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After a late and leisurely lunch, and the collection of my cleaned and refurbished clothes, I strolled back to my apartment. My stomach had settled completely after David's ministrations of food and medicine and the ache in my head had subsided enough that I winced only slightly when I placed my restored hat on my head. I needed to think. I needed to get out and about, too. Hanging around the apartment wouldn't help. Besides, a walk would ease out the remaining aches from my body, aches caused by having lain all night on damp grass. I slipped on my overcoat, then put a fresh packet of cigarettes in one pocket and my spare pair of sunglasses in another. I shook the disposable lighter - empty already - and threw it in the trash bin disgustedly. Then I realised I had no matches - the match-books from the Starfield Club and other detritus that I had collected over the last few days had been carefully removed by whoever had ambushed me. A short rummage in various drawers in the kitchenette turned up a half-used match-book, one I had forgotten about months before. I struck a match and lit a cigarette, blew smoke, closed the apartment door behind me and set off to take in the fresh air, or what at least passed for it down here in the lower realms. Now that my brain was working again, I could think clearly about what Madderfy had told me. There was evidently something he wanted, something he thought I could provide, something that he couldn't get for himself - either directly or through his tame police captain - which may or may not be the identity of his ex-junior partner's killer. Madderfy clearly knew where the briefcase was stashed, and also knew it was well-protected - protected enough that mere explosives wouldn’t release it. If he really wanted the case, he could have just asked for it - or at least offered me money to bring it to him. I wasn't planning on moving it; it was probably as safe up there as it would be anywhere. In any case, bringing the briefcase back down here without an army to protect it would be a sure-fire recipe for being whacked on the head again, this time less gently. On the other hand, I knew that Madderfy was also concealing the existence of the briefcase from the police. He had very pointedly got rid of the annoying Captain Wester before he told me about the explosion at the railway station lockers. Even if Wester had seen the report, he would not have understood the significance. That was something known only Madderfy and me, and whoever had followed me to the surface. That deceit, that concealment, made us equals in my book. Both of us thought that wretched briefcase was import and, I suspected, neither of us could safely open it. I wasn't ready to return to Professor Garrick - who knew what games he was playing? But the old boy's analysis was still spot-on. Time to explore the legal route. Time for a return trip to see the Widow Vale.
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Part 35