Dead Men's s Boots

I was choked when I found out that she and Book were—’

‘You mean Juliet Salazar,’ I said bleakly, cutting him off before he could go on to tell me what a waste it was that Juliet was a lesbian – or worse, start speculating on what it might take to turn her around.

‘Salazar,’ he repeated distantly, looking past me in a way that made it quite clear that he was still seeing her in the private theatre of his visual cortex. ‘Yeah. Got it in one.’

I waited patiently until Coldwood pulled himself out of the happy reverie.

‘Someone’s trying to kill me.’

‘Oh yeah?’

‘Oh yeah.’ I told him about the falling lift, and the man-sized footprint in the oil and shit on the roof of the car. He was interested, but he didn’t want to show it.

‘I hate it when you play junior detective, Castor,’ he said ruefully. ‘Some other poor bastard always ends up getting the sticky end of the lollipop.

‘Yeah, well, everyone’s entitled to a second opinion, Gary. Metal fatigue? Give me a fucking break!’

‘Well, if the cable’s been tampered with, it’ll be easy to tell,’ Gary allowed. ‘I’ll send a team down to get an impression of that footprint, anyway. Probably get some virtuals off the cable, too, if the gent wasn’t wearing gloves. You got any idea who he might have been? Whose cage have you been rattling?’

I didn’t want to mention John’s letter: it sounded too much like one of Nicky Heath’s paranoid fantasies.

‘Your Breathers mentioned a huge fat man. Have you pissed off any huge fat men lately?’

‘Not that I can think of.’

‘Have you even met any?’

‘Well, yeah, there was one,’ I said reluctantly.

‘Go on.’

‘Guy named Leonard. I don’t know his last name. He works at a law office over in Stoke Newington. Ruthven, Todd and Clay. I saw him for, like, five minutes as I was waiting to see one of the partners. But he did seem to be staring at me a lot.

‘He’s a lawyer?’

‘No, I don’t think so. Some kind of clerk, maybe. He was fixing the photocopier.’

‘Okay.’ Coldwood looked thoughtful. ‘Ruthven, Todd and Clay. I’ll look into it. Tell you if I find anything.’

‘Officially, or unofficially?’

‘The latter. I do homicide, Fix, remember? Not metal fatigue.’

7

There’s something you should know about Juliet, j V1"" ust so – unlike, say, DS Coldwood – you get the right picture in your head to start with.