Nightside 10 - The Good the Bad and the Uncanny

him.”
    Dash and Shirley looked at each other, and they suddenly seemed older and more frail. Dash’s hands closed together on the table before him, and Shirley put her hand over them.
    “Can’t say I approve of what Hadleigh’s made of himself,” Dash said finally. “Detective Inspectre for God’s sake ... We should never have left him alone, all those years. Not our fault, of course, but...”
    “He fell in with bad company,” said Shirley, glaring at Walker. “We’d hardly been back a year, before he disappeared. And when he came back ... We don’t talk any more. We never see him. He does write us the occasional letter, now and again. But it’s not the same.”
    “He was our first-born,” said Dash. “He meant so much to us. We had such hopes for him ...”
    “Larry and Tommy came later,” said Shirley. “Good boys, both of them. Nothing like their elder brother. We had hopes for them, too ... but Larry was murdered by his own partner, and we lost Tommy to the Lilith War.”
    “Never did like Larry’s partner,” said Dash. “That Mag gie Boniface ... stuck-up little piece. Just because her family was big in voodoo ...”
    “I never knew what he saw in her,” said Shirley.
    Dash grinned suddenly. “I could make a good guess. She had a balcony you could do Shakespeare from ...”
    “Oh, hush, you nasty old man,” said Shirley. And they smiled at each other.
    “Larry hasn’t been the same, since he came back from the dead,” said Shirley. “We try to look after him, as best we can, but he keeps us at a distance. As though we might be bothered because he’s dead. The very idea. He’s our son.”
    “Seen a lot worse than the walking dead,” said Dash, nodding. “Lot worse.”
    “We spent a lot of time and money looking for Tommy,” said Shirley. “After the War was over. But it was chaos everywhere, everything in such a mess ... and there were so many people missing. No-one knew anything. Dash wore himself out, walking up and down the streets, looking for something, some sign ... until finally I made him stop. We did think about hiring you, Mr. Taylor; but we heard you’d already tried your gift, to no effect, so what was the point? So we got used to the idea that our poor Tommy was gone, another victim of that damned War.”
    “Larry never gave up on his brother,” said Dash. “Always was stubborn as a mule, that boy.”
    “They were both good boys,” said Shirley.
    “Good boys,” said Dash.
    They sat close together, holding hands, their heads bowed.
    “We didn’t do so well with our children,” said Shirley. “Larry’s dead, Tommy’s gone, and Hadleigh ... God alone knows what Hadleigh is. Three sons, but no grandchildren, and never likely to have any now. Was all that we did for nothing? We saved the world, on at least three occasions. President gave us medals. In private. And all for what? To grow old and see our children lost to us. Don’t we deserve something for all we did?”
    “We didn’t do it for the rewards,” said Dash, squeezing her hand. “We did it because it needed doing.”
    “Duty and responsibility,” said Walker, nodding. “The only things that matter.”
    “Oh, fuck off, Walker,” said Shirley.
    I felt like applauding.

    After the Londinium Club, Walker and I paid a visit to the Uptown Board of Unnatural Commerce. A big stately building right in the heart of the Nightside business sector. All very solemn, very dignified and businesslike; you could practically smell fresh bank-notes on the rarefied lobby air. Walker took me in and out of various offices, where no expense had been spared, and comfort and ostentatious luxury came as standard. He made a point of introducing me to a whole series of powerful and influential people, who all pretended to be glad to see me. Because if I was with Walker, then I must be a personage worth knowing. They offered me thick, murky sherry, which I declined, and listened to my every casual remark as though each contained the secrets of the world. I smiled and nodded and avoided answering any of their subtly probing questions as to what I was doing with Walker. Let them wonder and worry.
    It didn’t take me long to work out why Walker wanted me to meet these high city types. These were the people who supplied Walker with private and confidential business information, from the inside. Such as who was on the way up, who was on the way down, and who could be pressured or blackmailed ... All so Walker