here with you.”

“
I’m not asking you to stay.”

“
I know, but I want to. I have to, Allan. Not believing in them won’t stop them.”

“
What will then?”

“
I’m researching that.”

“
I need time by myself to get my head around this.”

“
You might not have time,” Grey warned.

“
I’ll chance it. Go and I’ll get back to you.”

“
This might be a huge mistake.”

“
You’ve made that clear.”

Grey shook his head as he stood up. “Not clear enough if you insist on sending me away. I’ll be back tomorrow. I hope you’re here,” Grey said ominously. Allan said nothing, his thoughts unclear and incoherent.

There was no sign of Germaine in their room, and Grey knocked on every other room in the hostel looking for her without success. By half ten he was growing very concerned and walked the neighbourhood sporadically looking for her before she eventually came through the door, looking surprised to see him, not having expected him to return so soon.

”
You should never go out alone at this hour,” Grey snapped. “You don’t think I’ve got enough on my mind? Where have you been?”

“
You’ll go mad,” Germaine said nervously. He had never spoken to her like this before and it upset her.

“
I won’t.” Grey knew he had sounded harsher than he intended and he tried to calm down.

“
I’ve been to see Audrey,” Germaine said, wincing as she admitted it.

“
You’re right, I am mad. Why on earth would you do that?” he said, controlling his tone so that his anger did not fully come across.

“
Because I want to help you. She won’t even address you but she will talk to me. I can help.”

“
Worrying me doesn’t help. Please obey me and don’t get involved in this. This is going to turn very nasty. It’s already bad. I don’t trust her enough for you to see her.”

“
I do. She won’t hurt me. I know that because I understand her, I understand her anger and desire for vengeance. I think that gives me a chance of getting through to her.”

“
I understand it too, however she’s still wrong.”

“
Completely, but…I can see why she thinks she’s right.”

Grey rubbed his eyes, starting to feel tired and stressed (and a little frustrated) and he said, “I’m not your father, Germaine. You’re your own woman and I can’t dictate your decisions even if sometimes I’d like to – you must feel the same way about some of the choices I make. All I can ask is that, as your husband, you consider my wishes, ‘cause I’m thinking New York again. We don’t both need to be fools here, and you’ve another to consider.”

“
If you absolutely insisted I would return but I would be very, very unhappy to do so,” she said pointedly. He’d earn her displeasure for the first time if he did this and he knew it and it made him relent.

“
Don’t go to her house to see her and don’t see her at night – she can come and see you here during the day. I’ll probably be at Allan’s if I can make him see sense.”

“
I want her help, not the other way round. She won’t come to me so I have to go to her.”

“
You’re being too trusting.”

“
You always say that people are basically good.”

“
I spout a lot of crap.”

“
Are you cross with me because I won’t go?” she said, hoping that he wasn’t, feeling bad for forcing his hand. She had promised to obey him and had meant it but when his life was in jeopardy she felt that helping him took priority over following her marriage vows meticulously.

Grey was slow to answer, pulling her down onto his lap and he said, “I would have greater peace of mind if you did go but I find a lot to respect in your decision to stay. You’re hard on yourself about what happened in Maramont and you shouldn’t be because you are braver than you give yourself credit for. This proves it – not to me, I’ve known all along. I hope it proves it to you.”

“
I’m not brave, or reckless. It will end up being you, James, who faces off against those creatures. I just want to try and help a little.”

“
You help more than you know. I wouldn’t have found the confidence to put on shows without you. Trust me, I appreciate what I’ve got,” he said, kissing her, “but for the next few hours I’m going to be a mentally absent husband. The answers might be in here,” he said hopefully, tapping at his skull.

“
They usually are,” she said encouragingly. “I’ll let you get on with it – you won’t be able to concentrate with a whale perched on you,” she said, making a joke out of her real insecurities.

“
I’m not grimacing in pain, am I?” Grey said. “My powers don’t extend to super-strength, yet, so believe me, for the millionth time, when I tell you you’re not fat.”

“
The mirror tells a different tale.”

“
It says you’re the fairest of them all and if it says different I’ll smash it to bits!”

Germaine kissed his cheek and said, “Please be careful. I can’t lose you.”

Chapter 9 – The Alieus

Grey wished that he had as much faith in himself as his wife had in him. By concentrating he could contact a wide range of spirits, many of whom proved interesting enough without providing any insights into the Alieus or Audrey Gaines. He tried hard to contact Earl Gaines, figuring that he might be able to talk his wife out of her campaign of vengeance, without success. It wasn’t until the early hours of the morning that he managed to find a relevant spirit, which he was forced to put on hold, accompanying Germaine to the toilet as she was sick, holding her hair back for her and helping her back to bed before he recommenced the dialogue.

Sorry, Emile, let’s start again. My wife’s ill and I had to see to her and I didn’t want to talk without giving you my undivided attention because this is very important.

Indeed. When it comes to the Alieus you have to take the utmost care lest you suffer my fate. If you are considering hiring them please resist
, the male French voice said with urgency.

My only interest in them is stopping them. How do you know them, Emile?

I’m ashamed to say I contacted them. I was from a good family. We lived just north of Marseilles. I don’t know what year it is for you now, but my time was the latter part of the nineteenth century. Is it about 1910 now?

It’s 1946, Emile.

Good God. I was born almost a hundred years ago. I was from a military family and I was in my second year of active service and I was engaged to Juliette. Life was good and I was very happy, very much in love. My commanding officer, a contemptible man who lived to belittle me – he was a worldly man who seduced my love and set her up as his mistress. That was my incentive to contact the Alieus.

How did you hear about them?

It was an old legend in the village. I was unhinged enough at that stage to try anything.

How do you contact them?

You have to urinate across every doorway in and out of your home to grant them access, then you have to call them and they arrive. Adelaide does the talking while the beast glares and growls. They provide the parchment and feather – which betrays their age – with which I had to write the names in my own blood. I struggled for five and settled for three known murderers who were due to be executed in prison. Adelaide didn’t like that but she was caught by the rules. My housekeeper saw them and fainted and I asked Adelaide not to hurt her and she said that she couldn’t. They can only harm those on the lists, and those who make the lists. I was told that I would have to sacrifice myself to see my revenge realised and I agreed. It was worth it to see Coupeau and Juliette suffer. Before long the talk was of the escapes from the prison in Marseilles, three murderers escaping on consecutive nights. There was quite the furore and quite a few men lost their jobs. Then Coupeau was taken, and Adelaide promised me his suffering would be protracted, bringing me pieces of him from time to time to show how the torture was progressing. I got his job while he screamed in a hole in the ground, and I got Juliette back too, first just as my bitch – her family had disowned her for the disgraceful way she’d behaved and Coupeau couldn’t support her anymore from his tomb – and then I had to go and fall in love with her again. Women will always let you down, Grey, but without them what’s the point of life?

Not all do. Carry on, please.

I loved her again, and we were wed, but I knew that she was doomed. I tried to take it back and Adelaide said there was a way, teasing me, refusing to say what it was. Coupeau suffered in a hole in the ground for three years and nine months and then they came for Juliette in the dead of night. I fought them, trying to cling onto her as she screamed. Adelaide said to her that it was I who wished it. Adelaide would come and see me most days to update me on their progress, giving me gifts of my wife’s body. I lost my posting, dishonourably discharged from the army and I lost my house. I couldn’t work, I couldn’t talk to people and I lived in squalor, thinking of my Juliette in pain, wishing I could take her place and knowing that I eventually would. Juliette was tortured for eight months and seven days, whereas I was dissected for the same amount of time as all of my victims. Adelaide then told me the secret I wanted to know, how I could have saved my wife from her grisly fate. Suicide would have worked, my suicide, not hers. The list would have been void with my death.

So the death of the one who’s written the list cancels it all?

It does, and you’d be doing them a merciful act too because the years of torture make the prophecies in Revelations seem pleasant.

Do they have any weaknesses that you know of?

They’re too sadistic. They enjoy it too much. That could make them slip up.

Thank you, Emile. Is there anything else you can tell me about them that might help?

I can give you details of their preferred methods of torture and favourite targets. Other than that, no.

You’ve helped enough, so I’m going to try and help you now. Before you can find peace I think you have to accept that your actions weren’t just wrong to Juliette, but that you wronged Coupeau and the other three men.