Haversham reaches for a second panel – this one with a set of dials. He turns one of them left – and instantly the live feed starts to rewind behind a curtain of static.

The time on the screen – which Mookie hadn’t even noticed – zooms backward.

“Here,” Haversham says. The feed stops. Then starts playing.

8:30pm.

Ten seconds, fifteen. Nothing.

Then the door opens.

Then closes.

Haversham stops it.

“There,” he says. Like, voila, I just did a magic trick, except nobody sees that anything changed. No dove out of the hat, no card from the sleeve.

The Boss looks at them, taps his head: “You need to powder up for this.”

The denizens of the Underworld don’t show up on video, film, even audio – at least, not to those without Blue wrenching open the third-eye. Every once in a while some philosopher gets it in his head to talk about whether or not the powers of the Underworld are mystical or natural – something evolved out of nature or born from occult powers, but Mookie doesn’t know and doesn’t care. All he knows is, you want to see the monsters, you need to play with the peacock. And that’s what the Boss is telling him.

Except, no peacock smear around the Boss’ temples – nor Haversham’s. So how’s he know?

Doesn’t matter. The Boss knows. That’s good enough for Mookie.

Werth pulls a palm-sized tin. It’s an old hair pomade container: “Doan Brothers’ Hair Pomade Dressing Pat Pending”. Rust flakes rain as he screws it open.

Mookie pulls out his own tin. Hands shaking. The Blue is the key to a door he no longer wants to open. Nora…

Werth gives him a look.

“You don’t need to jump in on this,” Werth says.

“I want to see.” He doesn’t. But he has to.

“You’re just coming off a high. Your pupils are like pencil points.”

“Doesn’t matter.”

Werth lowers his voice. “You’re gonna run yourself ragged.”

“I said I’m in,” Mookie growls. And that ends it.

Big thumbs in the blue, back to the temples, smudge one, smudge two. The stuff rolls in rougher this time: like a horse kick to the psychic center. Werth dips a pinkie in, does the same – the true denizens of the Great Below don’t need Cerulean to see their own kind, but a half-and-half like Werth needs to. His eyelids flutter like fly-wings against window blinds and then he’s blazing, too.

Haversham replays the video.

Fifteen seconds in: a shape.

It emerges from the side, as if crossing the road.

The closet suddenly feels to Mookie like an elevator. The floor dropping out. His heart and all his substantial viscera left in the air as everything else falls.

Werth sees it, too. Sees her. “That little fucking bitch.”

Nora.

Something big is coming, Mookie.

I’m going to change the game.

Jesus.

On the video feed, Nora walks right up to the front door. Pulls out a key. Unlocks. Opens. And then she’s gone.