The Anubis Gates

The man was tall, and seemed to be drunk. His wide-brimmed hat was pulled low over his face and he lurched from side to side as he walked, though once for a moment or two he broke into a clumsy parody of tap dancing, whistling the tune fast to accompany himself. Just when he was about to pass Doyle’s hiding place he noticed, with an exaggerated jerk of his head, a pub at his right, a narrow, ill-lit place called The Vigilant Rowsby. The man stopped whistling, patted a pocket, and, reassured by the jingle of coins, pushed open the bull’s-eye windowed door and disappeared inside.

Doyle started to hurry away south, toward the river and Gravesend, but after a few steps he halted and glanced back at the pub.

Can you walk away from it? he asked himself. This guy certainly seems to be alone, and not particularly dangerous at the moment. Don’t be an idiot, objected the fearful part of his mind, get the hell out of here!

He wavered, then hesitantly, almost on tiptoe, he crossed the street and stepped up to the heavy wooden door of The Vigilant Rowsby. The place’s old name sign squeaked gently back and forth on its chains over his head as he tried to work up the nerve to take hold of the S-shaped iron door handle.

The decision was taken out of his hands when the door was yanked open from the inside and a tall, burly man stepped out onto the pavement, seeming almost propelled by the burst of warm air, redolent of beef and beer and candle tallow, that billowed out around him. “What’s the problem. Jack?” exclaimed the man loudly. “No pence for beer? Here. When Morningstar drinks, everybody drinks.” He dropped a handful of copper into Doyle’s pocket. “In you go.” Morningstar placed a giant hand between Doyle’s shoulder blades and shoved him inside.

Keeping his face averted from most of the tables and booths, Doyle hurried to the long counter at one end of the room and bought a beer from the bored-looking publican. Doyle brushed his hair down across his forehead and then tilted the heavy glass beer mug up to his face and, with only his eyes showing, turned his back to the counter and started a slow scan of the room while he took the first long sip.

Halfway through it he froze, and almost choked on his beer. The man who had been whistling was sitting over a beer in a tall-backed booth against the far wall; his hat was set next to his glass, and the candle on the table lit his slack, blear-eyed face clearly. It was Steerforth Benner.

When he had convinced himself that he was neither mistaken nor hallucinating, Doyle gulped some more beer. Why hadn’t Benner returned with the rest of the party? Had anyone else missed the boat? Doyle pushed away from the counter and, taking his beer with him, crossed to Benner’s table. He slipped his free hand into his coat pocket and gripped the ruined pistol.

The big, sandy-haired man didn’t look up when Doyle stood over him, so Doyle lifted the pistol inside his coat until the muzzle showed as a ring against the taut fabric, and then shook him by the shoulder.

Benner looked up, his wheat-colored eyebrows raised in irritable inquiry. “Yes?” he said, and then, carefully, “What is it?”

Doyle was impatient. Why did the man have to be drunk? “It’s me, Steerforth. It’s Doyle.” He sat down on the opposite side of Benner’s table, letting the barrel of the concealed gun clank onto the wood. “This is a pistol here,” he said, “and it’s pointed, as you can see, at your heart. Now I want some answers to some questions.”

Benner was staring at him in wide-eyed, slack-jawed horror. He said quickly, the words tumbling out of his mouth, “Christ Brendan don’t torture me are you real, I mean there, good God you’re not a ghost or a DT are you? Say something, god-dammit!”

Doyle shook his head disgustedly. “I should pretend to be a ghost, just to see you really crack. Get hold of yourself. I’m real. Do ghosts drink beer?” Doyle performed this trick, without taking his eyes off Benner. “Obviously you know I was shot at Sunday. Tell me who did it and why—and who else is going around whistling Yesterday.”

“They all are, Brendan,” said Benner earnestly. “All the boys Darrow brought back here with him. The tune’s a recognition signal with them, like that three note thing the Jets whistled to each other in West Side Story.”

“Darrow? He’s back here? I thought the return trip worked.”

“The trip you came along on? Sure it worked. Everybody except you got back fine.” Benner shook his head ponderously. “I’ll never know why you wanted to stay here, Brendan.”

“I didn’t want to. I was kidnapped by a crazy gypsy. But what are you telling me, then? That Darrow came back again? How could he? Did he find new gaps to jump through?”