22

RECONSIDERING A CAREER IN SECONDHAND RETAIL

Anton Dubois, the owner of Book 'em Danno in the Mission, had been a Death Merchant longer than anyone else in San Francisco. Of course he hadn't called himself a Death Merchant at first, but when that Minty Fresh fellow who opened the record store in the Castro coined the term, he could never think of himself as anything else. He was sixty-five years old and not in the best health, having never used his body for much more than to carry his head around, which is where he lived most of the time. He had, however, in his years of reading, acquired an encyclopedic knowledge of the science and mythology of death. So, on that Tuesday evening, just after sundown, when the windows of his store went black, as if all the light had been sucked suddenly out of the universe, and the three female figures moved toward him through the store, as he sat under his little reading light at the counter in the back, like a tiny yellow island in the vast pitch of space, he was the first man in fifteen hundred years to know exactly what - who - they were.

"Morrigan," Anton said, with no particular note of fear in his voice. He set his book down, but didn't bother to mark the page. He took off his glasses and cleaned them on his flannel shirt, then put them back on so as not to miss any detail. Just now they were only blue-black highlights moving among the deep shadows in the store, but he could see them. They stopped when he spoke. One of them hissed - not the hiss of a cat, a long, steady tone - more like the hiss of air escaping the rubber raft that is all that lies between you and a dark sea full of sharks, the hiss of your life leaking out at the seams.

"I thought something might be happening," Anton said, a little anxious now. "With all the signs, and the prophecy about the Luminatus, I knew something was happening, but I didn't think it would be you - in person - so to speak. This is very exciting."

"A devotee?" said Nemain.

"A fan," said Babd.

"A sacrifice," said Macha.

They moved around him, just outside his circle of light.

"I moved the soul vessels," Anton said. "I guessed that something had happened to the others."

"Aw, are you disappointed because you're not the first?" said Babd.

"It will be just like the first time, pumpkin," said Nemain. "For you, anyway." She giggled.

Anton reached under his counter and pushed a button. Steel shutters began to roll in the front of the store over the windows and door.

"You afraid we'll get away, turtle man," said Macha. "Don't you think he looks like a turtle?"

"Oh, I know the shutters won't keep you in, that's not what they're for. The books say that you're immortal, but I suspect that that's not exactly true. Too many tales of warriors injuring you and watching you heal yourself on the battlefield."

"We will be here ten thousand years after your death, which starts pretty soon, I might add," said Nemain. "The souls, turtle man. Where did you put them?" She extended her claws and reached out so they caught the light from Anton's reading lamp. Venom dripped from their tips and sizzled when it hit the floor.

"You'd be Nemain, then," Anton said. The Morrigan smiled, he could just see her teeth in the dark.

Anton felt a strange peace fall over him. For thirty years he had, in some way or another, been preparing for this moment. What was it that the Buddhists said? Only by being prepared for your death can you ever truly live. If collecting souls and seeing people pass for thirty years didn't prepare you, what would? Under the counter he carefully unscrewed a stainless-steel cap that concealed a red button.

"I installed those four speakers at the back of the store a few months ago. I'm sure you can see them, even if I can't," Anton said.

"The souls!" Macha barked. "Where?"

"Of course I didn't know it would be you. I thought it might be those little creatures I've seen wandering the neighborhood. But I think you'll enjoy the music, nonetheless."

The Morrigan looked at each other.

Macha growled. "Who says things like 'nonetheless'?"

"He's babbling," said Babd. "Let's torture him. Take his eyes, Nemain."

"Do you remember what a claymore looks like?" Anton asked.

"A great, two-handed broadsword," said Nemain. "Good for the taking of heads."

"I knew that, I knew that," said Babd. "She's just showing off."

"Well, in this time, a claymore means something else," Anton said. "You acquire the most interesting things working in the secondhand business for three decades." He closed his eyes and pushed the button. He hoped that his soul would end up in a book, preferably his first edition of Cannery Row, which was safely stored away.

The curved claymore antipersonnel mines that he had installed in speaker cabinets at the rear of the store exploded, sending twenty-eight hundred ball bearings hurtling toward the steel shutters at just under the speed of sound, shredding Anton and everything else in their path.

Ray followed the love of his life a block up Mason Street, where she hopped on a cable car and rode it the rest of the way up the hill into Chinatown. The problem was that while it was pretty easy to figure out where a cable car was going, they only came along about every ten minutes, so Ray couldn't wait for the next one, jump on, and shout, "Follow that antiquated but quaint public conveyance, and step on it!" And there were no cabs in sight.

It turned out that jogging up a steep city hill on a hot summer day in street clothes was somewhat different from jogging on a treadmill in an air-conditioned gym behind a row of taut fuck puppets, and by the time he got to California Street, Ray was drenched in sweat, and not only hated the city of San Francisco and everyone in it, he was pretty much ready to call it quits with Audrey and go back to the relative desperation of Ukrainian Girls Loving Him from afar.

He caught a break at the Powell Street exchange, where the cable cars pick up in Chinatown, and was actually able to jump on the car behind Audrey's and continue the breathtaking, seven-mile-per-hour chase, ten more blocks to Market Street.

Audrey hopped off the cable car, walked directly out to the island on Market, and stepped onto one of the antique streetcars, which left before Ray even got to the island. She was like some kind of diabolical rail-transit supervixen, Ray thought. The way the trains just seemed to be there when she needed them, then gone when he got there. She was master of some sort of evil, streetcar mojo, no doubt about that. (In matters of the heart, the Beta Male imagination can turn quickly on a floundering suitor, and at that point, Ray's was beginning to consume what little confidence he had mustered.)

It was Market Street, however, the busiest street in the City, and Ray was able to quickly grab a cab and follow Audrey all the way into the Mission district, and even kept the cab for a few blocks when she was on foot again.

Ray stayed a block away, following Audrey to a big jade-green Queen Anne Victorian building off Seventeenth Street, which had a small plaque on the column by the porch that read THREE JEWELS BUDDHIST CENTER. Ray had his breath and his composure back, and was able to watch comfortably from behind a light post across the street as Audrey climbed the steps of the center. As she got to the top step, the leaded-glass door flew open and two old ladies came rushing out, frantic, it seemed, to tell Audrey something, but entirely out of control. The old ladies looked familiar. Ray stopped breathing and dug into the back pocket of his jeans. He came up with the photocopies he'd kept of the driver's-license photos of the women Charlie had asked him to find. It was them: Esther Johnson and Irena Posokovanovich, standing there with the future Mrs. Macy. Then, just as Ray was trying to get his head around the connection, the door of the Buddhist center opened again and out charged what looked like a river otter in a sequined minidress and go-go boots, bent on attacking Audrey's ankles with a pair of scissors.

Charlie and Inspector Rivera stood outside Fresh Music in the Castro, trying to peer in the windows past the cardboard cutouts and giant album covers. According to the hours posted on the door, the store should have been open, but the door was locked and it was dark inside. From what Charlie could see, the store was exactly as he had seen it years ago when he'd confronted Minty Fresh, except for one, distinct difference: the shelf full of glowing soul vessels was gone.

There was a frozen-yogurt shop next door and Rivera led Charlie in and talked to the owner, a guy who looked entirely too fit to run a sweetshop, who said, "He hasn't opened for five days. Didn't say a word to any of us. Is he okay?"

"I'm sure he's fine," Rivera said.

Three minutes later Rivera had obtained Minty Fresh's phone numbers and home address from the SFPD dispatcher, and after trying the numbers and getting voice mail, they went to Fresh's apartment in Twin Peaks to find newspapers piled up by the door.

Rivera turned to Charlie. "Do you know of anyone else who could vouch for what you've been telling me?"

"You mean other Death Merchants?" Charlie asked. "I don't know them, but I know of them. They probably won't talk to you."

"Used-book-store owner in the Haight and a junk dealer off lower Fourth Street, right?" Rivera said.

"No," Charlie said. "I don't know of anyone like that. Why did you ask?"

"Because both of them are missing," Rivera said. There was blood all over the walls of the junk dealer's office. There was a human ear on the floor of the bookstore in the Haight."

Charlie backed against the wall. "That wasn't in the paper."

"We don't release stuff like that. Both lived alone, no one saw anything, we don't know that a crime was even committed. But now, with this Fresh guy missing - "

"You think that these other guys were Death Merchants?"

"I'm not saying I believe that, Charlie, it could just be a coincidence, but when Ray Macy called me today about you, that was actually the reason I came to find you. I was going to ask you if you knew them."

"Ray ratted me out?"

"Let it go. He may have saved your life."

Charlie thought about Sophie for the hundredth time that night, worried about not being there with her. "Can I call my daughter?"

"Sure," Rivera said. "But then - "

"Book 'em Danno in the Mission," Charlie said, pulling his cell phone out of his jacket pocket. "That can't be ten minutes away. I think the owner is one of us."

Sophie was fine, feeding Cheese Newts to the hellhounds with Mrs. Korjev. She asked Charlie if he needed any help and he teared up and had to get control of his voice before he answered.

Seven minutes later they were parked crossways in the middle of Valencia Street, watching fire trucks blasting water into the second story of the building that housed Book 'em Danno. They got out of the car and Rivera showed his badge to the police officer who had been first on the scene.

"Fire crews can't get in," the cop said. "There's a heavy steel fire door in the back and those shutters must be quarter-inch steel or more."

The security shutters were bowed outward and had thousands of small bumps all over them.

"What happened?" Rivera asked.

"We don't know yet," said the cop. "Neighbors reported an explosion and that's all we know so far. No one lived upstairs. We've evacuated all the adjacent buildings."

"Thanks," Rivera said. He looked at Charlie, raised an eyebrow.

"The Fillmore," Charlie said. "A pawnshop at Fulton and Fillmore."

"Let's go," Rivera said, taking Charlie's arm to help speed-limp him to the car.

"So I'm not a suspect anymore?" Charlie asked.

"We'll see if you live," Rivera said, opening the car door.

Once in the car, Charlie called his sister. "Jane, I need you to go get Sophie and the puppies and take them to your place."

"Sure, Charlie, but we just had the carpets cleaned - Alvin and - "

"Do not separate Sophie and the hellhounds for one second, Jane, do you understand?"

"Jeez, Charlie. Sure."

"I mean it. She may be in danger and they'll protect her."

"What's going on? Do you want me to call the cops?"

"I'm with the cops, Jane. Please, go get Sophie right now."

"I'm leaving now. How am I going to get them all into my Subaru?"

"You'll figure it out. If you have to, tie Alvin and Mohammed to the bumper and drive slowly."

"That's horrible, Charlie."

"No, it's not. They'll be fine."

"No, I mean they tore my bumper off last time I did that. It cost six hundred bucks to fix."

"Go get her. I'll call you in an hour." Charlie disconnected.

Well, claymores suck, I can tell you that," said Babd. "I used to like the big sword claymore, but now...now they have to make them all splody and full of - what do you call that stuff, Nemain?"

"Shrapnel."

"Shrapnel," said Babd. "I was just starting to feel like my old self - "

"Shut up!" barked Macha.

"But it hurts," said Babd.

They were flowing along a storm sewer pipe under Sixteenth Street in the Mission. They were barely two-dimensional again, and they looked like tattered black battle flags, threadbare shadows, oozing black goo as they moved up the pipe. One of Nemain's legs had been completely severed and she had it tucked under her arm while her sisters towed her through the pipe.

"Can you fly, Nemain?" asked Babd. "You're getting heavy."

"Not down here, and I'm not going back up there."

"We have to go back Above," said Macha. "If you want to heal before a millennium passes."

As the three death divas came to a wide junction of pipes under Market Street, they heard something splashing in the pipe ahead.

"What's that?" said Babd. They stopped.

Something pattered by in the pipe they were approaching.

"What was that? What was that?" asked Nemain, who couldn't see past her sisters.

"Looked like a squirrel in a ball gown," said Babd. "But I'm weak and could be delusional."

"And an idiot," said Macha. "It was a gift soul. Get it! We can heal Nemain's leg with it."

Macha and Babd dropped their unidexter sister and surged forward toward the junction, just as the Boston terrier stepped into their path.

The Morrigan backpedaling in the pipe sounded like cats tearing lace. "Whoa, whoa, whoa," chanted Macha, what was left of her claws raking the pipe to back up.

Bummer yapped out a sharp tattoo of threat, then bolted down the pipe after the Morrigan.

"New plan, new plan, new plan," said Babd.

"I hate dogs," said Macha.

They snagged their sister as they passed her.

"We, the goddesses of death, who will soon command the all under darkness, are fleeing a tiny dog," said Nemain.

"So what's your point, hoppie?" said Macha.

Over in the Fillmore, Carrie Lang had closed her pawnshop for the night and was waiting for some jewelry she'd taken in that day to finish in the ultrasonic cleaner so she could put it in the display case. She wanted to finish and get out of there, go home and have dinner, then maybe go out for a couple of hours. She was thirty-six and single, and felt an obligation to go out, just on the off chance that she might meet a nice guy, even though she'd rather stay home and watch crime shows on TV. She prided herself on not becoming cynical. A pawnbroker, like a bail bondsman, tends to see people at their worst, and every day she fought the idea that the last decent guy had become a drummer or a crackhead.

Lately she didn't want to go out because of the strange stuff she'd been seeing and hearing out on the street - creatures scurrying in the shadows, whispers coming from the storm drains; staying at home was looking better all the time. She'd even started bringing her five-year-old basset hound, Cheerful, to work with her. He really wasn't a lot of protection, unless an attacker happened to be less than knee-high, but he had a loud bark, and there was a good chance that he might actually bark at a bad guy, as long he wasn't carrying a dog biscuit. As it turned out, the creatures who were invading her shop that evening were less than knee-high.

Carrie had been a Death Merchant for nine years, and after adjusting to the initial shock about the whole phenomenon of transference of souls subsided (which only took about four years), she'd taken to it like it was just another part of the business, but she knew from The Great Big Book of Death that something was going on, and it had her spooked.

As she went to the front of the store to crank the security shutters down, she heard something move behind her in the dark, something low, back by the guitars. It brushed a low E-string as it passed and the note vibrated like a warning. Carrie stopped cranking the shutters and checked that she had her keys with her, in case she needed to run through the front door. She unsnapped the holster of her. 38 revolver, then thought, What the hell, I'm not a cop, and drew the weapon, training it on the still-sounding guitar. A cop she had dated years ago had talked her into carrying the Smith & Wesson when she was working the store, and although she'd never had to draw it before, she knew that it had been a deterrent to thieves.

"Cheerful?" she called.

She was answered by some shuffling in the back room. Why had she turned most of the lights out? The switches were in the back room, and she was moving by the case lights, which cast almost no light at the floor, where the noises were coming from.

"I have a gun, and I know how to use it," she said, feeling stupid even as the words came out of her mouth.

This time she was answered by a muffled whimper. "Cheerful!"

She ducked under the lift gate in the counter and ran to the back room, fanning the area with her pistol the way she saw them do in cop shows. Another whimper. She could just make out Cheerful, lying in his normal spot by the back door, but there was something around his paws and muzzle. Duct tape.

She reached out to turn on the lights and something hit her in the back of the knees. She tried to twist around and something thumped her in the chest, setting her off balance. Sharp claws raked her wrists as she fell and she lost her grip on the revolver. She hit her head on the doorjamb, setting off what seemed like a strobe light in her head, then something hit her in the back of the neck, hard, and everything went black.

It was still dark when she came to. She couldn't tell how long she'd been out, and she couldn't move to look at her watch. Oh my God, they've broken my neck, she thought. She saw objects moving past her, each glowing dull red, barely illuminating whatever was carrying them - tiny skeletal faces - fangs, and claws and dead, empty eye sockets. The soul vessels appeared to be floating across the floor, with a carrion puppet escort. Then she felt claws, the creatures, touching her, moving under her. She tried to scream, but her mouth had been taped shut.

She felt herself being lifted, then made out the shape of the back door of her shop opening as she was carried through it, only a foot or so off the floor. Then she was hoisted nearly upright, and she felt herself falling into a dark abyss.

They found the back door to the pawnshop open and the basset hound taped up in the corner. Rivera checked the shop with his weapon drawn and a flashlight in one hand, then called Charlie in from the alley when he found no one there.

Charlie turned on the shop lights as he came in. "Uh-oh," he said.

"What?" Rivera said.

Charlie pointed to a display case with the glass broken out. "This case is where she displayed her soul vessels. It was nearly full when I was in here - now, well..."

Rivera looked at the empty case. "Don't touch anything. Whatever happened here, I don't think it was the same perp who hit the other shopkeepers."

"Why?" Charlie looked back to the back room, to the bound basset hound.

"Because of him," Rivera said. "You don't tie up the dog if you're going to slaughter the people and leave blood and body parts everywhere. That's not the same kind of mentality."

"Maybe she was tying him up when they surprised her," Charlie said. "She kind of had the look of a lady cop."

"Yeah, and all cops are into dog bondage, is that what you're saying?" Rivera holstered his weapon, pulled a penknife from his pocket, and went to where the basset hound was squirming on the floor.

"No, I'm not. Sorry. She did have a gun, though."

"She must have been here," Rivera said. "Otherwise the alarms would have been set. What's that on that doorjamb?" He was sawing through the duct tape on the basset's paws, being careful not to cut him. He nodded toward the doorway from the shop to the back room.

"Blood," Charlie said. "And a little hair."

Rivera nodded. "That blood on the floor there, too? Don't touch."

Charlie looked at a three-inch puddle to the left of the door. "Yep, I think so."

Rivera had the basset's paws free and was kneeling on him to hold him still while he took the tape off his muzzle. "Those tracks in it, don't smear them. What are they, partial shoe prints?"

"Look like bird-feet prints. Chickens maybe?"

"No." Rivera released the basset, who immediately tried to jump on the inspector's Italian dress slacks and lick his face in celebration. He held the basset hound by the collar and moved to where Charlie was examining the tracks.

"They do look like chicken tracks," he said.

"Yep," Charlie said. "And you have dog drool on your jacket."

"I need to call this in, Charlie."

"So dog drool is the determining factor in calling in backup?"

"Forget the dog drool. The dog drool is not relevant. I need to report this and I need to call my partner in. He'll be pissed that I've waited this long. I need to take you home."

"If you can't get the stain out of that thousand-dollar suit jacket, you'll think it's relevant."

"Focus, Charlie. As soon as I can get another unit here, I'm sending you home. You have my cell. Let me know if anything happens. Anything."

Rivera called the dispatcher on his cell phone and asked him to send a uniform unit and the crime-scene squad as soon as they were available. When he snapped the phone shut, Charlie said, "So I'm not under arrest anymore?"

"No. Stay in touch. And stay safe, okay? You might even want to spend a few nights outside of the City."

"I can't. I'm the Luminatus, I have responsibilities."

"But you don't know what they are - "

"Just because I don't know what they are doesn't mean I don't have them," Charlie said, perhaps a little too defensively.

"And you're sure you don't know how many of these Death Merchants are in the City, or where they might be?"

"Minty Fresh said there was at least a dozen, that's all I know. This woman and the guy in the Mission were the only ones I spotted on my walks."

They heard a car pull up in the alley and Rivera went to the back door and signaled to the officers, then turned to Charlie. "You go home and get some sleep, if you can, Charlie. I'll be in touch."

Charlie let the uniformed police officer lead him to the cruiser and help him into the back, then waved to Rivera and the basset hound as the patrol car backed out of the alley.