The Case of the Toxic Spell Dump

II

Judy did end up staying the night, because she didn’t feel like flying after two rounds of the cup of roots. (In case you’re wondering how we did the second time, it’s none of your business.) No hanky-panky in the morning, though. We were both up early, her to go back to her place and change before she headed for work, me to to the parchmentwork I’d need to get a warrant from Judge Ruhollah.

After a fast breakfast, I walked her out to her carpet (as I said, I don’t live in the best neighborhood), then went back to my own and headed for the Criminal and Magical Courts building downtown.

The commute downtown wasn’t too bad, but parking in the heart of Angels City is outrageously expensive, even though they stack carpets up higher than you’d see in a rug merchants’ bazaar. I was almost as upset as if I’d had to pay with my own money, not the EPA’s.

You want to see every kind of human being any kind of God ever made, go the the Criminal and Magical Courts building: secular judges in black robes, canon law judges in red ones, bailiffs and constabulary and sheriffs looking more like soldiers than anything else, defendants sometimes looking guilty of everything in the world (regardless of whether they’re only charged with flying a carpet too fast) and others who from the outside might be candidates for sainthood, witnesses, doctors, rabbis, wizards… If you like people-watching, you won’t find better entertainment.

Judge Ruhollah’s bailiff was a big Swede named Eric something-or-other—I never can remember his last name, though I’d dealt with him before. He said, “I’m sorry, Inspector Fisher, but the judge won’t be able to see you till about eleven. Something’s come up.”

I sighed, but what could I do about it? I went over to the bank of pay phones across the hall from the courtrooms. When I told the mouthpiece imp what number I wanted, it squawked back, “Forty-five coppers, please.” I pushed change into the outstretched hand of the little pay phone demon, which must be descended from Mammon by way of the Gadarene swine. If I’d turned my back on it, I’m sure it would have tried to pick my pocket.

After I called in at the office to say I’d be late, I bought some coffee (and a Danish I didn’t really need) and cooled my heels in the cafeteria, looking with one eye at the data I’d be giving the qadi and with the other at people going past. Two cups and another Danish later (I promised myself I wouldn’t eat lunch), it was a quarter to eleven. I threw the parchments back into my briefcase and presented myself to Eric again.

He picked up a phone, spoke into it, then nodded to me. “Go on in.” I went.

How do I describe Judge Ruhollah? If you’re Christian (which he wasn’t), think of God the Father when He’s had a lousy eon. I don’t know how old Ruhollah is, not even to the nearest decade. Long white beard, nose like a promontory, eyes that have seen everything and disapproved of most of it. If you’re up before him and you’re innocent, you’re all right. But if you’re even a little bit guilty, you’d better run for cover.

He glowered at me as I approached the bench. Had this been the first time I’d come before him, I’d’ve been tempted to pack it in as a bad job: either fall on my knees and pray for mercy (not something Maximum Ruhollah handed out in big doses) or else turn around and run for my life (for who’s not a little bit guilty of something?). But I knew he glowered most of the time anyhow, so he didn’t intimidate me… much.

I began as etiquette prescribed—“May it please your honor”—though I knew it was just a polite phrase in his case. I set forth the reasons the Environmental Perfection Agency, and I as its representative, wanted to examine the records of the Devonshire Land Management Consortium.

“You have supporting documents to show probable cause?” he asked. He didn’t have an old man’s voice. He’d been in the Confederation for close to forty years (he was expelled from Persia the last time the secularists there seized power for a while), but he’d never lost his accent.

I passed him the documents. He put on reading glasses to inspect them. Just for a second, he reminded me of the scriptorium spirit at the Thomas Brothers monastery. Before I could even think of smiling, though, his hard old face became so terrible that I wanted to look away. I had a pretty good idea what he’d come across, and I was right.

He stabbed at the parchment with a forefinger shaking with fury. “It is an abomination before God the Compassionate, the Merciful,” he ground out, “the birthing of children without souls. All should have the chance to be judged, to delight with God the great in heaven or to eat offal and drink boiling water forever in hell. This dump is causing the birth of soulless ones?”

“That’s what we’re trying to learn, your honor,” I answered. “Finding out just who dumps there—which is what the warrant seeks—will help us determine that.”

“This cause is worthy and just,” Judge Ruhollah declared. “Pursue it wherever it may lead.” He inked a quill and wrote out the warrant in his own hand, signing it at the bottom in both our own alphabet and the Arabic pothooks and squiggles he’d grown up with.

I thanked him and got out of there in a hurry; his wrath was frightening to behold. As I went back to where my carpet was parked, I skimmed through the document he’d given me. When I was finished, I whistled softly under my breath. If I’d wanted to, I could have closed down the Devonshire dump with that warrant. Of course, if I’d tried it, the consortium’s lawyers would have descended on me like a flock of vampires and gotten the whole thing thrown out. I didn’t want that, so I planned on carrying out the strictly limited search I’d already had in mind.

Rather to my own surprise, I was virtuous enough to skip lunch. I just headed straight for the Valley; the sooner I served the warrant, the sooner I could—I hoped—start finding answers.

Thanks to a stupid publicity stunt, I got stuck in traffic in Hollywood. If you ask me, stunts by the side of the freeway ought to be illegal; it goes slow enough without them. But no. One of the light and magic companies was releasing a spectacular called St. George and the Dragon, so nothing would do but to have one of their tame dragons roast a sword-swinging stunt man right where everybody could stop and stare and ooh and ahh. People who actually had to go someplace—me, for instance—got stuck right along with the rubbernecking fools.

Behind the stunt man in his flame-retardant chain mail stood a blonde who wasn’t wearing enough to retard flames. The dragon was well trained; he didn’t breathe fire anywhere near her. Even so, I wondered what she was doing there. She wasn’t the sort of maiden I pictured St. George rescuing. If they’d been making Perseus and Andromeda, maybe—but St. George?

Well, that’s Hollywood for you.

I made good time after I finally put dragon, stunt man, and bimbo behind me. I parked in the lot across from the Devonshire dump I’d used the day before. This time the security guard was on the phone before I got across the street. He came out of his cage, started wheeling back the gate. “Mr. Sudakis is expecting you, sir,” he said.

“Thanks.” I crossed the wooden footbridge, went into the dump site. Sure enough, Tony Sudakis was already on his way out to greet me. I still wasn’t sure whose side he was on, but he brought a lot of energy to whichever one it was.

“How may I be of assistance to you today, Inspector Fisher?” he asked in a loud, formal voice that said he knew what was coming.

I produced the parchment and did my best to speak in ringing tones myself: “Mr. Sudakis, I have in my possession and hereby serve you with this warrant of search issued by Judge Ruhollah authorizing me to examine certain records of your business.”

“Let me see this warrant,” he said. I passed it to him. I thought his scrutiny would be purely pro forma, but he read every word. When he spoke again, he didn’t sound formal at all: “You do everything this parchment says you can do and you’ll break us to bits. Maybe I’d better call our legal team.”

I held up a hasty hand. “I don’t intend to do or seek any more than we talked about yesterday. Is that still agreeable to you?” Light the candle or cast the spell, Mr. Sudakis.

“Let’s go to my office,” he said after a pause like the ones I’d been hearing from Charlie Kelly. “I’ll show you where the client lists are stored.”

By the time I thought to look for the Nothing I might have seen the day before, I was already past the place on the walk where I’d noticed it. I had more concrete things on my mind, anyhow.

Sudakis pulled open a file drawer. “Here are clients who have used our facility in the past three years, Inspector Fisher.”

I started pulling out folders. “I will copy these parchments and return the originals to you as soon as possible, Mr. Sudakis.” We were both talking with half a mind for the Listener in his office. I asked, “Does this list also include the spells and thaumaturgical byproducts each of the consortia and individuals stated were assigned for containment here?”

“No, not all of them. That’s a separate form, you know.” He glanced down at the warrant he was still holding. “We didn’t discuss those lists yesterday. This thing”—he waved the warrant—“gives you the authority to go fishing… until and unless our people try to quash it. Shall I make the phone call now?”

I pointed to the amber amulet he wore—it made a small lump under his shirt. He nodded, pulled it out, went through his little ritual. I wondered again what language he was using. As soon as he nodded a second time, I said, “Look, Tony, you know as well as I do that finding out what’s in here will help us learn what’s leaking.”

“Yeah, but we didn’t talk about it yesterday.” He looked stubborn.

I talked fast. “I know we didn’t. If you want to play all consortiate, you can lick me on this one. For a while. But how will you feel when you read the next little story in the Valley section of the Times about a kid who’s going to vanish out of the universe forever some time in the next fifty or seventy or ninety years?”

“You fight dirty,” he said with a fierce scowl.

“Only if I have to,” I answered. “You’re the one who told me you wanted to keep this site safe. Did you mean it, or was it so much Fairy gold?”

He looked at his watch. It must have been a new one, because he didn’t ask me what time it was. After about a minute and a half (my guess; I didn’t bother checking), he said, “Very well, Inspector Fisher, I shall comply with your demand.” Clearly we were out from under the rose.

More folders followed, too many for me to carry. Having decided to be helpful, Tony was very helpful: he got me a wheeled cart so I could trundle them down the path and out to my carpet. I said, “I hope losing these won’t inconvenience your operation.”

“I wouldn’t give ’em to you if it did,” he said. “I have copies of everything. They’re magically made, of course, so they aren’t acceptable to you, but they’ll keep this place running until I get the originals back.”

I didn’t say that might be a while. If we ended up going to court again to seek a closure order, the parchments would be sequestered for months, maybe for years if the dump’s legal staff used all the appeals they were entitled to. Sudakis had to know that, too. But he seemed satisfied he could go on doing what he needed to do, so I didn’t push him.

He even trundled the cart out to the entrance for me. When we got there, a slight hitch developed: the cart was too wide to go over the footbridge. “Can’t I just stand on one side of the line and you on the other?” I asked. “You can pass the documents out to me.”

“It’s not that simple,” Sudakis said. “Go on outside; I’ll show you.” I crossed the bridge, stepped a couple of feet to one side of it. Sudakis made as if to pass me a folder; I made as if to reach for it. Our hands came closer and closer to one another, but wouldn’t touch. Sudakis chuckled. “Asymptotic zone, you see? The footbridge is insulated, so it cleaves a path right on through. We do take containment seriously, Dave.”

“So I notice.” Even if Anything was on the rampage in the dump, that zone would go a long way toward keeping it inside where it belonged. When I leaned toward Sudakis above the footbridge, he had no trouble passing me the files. I turned to the security guard. “Do you have twine? I don’t want these blowing away after I load them onto my carpet.”

“Lemme look.” He went back into his cage and came back out with not only a ball of twine but also a scissors. I hadn’t expected even that much cooperation, so I was doubly glad to get it.

Sudakis watched me tie parcels for a minute or two, then said, “I’m going back to work. Now that you’ve officially taken these documents, you understand I’m going to have to notify my superiors about what you’ve done.”

“Yes, of course,” I said. Decent of him to remind me, though. I thought he really might be on my side, or at least not altogether on the side of his company.

I carted the documents across the street to my carpet; I needed three trips. Like anybody, I had storage pockets sewn on, but the great pile of parchments overwhelmed them. I don’t know what I would have done if the guard hadn’t had any twine. Sat on some of the folders and hung onto others, I suppose, until I flew by a sundries store where I could buy some for myself. You see people doing that every day, but it’s neither elegant nor what you’d call safe.

Back to my Westwood office, then. When I got there, I discovered the elevator shaft was out of order. Some idiot had managed to spill a cup of coffee on the Words and sigil that controlled Khil. A mage stood in the shaft readying a new compact with the demon, but readying didn’t mean ready. I had to haul my parchments up the fire stairs (you wouldn’t want to be in an elevator shaft when the controlling parchment burns, would you?), slide back down, and then climb the stairs again with the other half of my load. I was not pleased with the world when I finally plopped the last parcel down by my desk.

I was even less pleased when I saw what lurked on that desk: my report about the spilled fumigants, all covered over with red scribbles. That meant I wasn’t going to get to the documents I’d so laboriously lugged upstairs by quitting time. I thought they were a lot more important than the report, but my boss didn’t see things that way. Sometimes I wish I were triplets. Then I might keep my desk clean. Maybe.

The office access spirit appeared in the ground glass when I called it. I held up the pages one by one so it saw all the changes, then said, “Write me out a fresh version on parchment, if you please.”

“Very well,” the spirit said grumpily. It likes playing with words, but has the attitude that actually dealing with the material world and getting them down in permanent form is somehow beneath it. It asked me, “Shall I then forget the version you had me memorize yesterday?”

“Don’t you dare,” I said, and then, because it was literal-minded, I added a simple, “No.”

My boss had the habit of making changes and then going back and deciding she’d rather have things the first way after all. Yes, I know it’s a female cliche, but she really was a woman and she really was like that. Judy, now, Judy is more decisive than I’ll ever be.

After the spirit promised it would indeed remember both versions of the report, I waited for it to finish setting down the new one. When that finally wafted over to my desk, I read it through to make sure all the alterations were accurately transcribed, then set it in my boss’ in-basket for the next round of changes. And then, it being about the time it was, I went out to my carpet and headed home.

I took with me the list of firms that used the Devonshire dump. I left behind the forms that showed what they’d dumped there; those would be more secure behind the office’s wards than the cheap ones my block of flats uses. But I figured I could do some useful work at the kitchen table, just grouping the firms by type. That would also give me at last a start on knowing what sort of toxic spells were in there.

After a dinner I’d rather not remember—certainly nothing to compare to the lush Hanese spread I’d enjoyed with Judy the night before—I piled dishes in the sink, gave the table a couple of haphazard wipes, took out a sheet of parchment and inked a pen, then buckled down to it.

The first thing that hit me was just how many defense firms dumped at the Devonshire site. All the big aerospace consortia that have kept the Angels City economy booming for decades used the place: Confederated Voodoo (it’s Convoo these days, what with the stupid and paranoid mania for clipping consortiate names into meaningless syllables: who’d waste time with name magic against as diffuse an entity as a consortium?), North American Aviation and Levitation, Demondyne, Loki (I wondered if byproducts from Loki’s famous Cobold Works were trying to trickle through the wards around the dumps; some of them might be very bad news indeed), all the other famous names.

Along with them were a host of smaller outfits, subcontractors mostly, that nobody’s ever heard of except their mothers: firms with names like Bakhtiar’s Precision Burins, Portentous Potions, and Essence Extractions, Inc. I looked at that last one for a while, trying to figure out in which square it belonged: my transmogrified list had evolved into a chart. Finally I stuck it in almost at random: with a name like that, it could have done just about anything (another modern trend I despise).

Along with the defense outfits were several of the Hollywood light and magic companies. When I thought about it, that made sense; Hollywood has always been a magic-intensive business. I wished I remembered which outfit had made the St. George epic that had snarled traffic this morning—I might have been tempted to try some name magic on it myself, more because I knew it would be useless than for any other reason.

I was a little more surprised to find how many hospitals were on the list. Layfolk see only the benefits medicine brings; they don’t think much about the costs involved (except the ones that come from their purses). But healing bodies—and especially working with diseased souls—takes its toll on the environment like any high-tech enterprise.

There’s only one major carpet plant left in Angels City—the General Movers looms in Van Nuys. They dumped at Devonshire, too. The GM plant wasn’t high on my list of probable culprits, though. For one thing, I had a solid notion of the kinds of spells it used. For another, it’s likely to close down in the next year or two: too much competition from less expensive Oriental rugs.

And what was I supposed to make of outfits called Gall Divided, Slow Jinn Fizz, and Red Phoenix? Until I got back to the office to see what they were dumping, I was as much in the dark about what they actually did as I was with Essence Extractions, Inc. They sounded more interesting, though, I must say.

After a moment, my eyes came back to Red Phoenix. I underline the name, just on the off chance. The phoenix was a bird neither Judy nor I had thought of the night before. It would be worth checking out, at any rate.

I started to call Judy to tell her about it, then remembered Wednesday was her night for theoretical goetics. She’s only a couple of classes away from her master’s initiation. One day before too long I expect her to be writing grimoires instead of copy-editing them.

Having done as much on the list as I could do, I tossed it back in my attachÇ case, read for a while, and then got ready for bed. Through the thin wall of my flat, I heard the fellow next door howling with laughter at whatever ethernet program he was listening to.

One of these days soon, I figured I’d break down and buy an ethernet set for myself. They’re based on a variant of the cloning technique that’s put telephones all over lately. In the ethernet, though, they clone thousands of imps identical to a few masters. Whatever one of the masters hears, each clone repeats exactly—provided you’ve chosen to rouse that particular imp from dormancy.

You can buy plug-in imp modules that let you choose from up to eighty or a hundred different ethernet offerings at any one time. More and more people all over the country are listening to the same shows, admiring the same performers, telling the same jokes. Unity isn’t bad, especially in a country as big as the Confederation, and I don’t deny the advantages of being able to pass on news, for instance, quickly.

So why didn’t I have an ethernet set of my own? I guess the basic reason is that too much of what they spread is, pardon my Latin, crap. Not to put too fine a point on it, I’d sooner think for myself than get my entertainment premasticated. Go ahead, call me old-fashioned.

When I got to the office the next morning, the wizard was still working on the elevator shaft. No, I take it back; more likely, the wizard was working on the elevator shaft again. What with everybody’s budget being tight these days, the government isn’t enthusiastic about overtime. I walked up to my office. Yes, I know it’s good exercise. It also wasted the shower I’d taken just before I left home.

And on my desk waiting for me, just as I’d known it would be, was my second draft of the report on the spilled load of fumigants. I gave it a quick look-through. Not only had my boss changed about half of her revisions back to what I originally wrote, she’d added a whole new set, something she didn’t often do on a second pass. And on the last page, in green ink that looked as if it would be good for pacts with demons, she’d written, “Please give me final copy this afternoon.”

I felt like pounding my head on the desktop. That cursed silly report, which could have been and should have been two words long, was going to keep me from getting any useful work done that morning. Then the phone started yelling at me, and the report turned into the least of my worries.

“Environmental Perfection Agency, Fisher speaking,” I said, sounding as brisk and businesslike as I could before I’d had my second cup of coffee.

Just as if I hadn’t spoken, my phone asked me, “You are Inspector David Fisher of the Environmental Perfection Agency?”—and I knew I was talking to a lawyer. When I admitted it again, the fellow on the other end said, “I am Samuel Dill, of the firm of Elworthy, Frazer, and Waite, representing the interests of the Devonshire Land Management Consortium. I am given to understand that yesterday you absconded with certain proprietary documents of the aforesaid Consortium.”

Even through two phone imps, I could hear that capital “C” thud into place. I could also hear Mr. Dill building himself a case. I said, “Counselor, please let me correct you right at the outset. I did not ‘abscond with’ any documents. I did take certain parchments, as I was authorized to do under a search warrant granted in Confederal court yesterday.”

“Inspector Fisher, that warrant was a farce, which you must realize as well as I. Had you fully implemented all its provisions—”

“But I didn’t,” I answered sharply. “And, in case you have a Listener on this call, I make no such admission about the warrant. It was duly issued in reaction to a perceived threat to the environment from the Devonshire dump. And surely you, sir, must admit examining dump records is not unreasonable in light of evidence showing, among other things, increased birth defects in the community surrounding the dump.”

“I deny the land management consortium is in any way responsible for this statistical aberration,” Dill replied, as I’d known he would.

I pressed him: “Do you deny the need to investigate the matter?” When he didn’t answer right away, I pressed harder: “Do you deny that the EPA has the authority to check records to evaluate possible safety hazards?”

By now, I ought to be old enough to know better than to expect straight answers from lawyers. What I got instead was about a five-minute speech. No, Dill didn’t deny our right to investigate, but he did deny that the dump (not that he ever called it a dump, not even once) could possibly be responsible for anything, even, it sounded like, the shadow the containment fence cast. He also kept coming back to the scope of the warrant under which I’d conducted the search.

Blast Maximum Ruhollah. That warrant was the juristic equivalent of performing necromancy to get someone to tie your shoelaces for you. I said, “Counselor, let me ask you again: do you think my taking the documents I took was in any way exceptionable?”

I got back another speech, but what it boiled down to was no. Dill finished, “I want to put you on notice that the Devonshire Land Management Consortium will not under any circumstances tolerate your use of that outrageous warrant to conduct fishing expeditions through our records.”

“I understand your concern,” I said, which shut him up without conceding anything. He finally got off the phone, and I put the second-generation changes into that worthless Hydra-headed report. I was about halfway through letting the access spirit scan it when the phone yowled again.

I said something I hoped nobody (and Nobody) noticed before I answered it. Turned out to be Tony Sudakis. He said, “I just wanted to let you know my people aren’t too happy about my turning records over to you yesterday.”

“They’ve made me aware of that already, as a matter of fact,” I said, and told him about the phone call from the Consortium’s lawyer. “I hope I haven’t gotten you into a pickle over this.”

“I’ll survive,” he said. “However much they want to, they can’t send me to perdition for obeying the law. If you push that warrant too hard, though, things’ll get more complicated than anybody really wants.”

“Yeah,” I said, still puzzled about where he was coming from. The contemptuous way he dismissed higher management made me guess he’d worked his little charm with the amulet again, but the message he delivered wasn’t that different from Dill’s. I’d got somewhere pushing Dill, so I decided to push Sudakis a little, too: “You aren’t having any kind of trouble out there, are you?”

But Sudakis didn’t push. “Perkunas, no!” he exclaimed, an oath I didn’t recognize. “Everything’s fine here… except for your ugly numbers.”

“Believe me, I don’t like those any better than you do,” I said, “but they’re there, and we need to find out why.”

“Yeah, okay.” He suddenly turned abrupt. “Listen, I gotta go. ’Bye.” He probably had done his little charm, then, and run out of time on it.

I pulled out my Handbook of Goetics and Metapsychics to see what it had to say about Perkunas. I found out he was a Lithuanian thunder-god. Was Sudakis a Lithuanian name? I didn’t know. The Lithuanians, I read, had been about the last European people to come to terms with Christianity, and a lot of them also remained on familiar terms with their old gods. Tony Sudakis certainly sounded as if he was.

Grunting, I put the handbook back on the shelf. Anybody who uses it a lot develops shoulders like an Olympiadic weightlifter’s—if you hung two copies on opposite ends of a barbell, you could sure train with ’em.

I’d just started my third stab at revising that blinking report when the phone went off again. I thought hard about ordering the imp to answer that I wasn’t there, but integrity won. A moment later, I wished it hadn’t: “Inspector Fisher? Pleased to make your acquaintance, sir. I am Colleen Pfeiffer, of the legal staff of the Demondyne Consortium.”

“Yes?” I said, not wanting to give her any more rope than she had already.

“Inspector Fisher, I have been informed that you are investigating the sorcerous byproducts Demondyne deposits in the Devonshire containment area.”

“Among others, that’s correct, Counselor. May I ask who told you?” I’d expected calls from some of the consortia that dumped at Devonshire (I’d also expected nobody’s lawyer would say anything so bald as that), but I hadn’t expected to get the first one by half past nine of the morning after I searched.

Like any lawyer worth a prayer, Mistress Pfeiffer was better at asking questions than answering them. She went on as if I hadn’t spoken: “I want you to note two areas of concern of Demondyne’s, Inspector Fisher. First, as you must be aware, byproduct information can be valuable to competitors. Second, much of our work is defense-related. Some of the information you have in your possession might prove of great interest to foreign governments. An appropriate security regime is indicated by both these considerations.”

“Thank you for expressing your concern, Counselor,” I said. “I have never had any reason to believe the EPA’s security precautions don’t do the job. The parchments to which you refer have not left my office.”

“I am relieved to hear that,” she said. “May I assume your policy will remain unchanged, and make note of this for the rest of the legal staff and other consortium officials?”

Such an innocent-sounding question, to have so many teeth in it. I answered cautiously: “You can assume I’ll do my best to keep your parchments safe and confidential. I’m not in a position to make promises about where they’ll be at any given moment.”

“Your response is not altogether satisfactory,” she said.

Too bad, I thought. Out loud, I said, “Counselor, I’m afraid it’s the best I can do, given my own responsibilities and oaths.” Let her make something of that.

My phone imp reproduced a sigh. Maybe I wasn’t the only one who thought I was having a bad day. Colleen Pfeiffer said, “I will transmit what you say, Inspector Fisher. Thank you for your time.”

I’d just reached for the fumigants report—I still hadn’t had the chance to let our access spirit finish looking at it—when the phone yarped again. I took in vain the names of several Christian saints in whose intercession I don’t believe. Then I lifted the handset. It was, after all, part of my job, even if I was growing ever more convinced I wasn’t going to get around to any other parts today.

No, you’re wrong—it wasn’t another lawyer. It was the owner of Slow Jinn Fizz, an excitable fellow named Ramzan Durani. I’d noted that as one of the smaller companies that used the Devonshire dump; evidently it wasn’t big enough to keep lawyers on staff just to sic them on people. But the owner had the same concerns the woman from Demondyne and the fellow from the Devonshire Land Management Consortium had had. For some reason or other, I began to suspect a trend.

Then I found myself with another irate proprietor trying to scream in my ear, this one a certain Jorge Vasquez, who ran an outfit called Chocolate Weasel. I tried to distract him by asking—out of genuine curiosity, I assure you—just what Chocolate Weasel did, but he was in no mood to be distracted. He seemed sure every secret he had was about to be published in the dailies and put out over the ethernet.

Calming him down, getting him to believe his secrets could stay safe for all of me, took another twenty minutes. I still wanted to know why he called his business Chocolate Weasel and what sort of magic he did in connection with it, but I didn’t want to know bad enough to listen to him for twenty minutes more, so I didn’t ask. I figured I could make a fair guess from the dump records anyhow.

When I got around to them. If I ever got around to them. That all began to look extremely unlikely. Just as I was about to let the spirit start moving with the report again, someone came into my office. I felt like screaming, “Go away and let me work!” But it was my boss, so I couldn’t.

Despite my grumblings, Beatrice Cartwright isn’t a bad person. She’s not even a bad boss, most ways. She’s a black lady about my age, maybe twenty-five pounds heavier than she ought to be (she says forty pounds, but she dreams of being built like a light-and-magic celeb, which I’m afraid ain’t gonna happen). She’s usually good about keeping higher-ups off her troops’ backs, but she can’t do much when Charlie Kelly calls you (or, more to the point, me) at home at five in the morning.

“David, I need to talk with you,” she said. I must have looked as harassed as I felt, because she added hastily, “I hope it won’t take up too much of your time.” Even talking business, her voice had a touch of gospel choir in it. She never hit people over the head with her faith, though. I liked her for that.

I said, “Bea, I’ll have that fumigants report for you as soon as the bloody phone stops squawking at me for three minutes at a stretch.” I looked at it, expecting it to go off on cue. But it kept quiet.

“Never mind the report.” She sat down in the chair by my desk. “What I want to know is why I’ve gotten calls from Loki and Convoo and Portentous Products this morning, all of them screaming for me to have you pulled away from the Devonshire dump. I didn’t even know you were working on anything connected with the Devonshire dump.” She gave me her more-in-sorrow-than-in-anger look, the one calculated to make even an eighth-circle sinner get the guilts.

More-in-sorrow-than-in-anger disappeared when I explained how Charlie had gone around her to call me. Real anger replaced it. If she’d been white, she’d have turned red. She said, “I am sick to death of people playing these stupid games. Mr. Kelly will hear from me, and that is a promise. Doesn’t he have any idea what channels are for?” She took a deep breath and deliberately calmed down. “All right, so that’s how you got involved with the Devonshire dump. Why are these people phoning me and screaming blue murder?”

“Because something really is wrong there.” By now, I could rattle off the numbers from the Thomas Brothers’ scriptorium in my sleep. “And because I’m trying to find out what, and—I think—because the Devonshire Land Management Consortium honchos aren’t very happy about that.”

“It does seem so, doesn’t it?” Bea thought for maybe half a minute. “I still am going to talk to Mr. Charles Kelly, don’t you doubt it for a minute. But I would say that, however you got this project, David, you are going to have to see it through.”

“I thought the same thing the minute I first saw those birth defect statistics up at the monastery,” I answered.

“All right. I’m glad we understand each other about that, then. From now on, though, I expect to be kept fully informed on what you’re doing. Do I make myself clear?”

I almost sprained my neck nodding. Even if she weren’t my boss, Bea wouldn’t be a good person to argue with. And she was dead right here. I said, “I was going to tell you as soon as I got the chance—Monday morning staff meeting at the latest. It’s just that”—I waved at the chaos eating my desk—“I’ve been busy.”

“I understand that. You’re supposed to be busy. That’s what they pay you for.” Bea stood up to go, then turned back for a Parthian shot: “In spite of all this, I do still want the revisions on that spilled fumigants report finished before you go home tonight.” She swept away, long skirt trailing regally after her.

I groaned. Before I had the chance to let the access spirit finish scanning the secondary revisions (and, let us not forget, the primary revisions about which Bea had later changed her mind), the phone yelled for attention again.

After Judy and I went to synagogue Friday night, we flew back to my place. I’ve already remarked that my orthodoxy is imperfect. Really observant Jews won’t use carpets or any other magic on the Sabbath, though some will have a sprite trained to do things for them that they aren’t allowed to do themselves—a shabbas devil, they call it.

But such fine scruples weren’t part of my upbringing, so I don’t feel sinful in behaving as I do. Judy’s attitude is close to mine. Otherwise, she would have called me on the carpet instead of getting on one with me.

When we were settled with cold drinks in the front room, she said, “So what’s the latest on the Devonshire dump?”

I took a sip of aqua vitae, let it char its way down to my belly. Then, my voice huskier than it had been before, I explained how all the consortia that dumped at Devonshire were so delighted to have their records examined.

“How do they know their records are being examined?” Judy, as I’ve noted, does not miss details. She spotted this one well before I needed to point it out to her.

“Good question,” I said approvingly. “I wish I had a good answer. The people who’ve been calling me, though, sound like they’ve been rehearsing for a chorus.” My voice, to put it charitably, is less than operatic. I burst into song anyhow: “It has come to my attention that—” I gave it about enough vibrato to fly a carpet through.

Judy winced, for which I didn’t blame her. She tossed back the rest of her drink, then got out those two little porcelain cups. I would have been more flattered if I hadn’t had the nagging suspicion she was trying to get me to shut up.

Whatever her reasons, though, I was happy to let her use up some of my beer. And, not too long afterwards, we were both pretty happy. Later, she got up to use the toilet and the spare toothbrush in the nostrums cabinet. Then she came back to bed. Neither of us had to go to work in the morning. Except for Saturday morning services, we’d have the day to ourselves.

I thought.

We were sound asleep, half tangled up with each other as if we’d been married for years, when the phone started screaming. We both thrashed in horror. She bumped my nose and kneed me in a more tender place than that, and I doubt I was any more gallant to her. I had to scramble over her to answer the phone; my flat’s laid out to suit me when I’m there by myself, which is most of the time.

I spoke my first coherent thought aloud: “I’m going to kill Charlie Kelly.” Who else, I figured, would call me at whatever o’clock in the dark this was?

But it wasn’t Charlie. When I mumbled “Hullo?” the response was a crisp question: “Is this Inspector David Fisher of the Environmental Perfection Agency?”

“Yeah, that’s me,” I said. “Who the—who are you?” I wasn’t quite ready to start swearing until I knew who my target was.

“Inspector Fisher, I am Legate Shiro Kawaguchi, of the Angels City Constabulary.” That made me sit up straighter. I was beginning to be fully conscious. Having Judy pressed all warm and silky against my left side didn’t hurt there, either. But what Kawaguchi said next made me forget even the sweet presence of the woman I loved: “Inspector Fisher, Brother Vahan of the Thomas Brothers monastery requested that I notify you immediately.”

“Notify me of what?” I said, while little ice lizards slithered up my back. Judy made a questioning noise. I flapped my free hand to show her I couldn’t fill her in yet. “Of what?” I repeated.

“I regret to inform you, Inspector Fisher, that Brother Vahan’s monastery is now in the final stages of burning down. Brother Vahan has forcefully expressed the opinion that this may be related to an investigation you are pursuing.”

“God, I hope not,” I told him. But I was already getting out of bed. “Does he—do you—want me to come up there now?”

“If that would not be too inconvenient,” Kawaguchi answered.

“I’m on my way,” I said, and put the handset back in its cradle.

“On your way where?” Judy asked indignantly, mashing her pretty face into the pillow against the glare of the St. Elmo’s fire I called up so I could find my pants. “What time is it, anyhow?”

“Two fifty-three,” said the horological demon in my alarm clock.

“I’m going up to St. Ferdinand’s Valley.” I rummaged in my drawer for a sweater; Angels City nights can be chilly. As I pulled the sweater over my head, I went on, “The Thomas Brothers monastery up there, the one with all the damning data about the Devonshire dump, just burned down.”

Judy sat bolt upright, the best argument I’d seen for staying home. “It wasn’t an accident, or they wouldn’t have called you.” Her voice was flat. She started getting dressed, too.

By then I was buckling my sandals. “Brother Vahan doesn’t seem to think so, from what the cop I talked with told me. And the timing of the fire is—well, suggestive is the word that comes to mind.” No, I wasn’t looking at her. Besides, by that time she already had on skirt and blouse and headscarf. “You don’t really need to bother with all that,” I said. “Sleep here, if you like. I’ll be back eventually.”

“Back?” If she’d sounded indignant before, now she was furious. “Who care when you’ll be back? I’m coming with you.”

Procedurally, that was all wrong, and I knew it. But if you think I argued, think again. It wasn’t just that I was in love with Judy, though I’d be lying if I said that didn’t enter into it. But procedure aside, I was glad to have her eyes along. She was likely to notice something I’d miss. And as far as investigating arson went, I’d be pretty useless up there myself. That’s a job for the constabulary, not the EPA.

The freeway flight corridors were almost empty, so I pushed my carpet harder than I could have during the day. All the same, some people shot by me as if I was standing still. And one maniac almost flew right into me, then darted away like a bat out of hell. I hate drunks. The one advantage of being a regular commuter is that you don’t see a lot of drunks out flying during regular commuting hours. It’s not much of an advantage, but commuters have to take what they can get.

One of these days, the wizards keep promising, they’ll be able to train the sylphic spirits in new carpets not to fly for drunks. This is another one I wouldn’t stake my soul on. Sylphic spirits are naturally flighty themselves, and they hardly ever get hurt in accidents. So why should they care about the state of the people who ride their rugs?

I pulled off the freeway and darted north up almost deserted flight lanes toward the Thomas Brothers monastery. Toward what had been the Thomas Brothers monastery, I should say. It was still smoldering when I stopped at the edge of the zone the constabulary and firecrews had cordoned off.

Fighting fires in Angels City is anything but easy. Undines are weak and unreliable here: simply not enough underground water to support them. Firecrews use sand when they can, and the dust devils which keep it under control. For big fires, though, only water will do, and it has to come through the cooperation of the Other Side: the Angeles City firecrew mages have pacts with Elelogap, Focalor, and Vepar, the demons whose power is over water. Most of the time, that just means keeping the infernal spirits from harassing the mechanical system of dams and pipes and pumps that fetch our water from far away.

But sometimes, like tonight, the crews need more than sand can do, more than pipes can give. I was just showing my sigil to a worn-looking constable when one of the monastery towers flared anew. A wizard in firecrew crimson gestured with his wand to the spirit held inside a hastily drawn pentacle. I saw the mermaid-shape within writhe: he’d summoned Vepar, then.

That mage had a job I wouldn’t want. Incanting always in a desperate hurry, drawing a new pentacle in the first open space you find, never daring to take the time to do a thorough job of checking it for gaps the summoned spirit could use to destroy you… only military magic takes a tougher toll on the operator.

But this fellow was cool as an ice elemental. He called on Vepar in a clear and piercing voice: “I conjure thee, Vepar, by the living God, by the true God, by the holy and all-ruling God, Who created from nothingness the heavens, the earth, the sea, and all things that are therein, Adonai, Jehovah, Tetragrammeton, to pour your waters upon the blaze there in such quantity and placement as to be most efficacious in extinguishing it and least damaging to life and property, in this place, before this pentacle, without grievance, deformity, noise, murmuring, or deceit. Obey, obey, obey!”

“It pains me to cease the destruction of the monastics housed therein.” I felt Vepar’s voice rather than hearing it. Like the demon’s visible form, it was sensuous enough to make me want to forget from what sort of creature it really came.

The wizard didn’t forget. “Obey, lest I cast thy name and seal into this brazier and consume them with sulphurous and stinking substances, and in so doing bind thee in the Bottomless Pit, in the Lake of Fire and Brimstone prepared for rebellious spirits, remembered no more before the face of God. Obey, obey, obey!” He held his closed hand above the brazier, as if to drop into the coals whatever he held.

I wouldn’t have ignored a threat like that, and I’m a material creature. To Vepar, who was all of spirit, it had to be doubly frightening. Water suddenly saturated the air around the burning tower; you could see fog turn to mist and then to rain. The same thing had to be happening inside, too. The flames went out.

“Give me leave to get hence,” Vepar said sullenly. “Am I now sufficiently humiliated to satisfy thee?”

The mage from the firecrew was too smart to let the demon lure him into that kind of debate. Without replying directly, he granted Vepar permission to go: “O Spirit Vepar, because thou hast diligently answered my demands, I do hereby license thee to depart, without injury to man or beast. Depart, I say, but be thou willing and ready to come whenever duly conjured by the sacred rites of magic. I adjure thee to withdraw peaceably and quietly, and may the peace of God continue forever between us. Amen.”

He stayed in his own circle until the mermaid-shape vanished from the pentacle. Then he stepped—staggered, actually—out. I hoped the fire truly had a stake through its heart; that mage didn’t look as if he could summon up ten coppers for a cup of tea.

A slim, Asian-looking man in constabulary uniform came up to me. “Inspector Fisher?” He waited for me to nod before he stuck out a hand. “I’m Legate Kawaguchi. As I said, Brother Vahan asked for your presence here.” He affected to notice Judy for the first time. His face went from impassive to cold. “Who is your, ah, companion here?”

What are you doing bringing your girlfriend along on business? he meant. I said, “Legate, allow me to present my fiancÇe, Judith Adler.” Before he could blow up at me, I added, coldly myself, “Mistress Adler is on the staff of Hand-of-Glory Publishing. As I feared magic might well be involved in this fire, I judged her expertise valuable.” I gave him back an unspoken question of my own: Want to make something of it?

He didn’t. He bowed slightly to Judy, who returned the courtesy. Kawaguchi turned back to me. “Your fears, it seems, are well-founded. This indeed appears to be a case of arson and homicide by sorcery.”

I gulped. “Homicide?”

“So it would appear, Inspector. Brother Vahan informs me that eleven of the monks cannot be accounted for. Firecrew have already discovered three sets of mortal remains; as the site cools further, more such are to be expected.”

“May their souls be judged kindly,” I whispered. Beside me, Judy nodded. Until it happens, you don’t want to imagine men of God, men who worked for nothing but good, snuffed out like so many tapers. Murder of a religious of any creed carries not just a secular death sentence but the strongest curse the sect can lay on, which strikes me as only right.

Kawaguchi pulled out a note tablet and stylus. “Inspector Fisher, I’d be grateful if you’d explain to me in your own words why Brother Vahan believes your recent work to be connected with this unfortunate occurrence.”

Before I could answer, Brother Vahan himself came up. I might have known nothing, not even magical fire, could make the abbot lose his composure. He bowed gravely to me, even managed a hint of gallantry when I introduced Judy to him. But his eyes were black pools of anguish; as he stepped closer to one of the firecrew’s St. Elmo’s lamps, I saw he had a nasty burn across half his bald pate.

I explained to Kawaguchi what I’d been investigating, and why. His stylus raced over the wax. He hardly looked at what he was writing. Later, back at the constabulary station, he’d use a depalimpsestation spell to separate different strata of notes.

When I was through, he nodded slowly. “You are of the opinion, then, that one of the firms in some way involved with the Devonshire dump was responsible for this act of incendiarism?”

“Yes, Legate, I am,” I answered.

Brother Vahan nodded heavily. “It is as I told you, Legate Kawaguchi. So much loss here; enormous profit to someone must be at stake.”

“So I see,” Kawaguchi said. “You must understand, though, sir, that your statement about Inspector Fisher’s investigations is hearsay, while one directly from him may be used as evidence.”

“I do understand that, Legate,” the abbot answered. “Every calling has its own rituals.” I didn’t really think of the secular law, as opposed to that of the Holy Scriptures, as a ritual system, but Brother Vahan had a point.

A firecrewman with the crystal ball of a forensics specialist on his collar tabs stood waiting for Kawaguchi to notice him. When Kawaguchi did, the fellow said, “Legate, I have determined the point of origin of the fire.” He waited again, this time just long enough to let Kawaguchi raise a questioning eyebrow. “The blaze appears to have broken out below ground, in the scriptorium chamber.”

I started. So did Brother Vahan. Even in the half-dark and in the midst of confusion, Kawaguchi noticed. Judy would have, too; I wasn’t so sure about myself. The legate said, “This has significance, gentlemen?”

The abbot and I looked at each other. He deferred to me with a graceful gesture that showed me his arm was burned, too. I said, “I drew the information alerting me to a problem around the Devonshire dump from the scriptorium. Now, I gather, any further evidence that might have been there is gone.”

“The actual parchments from which you made your conclusions, and from which you might have gone on to draw other inferences, are surely perished,” Brother Vahan said heavily. “I confess I have given them little thought, being more concerned with trying to save such brethren as I could. Too few, too few.” I thought he was going to break down and weep, but he was made of stern stuff. He not only rallied but returned to the business at hand: “The data, as opposed to the physical residuum on which they resided, may yet be preserved. Much depends on whether Erasmus survived the conflagration.”

“Erasmus?” Legate Kawaguchi and I asked together.

“The scriptorium spirit,” Brother Vahan explained. He hadn’t named the spirit for me when I was down there, but that had been strictly business.

Kawaguchi, Judy, and I turned as one to look at the smoking ruin which was all that remained of the Thomas Brothers monastery. Gently, Judy said, “How likely is that?”

“If the spirit betook itself wholly to the Other Side when the fire started, there may be some hope,” the abbot said. “The monastery is—was—consecrated ground, after all, and thereby to some degree protected from the impact of the physical world upon the spiritual.”

Kawaguchi looked thoughtful. “That’s so,” he admitted. “Let me talk to the firecrew. If they think it’s safe, we’ll send a sorce-and-rescue team down into the scriptorium and see if we can’t save that spirit. It may be able to give vital evidence.”

“Without the corroborating physical presence of the parchments, evidence taken from a spirit is not admissible in court,” Judy reminded him.

“Thank you for noting that, Mistress Adler. I was aware of it,” the legate said. He didn’t sound annoyed, though; my guess was, Judy had just proved to him she knew what she was talking about. He went on, “My thought was not so much for your fiancÇe’s investigation as for the facts relating to the tragic fire here. For that, the spirit’s testimony may very well be allowed.”

“You’re right, of course,” Judy said. One of the many remarkable things about her is that when she has to concede a point (which isn’t all that often), she concedes it completely and graciously. Most people go on fighting battles long after they’re lost.

Kawaguchi went off to consult with the firecrew. I turned to Brother Vahan. “I’m sorry, sir, more sorry than I could say. I never imagined anyone could be mad enough to attack a monastery.”

“Nor did I,” he answered. “Do not blame yourself, my son. You uncovered a great evil at that dump; that I knew when you spoke to me of what you’d found. Now it has proved greater than either of us dreamt. But that is no reason to draw back from it. Rather, it is more reason to work to root it out.”

I had nothing to say to that. I just dipped my head, the way you do when you hear the truth. Rather to my relief, Kawaguchi came back just then. A couple of men in red dashed into the ruins. My eye followed them. Seeing my head twist, Kawaguchi nodded. “They will make the effort, Inspector Fisher. They have, of course, no guarantee of success.”

“Of course.” I noted the understatement. After a moment, I went on with a question: “Did you call me up here just to take my information, or can I help you with what you’re doing?”

“The former, I fear, unless you have resources concealed in your carpet which are not immediately obvious.” Did the legate’s eyes twinkle? I wasn’t sure. If he had a sense of humor, it was drier than Angels City in the middle of one of our droughts.

“Well, then,” I said, “do you mind my asking you for as much as you can give me of what you’ve found out here? The more I learn about how this fire started and the magics that went into it, the better my chance of correlating those data with one or more of the consortia that use the Devonshire dump. That’ll help me figure out whose spells are leaking, which ought to help you figure out who’s to blame for this burning.”

I’ve worked with constabularies before. Constables are always chary about telling anybody anything, even if the person who wants to know is on the same side they are. Kawaguchi visibly wrestled with himself; under other circumstances, it would have been funny.

Finally he said, “That is a reasonable request.” Which didn’t mean he was happy about it. “Come with me, then. You may accompany us if you like, Mistress Adler.”

“How generous of you,” Judy said. I knew she’d have accompanied us whether Kawaguchi liked it or not, and gone off like a demon out of its pentacle if he tried to stop her. The irony in her voice was thick enough to slice. If the legate noticed it, though, he didn’t let on. I wondered if the Angels City constabulary wizards had perfected an anti-sarcasm amulet. If they had, I wanted to buy one.

Such foolishness vanished as the legate took Judy and me over to his command post (Brother Vahan tagged along, without, I noticed, any formal invitation). The firecrew forensics man was talking with his opposite number in the constabulary, a skinny blond woman who had a spellchecker that made my little portable look like a three-year-old’s toy.

I stared at it with honest envy. As soon as Kawaguchi introduced me to her—she was Chief Thaumatechnician Bornholm—I asked, “How many megageists in that thing, anyway?”

She must have heard me salivating, because she smiled, which made her look a little younger and a lot less tough. “Four meg active, eighty meg correlative,” she answered.

“Wow,” I said; beside me, Judy whistled softly. I wondered when the EPA would get a portable spellchecker with that kind of power. Probably some time in the new millennium; it would just about take the Millennium for us to have the tools we need to do the job right. The next century shouldn’t be more than two or three decades old before we’re ready to deal with this one.

“So what do we have in there?” Kawaguchi asked.

Bornholm was a good constable; she glanced over to him and got his nod before she started talking in front of us civilian types. Then she said, “Even with the spellchecker, this won’t be as easy as I’d like; on hallowed ground, sorcerous evidence has a way of evanescing in a hurry.” She turned her head in Brother Vahan’s direction. “The abbot here has a most holy establishment: good for his monks and a credit to him, but hard on the constabulary.”

“All right, I won’t expect you to hand me the case all sealed up with a papal chrysobull,” the legate said, “though I wouldn’t have been sorry if you did. Tell me what you know.”

“About what you’d expect in an arson case,” Bornholm said: “strong traces of salamander, rather weaker ones from the use of a blasting rod.”

“Uh-huh,” Kawaguchi said. “Any special characteristics of the salamander that would help us trace it back to a particular source on the Other Side?” Different rituals summon different strains of salamander; had this been one of the unusual ones, it could have told a lot about who called the creature to the monastery.

But the thaumatech shook her head. “As generic a spell as you can find. Ten thousand campers use it out in the woods every day to get their fires going. Of course, they tack a dismissal onto it, too, and that didn’t happen here. Just the opposite, in fact; it was encouraged. Same with the blasting rod: very ordinary magic.”

“Hellfire,” Kawaguchi said, which wasn’t literally true—salamanders are morally neutral creatures—but summed things up well enough.

Bornholm hesitated, then went on, “When I first set up, I thought something else might be there, too. I wanted to stake down the certain arson traces before anything else, though, and by the time I came back to the other, it was gone. Hallowed ground, like I said. I’ll take the rap for it—it was my choice.”

“That’s what free will is about,” Kawaguchi said. “You did what you thought was best. I presume you ordered the spirit to remember, not just analyze. We can do further evaluation later.”

“Certainly,” Bornholm answered, with a What do you think I am, an idiot? look tacked on for good measure. I didn’t blame her, not one bit. She added, “The trouble is, you can’t evaluate what just isn’t there.”

“I understand that.” Kawaguchi smacked right fist into left palm in frustration. I didn’t blame him, either. There was the spellchecker, with access and correlation capability on relations with the Other Side for everybody from Achaeans to Zulus and all stops in between, with hordes of microimps inside to do the thinking faster and more thoroughly than any mere man could manage—but, as the thaumatech had said, you can’t analyze what isn’t there.

“Legate!” The shout rang through the smoky night. Kawaguchi spun round (so did all of us, as a matter of fact). One of the guys from the sorce-and-rescue crew had emerged from the ruined scriptorium. His boots thumped on the pavement as he walked over to us. He was sooty and sweaty and looked about half beaten to death, but his eyes held triumph. “We made contact with that access spirit, Legate.”

“Good news!” Kawaguchi exclaimed. “That’s the first piece of good news I’ve heard tonight. What sort of shape is the spirit in?”

“I was just getting to that, Legate,” the sorce-and-rescue man said, and some of the sudden hopes I’d got up came crashing down again—he didn’t sound what you’d call upbeat. “The spirit’s here—it’s manifested enough so we can move it—but it’s not in good shape, not even slightly. Preliminary diagnosis is that whoever set the fire went after the poor creature on the Other Side, too.”

“Poor Erasmus,” Brother Vahan said, with as much concern as if he were talking about one of his monks.

“Erasmus? Oh,” the sorce-and-rescue man said; then: “I don’t think it’ll perish, but it’s had a rough time. Hard to characterize torments on the Other Side, but—did it used to manifest itself with its spectacles cracked?”

“No,” Brother Vahan said, and started to weep as if that was to him the crowning tragedy of all those which had befallen the Thomas Brothers monastery tonight. I remembered the fussy, precise spirit and the neat little pair of glasses it had worn. How could you crack lenses that weren’t really there? I suppose there are ways, but I got queasy thinking about them.

“We can run the spellchecker on this access spirit,” Thaumatech Bornholm said. “Maybe we’ll learn just what hit the monastery by finding out how the spirit was tormented.”

“For that matter, simple questioning may yield the same information,” said Kawaguchi, who sounded ready to start asking poor abused Erasmus questions right then and there if the sorce-and-rescue man would summon the spirit onto a ground-glass screen.

But the sorce-and-rescue man shook his head. “Nobody’s going to run a spellchecker on that spirit any time soon. Any sorcerous nudge right now, before it has a chance to regain some strength, and it’ll be gone for good. I’m not kidding—a sorcerous nudge right now will destroy, uh, Erasmus, and I’ll set that down on parchment. The same goes for interrogation. If that spirit were a material being, it would’ve gotten last rites. Because it’s not material, it has a better chance of recovering than thee or me, but I warn you: you’ll lose it if you push.”

“I shall pray for Erasmus’ recovery along with the recovery of my brethren who took hurt in the fire,” Brother Vahan said, “and for the souls of the brethren who lost their lives.” He spoke slowly and with great dignity, partly because he was that kind of man and partly to hold the tears back from his voice.

Judy stepped up to him and put a hand on his shoulder. He twitched a little; you could see how unused he was to having a woman touch him. But after a couple of seconds, he realized she meant only to comfort him. He eased, as much as you can when everything that matters to you is gone.

I wished I’d thought to make the gesture Judy had. I suspect the trouble is that I think too much. Judy felt what she ought to do and she did it. I’m not saying she doesn’t think—oh my, no. But it’s nice to be in touch with This Side and the Other Side of yourself, so to speak.

I turned to Legate Kawaguchi. “Do you need us for anything more here, sir?”

He shook his head. “No, you may go, Inspector Fisher. Thank you for your statement. I expect we will be in touch with each other about aspects of this matter of mutual concern.” I expected that, too. Then Kawaguchi unbent a little; maybe a human being really did lurk behind the constabulary uniform. “A pleasure also to meet your fiancÇe, Inspector. A pity to drag you out of doors at such an unholy hour, Mistress Adler, especially on dark, grim business like this.”

“I asked David to let me come along,” Judy said. “And you’re right—this business is dark and grim. If I can do anything to help you catch whoever did it, let me know. I’m no mage, but I’m an expert on sorcerous applications.”

“I shall bear that in mind,” Kawaguchi said, and sounded as if he meant it.

Judy and I ducked under the tape the constabulary had put around the Thomas Brothers monastery and walked back toward my carpet. The sun was just starting to paint the sky above the hills to the east with pink. I asked my watch what time it was and found out it was heading toward six. By my body, it could have been anywhere from midmorning to midnight.

We fastened our safety belts and headed back toward the freeway. A couple of minutes before we got there, Judy said, “I didn’t know I was your fiancÇe.”

“Huh?” I answered brilliantly.

“The way you introduced me to Legate Kawaguchi,” she said.

“Oh. That.” I’d just done it because it seemed the easiest way to explain what she was doing over at my place at two-something of a morning. I thought about it for a few seconds, then said, “Well, do you want to be?”

“Do I want to be what?” Now Judy was confused.

“My fiancÇe.”

“Sure!” she said, and her smile was brighter than the sun which just that moment poked itself into the sky. It wasn’t the traditional way to answer a proposal of marriage, but then I hadn’t proposed the way I’d intended to, either. I really had intended to get around to it, but I didn’t know just when. Now seemed as good a time as any.

We held hands on St. James’ Freeway all the way back to my block of flats. After a black night, morning sun felt very fine indeed.