me for ID when I buy beer now.
But I don’t want to look at what’s in the bag right away. Part of me wants to burn everything Alice and I left behind eleven years ago. Another part wants to leave it all right where it is, frozen in time, like bugs trapped in amber. It never occurred to me to wear any of my old clothes again.
“There was something weird and familiar about that amulet and I’ve been trying to remember what since I left the club.”
Donut Universe is a twenty-four-hour place with an outer-space theme. There’s a big plastic UFO suspended from the ceiling over the display case. The girl working the counter is a green-haired pixie who looks somewhere between twelve and thirty-five. She’s wearing sequined antennae that bob up and down when she talks. The grown-up part of my brain imagines that she tears the stupid things off and tosses them in the backseat of her car the moment she’s finished her shift. The nineteen-year-old in me wonders if she sometimes wears the antennae when she screws her boyfriend, and what it’s like to look up and see her and those sequined balls bobbing up and down over you.
“There was this one time Downtown when a couple of big, horned Hellions dragged me out of bed in the middle of the night. Azazel was my boss, but these two worked for Mephistopheles. The general with the fire palace. Lucifer’s third favorite general. His boys took me to the arena. It was after-hours, but there were a couple dozen Hellion posh types in the stands. They wanted a private show starring the living boy, which I knew meant that I was about to get my ass kicked.
“My favorite weapon, a na’at, was on the ground. A na’at is sort of like a spear, but it morphs and changes into a lot more than a spear if you know how to use it right. Like everything else down there, the name is a Hellion joke. They call a na’at a ‘thorn’ because its full name, na’atzutz, is the kind of bush they used to make Christ’s crown of thorns.
“Across the arena from me was something all draped in black. When it came closer I saw that it wasn’t dressed in black. It was black, nothing but black. It was like a hole punched in the world. And it kept shifting and changing shape, like a sheet on a clothesline on a windy day.
“It just stood there, so I went for it. I threw a few feints, trying to draw it into a fight, but it didn’t move. It didn’t even turn when I moved around it. The na’atzutz is spear-shaped. When I took a quick, hard shot at the thing’s head, the na’at went right through it, like it wasn’t there. But when the thing raised its arm to push me away, it was like getting hit by a dump truck.
“The na’at extends over ten feet when you open it all the way, so when the thing came at me, I let the na’at out to its full length and swung it like a flail. It went right through the thing again. I wasn’t about to let it lay into me again, so I did a Muhammad Ali and danced around the arena, trying to figure out what to do next. I didn’t know how to fight something I couldn’t even touch.
“Then the black thing took something out of a pocket. What it held up was a lot like that amulet back at that bar. Only it knew how to use it. First, it shot at my feet, kicking up dirt and blinding me. Then it shot circles all around me, so I couldn’t run. It could have burned me anytime it wanted, but it was taking its time, playing for the Hellions whooping it up in the good seats.
“After all those years and all that happened to me and all the things I’d killed, this laser-toting bathrobe was going to kill me. And I think it would have if Azazel hadn’t stormed into the arena. He started screaming at Mephistopheles and I thought the real fight was going to happen in the grandstands. Neither one of them was backing down and some of Mephistopheles’ buddies pulled out knives.
“A minute later, who strolls in but Lucifer? That shut everyone up damn quick.
“The thing you have to understand about Lucifer is that he hardly ever talks, and when he does, it’s never much more than a whisper. When half the universe is hanging on to your every word, you don’t have to shout.
‘“This is over,’ he said. ‘Go home. Mephistopheles, come to my tower in the morning.’ And that was it. Those Hellion hotshots couldn’t get out of there fast enough. Then he went to the black thing and said something to it. The black thing didn’t move. This is Lucifer giving the thing an order, and it just stood there. How is that for titanium balls? A couple of minutes later, the thing walks away across the arena and vanishes like smoke.
“I’d only seen Lucifer a couple of times and I’d only spoken to him once, but here he came right up to me and told me to go home to bed, and that none of this ever happened.”
“What do you think it means?” Vidocq asks.
“That amulet got me thinking. Whatever had it must have been some colossal hard case because it tried to stare down Lucifer. Mephistopheles obviously knew the thing because it was his party. So … what if Mephistopheles knows he can’t win the war Downtown and is recruiting some dark-magic types to help him move up here to Earth?”
“I thought that you had the only key that could allow them into this world.”
“That’s where it all falls apart. Except for Lucifer, no one can get out of Hell without the key, and I still have it.”
Vidocq sips his coffee and makes a face. “The shit you people drink.” He slips a flask out of his coat and pours a good portion of the contents into the cup. The next sip of coffee makes him smile. “It sounds as if you need to find those little Nazi boys and make them tell you where they get their toys.”
“That’s the second thing I need to do. The first is getting into Mason’s place. Want to come along?”
“Breaking and entering? Now you are my friend again. I will show you how a good thief earns his daily bread.”
“Sorry, man. There’s no actual house to break into. It’s just a basement, and that’s buried under tons of dirt. But we can get in through the room.”
Vidocq shakes his head. “You use guns when you should use magic and you use magic when you should let an old man pick a lock for you. You are a mixed-up boy, Monsieur Butler.”
“Please don’t say my name.”
He holds up a hand by way of apology and reaches into his coat pocket. “Take this.”
“What is it?”
“Someone you should meet. Dr. Kinski. He is an interesting man, and used to dealing with people of our kind. You shouldn’t walk around with those bullets in your belly. The lead is bad for you.”
“Thanks,” I say, and put the number in my pocket. “I’ll give him a call.”
“So, when are you we paying a visit to your friend Mason?”
“Tonight. Late. I don’t want anyone seeing us. We’ll use the key to get in, but I want a car there, too, in case things get weird.”
“Now you are thinking like a thief. Fewer guns and more exits. We’ll cure your cowboy ways yet.”
He doesn’t notice that I ditch the bag of shirts under the table when we leave.
“HI. I’M CALLING for Dr. Kinski. I want to make an appointment.”
“I’m sorry,” says a soft female voice on the other end of the phone. “Dr. Kinski isn’t accepting
