THE WEREWOLF DETECTIVE BY PAUL D. BRAZILL

It was a grubby-grey January morning and a cold wind, as sharp as a razorblade, sliced through me as I shuffled through Soho in search of a man in a pork pie hat. The air tasted like lead and the sky was gun-metal grey. Dark, malignant clouds crawled ominously across the sky, and I was in the middle of a creeping, crawling hangover that seemed to show no signs of respite. London was waking now, and the windows of the granite tower blocks were starting to light up. I, however, was not. The whole morning had felt like wading through treacle with every once broken bone reminding me of its presence with an ache or a sharp twinge of pain. I’d dressed suitably enough for the weather, wearing a red roll neck sweater, a brown duffle coat, thick brown corduroy trousers and brown brogues although a glance at my reflection in a shop window showed that my thick framed glasses made me look like more than a tad like Velma from Scooby Doo. As I stopped at a street corner, I suddenly heard the screech of car tires and turned. A shiny, red Mercedes was heading directly towards me and the red-headed woman behind the wheel looked more than somewhat perturbed, to say the least. I held my breath until the driver sharply swerved away and bounced the car onto the pavement, narrowly missing a decidedly tiddly old man in a Santa Claus suit. The driver suddenly braked in front of a camping supplies shop advertising its January sale with the slogan ‘Now Is The Winter Of Our Discount Tents’, and Santa Claus staggered towards the car swearing like a sailor who had overindulged his monthly ration of rum. The driver somehow burst the emergency bag and struggled free from the car. She headed off down the street with a furious Father Christmas chasing after her. I really bloody hated New Year’s Day. I carried on walking, ignoring the kerfuffle that was going on behind me. The streets bustled with the drunken debris of the previous night’s New Year’s Eve parties. The still sozzled and the newly hungover mingled. A massive skinhead in a leopard skin coat walked up to a pink shuttered shop door and pressed a buzzer. The door opened, emitting a screech of escaping metallic music as he slipped inside. A sense of longing swiftly enveloped me. A feeling of time passing like grains of sand through my fingers. I turned into a darkened alleyway that was illuminated only by the light from a nearby church and stopped as I heard a phlegmy cough. Tony Zerbe a fat, denim-clad skinhead, stepped out of the shadows, pulling up the zip on his jeans. ‘Oh, dear, Oh, dear. What do we have here? Roman Dalton all on his lonesome. The private dickhead himself. What brings you out on a godforsaken night like this?’ said Zerbe. ‘Cottaging?’ ‘Ah, Mr Zerbe. It’s really bloody smashing to see you again, it really is,’ I said. ‘It’s always a pleasure, never a chore and all that.’ ‘Yeah, whatever,’ said Zerbe. He pulled a knuckle duster from his pocket and winked at me. ‘Really?’ I said. ‘Oh, yeah, really,’ said Zerbe. ‘You only live once, eh?’ He winked. ‘Apparently, though James Bond seems to have had other views on that matter,’ I said. ‘Ha bloody ha,’ said Zerbe. ‘You’re one of those clever t***s, aren’t you? I hate clever t***s, I do. And you know what else I hate? I hate …’ I put a finger to my lips and then pointed at Zerbe. ‘A wise man speaks because he has something to say. A stupid man speaks because he has to say something.’ ‘What?’ said Zerbe. ‘What? Are you calling me a …’ I stepped forward and punched Zerbe in the stomach but the skinhead just took a step back and grinned. ‘Is that the best you can do Boris?’ he said. ‘I thought you Ruskies were supposed to be hard? I loosened my scarf and coat. Stretched my arms and took a deep breath. ‘A point of order, please, Mr Zerbe. To begin with, my name, as you well know, is Roman and not Boris.’ I swiftly moved forward and punched Zerbe in the jaw. The skinhead staggered back. ‘Further, I’m not a Russian. I am English, of Irish extraction. Although my late grandmother was, indeed, Polish.’ I punched the skinhead again. Zerbe staggered and fell backwards into a puddle of dirty water. He struggled to sit upright and dropped the knuckle duster. He raised a hand. ‘Here, steady on, mate, eh?’ said Zerbe. ‘I was only …’ I kicked Zerbe in the head, and he fell flat onto his back, out for the count. I bent down and picked up his knuckleduster. I put in my pocket and took out my phone. I’d have to tell his dad about this, like it or not. I decided to type a message to Zerbe’s dad rather than face a painful conversation. Zoltan Zerbe was not someone to cross at the best of times and his inevitable New Year’s Day hangover would only make matters even worse. The combination of the cold and my chunky sausage fingers made the process more than somewhat arduous, but I eventually managed. As I trudged through the thick snow that smothered Soho Square, my breath appeared and disappeared in front of me like a spectre. I stopped in front of a wooden bench that was illuminated by a flickering streetlamp, pulled a pair of brown leather gloves from my overcoat pocket and put them on. I pulled the hood of my duffle coat over my shaven head. I turned onto Dean Steet, my boots clip-clopping across the wet cobblestones, as murder of crows sliced through the whiteness and the purr of a passing motorcycle grew to a roar. My smartphone buzzed in my pocket. I took it out and checked the text message. As I replied to my client, I heard a shout from behind me. I put a hand into my coat pocket and gripped a steel-plated knuckle-duster. Hesitantly, I turned. An old woman with long, grey hair staggered out in front of The Neon Angel and gestured for me to walk toward her. As I did so, I realised that she was dressed like a cowboy, albeit without the hat. Her hair was wild and unruly and her cowboy suit was more than somewhat worn and torn, also. Like the woman that was wearing it, it had presumably seen better days and nights. The brown-dirt cowboy said something to me in some strange language that could well have been Finnish or Hungarian or even Klingon but was pretty much lost on me. ‘Sorry darlin’ but I can’t understand a dicky bird,’ I said, in an exaggerated cockney accent. The old woman looked confused. I shrugged. ‘I can’t understand you, luv. Do you speak English? Czy mówisz po Polsku? Parlez- vous francais? Sprichst du Deutsch?’ I said. The old woman sighed, and in broken German, she asked me for some cash for more booze. I smiled and nodded. I handed the cowboy most of the money I had in her pocket. The old woman broke into a smile, and she patted me on the back. 'Dankeshon,’ said the brown-dirt cowboy. I wandered past her with a wave of my hand. ‘Auf widershen, pet,’ I said.