They looked at me, we looked at them. I got the feeling they weren’t happy either.
Then one said, “So which are you?”
Vera rolled her eyes. The Alderman who’d spoken was young, male, and destined to rule the world. He had dark blond hair, slightly curled, a face just bordering on deeply tanned; bright blue eyes, a hint of freckle and a set of teeth you could have carved a piano with. If I hated Aldermen on basic principle, I hated him on direct observation.
“It’s not that simple . . .” began Vera, and I realised that she was also afraid. It takes a lot to frighten Vera.
“Of course it’s not,” said the middle man. He was older, with a little lined face from which boomed a great rolling voice, and neat precise hands. When he smiled, his every feature crinkled gnomicly, and so great were the welcoming good manners in his voice and every other aspect of his presence that I automatically didn’t believe them. “Mr Swift,” he said, “I am Mr Earle.”
He held out a hand only a few veins thicker than a sheet of paper. I shook it. “Mr Kemsley” - the young man with the teeth - “and Ms Anissina.” Ms Anissina was a woman in her mid-thirties, wearing clothes for a bright twenty-something and a hardened face fit for a dying warlord. Everything else about her was a frozen blank, neither hostile nor friendly, happy nor sad, lively nor subdued: just stone in a suit. Either she was a woman of hidden depths, or there was nothing beneath that marble surface to hide.
“I gather you’ve been injured; would you like to sit?”
I nodded, considering there was nothing to be gained from feigning a strength I obviously lacked. The one sofa had only space on it for three good friends. They left it all to me, and dispersed themselves casually around the room, just far enough apart to make it impossible to look at more than one Alderman at a time.
Mr Earle took up position by the window. I thought of sniper rifles and bright lights. He said, “Mr Swift, first may I offer my regrets that you have clearly been a victim of some violence.”
The words were the flat intonations of a busy priest, with three burials left to do before sunset and a migraine coming on. I said nothing. He didn’t care.
“How much are you aware of the remit of our duties, Mr Swift?”
“You’re the Aldermen,” I replied flatly. “A formation of like-minded individuals of a magical inclining whose responsibility is to ‘protect the city’, whatever that means.”
“Yes - you hit upon an ambiguity there.”
I shrugged.
“You are broadly correct. There is more to our mandate than a loose ‘protect the city’ and, naturally, more than simply ‘like-minded individuals’ in our exclusive choice of membership; but I don’t need to bore you with these details.”
I shrugged again, feeling skin stretch around the stitches, pain dribble down my spine. “I’m guessing you’re not here because you’re worried about my health.”
“Alas, that is not our main concern. I am sure you also understand our authority,” added Mr Earle, finding a point and sharpening it.
“I understand,” I replied, “that for nearly a thousand years there have been Aldermen watching over London, and that sooner or later anyone who opposes their will, dies. I know you serve the Midnight Mayor, who, if he exists, is the sacred protector of the city stones and whose heart beats in time to the rhythms of city life and so on and so forth.”
“You don’t believe in the Midnight Mayor?” he asked. “Interesting.”
“Is that what you meant by ‘authority’?”
“If you regard authority as merely being might, then yes. We could argue semantics all day, but I think you have the essential details. Well then, with all this in mind, perhaps I can ask you some questions. Where were you last night, Mr Swift, between one and three a.m.?”
I stared at him in surprise, which threatened to turn to anger. “Being stabbed by spectres,” I replied.
“But where, Mr Swift?”
“Willesden.”
“What were you doing in Willesden?”
“I told you. Being stabbed.”
“Mr Swift . . .” He sighed, then asked, “Is this your watch?”
He held up a sad, burnt piece of fabric and metal, 99p from a vendor on the street, with a faded Mickey Mouse behind the frozen hands. I didn’t ask how he’d got it, didn’t blame Vera for giving it to him. “Yes,” I said.