Dreamer's Cat: a sci-fi murder mystery with a killer twist by Stephen Leather

Author:Stephen Leather [Leather, Stephen]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Three Elephants
Published: 2010-05-03T06:00:00+00:00

* * *

We get back to the flat at about six o'clock, just as the daylight begins to creep out of the rooms. I take off the cap and throw it on one of the sofas. I hate hats, no matter how long I have them on my head I'm always aware of their presence, like a band of steel around my forehead getting tighter and tighter, but until my hair grows back I'm stuck with it.

I was being honest when I told Herbie that I wanted to be on my own, but I also know that I must talk to other Dreamers to find out what the hell is going on. If the Corporation is changing its stand on violence in its psi-discs then it's possible that they wouldn't tell me about it because I'm so near the end of my contract. But the new intake, those that have only recently been signed up, might have been given new instructions.

I shower and change into jeans and a sweatshirt then look at myself in the mirror and wince, a 48-year-old wreck trying to pass himself off as a teenager. The effect is not easy on the eye, and I realise with a jolt what bad shape I'm in. Looking straight down I am unable to see my knees. That is not a good sign. I have fallen victim to gravity and over-indulgence in a big way.

‘Hardly surprising considering the type of restaurants you frequent,’ says Ruth archly. She looks not one day older than when I first met her and that was almost four years ago. ‘And bearing in mind your alcohol intake,’ she adds.

‘I'm going to have to change,’ I say. ‘It'll be an uphill struggle,’ she says.

‘The clothes, I mean,’ I say. I figure that if I'm going to meet the juvenile delinquents that pass for Dreamers then I should dress for the part, but I'm not going to fool anybody. I throw the jeans and shirt back into the wardrobe and put on something more befitting a middle-aged man with a paunch.

‘And bald,’ says Ruth. ‘Don't forget bald.’

The grey flannel trousers, white shirt and red sweater look okay, a bit like an off-duty scoutmaster, and I try on a selection of hats until I find one that's half-way decent.

‘You call a Yankees baseball cap decent?’ accuses Ruth.

‘It'll have to do,’ I say. Anything is better than a bald head.

The bar that Herbie told me about is within walking distance so I don't bother calling for the limo, but on the way out the phone rings. I ask the phone who it is and it tells me that it's someone called Helen Gwynne from the Moral Crusade then waits for me to either accept the call or tell it to take a message. I decide to speak to her.

‘You don't know me but I'd very much like to talk with you about CBS's psi-discs,’ she says.

‘What in particular do you want to talk about?’ I ask.

‘I'd rather go over it in person,’ she answers.

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