In Your Dreams (36 page)

‘Paul.'

‘Oh, please don't say “Paul“ in that tone of voice, you remind me of my mum and that's not tactful. All right, here goes. My uncle Ernie, right?'

‘The one who died.'

‘That's right, the one who died. Turns out that he was one of them. One of us. Good at magic, strong in the Force, whatever. He was
really
good at it, apparently, and according to Countess Judy, the sort of magic stuff he was best at almost always runs in families. She explained it to me, but I wasn't really listening; seems there's charts and tables and whatnot, you can work it out really precisely, who in the family's likely to have inherited the gift, if that's the word I want. Seems that Countess Judy and the other partners did the maths and decided that I'd be a good investment. So they looked up my mum and dad and made them an offer they couldn't refuse.' Paul grinned disturbingly. ‘Not that they tried all that hard, it seems. Countess Judy said she and the rest of the gang got the impression that mum and dad would've settled for a hell of a lot less, like a fiver cash and a bag of dog biscuits, but according to her there's rules of professional ethics that mean they had to make a fair offer to start with. She did tell me how they arrived at the figure, something about thirty per cent of the income they'd reasonably expect me to produce for them, multiplied by two-thirds of the number of years till I retire. I'm sure she was telling the truth. She's got an honest face, among others.'

Melze didn't say anything for a very long time. ‘Paul,' she said, ‘you're not making this up, are you?'

‘Nope. Come on, be reasonable. You've known me for years. When did I ever have that sort of imagination?'

Melze looked like someone had just slapped her round the face with a large sea bass. ‘But they can't hold you to it,' she said. ‘They can't.'

Paul shook his head. ‘Don't you believe it,' he said. ‘Look, I told you about how Dennis Tanner made puppets out of Sophie and me when we tried to resign, and that was just on the strength of a contract. Where they've bought you outright, it's far, far worse than that. Among other things, they can kill me, just like that.'

‘But the police—'

‘Can't arrest them for killing someone who drops dead of perfectly natural causes, like a heart attack or a blood clot in the brain. It's not my body any more, you see; it'll do precisely what they tell it to do. Not that they're likely to kill me just for wanting to quit – I cost them too much money. Besides, all they need to do is tell my body to show up for work every morning and that's exactly what it'll do, whether I like it or not. Pretty cool, huh? Anyway, that's my bit of news. How's things with you?'

‘But—'

‘Please,' Paul interrupted. ‘I know you're trying to be nice, but I'd rather you didn't. I think I've stopped believing in nice for the moment, and if you stay here I'm going to say something really horrible. I know I won't really mean it, but you'd have to take that on trust. Besides, you've got that stupid form to find.'

Melze stayed right where she was. ‘Are you sure it's not just Countess Judy winding you up?' she said. ‘I mean, she doesn't seem the type, but you never know. Did she – well, give you any proof, or anything?'

Paul stifled a yawn. ‘Well, she showed me the bill of sale, all properly signed and witnessed. Do you know, they got old Mrs Bath-Patterson from next door to witness their signatures. I hope they didn't tell her what the document was all about – it'd have fried her brain.'

‘But—' Melze was struggling, he could see; trying to find a loophole for him, something to give him a tiny crumb of hope. He should have found it touching and sweet, but all he felt was irritation. ‘You told me you saw the job advertised in the paper and went for an interview.'

‘True; but the questions they asked me were gibberish. According to Countess Judy, that was to see if I freaked out easily. But no, I just thought I was too stupid to understand what they were getting at. They'd got it all carefully arranged. I only saw that advert because mum and dad told me the best place to look for jobs was that particular newspaper. The whole interview thing was a set-up.'

‘But it couldn't have been. They hired that other clerk at the same time. The girl. Chloe.'

‘Sophie. I guess they must've set her up too,' Paul added; that hadn't occurred to him before. She'd told him her mum had highlighted the ad in the paper with yellow marker pen so she couldn't miss it. ‘Look, I really don't want to talk about this stuff any more. Last night—' He frowned. ‘Last night, Countess Judy tried to kill me. She'd have done it, probably, if Ricky Wurmtoter hadn't stopped her.'

‘
Kill
you? But why?' Paul shrugged. ‘And is she going to try again? Paul, for crying out loud . . .'

‘The answer is,' he said, ‘I don't know. Don't bother asking me the question, whatever it is. I really do think you should go away now.'

‘But—'

‘Go
away
.'

Melze left. For a long time, Paul just sat, his mind in neutral. He was trying to remember something that had occurred to him – yes, right; Ricky Wurmtoter had saved his life, apparently; but Ricky was a partner in the firm, he'd been at the interview, so he must've known the whole deal, right from the beginning. Another cheerful thought.

How could they
do
that to me? Their own
son
?

Not that it mattered. Evil, unspeakable bastards, like every other living thing on the planet. Four hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars; what did that come to in English money, anyhow? Paul shrugged. It sounded like a lot, but hadn't he found all those hidden bauxite reserves for Mr Tanner, just by looking at photos of blank bits of desert? Maybe he'd already earned out what they'd paid for him; in which case, no wonder Countess Judy regarded him as nothing more than a Kentucky fried soul on legs, handily in reserve for the next time she needed a midnight snack.

Talking of which, he was feeling painfully weary. Just ten minutes' zizz was all he wanted, and could it possibly matter now, if he slept and dreamed, and never woke up? Paul thought about the fairy tales that had scared him so much when he was just a kid: stories about young men who get lured into the fairy castle, and wake up to find it's a hundred years later and all their family and friends have died. What was it Ricky had said about people dying in their sleep? Not that he was in any position to believe anything Ricky said, at that.

Ricky Wurmtoter.
I trusted that bastard. I gave him the last of my coffee (and that posh stuff he bought me tastes horrible, too). I ought to be fucking angry about that. Depressing, really, that I'm not.

(If I went to Florida and killed them both, strangled them with my bare hands, I'd inherit the four and a quarter hundred thousand dollars, assuming they haven't frittered it all away on garden makeovers and soft furnishings. That'd be no more than justice, because that way at least I'd get the money that paid for me. Not that money's any good to me. Besides, killing them would mean having to be in the same room as them, and I don't think I could face that. And I'd have to ask Mr Tanner for time off, and he probably only lets you take your holiday if you're dead.)

Ricky Wurmtoter
—

The door opened, and Ricky came in. Today he was well groomed and elegant, Pierce Brosnan modelling Armani; not a hair out of place, no scars or bruises. He had a large black box file tucked under his arm. It wasn't often that Paul felt an urge to use the word ‘smarmy'; right now, though, he reckoned that it had evolved its slow, painful way from Anglo-Saxon through Middle English to its present meaning just for this very moment. Ricky smiled and said, ‘Hello.'

‘Hello,' Paul replied.

‘How are you feeling?'

‘Tired.'

‘Well, that's understandable,' Ricky said, with a viscosity of sympathy you could've poured on flapjacks. ‘No return visit, though?'

‘No.'

Ricky's frown was so slight that most measuring devices wouldn't have been finely enough calibrated to detect it. ‘That's good,' he said. ‘I said, didn't I, she wasn't likely to try again right away. I guess that means we've got a little time—'

‘She explained about that,' Paul said grimly. ‘Apparently, she found someone else to murder, so I'm off the hook for now. I expect you're glad,' he added. ‘After all, it's your money too, isn't it? Seventy thousand dollars.'

Ricky looked genuinely confused. ‘What about seventy thousand dollars?'

‘Six partners,' Paul said. ‘Six into four hundred and twenty-five thousand is seventy thousand, five hundred.'

‘Eight-hundred and thirty-three, actually.' Ricky pulled a sad face. ‘She told you about that, then.'

Calm, always calm. ‘Yes,' Paul said. ‘She told me.'

‘Oh.' He paused, then shrugged. ‘You wouldn't care to consider the soccer transfer fee analogy, I suppose.'

‘Not really.'

‘Thought not. And you aren't flattered, I guess.'

‘No.'

Ricky grinned. ‘You should be,' he said. ‘And if it's any consolation, it's a good sign – for your career prospects.' He put the file down on the desk, and sat in the chair; Sophie's chair, of course. ‘Shows how highly the firm values you, and all that.'

‘I couldn't give a flying—'

‘They only paid twenty-five thousand for me.'

Paul couldn't remember what he was about to say, even though he was in the middle of saying it. Instead, he froze with his mouth open.

‘Mind you,' Ricky went on, ‘that was when twenty-five K was worth something – we're going back a few years, to when money was something you could melt down and turn into jewellery. Even so, with due allowance for inflation and the underlying trends in the industry as a whole, I was cheaper than you when I was your age. And I'm sure you know better than to go telling anybody what I just told you. It's one of those deadly men's-locker-room secrets that you don't even share with your best friend.'

Paul was still staring, but his mouth was back on-line. ‘They own you too?'

‘Not
they
,' Ricky said with a sad smile. ‘
We
. As you so astutely pointed out just now, I'm one of them, which means that I own a sixth of me. Well, a twelfth, if you take the bank's share into account, but even a twelfth of yourself is better than—' He shook his head. ‘For a twelfth of me, I've worked seven days a week, five hundred and forty-seven days a year—'

‘Five hundred and—?'

Ricky smiled. ‘In a magical environment, the term “time and a half“ takes on nuances you couldn't even begin to imagine. The point is, I survived and I'm still here, dragons and vampires and animated skeletons and office politics notwithstanding. If I can do it, so can you. It's tough, but this is a tough business. Besides,' he added, scowling fiercely, ‘Judy was entirely out of line trying to cull you like that. Clause fifteen of the partnership agreement is absolutely clear: partners must not use the firm's assets in such a way without formal consent at a properly constituted board meeting.' He glanced at his watch and stood up. ‘In fact,' he said, ‘this time I think she may finally have gone just too far enough, if you see what I mean. In which case, we've got her. Thanks,' he added graciously, ‘to you. Of course, it'd be better if we had something in the way of proof other than your word. Still, it's a start.'

Paul shook his head. ‘That's all you're interested in, then. Booting her out of the partnership so that you can work your way up the letterhead. Is that it?'

Ricky nodded. ‘Partly. In fact, mostly. There's also the small matter of her trying to have me killed for the past hundred and sixteen years, but I flatter myself that I'm big enough to overlook that.' He paused, hand on the door handle. ‘Oh, one other thing,' he said. ‘I guess I owe you an apology.'

Quite
, Paul thought;
and on the same scale of values, the attack on Pear Harbor was a bit uncalled for.
‘Really,' he said.

‘Yup. Your Portable Door. You remember you lent it to me, just before I— Well, anyway, I'm afraid I haven't got it any more. It was taken from me when I was in the dungeons. They gave me back the rest of my stuff when they let me go, but not that. Sorry,' he added. ‘I'd replace it if I could, but it's not really the sort of thing you can buy in Lakeland Plastics.'

It was some time after Ricky had gone that Paul noticed he'd left his box file on the desk. Paul picked it up, and a typed memo fluttered out from under the lid.

Paul,

Thanks for minding the fort for me while I was away. By and large you coped pretty well. However, work has been piling up rather, and I'd be grateful (since you're still offi cially part of my team) if you'd deal with a few odds and ends for me – routine paperwork, mostly. I'll drop JDCB a memo explaining that you'll be working for me for the next few days, as she's now your nominal head of department.

Ricky

– and in handwriting underneath:

PS I'd clean forgotten, but today's my birthday; and in case nobody's told you, we've got this corny old thing where on your birthday you buy cakes for everyone in the office. I know you like Uzbek, so yours is honey and nut baklava Tashkent style. Enjoy.

Sure enough, inside the box file, along with half a dozen fat brown envelopes full of papers, was a white paper bag, partly transparent with oil and honey, inside which was some sort of sticky pastry thing with bits on top. Paul couldn't see any reason why it should be poisoned, and he'd missed breakfast, so he ate it, but not in such a frame of mind as could in any way be construed as forgiveness. It tasted all right, though.