“Why not just say you’ve never been married? For a man your age, that seems to represent a certain level of failure.”

“That’s true, but it’s still not enough. The detective game is a tough business. I can’t afford to go for any half measures. This way, not only do I have a failed relationship in my past, but by keeping the picture of the wife that betrayed and humiliated me, I reveal that I still carry the torch. The clients love that sort of stuff. It allows them to feel superior, no matter the nature of their own problems. Cutting a wretched, broken, and tragic figure is the only way I can maintain the competitive edge I need. And I can assure you, Angel, I really need it.”

She was silent for a moment. Then she spoke.

“So why are you confessing this to me now? Aren’t you afraid you’ll lose your credibility with me?”

“I have no interest in retaining that sort of credibility with you. The reason for this confession is simply to make a point.”

“What point?” She was still doing her best to sound like a sweet young schoolgirl, but that schoolgirl was growing up fast.

“When I pull that ex-wife routine on my clients, it’s because I want to give them a particular impression about myself. It’s an act, a character I hide behind so the client can’t find out too much about the real me. Now the most important part about putting on an act like that is making sure you don’t leave any gaps. Every possible aspect of the character must be covered, so nobody can see through it.”

“That all sounds very clever, but I don’t see why you need to make this point to me.”

“Because one of the advantages of becoming adept at this act is that it’s much easier for me to see through other people when they try to pull it on me. Especially when they’ve left gaps. Big ones.”

“What do you mean by that?” In the darkness, I could sense her pulling away from me.

“Before I saw Sally, I went to the library.”

She was sitting up now, her head propped on her hands. “You really have a strange style of conversation. Do you always prefer changing the subject, rather than explaining yourself?”

“Don’t you want to know what I found?”

“Is it pertinent to anything we’ve talked about so far?”

“I’ll leave that for you to decide. What I was looking for were historical records. Initially, I was only interested in one particular record, but as I searched I had the chance to see many others, and they revealed some very interesting details.”

“Such as?”

“Each of those records represented minutes from the executive meetings of the Heavenly Council. As far as I can tell, this council is comprised of God himself, His sons, St Peter, a number of less significant deities, and you angels. Certain members of the council seem to play a more prominent role in discussions than others. Peter, for instance, plays a relatively minor role, which given his work commitments is no surprise. Sally and Raphael, on the other hand, are both highly involved. However, oddly enough, motions presented by Raphael are rarely successful, while those put forward by Sally are almost never defeated.”

“That is interesting, but not all that surprising.”

“You’re right. It isn’t surprising at all. What is surprising is the total lack of involvement by someone who I would have expected to care quite a lot about how Heaven is governed, especially given the comments she made to me only yesterday. I didn’t see your name mentioned in any of the minutes. Not even once.”

Jessie sat very straight. I could feel her eyes boring into me.

“I guess there are some matters I’d rather leave to others.”

“Leave to others like Sally?”

“I didn’t say I was happy about it. I’d like to be able to go into the council and stand up to Sally. I guess I just don’t have the confidence.”

She didn’t have the confidence? That didn’t just take the cake. It took the icing and the candles as well. The time for game-playing was over.

I said, “You don’t have the confidence, and I have the credibility of a goose.”

Jessie stood up. “Perhaps you’d prefer it if I left.”

I grabbed her by the waist and pulled her back onto the bed. “You’re not leaving until you tell me the truth. You came to me yesterday, acting all flighty and mysterious, then disappeared when the questions got too difficult. You reappeared tonight and pulled this wilting rose petal act. You did it pretty well, but I‘ve seen it a hundred times before. Now call me a sucker, but I actually believe your fears are genuine and I’d like to help. But until you start giving me some information that vaguely resembles the truth, I don’t see how I can.”

She sat motionless for a moment, then lay back and put her head on the pillow. “You’re right,” she said. “I have a confession to make too.”

I didn’t say anything. It was her turn to do the talking.

“There’s a reason you didn’t see my name in any of those council minutes. It’s because I wasn’t actually at any of the meetings.”

“An absentee angel?”

“No.” She paused. Her lips were pressed together tightly, as if she wanted to stop the words escaping. Finally, she forced them out. “An absentee, but not an angel.”

It was my turn to be genuinely surprised. “What did you say?”

“You heard,” she said, her voice now as bitter as coffee grounds flavoured with lemon rind. “Would you like me to say it again? I’m not an angel. Are you satisfied now?”

“If you’re not an angel, who are you?”

“Just a woman. Just a normal, everyday woman. I lived my life, I died, and I was sent . . . down below.”

“Why were you sent . . . down below?”

“I’d prefer not to talk about it. I didn’t live a particularly good life. I did a lot of things I wasn’t proud of, and hurt a lot of people. And that’s why they sent me down . . . Oh what’s the point in being precious about it? That’s why they sent me down to Hell, to do my time and endure the punishments of a life ill-spent.”

“You don’t seem to be enduring much punishment.”

She started to reply, but I placed a hand over her mouth.

“Save it,” I said. “This is a story that should be told over a drink.”

She nodded. “Last drink for a condemned woman.”

I went back to the kitchen, grabbed the bottle and the glasses, and returned to the bedroom. I poured two glasses and handed one to her. She held it to her lips, and with a delicate flick she downed its contents. A second glass met with a similarly swift fate.

“So, a funny thing happened on the way to Hell,” I said. She was right. The time for euphemisms was over. I felt a sense of release having finally uttered the word.

Jessie shivered. “There’s nothing funny about Hell.”

“It’s really that bad?”

“The place you lived in before you died. What was it like?”

“It was a charming place.”

“Really?”

“Oh yes. We had a wonderful family called the Bostinos, who looked after everyone and made sure nobody ever misbehaved. They had all these lovely little games they liked to play. Games where if you lost, they’d beat your brains out. Actually, that’s not completely true. If you won, they’d beat your brains out too.”

“So you think it was pretty rough?”

“I know it was pretty rough. If a boy didn’t have at least twenty knife scars by his fifth birthday, his sexuality was called into question.”

She laughed. A cold, hard laugh. “Hell’s worse.”

“You really think so?”

“Listen to me, Jimmy. Anything your Bostino family dished out would be like a Christmas party compared to Hell.”

I finished my glass and poured another for myself. I offered one to her, but she shook her head.

“What makes Hell so bad?” I said.

“I can’t tell you. The memories are too strong. Too terrible. All I can say is that after many long years of pain, I found a way out. I stumbled on a secret passage between Heaven and Hell.”

“Must have been your lucky day.”