The Returned Dead. Rafe Kronos

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      The traffic final slowed and I was able to dodge through a gap in the stream of cars, cross the road and stop in front of our front door. The firm’s brass name-plate gleamed like a fragment of trapped sunlight. It bears the words ‘Charles Dawson and Co.’ though the letters are almost worn away and difficult to read. People look at the elegant house and then at the worn name-plate and assume we’d been here for decades. After all, what better indication is there of a firm’s age and probity than a brass plate with lettering rubbed away by years of regular polishing?

      I gave the shining golden rectangle a fond look. For something faked up only four years back it was doing a splendid job.

      As I say, in my career I’ve learned you can get people to deceive themselves and the plate, the house, the neighbours all do just that. There is nothing malicious about it, you understand, it’s just I want to distinguish my agency from all the sleazy, fly-by-night operators who give investigators a bad name.

      We get all sorts of clients and charge them appropriately for our high quality service but this was the first time that I’d been hired by a client who thought he was two people, one of them dead. Well, the sooner I began work, the sooner I’d get to the bottom of all that.

      I opened the front door and went in. In the hall Mrs Beattie, our receptionist, smiled and moved her hands apart to indicate there were no messages that I needed to bother about. I like her sensible, motherly approach to looking after me and my staff: she is another layer in the protection I have tried to wrap around myself.

      I walked past her desk and through to my office at the rear of the ground floor. It has large windows that look out over a lawn edged by gloomy evergreens. Whenever I look at it, it strikes me that the place is pretty dull. From time to time I’ve toyed with the idea planting flowers to give it some colour. I thought about how even a little of the £15,000 could buy a lot of bulbs. Then I recalled the far more important thing that required money; improving the garden would have to wait.

      I settled myself behind my desk, thought again about our new client for a few moments and then addressed the empty room and said, “OK, Kate, you can come in now.”

      A minute later the door opened and Kate Simmonds, my number two, came in and seated herself neatly in the client’s chair. She pulled down her skirt, brushed back the lock of her red hair that fell over her left eye, looked at me and laughed. It was a deep, rich sound at odds with her petite figure. I waited for her to speak and tried not to stare at her. There were times when I found her beauty disturbing.

      “Well, well, Charlie, we’ve really got one this time. Amazing, truly amazing! A man comes through the door and expects us to believe a dozen impossible things and then, just to add to the fun, he hands over fifteen thousand pounds in used notes. Wow.”

      It was not a bad summary of what had happened.

      “And as for handing over all that money, well, Charlie, you should have seen your face when he tipped it over your desk,” she giggled. “By the way, I noticed the firm’s receipt book did not put in an appearance.”

      I ignored that.

      She giggled again. I tried to look serious; after all, I was the boss. It was a struggle; her high spirits always made me want to smile. I just hoped she would stay that way: so far experience had not darkened her mind.

      “So I take it you listened to all of it?”

      “Of course I listened and watched the whole thing, of course I did. When you press your button and the little red light on my console starts to flash I’m all ears and eyes. I must say enjoyed it; in fact the whole thing was better than most of the stuff on TV these days, though you must admit it was a bit Dr Who-ish. So what do we call the investigation? The Man who was Two? The Return of Mr Rankin?” She laughed again. It was clear that, like me, she couldn’t believe our new client’s story.

      I gave a smile and waited: I wanted to hear her views before I said anything.

      “Right, Charlie, I told you the video stuff would be useful. I’ve pulled some good stills of our client from the recording. We can take them around and see if anyone recognises him as Rankin or, I suppose, as Baxendale.” She grinned, “Which is he? Do you think we should start calling him Rankindale or Baxenkin? We certainly need a name for him till we decide who he really is and what he’s doing. I’ll bring the pics up later and you can decide whose name we use to file them. You’ll be impressed by how sharp they are. I told you it was worth spending the extra money on high-end kit.”

      I refrained from looking at the places in the ceilings and walls where the cameras’ tiny lenses and the microphones were hidden.

      Kate looks after the firm’s technology. One of the reasons I hired her was her doctorate in information technology from Imperial College -- that and her quick intelligence – and, I have to admit it, her red hair and her green eyes. I like to have her near me because it reminds me that beautiful young women need not end up horribly deformed and broken. Sometimes, just sometimes, her presence helps to blot out my memories.

      “Anyway, go on, say it, Charlie, say it,” she said, wrinkling her nose and giving me her slightly crooked grin. “Say what you always say at this point in an investigation. Repeat to me those immortal words. Let me hear the proud motto of our firm -- though I don’t know why I’m bothering to ask because I know you’ll do it anyway”

      I found myself smiling. “Why is this man lying to me?”

      “Exactly. The firm’s golden motto: ‘why is this man lying to me’? Plus, of course, ‘bring the money -- now’. That bit’s important too, especially for you, Charlie, isn’t it?”

      I shrugged. I hoped she’d never find out why we needed to earn so much money. If she ever did she would see me in a very different light and I didn’t want that. As for ‘why is this man lying to me’ our unofficial motto, well, she could mock but as far as I am concerned complete scepticism has to be the starting point in any investigation into the murkier areas of human existence.

      ‘Why is this man lying to me’ had been taught me years ago by a Scottish professor of Biblical History. Scholars like him don’t have blood in their veins, they have liquid doubt. When I think of him I regret leaving academic life. Perhaps if I’d stayed I might be a seriously overworked and underpaid lecturer by now, even a professor. It mightn’t have been a bad life. But it’s all too late now, much too late.

      I became aware Kate was speaking again. “You know, Charlie, this Baxendale bloke tells a fascinating story but…”

      As her voice faded away I finished the sentence for her, “but the whole thing’s impossible, utterly so.”

      She leaned forward and the lock of hair flopped back over her left eye. “Right, Charlie, do you think we can we believe one single word he said?”

      “I wish I knew,” I replied. “Of course his story seems incredible, well, it is incredible. But I’m puzzled by Baxendale himself. I was watching him closely all the way through and he was convincing, very convincing. I’m pretty sure he believes everything he told me. Either that or he’s a damn good actor.”

      “Hmm. But you must admit your judgement of people sometimes goes wildly wrong.”

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