Edward stared at it, speechless. Something was terribly, horribly 
wrong here. Could David have been driven to suicide by the events 
of the evening? Perhaps. Would he have completely omitted his 
betrayal by a man he thought of as a friend and perhaps protégé? 
By a woman he loved? Would he have imputed his own death to 
guilt felt over insider trading? Edward couldn't believe it. All the 
deals the note mentioned predated Cholmondeley; the note read like 
it had been penned by someone ignorant of the last few months of 
David Went's life. 


The lawyer allowed him to tell the police that David Went had not 
seemed suicidal earlier, though he had appeared agitated at the 
party. Was it Went's handwriting, they asked. Edward considered 
the haphazard lettering. The lawyer permitted him to express the 
view that never having seen anything written by David in the dark he 
was unable to form a verdict. The police nodded sagely and handed 
the plastic bag containing the note back. Had Edward ever known 


me? They think they can talk about a learned doctor behind his back 
without him knowing? Oh, these children are in for it, and not just the 
little things I've been doing. No more burns and cuts, oh no, these 
children will pay for their insolence! 


Note: On //_ , Security responded to an alarm called in by one 
Dolores Trai, a Site 63 caregiver. Upon arriving at room 301, 
Security discovered Dr. L cavorting amidst the remains of his 
young charges, covered in their blood, laughing and claiming that 
he'd 'shown those little brats.’ Such instability being previously 
undocumented in Dr.L_ __, we are forced to assume such feelings 
came from SCP-573, a fact corroborated by the remains found at 
the SCP's discovery. As of now, further human testing on SCP-573 
is denied. -O5-6 


Went to be anything less than a perfectly ethical broker? Before 
Edward could even begin to formulate a response the lawyer leaned 
in and snippily told the officers that any questions about Went's 
performance were a matter for Cooper Drake's management alone, 
in the first instance for his direct manager, Raymond Macintyre. 


At work, Edward watched in shock as police came and took all 
David's computer equipment away for forensic analysis. Another 
round of interviews for everyone on the trading floor; Edward 
insisted on hiring his own lawyer, who sat on his other side and got 
into short, terse disagreements with Cooper Drake's representative 
for four hundred and fifty pounds an hour. It didn't help that at some 
time since the ball Edward had caught some respiratory infection 
which left him hawking great lumps of phlegm into a tissue, which 
both his lawyers insisted on pointing out to the present police 
officers—every single time—did not constitute an answer and should 
not be taken as an affirmative or negatory response. 


After intense discussion with both his legal counsel, Edward was 
able to represent to the police that David had passed on several 
leads which seemed unusually hot; but which he had insisted 
originated in conversations overheard at his gentleman's club. It did 
not escape Edward that the words ‘Marshall, Carter & Dark' were 
never mentioned by the police at any time; the venue's own lawyer, 
slick and toothy in a black suit and coiffed hair, seemed to have the 
power to always appear just outside any room where David Went 
was being discussed. 


Edward had phoned through to MC&D and demanded to speak to 
Jeremy Marshall. 


"Complete immunity, you said. When the police search David's 
computers and find reference to the Cholmondeley deal..." 


"You're safe, Edward," he crooned, voice slightly distorted by the 
line. "Everything's being taken care of. How unfortunate about 
David. Still, we have a bright new star at Cooper Drake, don't we?" 


Edward had ended the call and immediately thrown up in his sink. 


He had not been mistaken; there had been no other guests 


legitimately playing 'Sardines' left by the time he was wandering in 
silence. He felt sure that David Went had been killed, perhaps as 
soon as the lights had been extinguished. That cold, damp presence 
... the woman who had effortlessly pinned him to the wall but whose 
body felt like a dead thing—he was left in no doubt that she had 
been the killer. And he was just as sure that the agency behind her 
had been Jeremy Marshall. He suspected that Went had made no 
further acquisitions for Marshall after Cholmondeley. But if Edward 
had not involved himself directly with the firm, surely David would 
still be alive. No, Marshall, Carter & Dark had David killed because 
they had a shiny new toy, at least, until they got bored of him too. 
Perhaps it had even been a warning. Probably all three—Jeremy 
Marshall didn't seem like the sort of man to order a murder for just 
one reason. 


He needed a plan. Googling '4H' yielded nothing useful. '4H Death’, 
similarly. '4H Death War Famine Pestilence’ told him what he should 
probably already worked out, that '4H' meant 'Four Horsemen’, but 
nothing else. Finally, in desperation he returned to #theologywars 
and asked if anyone had heard of a group or organisation called '4H' 
or 'Four Horsemen. 


Acts238: Actually, it's Conquest, War, Famine, Death, 
and Hell. There's five. 


Acts238: But only four horses; Zech 6:2-3 calls them the 
spirits of the heavens (KJV 1611) 


nodeceit: that's a deceitful interpretation. there are many 
horses of each kind in Zechariah, and they are chariots, 
not horsemen. they don't represent the same thing 


nodeceit: and KJV-onlyism is a doctrine from hell, see 
our expose 


landoverbaptist: Your mother sucks cocks in hell. 


Edward sighed. He probably should have known better than to ask 
about anything with an eschatological subtext here. Then something 
caught his eye. 


911truther: They're a conspiracy theorist group. Let-it- 
happeners. 


911truther: Big into black helicopter stuff: see here— 
link 


The blog seemed to have been abandoned a long time ago; mostly 
blurry pictures of paramilitary-style SWAT teams raiding houses, 
unmarked planes and the standard conspiracy spiel about various 
shady non-state actors who supposedly had tendrils in every level of 
national and supranational government. No wonder Marshall, Carter 
& Dark are giving them such a boner, he thought, Secretaries of 
State, big business tycoons, movie stars... if the Illuminati exist, 
MC&D are cramping their style. 


The nicks of the authors were the same—Death_4H, War_4H, 
Famine_4H, Pestilence_4H, confirming for Edward that he'd found 
the right place. There were no contact details listed, but after 
trawling through their archives he found an appeal for information 
about an obscure Red Scare-era organisation called GRU Raskolnik 
P (supposedly headed by chess grandmaster Ivan Sokolov and the 
Soviet counter to Project Stargate), with a hotmail email address. He 
had no idea if it was even still active, but decided it was his best 
shot. He wrote: 


To: FourHorsemen 
From: EGradley 


Subject line: Marshall, Carter & Dark 


It's Edward. I'm ready. 


O'Reilly's Grill and Diner was about as far from the art deco café 
used by Jeremy Marshall as you could get. Dark colours, stained 
padded seats, with a cracked television blaring out horse races and 
occasionally football. The smoking ban was in force but the smell 
remained, pressed horribly into every surface by years of nicotine 
exposure. The owner, an incomprehensibly Irish man with a limp, 
scowled when Edward ordered a black coffee and what slid over the 
counter a few minutes later was some sort of tea with black grit 


floating in it. Edward strained some of the granules out with a napkin 
and took a cautious sip. It tasted like burnt toast. 


Edward wasn't sure what he had been expecting from the Four 
Horsemen—what did conspiracy theorists wear these days? Tie-dye 
and ripped jeans? Then again, if Hollywood had taught him anything 
about hackers, he should be looking for beautiful people in black 
leather and wraparound shades. The odd couple who walked in the 
door and ordered drinks didn't even register on his radar until they 
slid in beside him. One was literally a kid—a young teenager in a 
school shirt and trousers with dark hair in a flippy haircut with white 
highlights and painted fingernails. The other looked to be well into 
his forties, tall and borderline obese, with a massive gut hanging 
over his belt below a Metallica teeshirt, a goatee and thinning curly 
brown hair scraped into a ponytail. He did wear shades—but they 
were brown with big plastic frames. 


"Edward Gradley," said the kid with the black fingernails. 
"You two? You're the four horsemen?" said Edward, amusedly. 


"Well, I'm Death," said the kid, who had the good grace to look a 
little embarassed as he said it. "This is War -" he gestured to the 
overweight metal fan. "Pestilence's mom wouldn't let him come and 
Famine couldn't get the day off work." 


"If you don't mind me saying so, you're a bit of a mismatched pair." 


"This is the first time we've met up in person, actually," said War, 
looking distinctly uncomfortable. "Look, we're here for one reason, 
and that's to talk about Marshall, Carter & Dark. Why the sudden 
change of heart?" 


"They killed David Went." 


"We heard suicide," said Death measuredly, sipping his glass of 
Sprite. 


"That's what the police think. But his suicide note doesn't make 
sense. It couldn't have been written by him. Things that happened 
that night, things that could have really pushed him over the edge, 


he doesn't mention at all. There was a party game—in the dark. 
bumped into someone still walking around after everyone was 
supposed to be hidden. A woman." 


"And you can prove that MC&D were behind it?" War sounded 
excited. 


"No. Sorry. But Jeremy Marshall..." 
"Who Marshall?" 
"Jeremy. That's what he said his name was." 


"Interesting," said Death, and scribbled something in the margins of 
the ringbinder he'd brought along. 


"...Jeremy Marshall all but told me he'd had David killed because | 
was ... better controllable, more promising, | don't know." 


"You must feel good about yourself right now," Death said flatly. 


"Look," said Edward angrily, "| didn't come to get lectured at, okay? 
You said you were going to explain what's really going on here." 


"We're trying," said War. "You got it the wrong way round. The art 
stuff isn't a cover for the insider trading—the trading covers a 
worldwide art theft and money laundering operation. Members ask 
for a piece and MC&D get it, no questions asked. In return they're 
taking in money from drugs, illegal arms deals, regimes like North 
Korea and Iran. They have a catalogue—you've seen it?" 


Edward nodded. 


"That's so any criminal can walk in and trade as much cash as he 
can carry for a legitimately acquired piece; guaranteed value. Right 
now they're untouchable—their membership includes police chiefs 
and politicians; not just here but in the USA, France, Germany. They 
make sure they have something on all their members; whether it's 
dodgy deals based on information they've provided, photos of kinky 
sex scandals orchestrated in their own clubhouses, or just straight- 
up bribery." 


"So they're a gentleman's club fronting an insider trading ring 
fronting an international crime syndicate? It seems unbelievable." 


"Well," said Death, "you've apparently met the fuckers behind this 
thing. Does it strike you as beyond them?" 


Edward fell silent for a moment. 
"What can | do? 


"First, you need to figure out who you can trust at Cooper Drake. If 
what you say is true, MC&D wouldn't have had Went killed unless 
they had someone else in place to keep tabs on you. Then you'll set 
up another acquisition with Marshall." 


War nudged the kid's arm and he stopped talking. 


"| don't wish to alarm you but that car's gone past twice already." 
Edward looked up but it had already gone. "Black Citroén, license 
plate starts 'SE'". 


Death looked up, eyes flashing. "You idiot! You didn't check to see if 
you were being tailed?" 


"| think you're being paranoid," said Edward, though even as he said 
it he thought: but that doesn't mean they're not out to get you. 


"Fuck that," said Death. "Look, we'll be in touch. Hey, O'Reilly, is 
there a back door to this place?" The barkeep said something 
neither Edward nor apparently the Horsemen could make out. 
Instead, Death tapped his watch and War nodded. Death left first, 
followed fifteen seconds later by War. They went in different 
directions. Edward was left with his toast-flavoured hot water, which 
after a moment's consideration he swapped for Death's half-finished 
soft drink. 


Who can you trust, he thought? It would help if | could trust myself 


first. 


After another twenty minutes he left the bar and walked back to his 
apartment. Half-way he bumped into a man he didn't recognise— 


thirties or forties, stubbly, balding. "Sorry," Edward said, absent- 
mindedly. The man's reaction, however, stuck in Edward's memory 
—he fixed Edward with a look of fear or embarassment, then 
brought his hand to his mouth in a strangely feminine gesture. Then 
he turned and fled. There was something strange about the way he 
ran, but Edward couldn't put his finger on it. 


This time Edward walked from his car to the Beaumont house under 
cover of an umbrella. She opened the door, resplendent in an apron 
and the smell of something hot and sugary filling the air. 


"Edward," she said, smiling. "| wasn't expecting -" she trailed off as 
he shrugged off his shoes, walked past her wordlessly. She followed 
him, tugging at his sleeve, asking him what was wrong. 


They stopped in the library, and he took her to the shelf containing 
the replica codex. Lifted it out, placed it in her hands, saw her feel its 
weight. He opened it for her, let her see the Currys-spare-part 
hinges and chipped washing-machine paint interior—its empty 
interior. She dropped the box, turned and grasped him tight around 
the chest with one arm, beat on it with the other. 


"I'm sorry." he said. "I'll get it back. | swear. I'll get it back." 


As he drove away he saw another car, a red Vauxhall Meriva, put its 
lights on and pull out of the row in front of the terrace. He looked in 
the mirror every few minutes and could see it hovering at the very 
edge of visibility in the London traffic. Then he saw it signal off and 
turn into a side road, and he allowed himself to exhale deeply as 
another vehicle emerged. Then, five minutes later, the car that had 
turned onto his road turned off, and the red Vauxhall was back. 
Edward deliberately took a detour from his usual route, even circling 
around a roundabout three times as though trying to make up his 
mind. When he exited, the second car was a short way behind him. 
He pulled over, watched it pause, then indicate that it too would 
park. He got out of his car and walked towards the vehicle, not 
caring about the rain. When he got ten paces from its tinted windows 
its engine started up again and it pulled away. 


That night he played chess online again for the first time in years, 


against a self-professed first-timer from Texas. He played under a 
pseudonym, just in case anyone still recognised him from that brief 
glorious summer when he had seemed invincible. 


Edward hadn't been able to see six moves ahead—those corridors 
were still closed to him. But he realised he could remember thinking 
that way, could recall the output of that black box if not the 
mechanism by which it had operated. He had played White and the 
game had resulted in a stalemate. Still, he thought, it was a start.