Embassy of the Dead Read online

  The Corpse

  The Box

  The Finger

  The Ambassador’s Office, Embassy of the Dead

  Mom and Dad

  What Are You Supposed to Do with a Severed Finger?

  Do You Need a Hand?

  The Bonewulf

  This Is Really Happening

  Bad Penny

  The Book of the Dead

  Whose Finger Is It, Anyway?

  A Nasty Case

  Mr. Sixsmith

  What Could Be Simpler?

  Sab

  The Second Man

  The Bodelean School for Girls

  Cora Sanderford

  Freed

  Mr. Rayburn

  Child Lock

  Cora Sanderford Is No Poltergeist

  You Have Four New Messages

  Hunting

  The Undoing of Rose Buhari

  Zorro

  Mawkins

  Old Magic

  The Embassy of the Dead

  Rayburn Again

  Mawkins

  The Coatroom Attendant

  Temporarily Dead

  The Receptionist

  The Final Countdown

  Follow the Finger

  The Mausoleum

  The Arrival

  The Talking Hare

  The Aftermath

  One Week Later

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  There are some things in life and death that are certain. One of those things is that a man digging a hole in the dead of night is definitely up to no good.

  A lamp swung in the branches of a hawthorn tree, and the shadows of the headstones jumped around the overgrown graveyard. In the silence of the hour, each thrust of the shovel seemed loud enough to wake the dead sleeping for eternity beneath the cold, hard earth.

  There was the unmistakable sound of metal scraping against wood. The huge man digging the hole grunted, straightened his back, and wiped a grimy hand across his sweaty, sloping brow. He looked up as another figure stepped from the shadows, carefully avoiding the patches of wet mud.

  This second man had done no digging. Even in the darkness, that fact was clear as day. His sharply tailored suit was still in impeccable condition, unplucked by the prickles of the hawthorn trees and unsoiled by the fresh dirt that had been removed from the ground.

  The suited man watched as the remains of a partly rotted coffin were manhandled from the grave. Now the coffin sat beside the hole. He leaned forward as his brutish accomplice began to pry the lid open with a crowbar, the damp wood separating easily from the rusty nails. A satisfied smile flickered across the suited man’s face as the acrid stench of embalming fluid was released from within. He reached inside and lifted the corpse’s hand to the lamplight.

  He had found what he was looking for.

  “It is you,” he whispered. “After all this time. It is really you.”

  He looked at the corpse’s withered, lifeless face, and then reached out to brush a strand of black hair from its cold, gray forehead.

  “Your time has come at last!”

  Jake Green was definitely alive. He was alive when he woke up, he was alive all day at school, and he was currently still alive as he trudged his way home through the little village of Elmbury. Being alive was something Jake took for granted. For as long as he could remember, he had always been that way. Jake found being alive quite easy. All you needed to do was not die—and so far, for Jake, that had come naturally.

  He turned to head up the dark alleyway that cut between the high flint wall and the back of a row of houses. Jake didn’t normally come this way—like a lot of the living, he associated darkness with danger. But it was a shortcut, and the late-October sun was already low in the sky, and he was eager to get home.

  Jake’s phone beeped. He unbuttoned the pocket of his coat and reached inside. It was a message from Sab, his best friend. If Jake was honest, the job of being his best friend wasn’t a highly sought-after one, but they’d found a common interest in playing computer games and a common disinterest in studying. They had a mutual respect for each other, too. Sometimes that was all you needed. Jake opened the text.

  Ready for tomorrow, freak?

  It was the sort of message that was typical of Sab. He was talking about their school trip: three days away from home. It sounded all right when you said it like that. But three days studying rock formations didn’t sound quite as fun. Still, Jake was looking forward to the trip. It would be good to get away from what Sab called his “Mom and Dad situation.” It was the only thing Sab didn’t make jokes about. Sab knew what it was like. His parents had split up, too. It wasn’t a common interest as such. More of a shared affliction.

  Given how things were at home, Jake had jumped at the chance to get away for a while. His suitcase was packed and ready to go, waiting in the spare room at his dad’s place. He typed his reply:

  Yup

  Then, as an afterthought, he added:

  Freak

  It was the little details that made their friendship work.

  The phone beeped again.

  How’s it going? Love you. Dad xx

  Jake rolled his eyes. Dad signed all his messages like that. Like he was writing a postcard or something. As though he thought Jake wouldn’t know who they were from.

  To say Dad hadn’t kept up with the forward progress of mobile technology was an understatement. He preferred old-fashioned things, like his camper van. In Jake’s opinion, Dad buying the van was when things had started to go wrong. He typed a reply:

  You’d know if you still lived with us

  Jake’s thumb hovered over the send icon, but he knew he wouldn’t tap it. He returned the phone to his pocket.

  There was a quiet rustling sound in the bush. Jake paused as a cat emerged from the shadows.

  “Hello, cat,” said Jake. He’d always wanted a pet, but Mom was too busy to look after one, and Dad . . . well, Dad probably wasn’t responsible enough to have a pet. Jake squatted down and reached out to stroke the cat behind the ears, but it suddenly arched its back and hissed.

  “It’s OK, cat . . .” He moved his hand out of scratching range, then stopped. He looked at the cat. It wasn’t hissing at him. It was hissing at something behind him.

  A chill swept over Jake’s body. He had a strange feeling that someone was there. Taking a deep breath, he slowly stood up and turned around.

  The alleyway was empty.

  He breathed out heavily. “Weird cat,” he muttered, turning around to continue on his way. But the words caught in his throat, hindered by the fact that he could not close his mouth.

  Where once the alleyway ahead had been clear, now a man—tall, thin, and stooping—stood within touching distance, blocking Jake’s path.

  A top hat added to the man’s already looming height, and a tattered black coat flapped behind him in a sudden, cold breeze. To Jake he seemed the very picture of what an undertaker should look like, which was a) solemn and b) wrinkly.

  The man inspected Jake through small, baggy eyes perched closely together over a beak-like nose that, along with his flapping coat and long, thin legs, gave him the appearance of some kind of sinister wading bird.

  The man took a pocket watch from his waistcoat and inspected it. He frowned and placed the timepiece back in his pocket.

  “Good morning,” he said in a deep voice.

  Jake blinked. It was the afternoon—maybe even the evening—though he wasn’t too sure where one officially ended and the other began. He looked up at the darkening sky. Even if it were morning, it couldn’t by any stretch of the imagination be referred to as a good one. He didn’t know how to reply, and he definitely didn’t want to start a conversation about the
correct greeting to use when a person looms out of the shadows to surprise a child in a dark alleyway.

  “Er . . . yup. Good morning,” he croaked, slowly edging backward, tightening his frightened, sweaty grip on his phone.

  The man removed his hat to reveal thinning gray hair and a wrinkled brow. He tucked the hat beneath a long arm. Some dirt fell from the brim.

  “You be a little early, but I appreciate punctuality. Pleased to be making your acquaintance,” he said, not looking particularly pleased. “The name’s Stiffkey, but I’m sure you already know that.” He peered at Jake through narrowing eyes. “I’ve a package for you.”

  The man reached into the dark folds of his coat and retrieved a clipboard and pen that he handed to Jake. Jake stared at a form on the clipboard, his brain refusing to read what his eyes could see.

  “You can just mark it with an X,” said the man sternly, “if you ain’t been sufficiently schooled to read or write.” He pointed a long gray finger to a space for a signature. “Although that would be highly irregular for someone of your position.”

  Jake unhooked the pen. He was standing in a dark alley with the sort of man the phrase I wouldn’t want to meet him in a dark alley was invented for. It was probably best to skip to the end of the form as quickly as possible. He signed his name in an elaborate swirl of letters and loops that was illegible but looked cool. He’d been practicing for when he eventually became famous for something. He blew on the ink and handed the clipboard back to Stiffkey.

  Stiffkey looked at Jake over the top of the clipboard. “A mere child,” he said, sighing. “No good will come of this . . .” He shook his head slowly and replaced the clipboard in his coat. “But no good ever comes from the living meeting the dead.”

  Jake might not have put much effort into staying alive so far, but right now, he was conscious of definitely wanting to remain that way. He took a cautious step backward, preparing to run.

  Stiffkey stepped forward, stooping until his eyes were inches from Jake’s.

  Once more, he reached into the deep folds of his coat and removed something—a small package wrapped in brown paper and tied neatly with twine. He pressed it into Jake’s hands. It was surprisingly heavy. Jake blinked and looked up at Stiffkey, unsure of what to do next.

  Stiffkey’s mouth formed a tight smile, almost a grimace, and he breathed in deeply through his nose and then out again. “I know you will protect the box and carry out the Embassy’s orders. To be unburdened of the damned thing after all this time is a relief, and I don’t mind admitting it. Good luck.”

  He jammed the top hat back on his head and, starting from the hands and nose and working slowly inward, faded into nothingness, until only a neat pile of freshly dug earth remained.

  Jake blinked again.

  “Goodbye, Stiffkey,” he said quietly, and shook his head in disbelief.

  I’ve just seen a ghost!

  Mom knocked on the bathroom door. “What are you doing in there? You’re supposed to be at Dad’s in ten minutes.”

  Jake looked at the package. It was still unopened. “What do you think? I’m pooping.” It was a panic response. He could sense Mom was still on the landing, so he noisily slid his pants down around his ankles, sat on the toilet seat in his underwear, and attempted to whistle. Jake couldn’t whistle. He wasn’t sure why he’d even tried. It just seemed that whistling was something you should do to distract someone from thinking you were doing something else. Something you shouldn’t be. On second thought, it was probably for the best he couldn’t whistle. Mom was too smart for that kind of trick. It wasn’t like she was Dad. Dad would fall for anything.

  Jake sat in silence, contemplating the package in his hands.

  Mom’s voice came through the door again, “Are you worried about the school trip?”

  Jake rolled his eyes. She wasn’t falling for the fake pooping story.

  He’d actually forgotten all about the trip—probably something to do with being given a mysterious box by a ghost.

  Mom tried again. “Is it . . . something else?”

  He heard her sit down on the floor outside. She wasn’t giving up. “You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to, love.”

  That was what she always said when she wanted to talk about it. It, by the way, was Dad moving out.

  Jake still didn’t reply. Instead, he turned the package over in his hands and inspected the neat wrapping.

  “You know it’s not your fault, don’t you?” Her voice was quieter now. Like she was talking to herself.

  Yeah, I know . . . It’s your fault. Yours and Dad’s.

  He couldn’t say those words aloud, because it would upset his mom and that wasn’t what he wanted. He just wanted everything to be the same as it was before.

  “It’s for the best . . .” came his mom’s voice again, “in the long term.”

  The long term. That’s what Mom and Dad always said. But when did the long term start? It had been four months since Dad left, and it didn’t feel like they’d reached “the best” yet.

  Mom knocked on the door. “Jake? You know we both love you, don’t you?”

  Jake let out a deliberately dramatic sigh. “Please, Mom. Some privacy?”

  There was a silence. Then the sound of Mom’s footsteps going down the stairs.

  Jake shook his head, trying to clear his brain.

  Earlier he had seen a ghost.

  And the ghost had given him a package.

  Should he open it?

  Probably best not to open it.

  Jake’s fingers closed around the loose end of the twine that bound the package.

  Definitely best not to open it.

  It had been given to him, though.

  No good ever comes from the living meeting the dead.

  Jake tugged at the twine. Now the knot was undone. He slowly unwrapped the brown paper to reveal a small wooden box. He turned it around in his fingers. The box’s worn and well-handled appearance gave no clue as to its contents apart from a ratty label with a strange symbol inked upon it: three vertical lines crossed by three horizontal lines, like a small grid. A fine brass clasp held a hinged lid in place. Jake took a deep breath and unhooked the clasp. Carefully, he lifted the lid.

  The box was lined with cold, grayish metal. That’s why it was so heavy. Maybe it was lead, Jake thought. He seemed to remember something about lead being heavy. Inside, the box was full of strips of ancient yellowed newspaper. Perhaps they were protecting something? Cautiously, he picked the pieces out.

  Jake stopped suddenly. There was something in the box.

  At first he just caught a glimpse. A pale yellowy glimpse that made his stomach tighten, like he was going to vomit all over his lap.

  Holding his breath, he parted the packaging further. There, cushioned on a piece of folded newspaper, was a withered, wrinkled, severed human finger.

  Jake slammed the lid closed. He breathed out. Then he looked around. Even though he was sitting alone, pants around his ankles, in a locked bathroom, he had a funny feeling he was being watched.

  Maureen had been dead for ages now, and it still amazed her that the Embassy and Afterworld were technologically so far behind the Earthly Plane. Still, it wasn’t for her to worry about. Despite the frustrations of her outdated printer and her boss’s moods, Maureen enjoyed her job as personal assistant to the Ambassador of the Embassy of the Dead.

  The light on Maureen’s printer came on, and the machine started to hum. A memo was coming through. She checked the paper as it emerged.

  She raised an eyebrow. They didn’t get one of those very often. She put on her reading glasses as she waited for the report to finish printing, then ripped the paper from the machine, reading it on the way back to her desk.

  Didn’t people know that unlicensed opening of spectral containers was a serious matter?

  Maureen opened the middle drawer of the “Spectral Containers” filing cabinet and searched for file 34. She smiled at the soft gray
ish-pink cardboard cover. Of all the card colors, it was Maureen’s favorite. She’d painted her downstairs bathroom that same color. It was a shame such a pretty file had to contain such dark information.

  She opened the file and read the front page.

  Maureen’s eyebrow, already raised, rose even higher.

  Highly classified? Code Red?

  It meant the box contained something of a highly dangerous and sensitive nature. Maureen hadn’t personally dealt with a Code Red since back in 1982. She pursed her lips at the thought of what had happened that day. Most disagreeable for all concerned.

  So, this wasn’t just a serious matter. This was a very serious matter.

  She shuddered at the thought of what would happen now. And not just at the mood it was going to put the Ambassador in. But more than that—who she would be forced to summon from the Afterworld. There was something about him that she found disturbing. Even for a reaper, he was unusually grim.

  She sighed and pressed a button on her desk.

  “Hello, Ambassador? . . . Yes, did you see the . . . Yes, I know. Should I summon . . . ? OK, yes, right away, Ambassador.”

  Maureen clicked off and pressed another button.

  “Could you put me through to the Afterworld? It’s Maureen from the Embassy.”

  She waited for a connection. A crackling voice answered briefly, then went silent. Maureen tutted. Afterworld technology! She tried again.

  “Hello?” answered a voice, clearer this time.

  Maureen took a deep breath. “Send for Mawkins.”

  Jake gazed out the window of Mom’s car as the village passed by. It was reassuring that it was all so familiar, despite what had just taken place in the alleyway. The houses looked the same. The King’s Head pub looked the same. The store looked the same. It was cold, and wet. People were still going about their everyday, boring lives.

  No one knew.

  Mom glanced at him. “You’ve got everything packed, right? Toothbrush, shower gel . . .”