Hobbling into the alleyway on his crutches, William Godwin turned the corner, eased himself down to sit on an empty beer crate at the top of the staircase tucked in the alcove, and waited.
When he had finally felt up to journeying to his out-of-use call box to collect his order of Blackberry Joy today, there had been a folded note sitting on top of the package. It had asked him to meet in this alley and to sit at the top of the stairs. The writing didn’t match Sally Boyle’s round, bubbly script so William worried that he might be being set up. There were plenty of people who would love to silence him once and for all. The alley was small enough and close enough to the street that he didn’t feel too vulnerable to take the chance on the meeting though. If anyone asked, he would say he was just having rest. Moving around on crutches was hard on the armpits.
Eventually, he heard footsteps approach. Whoever had wanted to meet with him stopped at the corner and didn’t come around.
“You there?” whoever it was – a man – asked.
“Yes?” William answered. “Who are you?”
“If I wanted you to know who I was, I’da come ’round the corner, wouldn’ I?” the mystery man said.
“All right, fair enough,” William said. “What do you want then?”
“Nick Lightbearer is dead.”
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