The Bride Wore Black Leather

of living flesh, going through the motions.
    Row upon row of customers pressed close around the raised stage, jostling each other to get in close. Sweat gleamed on their fascinated faces, and they couldn’t look away. None of them offered money; ghosts have no use for cash. They sucked a little life energy out of any customer who got close enough. Sucking them dry, bit by bit, and making them love it. Not too different from any other such club, really.
    Cathy took it all in her stride. I looked at her suspiciously.
    “You’ve been here before. And you knew the man outside by name. How is it you even know places like this exist?”
    “Ask me no questions, and I’ll tell you no lies,” Cathy said calmly. “You really don’t want to know about how I spend my spare times, boss. I’m all grown-up now. And you probably have enough trouble sleeping as it is. This way . . .”
    She beckoned imperiously to a figure at the bar, and the owner of the place came smarming forward to join us. I knew immediately why Cathy hadn’t told me his name. Because if I’d known we were going to talk with Dennis Montague, I would have hurled myself out of the car and into the on-coming traffic. Oh yes, I knew Dennis of old. This wasn’t the first disreputable club he’d owned. I’d shut down several of them on moral-health grounds and because his very existence offended me.
    Dennis, or Den-Den, as he preferred to be called, in the mistaken belief that it made him seem more engaging, was a minor player and major-league scumbag who always seemed to land on his feet, no matter how high a building you threw him off. He came sleazing forward to greet Cathy and me as though we were most-favoured customers, smiling and smiling as though he were genuinely pleased to meet us. A short, shiny butter-ball of a man, with slicked-down black hair, a face like a boiled ham, and large, watery eyes. He looked like he ought to leave a trail of slime behind him when he moved, like a snail. Though given the state of the floor in this club, it would probably have been an improvement. He came to an abrupt halt before us, bobbing his head repeatedly and rubbing his soft, podgy hands together.
    It was a masterful performance, to make himself appear nothing more than another harmless letch; but he needn’t have bothered. I remembered Den-Den. A cheat and a liar, a ponce and a pervert, given to abusing and profiting from anyone weaker than himself. But I also knew why Cathy had brought me here to see Den-Den rather than anyone else. Because once upon a time, Dennis Montague had been a rising star, a young man with a great future ahead of him, as the most talented field agent the Carnacki Institute had ever produced. The Institute exists to track down, identify and then do something about all kinds of ghosts and hauntings. And for a while, Dennis Montague was their top man. Till they found out what he was really up to and threw him out. And quite rightly, too. I looked at Cathy.
    “Are you
sure
there isn’t anyone else?”
    “Not who can do what he can do. And you’re really not too popular in the Nightside right now, boss. We have to work with what we can get. What’s so bad about Den-Den, anyway? I mean, apart from the obvious. He knows his ghosts.”
    “Did he ever tell you why he was kicked out of the Carnacki Institute?” I said. “Tell her, Den-Den.”
    “For having sex with ghosts,” said Dennis, quite proudly.
    “Can I just say
Oh ick!
in a loud and carrying voice?” said Cathy. “How is that even possible?”
    Dennis sniggered until I glared at him, and he stopped. “Best not to ask, dear,” he said to Cathy, smiling happily. “Not at all the kind of thing you want to talk about in public.” He looked me up and down, still rubbing his hands together, considering how best to squeeze money out of me. “Welcome to my humble establishment, Mr. Taylor, yes . . . Make yourself at home, do. See anything you like? All wery tasty, wery clean, and all at wery reasonable prices, I assure you.”
    “You even hint to anyone we were ever here,” said Cathy, “and I will burn this place down around your ears.”
    “Oh, I believe you,” Dennis said immediately. “Mr. Taylor’s reputation isn’t the only one that proceeds him, you little minx, you. You can rely on old Den-Den not to breathe a word, oh yes. I have no problems with Mr. Taylor’s being here! No! Anyone capable of seeing off Julien Advent is clearly a man to be