* * *
Paddington spent the night in an abandoned house, terrified that the vampires would recover from his poisoning and hunt him down. Who knew how they might sense him? Maybe they could smell him. Or see his blood from a street away.
When the sun finally rose, Paddington breathed a sigh of relief. Vampires couldn’t get around in the daytime. Hopefully. The candlelight in the duke’s manor certainly suggested that that part of the myth was accurate. He slept a little after dawn, then headed to the police station to see how Mitchell’s night had gone.
Both Quentin and Andrea were on their phones. There must have been a crime wave overnight. Or Adonis had called to arrange Paddington’s execution for treason.
Five of the Supernatural Help and Investigation Team were also there, looking edgy. Mitchell looked furious. “Why the shitting hell didn’t you tell us there were zombies on this island?” he yelled.
Paddington looked around for help, or even context. Quentin obliged. “Seems a bunch of them attacked a city meeting last night and now there’s a…” He paused to check his dictionary. “…a horde of zombies.”
“Why didn’t you mention it?” Mitchell demanded.
“It slipped my mind,” Paddington said.
“The zombie horde slipped your mind?”
“There was only one, and that was a week ago, and since then I learned my girlfriend is a werewolf and the man running my home is a vampire! Yes it slipped my bloody mind that there was a single zombie out there!” Paddington turned to his mother. “Didn’t Conall deal with this?”
“I informed Adonis as soon as you left Samuel Winslow’s,” Andrea said, placing one hand over the receiver. “He said he’d take care of it. Maybe Conall missed one during the cleanup.”
The penny dropped: Adonis had been in charge of cleaning up the zombies. Adonis, the vampire. The vampire who required a zombie outbreak for his prophecy to succeed. He had been in charge of killing the zombies? Fantastic.
“One?” Mitchell shouted at Andrea. “You said the calls mentioned hundreds!”
“You needn’t shout,” she said. “I’m right here.”
“Yes, sitting there like nothing’s happened!”
“Someone needs to man the phones,” Andrea said calmly. Paddington suspected his mother was annoying Mitchell on purpose, not that he blamed her.
“And did the vampires slip your mind too?” Mitchell asked, rounding on Paddington.
“I told you, I wasn’t sure what they were until last night,” he said.
“Yes, when you robbed them! Did you think we needed another enemy, detective?”
“You need that Book if you’re going to stop the prophecy.”
“Bollocks to your prophecy. What about tonight? Should we expect the figures that have been watching us from the trees to stop watching and start attacking?”
“I don’t know,” Paddington admitted. He had known they couldn’t trust Adonis, that Adonis was holding back what they needed, so he’d taken it. He couldn’t know what the consequences would be.
“In the meantime, sir,” Truman said, stepping between them, “shouldn’t we be stopping the zombies? Isn’t that, basically, our job description, sir?”
That was a promising idea. If the Mainlanders were occupied controlling these zombies, no one was looking for Lisa. For a while, at least, she should be safe.
One problem down. Seventeen to go.
“Thank you, Truman,” Mitchell said, still glaring at Paddington. “But I’m not in the habit of marching into a war zone I know bugger all about.”
“Sir, it’s zombies,” the American said. “You shoot them in the head.”
“Yeah, and werewolves change at the full moon,” Mitchell said sarcastically. “Now perhaps we can get some facts.”
“Well,” Quentin said, standing, “I’m off.”
“Off on your rounds, I suppose?” Mitchell asked.
“I thought I might drop by the bakery.” Quentin hitched his thumbs into his belt. “They’ve got these really nice buns in there on Fridays, with jam and cinnamon. But they always sell out before lunch, so you have to get in quick. After that I might take a stroll down south and see if I can stop the zombies from killing everyone. If there’s time.”
“Quentin,” Paddington said, “you’re not serious?” He’d never pictured Quentin as the fighting sort. He was probably stronger than Paddington, but it was hard to spot muscle beneath flab. Even if he were a perfect physical specimen, he’d still be one man against an entire horde. That was suicide.
“Not about the bakery,” Quentin said. He strapped his helmet on and Paddington waited. If the Team wasn’t watching, they probably would have hugged: with hundreds of zombies on the loose, odds were he’d never see Quentin again. At least, not alive.
“Watch your back,” Paddington said. “And keep your distance. And don’t let them bite you!”
Quentin rolled his eyes. “Yes mother. Can I go play now?” He stepped past Paddington.
“And try not to die!” Paddington called after him.
The front door swung shut. Outside, an engine revved to life and faded away. Paddington wished it would come back; Quentin was the closest thing he had to a friend. Now that he was gone and Lisa was in hiding, Paddington was alone with his new “friends”.
“Detective,” Mitchell said, “tell me about these zombies. How do we stop them?”
Paddington remembered Marion’s corpse in Samuel Winslow’s cellar. “Shoot them in the head. That keeps them down.”
That was how it had started: with Marion. But how had Marion started? Where had the first zombie come from? Maybe understanding that would be another piece of the Big Picture.
“We should talk to Ian,” Paddington said.
“Who the hell is Ian?” Mitchell asked.
“He was dating the first zombie. Before she was a zombie, obviously. We thought he might have killed her. Even if he doesn’t know about zombies, a mortician’s as good a place to start as any when dealing with the dead.”
“Right. Detective, you’re with me.”
As Paddington drove them south, Mitchell filled him in: apparently the zombies were clustered around the south-west, but spreading. A few people had escaped last night’s town meeting uninfected, but fewer thought to go back and stop the undead. Most, it seemed, had left a message on the police station’s answering machine and gone to bed. Someone else’s problem.
And still Mitchell spoke as if Archi existed only to annoy him. Paddington was getting sick of it. He’d babysat the Mainlander all of yesterday and discovered a complete absence of personal skills. It wasn’t that Mitchell didn’t engage in small talk; it was that he refused to acknowledge its existence and eventually it went away.
The streets were quiet, the shops closed. Most people were staying indoors, perhaps praying that the zombies didn’t reach them or else working silently, not sure what was happening. No official statement had been made over the wireless and most Archians were happy to believe the situation was under control until told differently. The dead silence on the streets would have told them it wasn’t under control, but most people were inside with the blinds drawn, trying not to see it.
“You still don’t believe in the prophecy, do you?” Paddington asked.
“No.”
“Even though we’ve got three Races now?”
“Even if your prophecy’s true, the mission’s the same: kill every monster I see.”
“Doesn’t it throw up questions about the nature and accuracy of prophecy?” Paddington asked. “For someone whose job is to investigate the supernatural, you don’t seem to want to investigate anything.”
“I’m not in this job for the aliens,” Mitchell said. “I’ve had three years in charge of this lot. Most of them are rejects from other units, dumped in some forgotten Team so they can’t do any more damage. I’ve trained them hard, got them in shape, done the best I can with them.”
No wonder Mitchel
l was so grim. He saw his life as pointless; preparation for a day that he believed could never come. “But why train them if you didn’t think they’d see action?” Paddington asked.
“Doing my bit to protect stupid little people like you, detective.”
“But why?”
“Because those are my orders. Because I’m not a coward.”
“We’re here.” Paddington jumped out of the van before the discussion could become an argument.
Against the cottage’s right wall swelled another building, like a giant tumour. In the garden was a sign: “Ian Athanasius, Mortician. All welcome”. Paddington knocked on the front door and, when there was no answer, Mitchell kicked it in.
The house appeared deserted. They moved through its cramped rooms, Mitchell swinging his rifle around. The lights were off and there was no sound, but in the back room a sallow man with greasy black hair was trying to undo the top bolt of the back door.
“Freeze!” Mitchell shouted, rifle aimed. He nodded to Paddington. “Detective, do your thing. And buy a gun, for God’s sake.”
“No,” Paddington said. “Hello Ian. I thought we’d have a little chat about Marion.”
Ian abandoned his escape attempt and stood with drooping arms beside the door. At the mention of Marion, fear snaked through the mortician’s face: the fear of the past freshly stirred.
“So…” Paddington said, filling the space between Ian and Mitchell, “why did you kill her?”
“I told you a month ago, I didn’t!”
Paddington sighed. They didn’t have time for games, not with zombies on the loose. “You see this man behind me? Well he’s crazy.”
“This is just good cop bad cop,” Ian said. A single bead of sweat dribbled down his long forehead.
“Not just, it’s also true,” Paddington said. “Yesterday I had to stop him stabbing the mayor in the heart with a chair leg; he wouldn’t think twice about killing you. In fact,” Paddington turned to Mitchell, “could you put the safety back on that, please? And not point it at his head?”
Grudgingly, Mitchell adjusted his gun’s aim.
“So,” Paddington continued, “it really is in your best interests to help me, Ian, because otherwise I’ll leave the room.” He stared into Ian’s eyes until he was sure the mortician understood him. “I need to know how you killed Marion, because I think she started all of this.”
“I didn’t— What’s he doing?”
“Hm?” Paddington glanced back at Mitchell. “He’s attaching a bayonet to his rifle, Ian.”
“Why?”
“I imagine he wants to stab something.”
“It was an accident!” Ian said. “We were talking, and she… said some things, and… I hit her with an ashtray.”
So she was dead. Paddington had suspected, but they’d never found it or the body, so Marion was only listed as missing. And she went missing a lot, usually to turn up a few days later in the bedroom of one of Archi’s young men.
“What then?” Paddington asked.
“I hid her in Mister Henderson’s coffin and covered her with flowers.” To his credit, Ian appeared ashamed of this. Paddington had expected him to be colder.
“You didn’t check the caskets?” Mitchell asked Paddington.
“Not the ones in use!” Paddington said. “What flower?” A month ago he wouldn’t have asked, but his time with Lisa had given him a rudimentary interest in plants. Or an interest in her that he could express via plants.
“Angel’s trumpet,” Ian said. “It was her favourite.”
“Angel’s trumpet?” Paddington asked. Was he serious?
“What’s angel’s trumpet?” Mitchell asked.
“More commonly known as devil’s trumpet or hell’s bells,” Paddington said. The devil’s trumpet had heralded a zombie. How appropriate.
Mitchell rolled his eyes. “Don’t tell me you think a plant’s responsible for creating all those zombies?”
“No,” Paddington said. First the prophecy on the Tree; then the Andrastes who didn’t eat their vegetables; now plants again… Paddington felt another piece of the puzzle slip into place. “Just the first one, Marion.” After that, one zombie could create another…
Paddington clapped Ian on the back and smiled. “This is your lucky day. You’ve just volunteered to fight the hordes of the undead.”
“I have?” Ian asked.
“And, in honour of your bravery – assuming you are brave – I’ll forget everything you just told me. Am I understood?” Paddington asked.
Ian looked uncertain.
“Because if not, Mitchell still has that bayonet…”